> The Scroll of Exalted Ponies
>  by webkilla
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1: Lights are lit
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was a chilly morning when Heart Speaker strode towards the nearby village on the edge of the bamboo forest he lived in. His big hooves made slow but steady work of the distance to the market square, and what had once been a strong physique still managed to hold two big saddlebags filled with medicinal herbs, despite him being an old pony, now in retirement.

Heart Speaker’s retirement was surprisingly nice, all things considered; over thirty years of proud service to the 7th Legion of Lookshy as an army medic. Now he spent his twilight years walking through meadows and forest trails, using his survival skills to forage for herbs and plants he could sell to the villagers. They enjoyed his wisdom, he enjoyed their cooking.

Exiting the shady forest, the sun’s warm rays fell upon Heart Speaker’s hazel-colored coat and his old, but well-maintained uniform. After thirty years, it just felt wrong to not wear it (except when changing into surgery gowns of course). Half-covered by his uniform, one could just barely see the red heart encircled by a metal gear that made up his cutie-mark. His black mane was nothing but a short 7th legion standard issue buzz-cut, even if it had been an uphill battle to convince the village barber to keep it.

The village itself was like countless others in the hundred kingdoms of the east: Huts and houses made with sturdy timber frames, with walls of woven bamboo or wicker, (some were covered in a mix of ground rice and mud and then painted, if the occupant had the money to splurge on such things). The roofs of the huts were all baked clay tiles. The shrine to the local rice gods at the edge of the village was well kept as usual: No sense in upsetting the spirits that oversee the growth of your food.

Looking around for his usual buyers for the herbs, Heart Speaker spotted one thing that caught his attention, although after inspecting it, his old bones ached with great annoyance as his wrinkly face sighed. First were the two large wagons pulled by oxen, filled with colorful goods; a merchant was in town! Finally! Something Heart Speaker could spend his retirement stipend on, as there was little use of silver coinage in a backwater village like this. However, next to the wagons were the colors of the local Daimyo, specifically the local lord’s spoiled brat of a son, engaged in a loud argument with the merchant. Apparently sonny-boy didn’t think that he had to pay for the merchant's wares. So much for honor in nobility. Approaching the scene, Speaker could easily hear the two shouting. 

“Do you know who my father is? How dare you defy me?!” screeched the Daimyo’s son. As the son of a noble, the colt fancied himself a prince, but he was no son of a shogun – and despite being dragon-blooded, he was clearly a very thin-blooded one. Heart Speaker couldn’t see the merchant for the fifteen samurai that made up the princeling’s retinue, or the ten or so armed mercenaries that the merchant was using to protect his wares.

“My lord Bien River Parter, might I ask what is going on?” Heart Speaker confidently called out. The argument stopped as River Parter, the son of the local Daimyo Bien Plumtree Root of House Bien, turned to face his old nemesis.

Nemesis might be a stretch, but River Parter had never liked Heart Speaker – unlike everyone in the village and the surrounding lands. Heart Speaker had seen thousands of ponies blessed with unicorn horns and powers by the elemental dragons when he lived and served in Lookshy. Because of this, Heart Speaker knew quite well that dragon-blooded deserved little reverence for their supernatural powers: Sure, their exaltation gave them the unicorn horn and elemental powers (powers over water in River Parter’s case, as marked by his dark blue coat, black mane and his black horn). However, as a Lookshyan, Heart Speaker believed that reverence and respect came from honorable action, not just a magic bloodline.

River Parter saw things differently; the immaculate faith clearly told that dragon-blooded were spiritually superior to all common mortal ponies, and their powers were signs from the gods that they should rule all of creation. Heart Speaker, being a stallion from Lookshy, did not believe in the immaculate faith, and so was a heretic in River Parter’s eyes. If he could have his way, Heart Speaker would have been put to death a long time ago.

This of course wasn’t happening. It was all politics: In his last years of service to the 7ths legion, Heart Speaker had, amongst many others things, at one point performed surgery on a wounded dragon-blooded officer. She was River Parter’s aunt, for her sister had ventured off and married this local Daimyo here, as part of a business deal to secure the rights to the rich mineral resources the Daimyo had in his lands. As thanks for saving her life, the officer pulled a few strings with her sister and gave Heart Speaker her old hunting lodge as a retirement gift, where he lived now. It was also this deal which ensured that Heart Speaker could not be touched by River Parter.

“This is none of your business” River Parter barked, his shrill voice breaking as he tried ever so hard to sound deep and threatening. It didn’t help that Heart Speaker was almost two heads taller than the colt, who was barely thirteen years old. The not-quite-foal, but equally by no means stallion, was smart enough to recognize the power he had (especially after he exalted by the grace of the elemental dragon Daana'd two years ago), but he was far too immature and foolhardy to handle such power as anything but a weapon.

Heart Speaker once again rolled his eyes and hoped that the Equestrian Realm would swoop by some day and spirit the little pain off to the blessed isle, never to seen or heard from again. Alas, that was not happening.

Heart Speaker gave River Parter a condescending look, and then glanced at his samurai retinue. The samurai, all strong stallions and mares trained in the art of war and martial arts, wore nice white hakamas with wide open sleeves, showing their wealth by using three times the fabric needed to clothe them. Also they were all armed with glaives, long polearms with heavy blades at the end, currently tied to their backs. They looked understandably annoyed and apologetic: They knew Heart Speaker, indeed Heart Speaker had at one point been summoned by the Daimyo to teach River Parter in Lookshyan etiquette and lore, but River Parter much preferred to run around and fight with the servants’ foals, none of which dared to raise a hoof to defend themselves.

“I don’t think his Lordship and your mother would like that you scare off traders” Heart Speaker calmly stated.

Emerging from behind his mercenaries, the merchant chimed in: “That is exactly what I’ve been trying to say”

Heart Speaker had to admit the merchant was a snappy dresser. Nice embroidered blue silken robes, with a big fat purse bulging with coin hanging from an ornamental saddle with – was that golden filigree? This pony certainly seemed to enjoy flaunting his wealth. The robe was embroidered in such a way that it showed what the merchant pony’s cutie mark was (Well probably, as the robes covered his flanks as well): Three golden coins.

Completely ignoring the angry River Parter, Heart Speaker turned to face the merchant: “Is that so? Well I’m afraid his Lordship's son isn’t one to listen to what others say. My name is Heart Speaker by the way, what’s your name?”

The merchant gave Heart Speaker a raised eyebrow, gave a quick glance at River Parter, then looked back at Speaker. He smirked, said “The name is Cash Charmer, vendor of many things” and bowed politely.

Heart Speaker smiled, and realized that he hadn’t done so in quite a while, as his old face ached a little from the strain, but it was none the less nice to meet a well-cultured pony after having left Lookshy, as such were a rare thing this far from the main trading routes in the hundred kingdoms.

It was then that a high-pressure blast of water erupted in front of Heart Speaker, from the tip of River Parter’s horn. It gouged a wide trench three yards long where it struck the ground, nearly hitting a couple of innocent villager ponies who were just passing by.

River Parter was fuming – literally. Elemental water vapors were gathering around the young colt into a whirling sphere, as thin as an egg-shell, but moving at such a speed that it was cutting into the ground up like ice razors.

Everypony knew that an enraged unicorn was dangerous: they would manifest their element as elemental flux, in this case a sphere of cutting water, and that would kill a mortal pony in seconds…

Heart Speaker and Cash Charmer leapt back – so did River Parter’s retinue. Cash’s mercenaries were far enough away that they weren’t in any danger, as flux didn’t affect things more than a yard away from the dragon-blooded it came from.
“Calm yourself sire, please” one of the samurai ponies pleaded.

Heart Speaker saw Cash Charmer back away behind his mercenaries – a wise decision, but likely not a privilege they would share with Speaker, as he wasn’t the one paying them.

River Parter advanced towards Speaker: “You will show me the respect I am due, as your spiritual and lawful superior!”

Having always had a stubborn streak Heart Speaker did not back down. Sure, he was little intimidated, but he didn’t want to give the twerp the satisfaction of lording over him. His stubbornness as well as his bright mind had gotten Speaker through his medical training; his stubbornness had kept him calm in countless battles while doing field surgery on mortally wounded ponies. All in all; compared to what Heart Speaker had lived through, then this was by no means scary. Dangerous, yes, but not scary.

“Why are you doing this anyway? You want new silk clothes? Did your mother cut off your allowance again?” Heart Speaker inquired. He knew that even with decades of combat training making him a proficient martial artist, then against a dragon-blooded he would be shredded by the watery flux in mere moments – but if he could defuse the situation, and find the root cause of the problem, then he could probably be able to live a few more years before dying of old age.

The angry dragon-blooded threw an angry look at Cash Charmer’s wagons. Of the most obviously displayed goods were brightly colored red and green bolts of silk cloth… and River Parter’s flux was tearing up dirt and stones which was ruining his current silk garbs. In Lookshy, the dragon-blooded there always wore sturdy clothing; even their silks were made to be strong enough to stand up to what environmental hazards that might come from anima flux – the flux wouldn’t hurt the clothes directly, but as with River Parter’s flux, the water flung around stones and dirt at high speeds. To Heart Speaker, it felt a bit like standing in front of a wet sand-storm, with tiny flecks of stone and dirt being flung at him. The samurai that were reluctantly standing next to River Parter probably felt the same.

“Okay, well why don’t you invite the merchant to come to the Daimyo’s castle where he can pay for the goods? You’ll need the Daimyo’s tailors to make use of the stuff anyway – no sense in taking it here unless you want to make a toga” Heart Speaker pointed out.

At first Heart Speaker honestly thought he’d gotten through to the colt, but that turned out to be a false assumption: “You stupid old stallion, he can just deliver MY silks at father’s castle – and he’ll do so if he doesn't want a watery grave!” the young colt said, looking towards the mercenaries and Cash Charmer.

Giving the mercenaries a good look-over, Speaker found them well armed. The leader of the mercenaries was clad in a suit of plain lamellar barding and a strong steel helmet, nothing fancy like the outfits one might see samurai wearing at festivals, but it would protect the mare quite well. The rest of the mercenaries were clad in thick leather barding and similar helmets, reinforced here and there with piecemeal lamellar plating of painted metal. All of the metal lamellar components on the mercenaries were lacquered mate black, making for a fearsome appearance. They were all armed with mouth-handled swords and heavy fighting horse-shoes, the sort that could knock out a pony with a single good buck.

It was clear to Heart Speaker that if River Parter was to attack the mercenaries for the merchant's goods, forcing his samurai to join in, then the samurai would be at a serious disadvantage due to none of them being armored at all, even if the samurai might be better skilled than the mercenaries – but River Parter didn’t seem to care about that: His dragon-blooded powers probably included charms that would prevent him from getting hurt too much, plus as a dragon-blooded pony he could levitate his sword around, giving him a great tactical advantage over his lesser mortal ponies who had to hold their weapons with their hooves.

Speaker backed away. It was clear that he couldn’t talk sense into the colt who was dead set on applying that age old saying of ‘Might makes right'. He sighed, wishing that the ponies of creation weren’t so petty. Rulers shouldn’t have to rob the people that they lorded over, and yet the Daimyo’s tax collectors operated more like armed raiders than the lord’s officials – and now this? A stupid foal wanting somepony else’s nice things simply because he has the power to take them?

It might be wishful thinking – but in a better world, everypony would have nice things, so no pony would have to fight over them.

At the same moment, Cash Charmer was equally wishing that things were a little more civil. Although from his point of view the problem was more that backwaters, like this place, did not have the right economic dependencies and ties: Business partners shouldn't kill each other or steal from each other; that would be bad for business. Working together and setting up mutually beneficial trade routes was good business, and good business would make Cash rich – and being rich and living the good life was all he wanted, especially if it also meant that he didn’t have to trouble himself with bandits or idiot nobles since such a system should ideally run perfectly on its own.

It was then that two things happened at the same time, two things that would ultimately spark a long series of events that would change the course of all of creation – for it was then that Heart Speaker and Cash Charmer both exploded in golden light, for they had exalted as Solars of the god of virtue and perfection: Celestia, the Unconquered Sun.

Of course, to an adherent of the immaculate faith, the sudden light show was anything but awe-inspiring. In fact, to River Parter, it was a terrible thing to behold, for the immaculate faith told of ponies who would consort with demons to gain great and terrible powers, and that you could always tell by the bright light they wreathe themselves in to lure lesser ponies to their doom. The old word for such beasts was anathema.

To River Parter it all became clear: “Anathema! Oh this makes so much sense! For years you’ve made my subjects refuse to bow before me – and now it’s clear how!”

This was followed by a raging blast of water from River Parter’s horn, as his samurai drew their blades and leapt at Speaker.

Of course, right behind them Cash Charmer was having a similar situation with his mercenaries. Glowing like a golden candle, Cash quickly found himself surrounded and held up at sword-point.

The captain of the mercenaries was quite clear: “We didn't sign up to guard demons – what is this treachery!?”

Cash quickly realized that while the mercenaries were quite upset over their turn of events – most of which he really didn’t understand – then he did sense a sudden surge in confidence, plus a keen awareness of the fact that he could talk anypony into anything, even more so than before: “Calm down, the deal hasn’t changed – if you want more silver because of this, that can be arranged”

“Buck that! We didn’t agree to guard no anathema! Kill him!” one of the mercenaries yelled. So much for diplomacy.

With a single jab from his right forehoof Cash stood in awe of his own might as the mercenary captain tumbled several yards back into the samurai that were advancing on Speaker. This had the benefit of freeing Cash from the grasp of the mercenaries, but it also made the samurai and River Parter aware of Cash’s glowing – which only made things worse.

The mercenaries quickly backed away from Cash. No pony should be able to just punch somepony with a light jab of the hoof then have that pony fly off several yards. You might topple over if you’re bucked hard, but that? That wasn’t normal fighting, that was magic fighting.

A few of the mercs ran to help up their captain as the loud sound of thunder boomed – from a cloudless sky. A light up above appeared, and from it emerged a strange spirit covered in rune-encrusted sheets of metal... no, the spirit was made up of rune encrusted sheets of metal.

Everypony stopped what they were doing and looked in a mix of confusion, fear and awe, for it was well known that gods and spirits never revealed themselves to mortal ponies without good reason.

The spirit quickly descended to the ground and came to a halt, hovering over the ground in front of Speaker. Its eyes were rotating gears that just floated in front of an otherwise flat ‘faceplate’, and its body seemed to undulate like pistons, most of which was shrouded in a thick oily smoke that lit up intermittently by internal flashes of crackling lightning. The runic metal plates extended towards Speaker like strange flat hooves, opening up to reveal a golden disk with a hoof-shaped imprint in the middle.

The disc was about a foot in diameter, made from a golden metal. As if driven by an ancient dream, Speaker reached a hoof up to place in the hoof-shaped mark on the center of the disc. The entire thing was decorated with gear-like etchings that circled around the disc.

Then River Parter blasted the spirit with powerful gouts of water - enough to kill most other ponies. The spirit was knocked a few feet to the side, but didn’t seem to acknowledge the event otherwise. The jostle did have the effect of knocking the disc onto Heart Speaker’s hoof, upon which Speaker felt a strangely eerie – but at the same time endlessly comforting – sense of familiarity.

The spirit’s eye-gears then suddenly stopped spinning as the thing ‘spoke’, its words imprinting in the minds of every pony present – and since nopony present spoke spirit, none of them understood a word of it. The spirit then launched itself high into the heavens, where it disappeared into the light from which it had appeared moments ago.

Everyone stood for a tense moment. Speaker still with his right front hoof out stretched, touching the golden disc that now seemed attached to his hoof. Cash was admiring his right hoof for being able to suddenly punch like the hoof of an angry god. The mercenaries were getting up to run away.

Things then started happening very quickly. Most of the samurai and River Parter leapt at Heart Speaker, glaives in hoof, trying to strike down the anathema. Six of the samurai had turned to engage Cash.

Still entranced by the beautiful golden disc, Speaker hardly noticed as his body girded itself to take the strikes, how the edge of the disc opened up to release a ring of three inch golden blades, like pointed teeth on a gear that began to spin around at blinding speeds. Speaker did notice the urge to not be chopped to pieces, so he moved the disc to intercept the glaives and River Parter’s blade, using a strange martial technique that resulted in Speaker catching all of his assailants’ blades in the teeth of his disc – and with a twist the blades shattered as the golden teeth of the disc chewed through the steel.

The samurai that had attacked Speaker were left wielding sticks of wood, causing them to fall back – but River Parter did not stop his assault, even as his blade was shattered. The colt leapt at Speaker, with a fluid grace that only the blessed of the elemental dragon of water could muster, striking at Speaker with hooves that moved with killing precision empowered by watery essence. River Parter might have been young, but with his exaltation his essence had been enlightened, granting him supernatural potential with the ability to channel said essence into guiding his hooves with the murderous intent and rage that only a spoiled son of a noble could muster.

River Parter struck Speaker with a force and precision that would not just have knocked an ordinary pony out, but probably also shattered the shoulder where Parter hit. However, having just exalted as a solar, Speaker was no longer an ordinary pony. As if by instinct, Speaker had the essence in his flesh harden momentarily, so that Parter’s strike might as well have directed at the thickest trunk of an ancient oak.

River Parter leapt back, confident that when he turned Speaker would be on the ground writing in pain… but the sound of pony collapsing on the ground never came. Instead, the hellish noise of the disc with spinning blades came closer, and closer – and River Parter barely had time to think as the disc zoomed past his head, striking half of the samurai attacking Cash Charmer’s glaives so that their blades too were cut from the wooden poles. River Parter couldn’t believe his eyes, but that didn’t matter much anyway, for as he looked on in disbelief at the shattered parts of his samurai’s glaives fell to the ground, a hoof impacted on his head so hard that it made the watery essence in his body at the point of impact erupt away in a gout of steam, leaving River Parter to fall to the ground unconscious and bleeding from the back of his head.

The golden disc zoomed back to Speaker’s right hoof, forcing the three samurai that still had weapons left to quickly reevaluate the situation – resulting in all of the samurai quickly rushing to pick up their lord and then run off out of the village, on the road to the Daimyo’s castle. The mercenaries were heading out on the road leading east that they had arrived via earlier that morning, but as a last fare-thee-well, two of the mercenaries , armed with bows shot burning arrows into Cash Charmer’s wagons. That the wagons burst into flames made it clear that during all the fighting with the samurai the mercenaries had tipped over clay jugs with lamp oil in the wagons…

Watching with childlike awe as the golden disc spun down, the loud sound of the essence mechanism inside slowly fading, the bladed teeth of the disc ultimately coming to a stop and retracting, Heart Speaker finally snapped out of his trance-like state. He looked around in horror.

His right hoof was stained in the blood of the son of the local Daimyo. The fire from the two merchant wagons was spreading to the house it was parked next to – and the villagers were slowly emerging, but seemed horribly conflicted as to whether they should run to put out the fire that would probably engulf the whole village if not stopped – or stay at a safe distance from the anathema that stood next to the fire.

A quick tactical and strategic evaluation told Speaker that the samurai would soon be back in force. All of the Daimyo’s ponies at arms would be after him because of this, no matter how much the Daimyo’s sister in law liked Speaker. And then there was this Cash Charmer, who was glowing just like himself. Under other circumstances, Speaker might have found this very odd and even worthy of panicking over, yet despite being strangely aware of the fact that he had not known this before he had… exalted… then he understood what had happened. With that knowledge, he knew that he and Cash Charmer were meant for something far greater than running from some random hundred kingdom Daimyo’s forces.

“Come on, we have to get out of here!” Speaker said to Cash, as he picked up his saddlebags and emptied their content of herbs on the ground. No need to carry that extra weight around anymore.

Cash didn’t answer, standing stupefied at the sight of his life savings going up in smoke. He had invested everything he had in those wagons and the expensive goods they carried.

“Come on!” Speaker said with painfully apparent urgency. Shaking Cash seemed to snap the merchant out of his fugue of horror, but it didn’t improve his mood: “My wares!” he sobbed.

Forcibly turning Cash around so he couldn't see the burning wagons finally helped, making the merchant liven up a little bit: “What’ll I do? They’ll come after us again won’t they?”

Cash reminded Speaker of so many junior officers in the 7th legion on the eve of their first battle – terrified of what might happen next. Then again, considering what had just transpired, his reaction was understandable – but it wasn’t needed either.

“We need to get out of here – the Daimyo’s men will be back in a couple of hours. I have a house in the forest. We’ll go there, pick up a few things, then flee these lands. We can’t stay here” Speaker said again, looking around at the pleading eyes of the villagers, most of which seemed to beg the two to leave so the fires could be put out.

The smell of perfumes and scented oils burning away mixed into the noon air as the two freshly-minted Solars ran into the forest.

Out of the village, the two found it slightly easier to speak to each other about topics other than ‘There will be armed ponies out for our blood soon’. Cash said that he was still confused about what had happened to him as they kept up the pace over well-trotted forest paths.

“We have exalted, that’s what happened” Speaker quickly retorted.

Cash neighed: “That wasn’t – well, I think I… I know that already, but what does that mean? I mean, one moment I just started glowing, and I could punch Captain Ironmane five yards over!”

Speaker drew a heavy breath. It was strange being able to keep up a gallop like this with his old bones – but they didn’t feel old anymore! His joints didn’t ache and he felt as nimble as when he’d just finished his medical training. Gathering his thoughts on Cash’s question, strange memories that didn’t seem to be his flooded his mind when he thought of what to say: “I… I can explain this when we get out of here. I need to think right now. We need to live through this, and then I’ll explain everything”

The hunting lodge that Speaker had lived at wasn’t much to speak of. Lookshyan aesthetics were focused with practicality in mind rather than luxury, so it really wasn’t much more than a wooden hut in the forest, with bamboo racks where you could hang what you caught to dry and drain out of blood, as well as a smoker-oven to smoke meat.

Inside the lodge, the floors were covered in soft pelts, mostly bear and boar. These also lined the walls to insulate the place, although most of the heat came from the central fireplace. Speaker wasted no time finding two big sacks and dumping survival gear, tents, blankets, a few extra sets of clothes, his fancy-pants formal uniform and his private surgical equipment into said sacks – then he plopped down and stared at them intensely.

Cash Speaker had no idea what was going on – still shocked from what had happened in the village – but when the two sacks disappeared into thin air, then the questions started flooding out.

“What was that? Where did the sacks go? What’s going on? Where will we go from here? Can’t we hide here? What’ll we do? I don’t want to die!” Cash blabbered, his words tripping over each other as they spilled forth.

With his things ‘packed’, Speaker finally breathed something akin to a sigh of relief. Getting up, he willed forth the golden disc the spirit had given him. It suddenly occurred to Cash that he hadn’t seen that thing since they fled the village – and it hadn’t been in Speaker’s saddle bags, even though he’d emptied them on the ground.

“Where did that come from?” Cash tentatively asked.

Speaker drew in breath: “It came from elsewhere. Celestial exalted like us can store things in elsewhere, usually only a handful of objects unless you know special charms that let you store more. It’s a magic place outside of normal space in creation”

Cash was about to ask how that worked, when Speaker continued, instead explaining something entirely different: “We’re Solars. Exalted by the power of Celestia, the Unconquered Goddess of the Sun”

Speaker then continued to explain that he was remembering things, things that he couldn’t possibly have done in this lifetime – and yet he knew that part of him had done these things: “My exaltation, the new divine extra component to my soul, just like the one you now have, can carry over memories. I… I’m pretty sure I’m remembering everything, and it’s a lot of take in… but I think I know what’s going on, do you want the short version or the long version?”

“I thought only dragon-blooded could exalt when the immaculate dragons blessed them?” Cash wondered out loud.

Speaker neighed and shook his head: “No, that’s simply because people don’t know any better – we’re different. Solars don’t exalt just because they have a special bloodline and strong breeding: We exalt when the heavens choose us, exalt us, and give us power and…” he trailed off, with a blank look on his face.

“Okay, but power and what? I like power, but I’d like to know the full deal here, any strings attached to this?” Cash said, waving a hoof in front of Speaker’s face.

With a start, Speaker snapped back into reality, having momentarily lost himself to memories of ancient times, as well as thoughts on how things could have gone from then to now. The implications were grim: “A mandate of heaven. Celestia and the other Celestial Incarnae, the most powerful of the gods, gave creation to the Solars to rule. One of the last things I remember from my last incarnation’s life is fleeing from dragon-blooded usurpers…”

Cash blinked for a moment. You didn’t have to be a genius figured out the implication here: “So the dragon-blooded ousted our exaltations’ past incarnations… ouch, that’d be fun to say three times fast”

Nodding, Speaker concurred with Cash’s conclusion and added: “Come to think of it, the immaculate faith sounds really dodgy now. I mean, think about it: A religion that glorifies dragon-blooded unicorns as the most spiritually enlightened ponies and most favored by the gods, while saying that anything that looks like a shiny golden solar is a demon? Sounds like the dragon-blooded had fun justifying their actions after the usurpation. The realm of Equestria is probably all that’s left of what they once took over, with people over here east in the hundred kingdoms and river provinces seceding at some point”

With some clarity of what the situation was, the question became what to do next. It wouldn’t be many hours before the Daimyo’s ponies would arrive, and they would, without a doubt, head straight for Speaker’s house.

“I say we go to Great Forks, the City of Temples. I’ve heard that there’s no place in creation where the immaculate are less welcome” Cash suggested, recalling an encounter with some hashish merchants from the city state of Great Forks.

Just as he was about to nod, Speaker remembered something, something from his exaltation’s past life: “We can go there, but we have to make one stop first along the way. I think I have maps in a chest somewhere here, hold on”

A little rummaging back and forth and the two were going over maps of creation, focusing on the parts that showed the east and the river provinces that dominated that particular terrestrial direction of creation.

> Chapter 2: Getting Wet Behind Your Ears
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The lay of creation was defined by the five elemental poles. In the middle of creation was the elemental pole of Earth, set in the middle of the giant continent known as the blessed isle. This was the land of the realm. It was aptly named, for by being in the center of creation it was in perfect balance to all the surrounding poles.

Around the blessed isle was the inland sea, although to the west of the isle was the great western ocean, for in the west was the elemental pole of Water. To the south of the inland sea were lands of endless sands, spices and mysteries, with the elemental pole of Fire. To the north of the inland sea was ice and cold, for the elemental pole of Air blew constant cold winds down over creation. This left the east with the elemental pole of Wood, meaning that most of the east was covered in dense jungles and forest.

Of more pertinent interest to Heart Speaker and Cash Charmer were the great rivers of the east, for they were the lifelines of this part of creation, facilitating trade and travel through land that otherwise grows over with shrubs and weeds twice the height of a pony in a year if not worked by farmers.

At roughly the ‘middle’ of the eastern shores of the inland sea the Yanaze river, almost as wide as an ocean to those who had never seen one, flowed into the inland sea. The river of tears came from the north and joined the Yanaze river about a 160 miles inland. The yellow and grey river existed further east, and joined together 400 miles east of the river of tears to form the Yanaze river. 

“Okay, so we’re roughly here, a couple hundred miles east of the river of tears. Great Forks is on the left to the mouth of the rolling river, where it meets the yellow river. It’ll be a long journey up river, but I’m pretty sure I can get us up there if we can find a ship” Cash said confidently, looking at the map.

Looking at Cash for a moment, Speaker frowned: “Have you ever captained a ship?” for Cash did not look like a seasoned riverboat captain at all.

Cash blinked a few times, it dawning on him that he knew surprisingly large amounts of seafaring lore without ever really having stepped on a boat as anything other than a paying passenger: “Uhm… no, not really, but I know this, I just know I know! You have to trust me on this”

“Ah, okay, I think I know what’s happening here – you know how dragon-blooded always become really good at certain things depending on what element they exalt with?” Speaker explained, telling Cash that certain skills and abilities were divinely intertwined with the various forms of exalting.

This of course made Cash very curious about what other things he would suddenly become good at.
“Only one way to tell – show me your caste mark” Speaker said, saying the word caste mark as if it was the simplest thing ever. Cash had no idea what Speaker meant.

Speaker demonstrated how a solar pony could will his caste mark to appear, a golden sigil in the form of a circle, with its top half inner-area half-filled with golden light in Speaker’s case. Speaker then thanked Cash for confirming the appearance of his caste mark, as he’d been a little curious he remembered right with all his strange new memories.

“What, you aren’t sure you remember right? And why call them castes by the way?” Cash jokingly said, while willing his caste mark to appear.

“You’re eclipse caste, makes sense – and you’ll have to ask the gods about that. There’s five Solar castes in all, just like the dragon-blooded and their five elements. Eclipse caste are diplomats, heavenly messengers and, well, merchants. Sailing the seas, and riding other animals should come very easily to you, as well as doing business and understanding other languages. I’m a Twilight caste Solar, which I guess makes sense: Supernaturally good doctors and craftsmen, as well as scholars and sorcerers” Speaker explained, adding that the Dawn caste were superb warriors and generals, the Night caste masters of stealth and deception, and the Zenith caste being by default the priests and priestesses of Celestia, being gifted in song, prayer and the ways of words.

Nodding furiously, Cash found himself half-knowing most of what Speaker said in advance. It seemed to be so obvious, yet he’d never heard it before. This kind of instinctive knowledge felt almost unnatural. They both agreed that it was fairly weird.
With everything cleared up it was time to go. On Cash’s recommendation, Speaker refrained from completely looting the house of everything of value to sell for their journey: “It’ll only make us look suspicious. It’ll be far easier evading detection if we do not leave a trail of merchants and traders who bought stuff from here”

That said, the two set off to the west, towards the salty river of tears with light saddlebags – most of their gear magically stored elsewhere. Cash was already smiling at the prospect of how many goods he could traffic around like this, but Speaker shot that down quickly: “You can only store a few things at a time – and never anything heavier than you can’t lift comfortably with one hoof”

“But those sacks you spirited away were big, that doesn’t make sense” Cash retorted, looking confused as the small specks of light that filtered down through the bamboo trunks and leaves danced over his face.

Speaker adjusted his direction slightly so he bumped into Cash, then shoving him hard to the side: “I’m big and strong, that’s why”

“I could have sworn when I saw you first in the village that you looked a lot more old and weak” Cash noted.

“Exalting freshens you right up! I feel like I’m twenty again” Speaker replied, smiling like crazy and galloping off. How Speaker had the endurance for that was beyond Cash, who was already feeling winded.

Suddenly Speaker stopped hard in his tracks, causing Cash to crash into him. Speaker said that he just had a thought: “Your mercenaries – they’re the only ones who really know who you are here, right? Did you ever get time to introduce yourself properly to River Parter?”

“Nah, the princeling just came up with his samurai and demanded I hand over my silks. As for the mercenaries, yes, what about them?” Cash wondered as he got up from the ground, brushing dirt off his silks.

Speaker explained: “There’s no way to avoid having the Daimyo send word across the hundred kingdoms and river provinces of who and what I’ve become, they know me too well and now they’ll carry a grudge, but if we stop the mercenaries then your name won’t be sullied. If we double back we should be able to catch them! I doubt they’re going anywhere in a hurry”

It quickly dawned on Cash how difficult it would be to conduct business if his reputation from that point on could be summarized as “We’ve heard you’re a demon, let’s kill you just to be safe” – so it made sense to stop the mercenaries before it became an issue.

Now, Cash had already had trouble keeping up going west towards the river. Having to run back towards the village, while taking a detour to go around the hunting lodge, in case some of the Daimyo’s ponies had already gotten there, only made it even harder. Speaker had no trouble navigating the woods, on account of having lived there for a number of years combined with decades of roughing it in the field with the 7th legion.

Speaker could easily see that Cash was getting winded, but with a little encouragement Speaker found Cash galloping through the forest brush: “Cash, just imagine how much money you won’t make if the rest of creation thinks you’re a demon” – it was a little mean to appeal to Cash’s greed, but Speaker had seen enough merchants to figure out that their love of money was an easy button to push, plus he had dealt with countless stubborn Lookshyan legionnaires who ‘just wanted to be patched up and sent back to battle’ instead of waiting for proper treatment of injuries, and Heart Speaker had plenty of experience in talking them into accepting more lengthy and proper treatment.

By nightfall the two had cleared the village and were continuing on the trade road east. Speaker found the mercenaries’ tracks and the two were good to go – if not for Cash Charmer wanting to stop for the night: “I’m tired, I’m hungry and I’m still hurting from having lost all of my fortunes in silks, perfumes, scented oils and exotic wooden furniture. Please, I’m not an army pony”

“Look, the mercenaries probably set up camp hours ago – without wagons they’ll have to walk in their armor all day, so that’ll have slowed them down as well. If we walk all night we should catch them before dawn. You want to eat? I have a tote bag somewhere here if you want, but we shouldn’t stop” Speaker said. Cash was getting really tired of Speaker having all the right answers.

Taking out some salted pork from his saddlebags, Speaker gave some to Cash while he chewed the fat himself. Cash wanted to whip out his caste mark to light the way, but Speaker suggested they go by moonlight instead, lest they become easy targets to spot at a distance: “And those mercenaries of yours seemed to be good archers”

Again, Cash was getting tired of Speaker having all the right answers, of not stopping to sleep, of not having his nice soft cot to sleep in anymore and of being on the run. This was not how Cash Charmer had planned this day.

Several dark hours later the light of a campfire revealed the mercenaries and their camp. They had their tents up, and appeared to have gone to sleep, with two sentries keeping watch.

“Okay, how do you want to do this?” Speaker whispered to Cash, thinking that Cash knew the mercenaries better, and so would be better suited to make a plan to handle them.

Cash looked to the starlit sky for a moment. His father had always told him that a pony could not change his stars, but that didn’t seem the case anymore, did it? “I’ll go talk to them, if we surprise them with your death disc they’ll just wake up and grab their nearest weapon. I’ll go in soft and quiet and talk them out of spreading word of this”

Speaker wanted to agree with Cash’s plan, he really did. It had always been Lookshyan doctrine to never commit more forces than were necessary, for so said the eastern goddess of war Sunipa, and if this situation could be handled with words alone then that would be very nice. It just didn’t sit right with Speaker to fight when there was no need for it, but he still feared that these mercenaries wouldn’t listen.

Cash Charmer strode into the mercenary camp beaming with confidence and an air of authority informed by his sharp looks, his well-styled mane and his choice of words. The sentries saw him coming, but had not expected to see Cash walking towards them in a simple casual stride. The captain struggled to get up quickly, having gone to sleep in her armor, so Cash was easily able to get the first word in.

Speaker couldn’t hear it – but Cash instinctively used essence to both make his words sweet as honey and make his offer sound irresistible. Speaker’s guess that Cash had gotten a good read on the mercenaries had not been wrong, but while Speaker had previously only pushed a single of Cash’s buttons to get him to keep up, then with a glance enhanced by essence had Cash understood everything there was to know about this Captain Ironmane of the mercenaries known as The Merchanter’s Armory.

Cash appealed to what little sense of honor the captain had, reminded her that it was never good mercenary custom to assault a client, plus the fact that he had never missed a payment to them, nor skimped on bonuses on previous occasions when he had hired Merchanter’s Armory forces to protect his wagons. He also noted that it was the stupid dragon-blooded colt who had initiated hostilities, and if not for Cash and his friend, then the dragon-blooded colt would most certainly have attacked the mercenaries instead, so in fact Cash and Speaker had probably saved their lives.

Any other pony would probably not have been able to use such arguments and fuzzy logic to convince an apprehensive mercenary officer not to speak ill about a former client in a situation like this, but the heavens smiled on Cash, who got an uneasy nod from the captain.

“So you promise that you and your fine soldiers won’t tell anyone about what you saw today? Or come after me? I will surely suffer enough hardships because of your torching my little trade caravan, I had put every coin in my name to those goods, so I’m pretty much destitute now” Cash Charmer said, giving Captain Ironmane the saddest puppy dog eyes a grown stallion could get away with making, while at the same time committing no small amount of essence into the appeal of his words, making it very difficult to refuse his offer, even if it made his caste mark glow on his forehead: A golden circle with a second smaller golden disk inside, the symbol of the eclipse caste Solars.

With far more certainty than before, Captain Ironmane nodded sternly and offered her hoof to shake on it. This was all Cash had been waiting for, as almost instinctively he grabbed the captain's hoof with both of his front hooves and held on tight as his caste mark lit up brightly and golden bands of heavenly sigils fluttered around them for a moment. The captain was too tired to wrestle free in time, and the glowing sigils and glyphs disappeared a few seconds later.

“What was that?!” the captain demanded to know, now a good deal more awake.

“Oh that was simple. The heavens have sanctified your promise not to tell on me or my friend.  Should any of you ponies blab about this the gods themselves will strike you down” Cash Charmer said, flashing a viciously confident smile as he started to walk about of the camp.

The mercenaries did not take lightly to this, but Cash was quick to remind them that the wording of the promise also included them not coming after him: “Raise arms against me and the heavens will strike you down”

“Oh, Yeddim drops to that!” one of the mercenaries shouted and drew a long knife. He managed to take exactly two steps before tripping a hoof over a tent corner and falling on his knife, stabbing himself in his right eye.

Cash casually strode off smiling to the sound of the cries of the now half-blind  mercenary, returning to a confused Speaker who had only heard the final cry, but not what had lead up to it.

“Oh, it was nothing my handsome good looks couldn’t handle – could probably have made the captain sleep with me if I wanted to. By the way, you could have told me that I could sanctify oaths and deals. I almost didn’t know what I was doing back there, so do tell if there’s anything else I can do that you haven’t told me” Cash said, with a cheerful tone of jest. Speaker found it nice that Cash had finally found something he was good at.

It didn’t take any convincing to have Cash continue the night west again – his dealing with the mercenaries had apparently give the heavenly merchant pony new energy. Taking a road south of the forest allowed them to cover more ground faster, but Cash still worried that the Daimyo’s men would find him.

“By now, they’ll have ransacked and probably burnt down the hunting lodge, but they know I’m good at walking around in the forest. They probably think we’re hiding somewhere in there. Plus, the Daimyo isn’t an immaculate adherent, neither is River Parter; the little shit only learnt about it from a traveling immaculate monk who was passing through a couple years ago. The Daimyo and the people here worship local gods, not the immaculate dragons, so the Daimyo has little religious motivation for hunting us. Add to that River Parter’s reputation for starting fights with foreigners and his dislike of me, then the Daimyo might not even believe River Parter’s claim that we’re anathema” Speaker mused.

Cash was quick to point that all the Daimyo would have to do to verify River Parter’s story was to ask the villagers. So he might learn that River Parter and his samurai attacked first, but the villagers would probably only confirm that Speaker and Cash are anathema.

“But we’re not anathema – that’s just the immaculates’ lies told to denounce us” Speaker said begrudgingly.

Cash laughed: “Hey, tell the same lie for centuries and it’ll become the only truth anypony will ever know”

---

The next two weeks passed without much incident. Two lone travelers didn’t attract that much attention, and after Speaker fashioned two nice straw hats that hid most of their faces, nopony would be able to give good descriptions of them. Cash didn’t like wearing one of the conical straw hats: It was something rice farmers ran around in, not a… would-be wealthy merchant.

Staying at a few farms and roadside inns on the way, Speaker found that Cash was able to bend the ear of pretty much anypony he got to chat with. Cash got his and Speaker’s clothes washed, secured them room and board for free at most places, plus Cash managed to bed a new mare at almost every place they slept.

It was clear to Speaker that Cash had no qualms about using his powers for his own gain, although he didn’t hesitate to share the wealth either, which was comforting.

About halfway to the river of tears Cash started talking about the ‘death disc’ again. Up until that point the two had been spending most of their time talking about what Speaker remembered from the past. Speaker had been trying to set up a time-line in his head, to figure out just how long ago the usurpation had taken place, but without any history books that simply wasn’t possible. It didn’t help that he was fairly certain that his ‘new old’ memories spanned millennia.

As per the ‘death disc’ then Speaker proudly declared that he had finally remembered its name: “It is called Gift, and was given to me by a very special friend shortly after a terrible war. I remember I was humbled by it so greatly that I created a whole new martial arts style focused on the use of this, the gyroscopic chakram: The Thousand Wounds Gear Style. It was a few of those techniques I used to defend myself from River Parter and his samurai”

“Impressive, but that’s still nothing compared to my Hoof of the Daystar style” Cash Charmer said confidently, Speaker having enlightened him earlier on the name of the natural fighting style of the Solar exalted.

Speaker frowned: “The two are very different – and neither of us have mastered our respective styles. You need to develop your skills and I can only hope that I remember enough of the Thousand Wounds Gear Style, and then understand what I remember, to learn the style again. Also keep in mind, these are magical fighting styles, not just mortal pony hoof tricks and bucking techniques, so they require a lot more to learn and master”

“You sound like my father, timid and cautious. I’m a business stallion, you have to take risks with some investments in order to get big rewards. I fight like that as well, big risks, big rewards” Cash said, his choice of words betraying his obvious lack of practical combat experience.

Speaker shook his head and neighed: “Cash, you might talk like that now, but try to say that after a really hard fight when you’ve been cut up good and proper – then we’ll see how much risk you’re willing to take”

“Oh, like your disc fighting is any different?” Cash said defiantly. This was another ‘quality’ of Cash that Speaker had begun to notice, a stubborn streak, but not stubborn in the sense of great inner strength to carry on when tired or scared, but more the stubborn of ‘I know I’m right, so you’re wrong’ kind of annoying stubborn.

Spinning Gift on the top of his nose, Speaker smiled: “It is very different. This is a gyroscopic chakram, a marvel of magitechnical engineering and artifice. Made of pure orichalcum no less. Thousand Wounds Gear Style is informed by the certainty of geometric laws of movement, the brutal calculated nature of machines and grinding gears. Hoof of Daystar is an expression of the raw might of Solars. There is risk in both, you might hit, you might miss. I can at least stay at a distance and hope to strike again before a foe closes”

The two argued a bit more over the next few weeks, but for the most part they got along fairly well – so long as Cash didn’t abuse his powers too much, although Cash also learnt the hard way that there are simply some things you cannot talk a mare into doing… with another mare… and another mare, at the same time. Speaker found the triple barrage of angry mares yelling at Cash quite amusing, enough so to make up for the fact that they had to run out of the inn and sleep under the stars that night, something that seemed to bother Cash a lot more than it bothered Speaker, as it would dirty his precious silks.

Finally arriving at the eastern banks of the ever so salty and mile-wide river of tears, the two emerged onto its plantless banks and started looking for ships. Most of the shipping going up and down the river were in the form of barges that probably wouldn’t stop to pick up travellers, but after going south along the river for a while the two came across a cove with a nasty sight: River pirate ponies had rounded up a couple of fishing boats and had captured the fisherponies. They seemed to be in the process of putting the fisherponies in chains and taking them on board their junk.

“Well, they have a good boat, but I don’t think they’ll take us all the way to Great Forks willingly… and I don’t think these guys will just let me talk to them” Cash noted, trying to spot what kind of cargo the pirates might have up on deck. There were some crates and barrels, but nothing clearly visible beyond the wooden railing and patch-work canvas sails.

Heart Speaker laughed a little: “Oh, so the mighty Cash Charmer doesn’t want to go in hooves swinging? No big risk for a big reward?”

Cash’s face contorted in a foul grimace. Sure he was a headstrong pony, but he wasn’t any braver than your average pony either, being mostly talk and not all that much action – and he knew darn well that two ponies against a whole crew of pirate ponies weren’t good odds. Plus he really didn’t want to mess up his silks!

Speaker willed forth Gift and ‘attached’ the disc to the side of his right foreleg. Over the last few weeks, when camping out with nobody looking, they had sparred a little, and through that Speaker had found that the disc would ‘stick’ to his leg so he could run and jump around with it on, and it would slide forward to his hoof simply by raising the hoof, but only if he wanted to strike, throw Gift or use it for defense.

Just as Speaker was about to propose a plan, there was an explosion at the junk. Water, dirt and torn pony limbs flew far and wide in bloody arches. This was followed by short-lived screams of ponies and a powerful blast of water that silenced the screams.

“Well that makes things a lot easier” said Speaker, sounding almost relieved. Cash didn’t quite understand.
“It’s simple:  If the pirates are led by a, from the looks of it water-aspected, dragon-blooded pony, I’ll just challenge him for the ship, the crew and the cargo. I remember my superior in the 7th legion doing that many times to avoid bloodshed. If they were all mortal ponies they would probably fight together, but like this I can just defeat their leader and that should be that” Speaker said, sounding a lot less confident than Cash would have liked.

Looking at his muddied hooves and then at Speaker, Cash bit his lip: “Are you sure that will work? What if they all jump you?”

Speaker sighed heavily and rubbed his temples with his left hoof and muttered “Just like a freshly-minted junior officer” under his breath, as he began trotting into the water. To Cash’s surprise Speaker didn’t just walk along the bank up to the pirates, but walked INTO the water… he didn’t even try to swim. Cash looked on in disbelief as Speaker’s straw hat floated off.

Walking just under the surface of the water would normally not be something ponies could do. However, over the last several weeks Speaker had become increasingly aware that he could channel essence to not just enhance his ability to spot and forage for berries or find shelter in the wild, but he could make the essence suffuse his body and resist the cold of night, or the sting of insects as he slept under the stars. This had led to some subtle experimentation, although it hadn’t been until Speaker had taken a quick morning bath in a stream that he had discovered that the same essence flows that inured him to the cold water, also allowed him to breathe in it. It was then that he recalled the name of this advanced technique, which had made him fully aware of its uses: The element-resisting Prana technique.

Walking in under the junk so he stood under the boats between the junk and river bank, Speaker detached Gift from his right foreleg, leaving it hidden in the river and strode up on the riverbank. The pirates were understandably shocked, as they certainly hadn’t expected company – especially not a pony that just walked out of the water.

The sight that Speaker was met with was an ugly one: The pirate captain was dragon-blooded, that was clear, and she was currently beating a fisherpony senseless, next to what were the bloody remains of another fisherpony who had been… made an example of, by being blasted apart by a bolt of tsunami-force water. There were scattered bits of limbs, flesh and guts everywhere, and head of the dead fisherpony had been completely scraped clean of flesh by the force of the elemental water blast, leaving it only barely attached to the rest of the torso by ragged sinew.

The pirate ponies quickly surrounded Speaker, but seemed unsure of what to think of him, giving him a mix of angry and fearful glances and snarls with enough rotten teeth to make Speaker want to retch. They were dressed in dirty clothes, and smelled like rot and cheap rice-wine. Their weapons of choice seemed to be short cutlasses and long knives, with a few of them wielding hatchets.

The captain didn’t seem to take much notice, simply continuing the beating while the other captive fisherponies watched on in shameful horror, painfully aware that they could do nothing to save their friend. But Speaker could do something:
“Captain, I challenge you for the crew and the ship!” Speaker shouted, trying his best to sound as intimidating as possible, standing all high and mighty in wet and muddy peasant clothes.

The captain was not impressed, but a challenge… well, there was no need to honor it, but the fisherpony the captain had been beating senseless wasn’t giving her any more satisfaction, so a new punching bag sounded nice: “Who’s the scum-sucker?”

Speaker was not a brave pony, nor did he now think that this was that good an idea – but his memories of an ancient time when things were better, had told him over and over that he had to get through this, that he had to persevere and that he had to overcome this challenge: “Beating up helpless fisherponies isn’t that much of a challenge - are you really that weak?”

Cash was too curious and anxious to stay back where Speaker had left him. He had snuck forward to get a glimpse of what was happening, allowing him to see the cerulean-colored unicorn mare charging at Speaker, with the fury of a raging river.
Speaker was caught off-guard at just how quickly the dragon-blooded mare was able to react to his taunt, and was thus knocked onto his back and into the water. The captain was quickly on him, holding Speaker down with strong hooves into the water to drown him.

The moment Speaker realized what the dragon-blooded pirate captain was trying to do, he stopped struggling and just waited. After a minute the captain judged him dead and let go. This was the opening Speaker had waited for, allowing him to buck the captain up over him and into the water.

Every foal is told by their mothers of the power of the dragon-blooded. The fire aspected dragon-blooded cannot be burnt, the earth aspected can freely dive into rock slides and come out unscathed, the air aspected can fall from any height and land safely, the wood aspected can handle any poison you can throw at them – but the water aspected, well… they can stand on water, as well as breathe in it.

Getting up quickly, Speaker turned to face the captain who stood, quiet on the murky river water, while he was almost up to his flanks in water. The captain glared him: “So, you can hold your breath – good for you, let’s see how you breathe when I cut off your nose!” and gestured for one of her pirates to throw her a blade.

As the captain caught and levitated over a cutlass that was already stained in blood and silt, Speaker dove into the water yelling: “Catch me if you can!”

The captain laughed and willed the water to let her drop in, splashing down into the river.

The visibility underwater wasn’t very good, but sound transmitted very well. Speaker had figured that the captain would just drop down, so he had a fairly good idea where the mare was. The dragon-blooded captain on the other hoof did not have that good an idea of where Speaker was, but she could hear something… a hellish noise unlike any other, a high pitched metallic whine dulled slightly by the water, which was approaching very quickly.

A mortal pony probably wouldn’t have been able to bring up a blade to parry the incoming gyroscopic chakram, but with her horn and the power to levitate things around, the dragon-blooded captain just barely made it. To her horror the sharp sound of metal snapping followed, as Gift was deflected by the blade at the cost of the cutlass being cut in half.

Speaker stood ready to catch Gift on his hoof when it returned – but it didn’t. The high-pitched machine sound circled around for another strike, at which point Speaker suddenly remembered that strange function of Gift: It would not return to him until it had hit its target properly, unless he wanted it to come back.

With his hooves thusly free, Speaker swam up behind the captain. Not being that deep in the water allowed light to be reflected from what remained of the captain’s cutlass, allowing Speaker see which way the mare was looking by judging where the broken blade was pointing. Gift came around for another run, with the captain again parrying with what was left of her blade, another part of it breaking off as the chainsaw-disc was deflected. This was Speaker’s opening, and he grabbed the dragon-blooded unicorn from behind, with a tight hold around her neck and right forehoof.

Up on the surface, the pirates and fisherponies watched with anticipation as murky shadows moved under the surface. They couldn’t hear Gift revving for a final go the captain. To Cash’s chagrin it was one of the fisherponies that spotted him who then called for Cash to help him, causing one of the pirates to look over and see him as well…

Down below Speaker held on tight as Gift came around for a final run, burying itself in the struggling captain’s chest with a horrible sound of metal against ribs and the captain briefly screaming, the mixed sound transmitting itself so excruciatingly well underwater that Speaker had to fight not to feel sick.

The murky water took on a nasty shade of red as Speaker swam to shore, finding a bloodied Cash Charmer battling pirates left and right.

It was a brutal sight: The twenty-some pirates were slowly being whittled down and flung left and right by Cash’s supernaturally mighty blows, but then Speaker recognized that Charmer had not only finally figured out the Hoof of the Daystar form, a powerful fighting stance that greatly magically improved the precision of all strikes that Cash landed, while also fortifying his skin and hooves so that he could parry blades with but a hoof and shrug off minor injuries.

Still, the pirates were outnumbering Cash twenty to one, and Cash didn’t have eyes in the back of his head, so while he could fight off the pirate ponies in front of him, he had been cut and lacerated many times over his back and flanks by pirate ponies he simply had no chance of seeing coming.

Speaker quickly flung Gift at the nearest pirate, cutting the pony with a deep gash from flank to shoulder. The pony screamed and dropped to the ground, feebly gushing blood from the wound, while Gift whirred and buzzed as it flew back to Speaker’s hoof.

When the pirates realized that their captain wasn’t the one who won the fight – and that Speaker obviously had some kind of magic weapon he was slicing them up with – their morale quickly began to falter. Cash equally began striking back with renewed vigor, his hoof-strikes not as much bludgeoning the pirates, but actually cutting into them via violent martial use of essence. It was a gruesome sight, as Cash’s bucks and punches sliced up pirates as if knives were tied to his hooves.

The pirates quickly surrendered, begging for mercy, some of them trying to appeal to Speaker by saying that now he was their captain, while others tried to attend to their wounded.
“Me, captain? Heavens no – that would be the blood-soaked pony in ruined silks over there” Speaker said, pointing at Cash Charmer.

Upon hearing Speaker’s words, Cash looked down at his previously very nice silk robes. They were completely ruined. There were dozens of cuts and bloodstains on the back alone, and his front sleeves were soaked in pirate blood. The sight of his beloved silks so torn hurt almost more than the dozens of cuts and injuries he had suffered in the fight: “Aww come on… you can't expect me to captain a junk dressed like this?”
> Chapter 3: What is Justice?
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Speaker wasn’t sure if he liked exactly how Cash handled the pirates.

Cash had ordered his new crew to line up on the bank of the river, which was fairly difficult considering how injured most of them were – not to mention that half of them hadn’t woken up yet from being knocked senseless by Cash or via losing consciousness from blood-loss.

Speaker willed the sack with medical equipment to appear and started patching up the pirates. It took a while, but with strong rice-wine for disinfectant and essence guiding his suture-needle, all the pirates were patched up when the ones with the worst injures started to awaken up. It was easy to tell that they were conscious: all the screaming and moaning was a dead giveaway. It would take weeks for all the pirates to recover, months for a few of the most injured: A solar doctor might flawlessly patch them up, but broken bones take time to heal, as do wounds even when stitched up. 

The fisherponies were released and were very grateful, saying that they would hurry back to their village upriver. Cash took a boat out and explored the pirate’s junk while the pirates tried once again to line up on the bank.

Speaker wasn’t sure what Cash’s plan was with the pirates, but didn’t question him as he helped the fisherponies get their gear back on their fishing boats. As the fisherponies were about to leave one of the oldest of them, an old stallion who looked about as haggard and rough around the edges as Speaker, approached Speaker, his head bowed in shame: “I cannot thank you enough for saving us, but we have nothing to repay you with, please forgive us”

Putting a gentle hoof on the old fisherpony’s shoulder, Speaker said: “You don’t have to give us anything. Just know that the chosen of the sun have returned to creation to bring peace, justice and prosperity back to creation for all ponies to enjoy” It felt surprisingly good on Speaker’s end to know that even among simple fisherponies there was still honor and a wish to express gratitude, even if they didn’t have anything to give.

“We will give our prayers in thanks to Celestia, thank you for your generosity” The fisherpony said, joining his friends as they pushed off into the rover and started to row up towards their village.

Cash Charmer returned a while later with a big grin on his face: “You won’t believe this: We’re rich!”

Speaker gave Cash a quizzical look.

“The holds in the junk are loaded. They have over eighty slaves tied up, stallions, mares, foals, as well as loads of pots, pans and pottery – if we make a stop at Nexus and sell everything we’ll have loads of money!” Cash beamed.

One of the less injured pirates’ ears perked up at the mention of their cargo: “Well of course we have all that, we just spent the last three days plundering the village those fisherponies were from – they were the last part of the haul before we set sail to nexus!” the pirate pony said, smiling with great pride in his work.

Speaker’s face betrayed his feeling of horror as he gave the pirate who spoke up a swift hoof to the side of his head that sent rotten teeth flying out, pelting the other pirates.

“I take it you’re upset?” Cash cautiously inquired, sounding otherwise as if he didn’t see the source of the problem.
Speaker gave Cash a thousand yard stare and spoke sternly: “We’re releasing those ponies, giving them all their stuff back, plus whatever they want of whatever other loot the pirates have.”

Cash looked insulted. He was the new captain; this wealth was his to use as he saw fit.

Taking a somewhat intimidating step towards Cash, which really wasn’t that intimidating on account of Speaker being up to his knees in mud while Cash sat in a boat, he tried to explain to Cash why they shouldn’t keep the slaves:  “We just saved their fisherponies. What do you think they’ll do when they return and find their village emptied, taken by the pirates here?”

Cash shrugged unapologetically: “They’ll moan, whine and get on with their lives – what else is there to do? It’s a moot point, the villagers are ours now. Didn’t you say something about a mandate of heaven giving us right to decide what is right and wrong? I say that it’d be a crime not to refill my purse after having lost all my money invested in my caravan” 

“Cash, do keep in mind who actually defeated the last captain here? Don’t make me do that again” Speaker calmly stated. Oh how he wanted to smack Cash so hard right now, but that’d probably just rip the fool’s stitches.

The pirates voiced their support to their captain – both because they claimed to have ‘worked hard’ in rounding up all those villagers, but also because they seemed to like the prospect of a captain who ruthlessly sought wealth.

Refusing to give in to the urge to punch everyone or peer pressure to keep the slaves, Speaker decided instead to remind Cash of their priorities: “Slaves are a liability. Plus this is a pirate vessel, we’re likely to be held up by the Lookshyan navy on our way to Great Forks – if we’re caught with a hold full of slaves, what do think they’ll do to us? I don’t want a reputation as a pirate or slaver any more than you want a business reputation as anathema”

Raising a hoof as if to gesturing for a moment to speak, but then lowering it again, Cash conceded to Speaker’s points – but did express reluctance in doing so: “I guess depending on what we do next after we reach great forks, then I could sell the junk” 

The few pirates with energy to do so shouted for Cash not to do so, but Cash was quick to point out that none of them were in any position to stop him.

It took a while to get the pirates out on the junk, since their injuries left only a few of them able to row. On board, Speaker entered the hold to check on the villagers and give them the good news, while Cash made good use of the now three pirate ponies who were able to walk about without makeshift crutches to get the junk ready to set sail.

What Speaker found horrified him to no end. The pirates had certainly captured and enslaved an entire village of ponies. 

Sixty-seven mares and stallions and fourteen foals of various ages were tied up in chains or ropes, barely able to move.

Several of the mares had severely bruised flanks and were sitting oddly. Speaker recognized the position from recovered prisoners of war: They had been beaten into submission and raped repeatedly. A couple of the stallions had been tortured, with their noses and lips cut off, their wounds still bleeding and rapidly on the way to develop nasty infections. Speaker wanted to cry, be sick, or just run up on deck and start beating the pirates, but that was just instincts and gut reactions – and Speaker knew how to control himself, even if he didn’t always want to. 

He gazed on the ponies as they tried to huddle together as well as their chains allowed, and acted like a proper combat medic at triage: “Okay my little ponies, my name is Heart Speaker and I have good news, better news and very good news. Good news is that I’ve killed the captain of this vessel and with a friend taken control of the ship. You’re all free to go. The better news is that I killed their captain while the pirates were in the process of capturing your village’s fishing fleet, who are now free already. The very good news is that once I’ve untied your ropes and opened your locks you’re free to take anything of value from the ship, although not stuff we need to operate the ship with. I suggest looking in the captain’s cabin first, as they tend to hoard valuables there”

The ponies didn’t seem that enthusiastic at first, as Speaker, still somewhat bloody and very muddy from the fight with the captain untied their ropes and brought out Gift to make swift work of the chains.

When everypony was free, Speaker addressed the mares who had been raped: “If you want, I can tell you what herbs you’ll need to find to make maiden tea – it’ll terminate any pregnancy you might develop from what was done to you. And if we haven’t killed the ones who did this already when we fought them earlier, I’ll see them gelded myself”

One of the stallions who had been facially mutilated, his nose and lips having been cut off – leaving ugly, festering wounds – approached Speaker. To Speaker’s surprise the pirate captain hadn’t cut off the stallion’s tongue, as he was able to speak, although not well due to his missing lips: “What a’out us? The pirates killed our ‘e’icine ‘are, these ‘oun’s will ‘ake us sick and ‘ie”

Nodding, Speaker quickly introduced himself as a doctor, one with great powers in that area no less: “I can restore your faces completely – it won’t be easy, but I can do it, if you will let me tend to your wounds”

The mutilated stallions agreed to let Speaker help them, seeing as they had nobody else to turn to. Speaker then led everypony up on deck, where he found Cash in the process of ‘swearing in’ his pirate crew.

“Do you all swear to obey my orders while I am captain of this ship, and never to raise a hoof against any of the chosen of sun, lest the rivers themselves come and swallow you whole?” Cash bombastically inquired, from the helm next to the ship’s wheel while looking down onto the main deck where the pirates were assembled, most of them leaning on each other just to remain standing, all of them bandaged or stitched up somehow from their injures courtesy of Speaker.

A split second later Cash added: “Need I remind you all that refusing to swear this oath means I let Speaker use his little death spinner on you again?”

Finding Cash’s threat ironically appropriate considering what he wanted to do to the pirates who had partaken in the rape of the village mares, Speaker held his tongue and refrained from saying anything – waiting to see if any of the pirates would resist.

To Speaker’s surprise none of them did, and Cash sanctified their oath in a brief but shiny materialization of golden glyphs; a manifestation of the oath in an ancient divine tongue fluttering about until fading away, forever to be known by heaven – but that was a moot point, as Speaker quickly informed Cash of his promise to the raped mares, to which Cash simply nodded and demanded that all crew members who had taken liberties with the mares identify themselves.

A pirate with his left forehoof in a sling defiantly asked why, showing no remorse, while also giving the now freed villagers some dirty looks.

Cash quickly reminded his crew that they had just sworn to obey all his orders – and that his prior request was now an order: “…because my good friend Heart Speaker here takes offense to such behavior, and wishes to punish them”

Holding up Gift, Speaker said but a few words that sent dread into the males of the pirate ponies: “Rapists get gelded where I come from”

One pirate, obviously not interested in losing his stallionhood shouted: “Buck that, they were ours to screw. The old captain said we could!”

Cash didn’t even have to point out that such a statement of refusal to obey his orders constituted a direct breach of his sanctified oath – for the next thing anypony knew the junk lurched to port side as river water ‘flower up’ on the deck and grabbed the defiant pirate and dragging him screaming into the murky waters of the river of tears, never to be seen again. It all happened so fast that few others even had time to react, gasp or shriek in horror.

“Right, so it’s that or just a small part of your anatomy – what’ll it be?” Cash said, enjoying his new-found power immensely.
About a third of the pirates, which was roughly half of the males, reluctantly raised a hoof or crutch to identify themselves. Seeing the fear in their eyes, Speaker realized that his planned punishment, combined with now losing their ‘cargo’, former captain, and once the villagers were done looting the ship probably most of their possessions, made gelding the now very defenseless pirates a horrible act of adding insult to injury.

Speaker suggested to Cash that they instead make all the pirates swear, both mares and stallions, never rape or otherwise unconsensually sexually molest another living being for the rest of their lives. Cash agreed, saying that doing so would be a lot quicker and less messy than the alternative. The stallions among the pirates certainly seemed relieved, even though some of the mares they had violated didn’t seem to agree that simply making them promise would be enough
Cash smoothed things over by specifying in the ‘no rape’ oath that to break it would case the offending pony’s fun bits to fester, rot and fall off. For some reason this made the stallions being sworn in look far more frightened at that prospect, than when Speaker wanted to geld them.

With all drama over, the junk was sailed upriver to the village. After a day and half of sailing they caught up with the fisherponies from the village, making for some very happy reunions.

Speaker tended to the mutilated stallions, carefully washing healing essence over their wounds so that it would manifest as new flesh. It wasn’t a pleasant procedure, and each took a long time, involving first cleaning up the festering wounds that were where their noses and lips had once been – and even with his treatment it would be weeks before the new lips and noses would stop hurting. On the second day of sailing, a day away from the village, Speaker discovered while treating the last of the mutilated stallions that with a little essence he could completely take away their pain – an anesthetic medical charm. This was a nice change from having to get the patients drunk on the pirate’s foul rice wine to dull their pain and make them sit still.

Later that night at the helm, Cash was impressed of Speaker’s new ability, and equally pointed out how navigating the ship over the last few days had given him some fun insights into how to use essence to improve his ability to steer the ship up the river or set the best angle for the sails.

“Cute, you discovered excellencies” Speaker mused, prompting Cash to ask what that meant.

Speaker explained that of all the powers of the exalted, then the most basic charms that all exalts shared was that of the excellencies – a fancy word for the ability to use essence to momentarily improve a pony’s ability to do certain things: “You need to learn excellencies for different things – the essence patterns that reinforce your abilities as captain aren’t the same needed for hoof to hoof combat, but they fundamentally work the same”

“Well that’s nice – so I just whip some essence around and I can be good at anything?” Cash said, smiling like a foal who had just been told of a secret stash of sweet-rolls.

Speaker more or less agreed, explaining that there were different ways essence could work. Looking to the stars, he spoke of essence used to overwhelm the odds – giving exalted ponies the greatest of potential: “In my past incarnation’s life, this technique gave Solars potential on a scale that there were no words for. We had a lot of fun inventing new words to express how powerful we were”

“I can totally see myself doing that” Cash noted.

Speaker then explained the idea of essence used as a guarantee: It would not allow for equally grand results, but those more risky attempts could still fail. These techniques of certainty guaranteed success, which was often more important: “I use a technique like that when cleaning and caring for wounds – you don’t want a hoof or knife to slip during surgery”

Nodding, Cash praised Celestia that he didn’t scar easily.

“Then there’s the way in which essence can be resurgent, giving you a second wind to pull you back on track even if you do mess up – it’s a good way to better your odds, plus if applied with a different motonic motivation, you end up with a brief clarity that allows for very impressive physical and mental performances” Speaker noted, adding that there were other basic techniques, but that Cash would do just fine by knowing how these fundamental techniques worked.

Cash looked as if to speak, having no clue what ‘motonic motivation’ meant, then pausing for a second, looking at his hooves: “So that’s how I was able to fight so well against the pirates while you down in the river. I just kept willing essence into my hooves, and they flew around as if guided by the gods themselves”

“Exactly. The rest of your powers and charms are informed by our skills. If you know the basics of hoof to hoof combat you can learn simple charms to do impressive feats on par with a master, but if you are a master – say a master swords-pony, then you can learn Solar charms that will let you cut down entire armies on your own” Speaker proudly stated, looking off into the darkness.

The junk, lit by a hoof-full of paper lanterns hung on the sides, the stern and the bow, was a dim beacon of light in the darkness of the river of tears as Cash navigated it upriver, idly fantasizing about what his past lives must have done with such amazing things.

By dawn they had reached the village. The villagers had their pick of the captain’s cabin, which netted them a small chest full of silver, two dozen sabers and bows and enough arrows to equip a hundred archers. The villagers also took a few bars of iron and sacks of coal from the ship’s armory and smithy. The pirates were now officially defenseless.

Cash’s crew wasn’t happy with this development – but Cash made it clear that he didn’t want to hear any complaints: “I lost a great deal of wealth when I gained my powers because stupid ponies did stupid and cruel things. You lot did stupid and cruel things to these ponies, so I can relate to what they’re going through. They want something for their pain. They want their things back. With a little luck I’ll see a creation where ponies like you don’t have to resort to piracy to get rice in your bowls. Now shut up and hoof over your belts, or the river gets you”

With the villagers offloaded and the junk lightened considerably of anything of any value, Cash and Speaker bid farewell to the villagers. The previously mutilated stallions had miraculously regained their noses and lips thanks to Speaker's medical charms – and the mares, well, Speaker had told them what herbs to mix up for some field-expedient Maiden Tea. Maiden Tea was a common feature in the diet of most prostitutes and brothel employees across creation: A single cup would render a mare barren or stallion infertile for a month and induce abortion, so in those businesses it was well worth the cost of shipping in the rare herbs needed for the mix. Drinking too much was slightly poisonous, and drinking way too much would make the effects permanent – but considering the unique, pungent flavor of the tea, that was a difficult feat to accomplish by accident.

Luckily for the villagers, the stuff grew wild in the eastern forests, so they could gather it up themselves. Cash even suggested they collect loads of the stuff and sell it, which didn’t seem like that bad an idea.

Setting ragged sails for the Yanaze river, the junk flowed downriver at a reasonable pace. Cash Charmer estimated that they were covering a good fifty miles a day at least in the summer heat. Nothing earth-shattering by any means, but this was the fastest way ponies could travel with any large amount of cargo over long distances in the east, for the jungles and forests were often quite impenetrable unless you had a yeddim or something stomping down trees up in front.

In the week it took to get to where the river of tears merged with the mighty Yanaze river, Speaker spent most of his time practicing with Gift, throwing the gyroscopic chakram at trees that hung over the side of the river. He didn’t do it for target practice, but more to remember how he had used it in his exaltation’s past life. It was with no small amount of joy that he finally understood the essence patterns that went into the stances that made up the Thousand Wounds Gear Style form – allowing him to stand ever-ready to both attack and defend, while using Gift not just to catch blades with its teeth, but to deflect blows as if it was a small shield. Cash wasn’t particularly impressed, but Speaker scolded Cash: “Never think less of magical martial arts – never, because you can’t always tell from a stance how a pony benefits from it. A low, firm crouch can give stability, or be the first part of a leap to rip your throat out. I would personally be quite pleased if I do not have to ever use Gift for violence from this point on, but in this age of sorrows, I don’t think that’ll be possible”

Cash laughed: “You think too much – you need to learn to not worry and just let things happen”

Merging into the Yanaze river’s boat traffic was a smooth transition thanks to Cash Charm’s surprisingly good skills as a captain. His crew was continually surprised as Cash would act and speak like a seasoned captain who had walked the deck of the junk for decades.

It was just before they were halfway to where the grey and yellow river merged into the Yanaze river, the site of Nexus, Creation’s second largest city and greatest site of commerce, that Speaker suddenly started yelling that they had to go to shore like a madpony. Cash couldn’t calm him down no matter what he tried, no matter how much essence he put into calming words.

Ultimately Speaker jumped off the ship and swam ashore to the southern bank, Cash ordering the anchor dropped off shore shortly thereafter and following in a boat.

What he found was Speaker nosing around in the grass of a weed-filled meadow.

“Speaker, what in the sweet lush rump of the mare of the serenity are you doing?” Cash simply had to ask.

Speaker raised his head with a start, having been completely unaware of Cash walking up to him: “I… I’m looking for where my past… where I died”

Cash blinked a few times.

“I’m looking for the tomb I remember burying myself in” Speaker said, suddenly disappearing from sight.

The Solar pony named Cash Charmer looked around on the quite open and empty meadow, feeling increasingly panicky. His fellow Solar, Heart Speaker, had just disappear from plain sight in the blink of an eye, after saying that he was looking for the tomb that he’d buried himself in alive… or dead – it was a little confusing.

Several silent minutes passed as Cash ran around on the meadow looking at the same bland weed-filled grassland.
Suddenly Speaker reappeared and Cash nearly fainted from the shock as the hazel-colored pony came out of nowhere.
“Okay, I take it you found something?” Cash said, looking up from the ground.

Speaker nodded as he helped Cash up.

Pointing a hoof over at a spot in the meadow, Cash saw… grass… and meadow.

“You don’t see it?” Speaker said with a thoroughly confused voice.

Cash shrugged, and said that he couldn’t see anything special.

Speaker then walked over to the spot and disappeared from view. That got a reaction out of Cash – mainly a big gasp and Cash shouting: “You disappeared again! Where’d you go?!”

Speaker reappeared a moment later, looking as if he just realized some profound truth: “I think I understand the problem here”

“Good, because I was getting tired of waiting on you” A female pony with strange silvery tattoos covering her body said with a notable western accent, leaping from out of nowhere to embrace Speaker in a tight hug and a very sloppy kiss. 

> Chapter 4: Old and New Friends
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The first thought in Cash’s mind was that he, being a far prettier pony and a much snappy dresser – even if his current pirate rags weren’t that impressive – should be the one that mares were jumping at. His second thought was that Speaker was looking very... weird, like he was feeling a mix of confusion, happiness and sadness.

Speaker would later very much agree with Cash’s assessment, but at the moment the mystery grey-blue mare was fondling his mane, which somehow seemed to be... growing very long.

Fumbling as he tried to get the mare off of him, Speaker found his vision becoming obscured by the mess of black hair falling in his face: “Wha-pffft-stop it!”

Quickly tiring of watching the bizarre display, Cash trotted up to give the impetuous mare a quick jab with his Heaven Thunder Hoof technique – just to fling her off his friend, not necessarily to hurt her.

Raising his right hoof, Cash quickly stopped as the mare noted: “I’ll peck your eyes out if you do that” without ever lifting her gaze from Speaker, somehow saying the words quite clearly without letting go of the long tufts of Speaker’s mane in her mouth.

After a few more moments of elongating hair-pulling, especially around his otherwise well-shaved muzzle, which really didn’t hurt Speaker, but felt very weird, the mare finally relented and let Speaker stand up – which turned out to be another weird experience as Speaker’s mane now reached down to his fetlocks… and he also now sported a mean fu-man-chu style beard.

“Who are you? What is this?” Speaker said, struggling between curiosity and amazement of what had been done to him, as well as fright over the sudden make-over assault, as such abilities were not in any way normal:  not even Solars should be able to do something like that.

The mare looked positively offended by Speaker’s question and batted an errant curl from her dreadlock’d mane away from her face: “Don’t you remember me?”

Heart Speaker gave the mare a careful look-over. Purple mane, styled in dreadlocks, coupled with her accent, made her a likely western-born pony, probably a tribal or former tribal – the metallic-blue tattoos that circled her body were… strange, but familiar somehow. Suddenly the mare laughed: “Of course, I probably look different, this will help!”

The mare’s eyes briefly emitted a silvery flash of light that in a matter of seconds spread all over her body with a dim glow as her coat became as quicksilver, flowing into a new form. Hooves became talons, legs a little longer with much thicker joints, her coat sprouted silvery feathers and her head changed and sprouted a beak. From her back a new set of limbs sprouted, quickly popping out feathers as well. The second the new form was set, its silvery appearance changed into real feathers, all of them white. The talons took on a dark color, and from her talons to knees her limbs became banded skin with a bright red color. Her entire form was now one of a strange birdlike creature, but in the guise of a pony. Her beak was long, red like her limbs and slim but larger than a pony. The feathers that made up the tips of her wings and the crest on her head had black and purple tips. The strangest feature was that she was now sporting a third eye on her forehead which appeared to be less an eye and more a silvery orb of infinite depth.

Cash was about to faint, but Speaker just scratched his chin and went: “Oh it's yo-“ as he suddenly made the connection to his ancient memories and stopped mid-sentence.

The former mare, now bird creature leapt at Speaker, hugging him intensely, crying with joy as tears trickled down her feathers: “You remember me!”

The two didn’t notice Cash having fallen over on the ground, as they were quickly engrossed in a quite awkward reunion.

“Your name… Last Shimmer, right?” Speaker hesitantly said, not wanting to get the mare-now-bird monster’s name wrong. But that name, he remembered the name and the form in front of him.

Last Shimmer nodded and wiped tears from her eyes, all three of them: “That is my name – and has been the name of all my incarnations since we last met. Didn’t want to confuse you when we met again”

Furrowing a brow, Speaker noticed Cash’s condition, but didn’t let that bother him too much: “Right, but, eh... what are you?”

Speaker genuinely couldn’t remember what Shimmer was, but he was quite certain that she was of a benign sort, as he remembered quite a lot of her: In his past life the two had apparently even been lovers, he certainly remembered that, but… what was she?

Shifting back into her pony form, Shimmer laughed: “Oh now, you remember my name but not that I’m a Lunar? Really, I’ve had ponies keelhauled for less”

Nodding for a few moments as Speaker was able to make a little more sense of his memories, it became clear to him: Shimmer was a Lunar, exalted by the mercurial god of the moon Luna. If anything she looked rather young, being a good deal smaller than Speaker’s bulky or Cash’s fit body, as if she was just a few years past getting her cutie mark, which was a tribal symbol featuring a stylized feather and body of water.

“But where are the others then?” Speaker said, in a very matter-of-fact tone.

Shimmer’s gaze turned down into the ground: “I don’t know... it’s not been easy being a Lunar the last couple thousand years”

Walking over to give Cash a quick shake, followed by a swift kick in the rump to wake him up, Speaker voiced his surprise of Shimmer’s statement: “Wait, I’ve… Solars have been gone for how long?”

“Almost three thousand years. Now the dragon-blooded hunt us and no sane pony in the civilized parts of creation wants to even be near a Lunar – but hey, now the Solars are coming back, so it’ll all be good, right?”

Speaker wasn’t sure how to reply to that, so without even thinking of it he began to stroke his new beard – it felt weird. Had the Solars really been gone for three thousand years? That shouldn’t have been possible! A Solar exaltation, once free from a previous host would go to heaven, to Yu-Shan and be prepped to return to creation for reincarnation in a new host… that process shouldn’t take more than a few days.

“Wait, how did that happen? Why did the reincarnation cycle stop for Solars, but not Lunars?” Speaker wondered, his mind reeling at the possible implications.

Shimmer simply shook her head and smiled, looking and sounding very much as if she was meeting a long-lost love: “Again, don’t know – but now you’re here again, I’m sure it’ll all be better”

Getting Cash up and introducing Shimmer to him, Speaker suggested that they get back to the business at hand.

“Oh, what’s that then?” Shimmer said, sounding very cheerful and bubbly as she bounced around Speaker.

Speaker took a deep breath and explained that he was quite sure he’d found the tomb of his past self.

Shimmer looked around, not seeing anything: “Well… That does sort of make sense”

Now it was Speaker’s turn to be confused, but Shimmer explained that it had been custom amongst her Lunar elders for millennia to perform a scrying ritual every full moon for one of the Lunars present, to try locate their Solar mates.

“Hold on, Solar mates?” Cash exclaimed, sounding both confused and a little put off. He certainly didn’t want any random animal-beasty pony thing to suddenly pop up and latch on to him.

Shimmer smiled: “You don’t really have a choice – when the Solar exaltations were made, so were the Lunars – we’re bonded, each lunar to a different solar. But don’t worry, it’s a one way bond – you won’t feel anything, unless you want to. Plus I’ve been told of Lunar mates that never had anything to do with their Solar mates, while others…” she said, poking Speaker with a jestful hoof: “…were much closer”

“Hey, we just met…” Speaker protested. Speaker was an old pony, and he’d never married: being a doctor had been his life, helping Lookshyan legionnaire ponies survive the wounds of battle. Mares had been something he’d only dabbled in when invited to brothels by friends or colleagues.

Shimmer shushed at Speaker and continued where she’d originally left off about the whole scrying thing: “Up until recently the scrying always came up blank – but a year ago that changed. Shadow Swimmer’s ritual showed a path north. After that, every scry at full moon showed another Lunar the general direction and location of their mate…” Looking around at the field she noted: “In my case, very precisely – the fates are weird like that”

Speaker was surprised that such a ritual even existed, but Shimmer noted that in the first age such was rarely necessary – but occasionally handy if newly exalted Solars weren’t found quickly. 

“So… can we trust her?” Cash asked. Speaker nodded, and Shimmer pointed out that Lunars had been hunted for centuries following the Solars' disappearances, so they were very much in the same boat as the Solars. 

Quickly changing the subject, Shimmer once again asked of Speaker’s tomb: “So, this invisible tomb of yours?”

“It is actually more unnoticeable – and protected by... something... that I don’t have the word for or understand, but I think the… way gate? Or something like that, of this land was changed to conceal the tomb” Speaker noted, leading Cash and Shimmer over to a very not-special-looking spot on the field.

Speaker said that he wasn’t sure if he could get the others into the tomb at all: “The tomb is… disconnected, I think, from creation. It’s hard to explain. But bite on to my mane or tail, close your eyes and just follow behind me”

Cash and Shimmer did as instructed and quickly found themselves tumbling down a smooth stone staircase, the three ending in a pile on a landing in front of a smooth stone door decorated in presumably ancient symbols.

The stonework itself looked pristine, as if made the day before. Getting up, the three surveyed the door. There was no visible way of opening it... but then again, most tombs weren’t made to accommodate visitors.

Looking around at the glyphs which covered the walls, Speaker could see that they were some kind of writing. That much was obvious, as he could even remember them appearing on the wall as he… played music to write them. He quickly agreed with himself that such probably made a lot more sense in the first age.

“Can any of you read this?” Speaker asked, only to notice Cash looking as confused as he was over the writing, while Shimmer was deeply engrossed in reading.

“Right, here’s the start. ‘This is the final resting place of the copper spider known as Bright Machine Speaker, builder of the dam that could not feel or be felt, healer of many, bringer of wisdom, giver of gifts and seeker of truth’, it says over on the right” Shimmer said, pausing every now and then to decipher the meaning of the glyphs.

Cash quickly noted the oddity of Speaker’s old and current name: “Hold on – ‘Bright Machine Speaker’? That’s not your name”

“Hmm, what is your name this time around anyway?” Shimmer nonchalantly asked, looking at Speaker.

Thinking for a moment, Speaker replied: “I chose the name of Heart Speaker at my cute-cenera… correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t it custom for ponies who drew their second breath to choose a new name again? Like how the dragon-blooded unicorn ponies do in Lookshy?”

Shimmer shrugged: “My Lunar elders had me choose a new name. They said that was the old way, so I think you might be right”
“Then I want to be the Shining Perfect Awesome Ultra bodhisattva of all Knowledge and Wealth!” Cash proudly and loudly declared. Shimmer and Speaker looked at him and shook their heads.

“Right, do the glyphs say how to open the door?” Speaker asked, completely ignoring what Cash had just said.
Shimmer noted that the writing was in old realm, the original first language – and no, there weren’t any instructions on how to open the door, only a long list of Speaker’s deeds and accomplishments, all of which Shimmer found quite interesting to read: “Bright Machine Speaker, the great giver of wisdom, lover of life, spreader of civilization, builder of dam that could not feel or be felt, he who defied the Sea that Marched Against the Flame at the battle of burning rain, granter of endless wisdom – this is so awesome guys!”

“Hey, you said you buried yourself in here – can’t you just remember how to open the door?” Cash asked, wondering if he could punch the door down with his super punching martial arts.

Speaker sat down and tried to think really hard of the last of his memories from his past life. He remembered being scared, hiding, making the tomb in but a single day – his last day. A sad piece of music came to mind, but he couldn’t quite recall the instrument.

Shimmer and Cash both turned to look as Speaker absent-mindedly started humming a morose melody as he tried to recall how to open the door. It was a somber little melody, like a funeral march.

Then the stone slab that stood as the door suddenly swung to the side silently, revealing a dark interior.

“Speaker, I think your little musical act there did the trick – what song was that from?” Cash wondered.

Peeking inside the darkness of the tomb, then up the staircase into the sunlight, Speaker sighed: “That was the song that built this place. No, don’t ask me how, I don’t remember how”

“A song that builds tombs? Impressive” Cash noted as the three carefully entered the tomb.

Shimmer was quick to ask if Speaker remembered putting up any traps - but that fear was quickly put to rest. The smell of stale air poured out like an invisible choking fog, revealing that the tomb was right behind the door. There were no tunnels, no hallways, no traps, just a large square room carved out of the rock that became lit by glowing crystals as the three entered, with air that smelled as if it had fermented behind the sealed stone door. The walls of the tomb were smooth, polished to a mirror-shine, and like the entrance every surface was covered in glyphs extolling the accomplishments and deeds of the pony laid to rest there.

In the middle of the room was a large stone sarcophagus, which appeared to be carved from the same rock that the rest of the tomb was dug out of, to the point that it was even a part of the floor – the sarcophagus had evidently been made on the spot. 

Speaker approached it slowly. The lid of the sarcophagus was thick gray stone just like everything else – but it had also been gilded to show a glorious and shiny effigy of Speaker’s last incarnation, presumably in his prime, replete with his panoply of miraculous artifacts and tools. Most prominently featured was a disc that Speaker instantly recognized and a rod or staff of some kind.

The visage of Speaker’s previous form was quite weird to behold for Speaker. If anything it did explain why Shimmer had given him an impromptu mane and mustache extension – his past self’s golden effigy was sporting a beard that reached all the way to his hooves, while his hair was done up in an incredibly lifelike braid that reached as far down as his beard. Having seen this, Speaker found himself wanting to get his hair braided in the same style.

“So… why are we here? There obviously isn’t much in grave goods for us to loot, unless you had it all crammed into the coffin? The gold on this thing is paper thin!” Cash noted as he scratched the surface of the gilded sarcophagus.

Pushing the lid aside, which turned out to be a lot easier than expected, two things happened. First of all the insides of the sarcophagus were revealed, but a stone door at the far side of the tomb also silently opened, revealing a room from which faint strange lights flickered, casting strange shadows deep into the tomb proper.

The three opted to first look inside the sarcophagus. What they saw wasn’t much; hardly anything at all really.

There was a lot of dust strewn in a pattern that corresponded to the corpse of a pony. In the pile was a staff of white jade, a stone tablet and nothing else. There was no jewelry, only a smooth black pearl the size of half a chicken egg and no decorations or even anything to suggest a coffin inside the sarcophagus.

Considering that Speaker had said that the place was build single-hoofedly, then a macabre thought occurred to everypony present: Speaker’s prior incarnation had sealed himself inside the stone sarcophagus and simply waited for himself to die.

The tablet revealed some details, as Shimmer read it out loud, becoming increasingly teary eyed as she did so: “To the future bearer of the mantle of the Bright Machine Speaker. I have spent weeks pondering what wisdom I should impart to you. We, the Solars, have been betrayed, but I will not tell you by who. To inform you of that would probably put you in more danger than it would do good. Simply bide your time, build your forces and ensure the loyalty of those around you”

“Well, that totally doesn’t sound ominous at all – but isn’t it just the dragon-blooded unicorn ponies we should be looking out for? I don’t see why it’d be a bad idea not to tell us of that” Cash commented.

Continuing, Shimmer read: “I came to this place, east of Deheleshen, north-north-west of Denansdor, seeking a refuge I did not find. To this end I made my own, this, my tomb and my final gift to my successor. My soul has been wounded, for I would be able to heal any wound of the flesh, so my time is short as I write this.”

“I call this place the Soulforge. Whether you choose to keep that name or rename it to reflect that it is by the time you read this also a tomb is your choice, but I made it to house the remains of my greatest gifts to this world. I have not left you artifacts or other trinkets that looters might steal. Indeed, this sarcophagus is made to only open to my own exaltation's presence, and to open the door to the stairway out by the tune that matched that which made this manse. You should know it well: If you’re reading this, you should already have sung it” Shimmer slowly read, looking over at the sarcophagus lid while doing so. This certainly explained why the foot-thick stone lid was so easy to get off.

“In the rooms furthest beyond the central chamber you will find vast archives. On stone tablets like these, which you must never remove from this place lest they crumble to dust, are inscribed all of my knowledge of the heavenly skills needed to marry magic and technology. Kal Bax might have cornered manse-making, and Bright Shattered Ice might have kept stealing my notes, but I was the greatest mind when it came to magi-technical wonders, for the Great Maker favored me. I have built directional titans, I have made protoshinmaic vortices like they were toys and wonders that new words had to be made to describe. The knowledge of how to make them all are in these archives, but sadly not the blueprints. These I could not save from those who I feel will soon be the death of me” Shimmer read out loud, having to stop at times to squint to read the tablet. It was filled with glyphs the size of rice grains, so it was not easy to read with the naked eye.

Speaker even noticed that Shimmer’s eyes had changed into strange eyes with huge oval pupils, probably to read the tiny old realm script properly. Such was the shape-shifting power of the Lunars.

“In the first room of the manse I have built what I reckon will be of greatest immediate use for you. It certainly helped me make this place. It is not an inauspicious gateway, and you can’t use it as such, but it is essentially a small font of power, flowing with the same potential one finds far beyond the sane edges of creation. The wyld energies accessible through the portcullis of iron and soulsteel are pure and will make for great shaping. This is why I have not filled this tomb with tools and trinkets: If you are a true bearer of the name Bright Machine Speaker, then you will make whatever you need from this.
This is my final gift to you. Regain our honor, avenge me” Shimmer finished, putting the tablet down on the edge of the tomb, looking at Speaker with tears in her eyes.

Speaker could at least partially understand why Shimmer was in tears, but he’d honestly heard it all more as a list of instructions, rather than the last words of a dying pony.

“I should have been there with you, I really should. I don’t why I wasn’t, maybe I was already dead at the time, but there’s no excuse” Shimmer said with great sorrow in her voice, carefully letting a tear fall on the dust that was the original Bright Machine Speaker.

The teardrop mixed into the dust and made for a tiny dark speck of moist dirt, the dust absorbing it.

“Right, so… what’s with the walking stic- whoa” Cash said, trying to pick up the white jade staff in the sarcophagus. This turned out to be quite difficult, as it weighed a lot.

A quick examination revealed that it was of pure white jade, despite being shaped like a wooden branch fashioned into a walking stick, complete with the smooth grainy texture of a gnarled stick stripped of its bark. The knotholes on the ‘stick’ revealed orichalcum plugs traced with infinitely regressing runic patterns. If the thing was painted a shade of brown it would be very hard to tell that it was made mostly of jade, one of the five magical materials.

Shimmer quickly grabbed the staff – which despite Cash having shown it to be impossibly heavy for its small size, levitated it up effortlessly – and marveled at the white jade stick: “Is this… no, it couldn’t be…”

Looking at the staff, Speaker instantly remembered what it was, and how it worked. This revelation also told him that he currently had no hope of being able to use it, but he knew that such a barrier was only there for a Solar to tear it down. Snatching the staff and touching it to his forehead, Speaker proudly declared: “My very own singing staff. That’s how I made this place. That’s why a song opened the door – it makes perfect sense”

“Okay, come on – what's a singing staff? How come you two can lift this thing while I couldn’t?” Cash half-whined, sounding very unsatisfied with the lack of riches and splendor in this tomb of a real, genuine first age Solar.

Shimmer looked at Speaker: “Is he really that dumb?”

Speaker shrugged and looked at a now very indignant Cash: “Things made of magical materials, like jade or the orichalcum in Gift, or moonsilver for Shimmer, or starmetal or soulsteel all weigh as much as the largest yeddim when not attuned to someone’s essence, even when in small amounts. A bead of jade can weigh as much as a pony-sized boulder, but be light as a feather when attuned. Shimmer put a little essence in the staff, I put more in, so now it’s as light as a dry walking stick”
“I can’t believe you didn’t know that” Shimmer added, explaining that it was painfully common knowledge – even among mortal ponies, that you couldn’t move jade around very easily unless a dragon-blooded or mortal pony with enlightened essence was there to lighten the load.

Cash sheepishly admitted that he’d never really paid that much attention to magical things, having originally reasoned that as a previously mere-mortal pony, he’d never be able to use the stuff – so why bother?

Speaker explained to Cash the awesome power of the singing staff: When placed against a body of rock or dirt and played with a rosined bow, like what you’d use to play an erhu fiddle… With the right melody or tones one could magically terraform large amounts of dirt or rock in seconds – make bridges, houses, palaces, roads, seal caves, tear down castle walls, or even make tombs in a matter of hours, if not minutes.

“Well, that’ll be nice if we ever get into real estate – but beyond that I don’t really see any uses” Cash said, clearly oblivious to the marvelous potential of the staff, or that was what Speaker thought.

The smooth black pearl in the sarcophagus was quickly identified: It was the hearthstone of the manse that the tomb was part of.

This fact stumped Cash: “Hold on – manses are big magical temples. I don’t see the big magical features in this place, you two sure this is a manse?”

Shimmer was quick to point out the strong feeling of earth essence in the tomb. Cash said he couldn’t feel it at all. Shimmer was just as quick to point out the magic stone door that reacted to music: “...plus, the whole place here is hidden. I remember being very careful to construct it outside of fate, or at least something similar… no clue how, plus none of you could see or even feel the stone stairway going down until I led you down it. This is a powerful manse, but that’s kind of weird. You’d think that a manse that feels this powerful on the inside would have more powerful dragon lines in the land surrounding it?”

Once again, Cash had no clue what dragon lines were – but he was quickly enlightened by Shimmer as the three ventured deeper into the tomb: “Okay, everything living respires essence. Ponies with enlightened essence can gather that up inside them and use the essence, like we can. But all the remaining essence collects and flows naturally, like water through a valley, only essence flows through all the elements. Where lesser flows gather into big ones they’re called dragon lines. And Speaker is right, this manse is weird. I’ve been staking this area out for months, but there’s no strong dragon lines leading up to the manse”

Speaker explained that he might have actually ‘made’ the demesne, the conflux of raw essence that the manse was tapping for power, himself – somehow. Shimmer was quick to note that such manipulation of reality this far inside the borders of creation shouldn’t have been possible, but Speaker rebutted: “This place has a stone door that opens with music, that’s impossible too. Plus a first age Solar at the peak of his power did this, no telling what else I… he… could have done”
The room beyond the central tomb was the one with the shimmering lights. As the tablet had said, it contained a strange source of power – a wellspring of raw wyld energy.

The wyld was – well – not reality. Everypony knew that to venture beyond the borders defined by the elemental poles, into the bordermarshes, was not wise. To go even further into the middlemarshes was tantamount to suicide. To go beyond into the deep wyld… ponies just didn’t do that. And now the original Bright Machine Speaker had made a font that spouted the madness from the absolute furthest edge of reality in his tomb? It sounded crazy. All ponies knew to fear and loathe the things that dwelt in the wyld – for such monsters liked to eat the dreams and souls of ponies.

“Okay, seriously Speaker, what’s the idea here?” Shimmer asked. Sure, she had read the tablet, but a source of pure chaos? This wasn’t just dangerous – if the spherical iron and soulsteel cage that surrounded the rainbow flares of light and constantly shifting emerald fish that floated above the plain stone pedestal was to fail… there’d be no words for what’d happen, for it’d be beyond sanity and reality.

Looking at the spherical cage around the sparks of potential, Speaker nodded in recognition of his previous self: “Brilliant, just brilliant”

With Speaker having revealed that he knew what the setup was for, Speaker first walked up to a stone switch on the wall and flicked it. The multi-colored lights and unreal gurgling noises from within the cage died down. Speaker said that the font was now turned off, and that it had only been left on in case it might otherwise denature and fail completely, making the feature built in vain. Beyond that, the idea was exactly as explained on the stone tablet: “I don’t remember exactly how to do it, but I know it’s within my reach – the Solar Wyld Shaping technique, it’ll let me shape anything out of the wyld energies here. Anything I can dream up and figure out how it works, I can make components for here, be it metals, liquids, uncut gems, magical materials...”

This news absolutely shattered Cash’s world view. His hopes and dreams of using his powers to become the wealthiest pony in creation crumbled before him – for if a Solar could simply create material wealth out of pure chaos… then it would have no value. Cash’s breathing intensified. This was too much to handle, too sudden! He’d only had these powers for a month or so, now he had to come to terms with the possibility of a world where money might become meaningless? No, this was just... this was too much.

Speaker and Shimmer watched in confusion as Cash said he’d run back to check on the ship and wait for them there. Shimmer shrugged and looked back at the dimly-illuminated iron and soulsteel cage, then at Speaker: “What got him so upset?”

“No idea, but this thing is incredible. Once I remember enough of the wyld shaping technique, we can go here to make... well... pretty much anything. Can’t make finished products though, what I make from this has to have some ‘potential’ left in it, like a bar of steel that can still be worked into many different things, or a raw vegetable that has to be cooked first” Speaker marveled.

Shimmer smacked her lips at Speaker saying ‘cooked first’ – her stomach growled a little moments later: “Hehe, sorry – haven’t eaten lunch yet”

Speaker said that they could eat on his junk afterwards – but first he wanted to see these ‘archives’ that his past self had left behind for him. The stone doors to the archive opened at the touch of a hoof, leading from the wyld spring into what turned out to be vast halls. These rooms were lit like the rest of the manse with glowing crystals, and shelves carved… or ‘played’ into the walls, with the use of the singing staff no doubt, contained rows upon rows of… shattered stone tablets.

“No…” Speaker slowly said, running up and down the hundreds of aisles. Every single stone tablet had been shattered by some unknown vandal. Shimmer found Speaker a while later, huddled up against one of the shelves, feebly trying to assemble the impossible jigsaw-puzzle that was made up of tiny stone shards.

It was clear that whoever had done this had been very methodical – the tablets hadn’t just been broken, they had all been pulverized to the point that largest pieces left were the size of peas, all of which had been scattered equally across the floor of the archive, making every hoof-step a sad crunchy step on what had once been a treasure-trove of ancient knowledge, now possibly lost forever.

A couple of hours later, Cash saw the hazel and grey-blue duo of ponies approaching the junk. In an idle thought, Cash realized that he’d never asked for the ship’s name or considered naming it himself. With a small feeling of regret he figured he wouldn’t bother, seeing as it’d just be sold, crew and everything, so they could have some money to work with. Money that might soon become completely worthless… or worse yet: obsolete. That wyld shaping technique, it could be the end of all economic activity…

It took some serious pulling himself together to force out a smile and welcome the two fellow exalts aboard – even if they arrived via Shimmer having turned into her bird-monster form and lifting Speaker up as she flew from the river bank over to the ship.

If Cash had to hold himself together hard to stay happy at grim knowledge of the economic holocaust he was imagining, then his crew was having an even harder time – only narrowly choosing not to disobey Cash’s orders not to run off or leave their posts without his permission, at the sight of the incoming bird monster carrying a pony in its talons.

Cash quickly noticed how depressed Speaker looked, as he led the two into the captain’s cabin and ordered a crewpony to fetch something to eat and drink.

Shimmer really wasn’t sure how to cheer Speaker up. They’d just met, and she’d read so many stories written down by her previous incarnations about how cheerful, determined and generous Bright Machine Speaker had been. Of course, she could understand how it felt to find ancient knowledge lost, having herself spent decades in the west defending tribes from fae raids coming out the wyld, only to see that no matter what she did, more would still come, and there would always be something lost, be it a son, a daughter, a father, or a wise old mare who might have been the only pony in a tribe who knew their secret traditions and rituals…

Learning of this didn’t exactly cheer Speaker up, so he tried to distract himself by methodically chewing on some smoked fish.

Shimmer was less impressed with the food the crewpony had brought – being a mare of the west: “How can somepony screw up smoking a fish. Really, how is that possible?”

Speaker looked up and swallowed: “With practice… say, did you know that at one point ponies only ate plants and stuff? Like grass and flowers?”

Shimmmer burst into laughter, thinking Speaker had just tried to crack a joke. His still sour look told her that she was sorely mistaken.

“No really, I just remembered. It changed after the three-spheres cataclysm. A lot of things changed after that, can’t remember them all, but I just remembered this” Speaker mused.

Shimmer didn’t know of the three-sphere cataclysm, so Speaker gave her the short version: “After a terrible war, one of the losing parties were feeling vindictive and blew up three parts of herself, altering the reality of creation. After that, ponies everywhere turned into omnivores. Heck, if foals aren’t fed soft meats when they’re old enough to eat solid food, their brains wouldn’t develop right any more. We barely discovered that in time, otherwise a whole generation of ponies would have grown up brain-damaged”

“The first age must have been a crazy time” Shimmer said, seeing that Speaker seemed to have cheered up a little talking about the old times.

The junk took almost a week heading east upriver before it reached Nexus. It took no small amount of threats and promises to visit Nexus later to convince Cash not to have the junk dock there, but Shimmer ultimately pointed out that most of the workforce and many of the mercenaries in Nexus were devout immaculate adherents – so if nothing else, then Cash should probably spend some time developing his powers before he took on a challenge like that. They did allow about half of the crew to leave, taking one of the boats, after having them magically sworn to never reveal the exalted nature of their former masters unless given explicit personal permission.

Looking at Nexus fade into the horizon as they continued to sail east on what was now the yellow river, Speaker confided in Shimmer that while his exaltation gave him much wisdom, he sorely lacked context for most of it: “When we get to Great Forks, I need to visit a library or two – in the meantime I think I’ll spend my time learning to learn again”

“What do you mean?” Shimmer said dreamily, still acting like an awestruck teen meeting a living legend.

Speaker sighed and wondered what help Shimmer would be if she kept acting like she had up until now: “In the first age, Solars could teach lessons that would ordinarily take months, or even years, in days. Enlightened lawgivers brought wisdom to millions, spreading literacy, medical skill and language across creation to all ponies. I might have to start over, but at least remember where I have to begin. Before we reach Great Forks I will hopefully have remastered the essence patterns needed to employ the harmonious academic methodology, then I can start to teach myself and then others”

A week and a half later up the yellow river, the junk docked at Great Forks, the city of temples, with Speaker having used his new educational magic to teach every crewpony on the ship how to read and write, an impressive feat that ordinarily could easily take three to four weeks of intensive studies, but with Speaker’s magic the crewponies weren’t even interrupted in their duties; the magic teaching them as they pondered his single lesson each night before falling asleep.
Instead of disembarking like a normal pony, Shimmer turned into a seagull and flew ahead into town, saying that she knew someone who’d want to meet them.
> Chapter 5: A fork in the road
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Heart Speaker had never been to Great Forks – but he had heard a lot of things about it. Unlike Nexus, he had even heard nice things about it, mainly through all the Forkian ponies that had come to Lookshy to be trained in military matters; For several centuries, Lookshy had trained most of Great Forks’ armed forces’ officers. In return, Great Forks was famed for its medical industry; Speaker had been trained in Lookshy’s medical academy which was staffed almost entirely by highly respected and skilled Forkian ponies - and Great Forks manufactured most of Lookshy's medical supplies.

Speaker could smell it in the air, even at the docks. The scent of a thousand strange eastern herbs blew out of Great Forks on the wind, with the sweet scent of hashish mixing with countless medicinal herbs, most of which were splayed out on the flat roofs of Great Fork’s houses so they could dry in the sun.

Cash Charmer quickly found himself engulfed in a heated discussion with the port director, a water elemental in pony form from the looks of it. Cash insisted that since he was going to sell the ship anyway, that he didn’t need to pay a full week’s worth of docking fees in advance. The water elemental was less impressed, looking like a pony made of water, with dark outlines of organs, eyes and other ‘innards’ somewhat visible through its ‘flesh’ of murky water.

Speaker watched as Cash and the elemental trotted off to an office, and used the time to take stock of what was left of his medical equipment. Having patched up the enslaved village had meant using most of his bandages and disinfectants, plus a lot of his silken suture thread. Sure, soldier ants could be used as field expedient ‘living suture’ if you could make them bite down right to hold a wound shut, but where would Speaker find ants in a city? It would probably be easier to buy some thread once Cash had sold the junk.

Cash returned a while later looking strangely satisfied and soaking wet, proudly declaring that they wouldn’t have to pay any docking fees at all. He was about to trot off to look for a buyer for the ship when Shimmer returned to the docks with three ponies.

Of the ponies following Shimmer, the hooded mare in front seemed the most authoritative, even if she was the smallest of the three. There was a stern purpose to her stride, and while her off-white cloak obscured her features, there was an unmistakable seriousness to the way she carried herself, and in how her red eyes beheld all she saw – despite her stature revealing her as a young filly, making Speaker wonder if she even had her cutie mark. Even Cash seemed captivated by this mare and her pure white coat, of what little could be seem by her off-white cloak. 

The two other ponies following the hooded mare were plainer, one a mare with a grim expression and an unmistakable air of fury around her. It was the mean look on her face, her fiery orange eyes, an aggressive gait, the scars on her face and the simple but utilitarian dark clothing, the sort that a real bruiser would wear, especially since Speaker couldn’t help but notice that her combination of a dark brown coat and her dark clothing would hide blood spatters well. Decades of exposure to sensible Lookshyan dragon-blooded fashion had at least taught him that much.

The third pony was a fairly unremarkable stallion, wearing a deep straw hat that reached down so far that it obscured his face completely – a real coolie hat, typical of servants as it prevented them from looking their masters in the eyes. From how this pony dressed, he was probably just a servant to one of the others; one unremarkable beige-coated stallion in a city of those infinitely more colorful.

Shimmer approached Speaker with a big smile on her face: “Speaker, this is Sunrise Glow, Sunrise Glow, this is Bright Machine Speaker”

Sunrise Glow gave Speaker a thorough look. Speaker felt as if he was being scrutinized by a mean drill sergeant.

“Show me your caste mark” the mare said. It wasn’t a question. And Speaker could practically taste the essence linked into the command; resisting the urge to obey was not easy, but Speaker had never been one to buckle easily under stress or to unreasonable orders. Of course, thinking about it for a moment, Speaker realized that by now news of his state of being would certainly have reached Nexus, so it wouldn’t be more than a week or so, maybe even only a few days, before merchant ships would reach Great Forks and bring the news of the hundred kingdoms anathema by his name with them. With that in mind Speaker chose to throw caution in the wind for the moment and flashed his caste mark briefly, the bright golden circle on his forehead with its top inner half illuminated by the glow of a setting sun, showing Speaker to be of the Twilight caste.

The filly’s lips curled into a tight little smile, albeit not a kind one by any standard: “Very well, you will follow me, we have work to do”

The filly and her two henchponies turned around and trotted off. Speaker wasn’t entirely certain what to do or say – he hadn’t really been given the chance to ask any questions himself. Looking at Shimmer yielded little else, as she seemed perfectly content following the three, while enthusiastically gesturing for Speaker and Cash to follow.

“Okay, who’s the hood and goon squad?” Cash casually asked Speaker.

Speaker shrugged and sighed: “I have no idea. Hey Shimmer, hold up for a moment!”

Shimmer stopped and trotted back to the two Solars and cheerfully said: “Come on guys, can’t let your circle wait”

“Our circle?” Cash Charmer wondered out loud.

“I think what Shimmer means to say is that those three were also Solars – possibly our circle, the old word for a group of five Solars, one from each of the five castes” Speaker explained, looking on as the three possible Solars stopped and looked back at Speaker and Cash.

Cash frowned and rolled his eyes: “That doesn’t mean that some little filly gets to boss you around like that – or me for that matter. I see no reason to follow her anywhere. I have a junk to sell. I need some coin and a visit to a good brothel!”

Speaker was about to tentatively agree with Cash when the hooded Sunrise Glow once again stepped up to the two, looking up at them with glaring eyes that displayed the fury of a zealot preacher: “I said follow”

“Right little filly – I don’t know what rock you’ve been living under, but Speaker here doesn’t take shit from no-pony, and neither do I, Cash Charmer, for your information. If you want us for anything, tell us what and why, otherwise we’ve got better things to” Cash fired off, speaking quickly and firmly with his rebuttal, yet with a charm and sense of purpose that Speaker had only seen when Cash was ordering his crewponies around.

Sunrise Glow’s lips twisted into a snarl. While her hood – which on closer inspection looked much too big for her -  covered most of her face, and made it impossible to see her eyes properly at that moment. The bumps on her hood from her ears twisted, which when combined with her snarl revealed her annoyance for all to see. Still, she kept her voice calm and collected, even if her words dripped with venom: “You dare talk back to me? I should have your legs broken”

Cash chuckled for a moment, for getting such threats from a filly was quite amusing to him. Sunrise Glow was taken aback by this reaction to such a threat, but she in turn didn’t know of Speaker’s miraculous healing powers. Cash was quick to seize the initiative: “I’m pretty sure Speaker here can fix those faster than you can snap ‘em – but before you even get to try that you’ll have to deal with my Hoof of the Daystar style martial arts!”

Speaker found it amusing to see Cash in his element like this.

Suddenly, the grim looking mare next to Sunrise Glow perked up and embraced Cash in a great hug. She moved so quickly that nobody had time to react, like a snake striking its prey: “Good to finally meet another pony who wields the true power of the sun! But come on, Sunrise is right; it is not smart to talk about what we are in the open here. Not all spirits in the city of temples are equally happy for the return of... the sun-touched”

Having admitted to also practicing Hoof of the Daystar style, the scarred mare had pretty much revealed herself to be a Solar as well. This reassured Cash and Speaker, so they finally consented to going with Sunrise and her friends.

Cash gave a few last orders to his crewponies, mainly to enjoy their shore leave while he found them a new captain, and then him and Speaker were off.

Sunrise Glow led the motley crew from the docks to the eastern city gate, as the Great Forks port was set outside of the city proper. The ten-yard tall white-washed city wall curved around the edge of city, and Speaker knew from his medical professors that Great Forks was surrounded by a circular city wall. The gate was guarded by a unit of ‘enforcers’, the name of Great Forks’ aptly-named law enforcers. The most striking feature of them was that half of the twenty-some enforcers at the gate were obviously not ponies. They were elementals, spirits, and a couple of them were probably gods! It was easy to understand how all of the river provinces, or scavenger lands as most ponies knew them, called Great Forks a city of wonders or a city of temples.

Being a local, Sunrise Glow was let through the gate into the city with nopony asking questions. Her two followers got the same treatment. Cash was nearly submitted pulled into customs, but the dockmaster flowed up and ‘vouched’ for him… and gave him a very wet kiss. Speaker was wondering where Shimmer had disappeared to when he spotted her beyond the gate, inside the city – but he didn’t get many moments to ponder how Shimmer had slipped past the gate when he was pulled aside.

“Name, place of birth and your purpose here” a strange-looking being said. It was a spirit in the rough form of a pony, but with a body of black stone which seemed to shift, crack and reform as the spirit moved. Its eyes were as polished marble orbs, making it difficult to be sure where it was looking.

Speaker calmly took a deep breath and figured that his military record would be enough to let him through without any more questions being asked: “My name is Bright Machine Speaker, born of Lookshy, formerly of the 7th legion, 1st field force 3rd Gunzosha 1st medical scale, rank of Chuzei, now retired, here for… spiritual enlightenment”

It was difficult to see if the spirit was more impressed with Speaker’s credentials or that he’d said all of that in one breath. The 7th legion of Lookshy was known by all in the scavenger lands as the bulwark that holds back the realm – and the Gunzosha were the mortal pony elite of Lookshy, shrouded in as much legend and mystery as the rest of 7th legion itself.

Speaker might only have been a combat medic, but he had been a combat medic for the very best and had been trained accordingly, having served in the field as much as in army hospitals. It wasn’t something he spoke much of, for to become Gunzosha, a pony would sacrifice the remaining half of his or her life, by wearing magical armor that would leech power from themselves, and thus speed up their aging. Having served for almost three decades with such ponies, Speaker had seen four generations of Gunzosha wither and die before his eyes, not from wounds acquired in battle, but from wearing the very  armor that rendered them almost impossible to kill, with Speaker helpless to stop it from happening. Speaker might be proud of his service to Lookshy, but he was pained by the memories of so many good ponies having died in this way.

It turned out that the marble-eyed spirit didn’t have any ill will towards Speaker, but having revealed his military past, Speaker quickly found himself being questioned by enforcers with very obvious military fetishes – and with Lookshy being well known for having the finest military in creation with the most largest known arsenal of magical first age weapons, it was clear why the enforcers thought it interesting to gush at Speaker. Of course, having been but a mortal doctor with command over twenty nurses, a few junior doctors and a handful of orderlies, Speaker couldn’t tell of much first-hoof experience with any magical weaponry, only what he had seen other legionnaires and 7th legion dragon-blooded use. This didn’t bother the curious enforcers, but questions about the Gunzosha dredged up unpleasant memories.

Cash was quick to alert the others that Speaker was being held up by the enforcers. But when Cash and the others approached the beleaguered Speaker, something unexpected happened: A seemingly decorative fixture, an amber and gold wind-chime that hung at a door in the city wall to an enforcer office started to make far more noise than a simple wind-chime should be capable of… and the amber started to glow with a bright red light.

Normally this would not have been given any thought, indeed Sunrise Glow and her two followers didn’t seem worried, as Great Forks was well known to have so many weird and magical things in it that such almost overflowed into the gutters. The enforcers in earshot reacted quite differently, as in a flash two dozen more enforcers materialized – all spirits or god-blooded ponies, the result of ponies and spirits or gods having foals together.

What was common for all of them was that they looked confused, and some of them were visibly scared. Orders were shouted, and higher ranking enforcers demanded to know what was going on, while lower ranking enforcers kept asking for orders.

“What’s going on!?” Speaker asked, his voice half-drowned out by the enforcers hastily surrounding the gate.

A high ranking enforcer, as visible by the highly ornate silken sashes the particular spirit of vigilance was adorned with, with seven eyes sprouting from its vegetable-looking head suddenly shouted: “Okay, the sun-chimes went off – reveal yourself Solar!”

Standing right under the chime, everypony looked at Speaker, who at the moment wished that he wasn’t so damn tall.

The many-eyed spirit in colorful silks approached Speaker, while a god-blooded pony used its magic to unhook the wind-chime and float it down right next to Speaker where it started to glow brighter and make even more noise, producing a mildly annoying cacophony of monotones.

Looking at the wind-chime being waved in his face, Speaker recognized the thing as being made out of many small chimes originally made in the first age to alert servants of the approach of their Solar masters, so that they could ready themselves.

“Are you… a Solar?” the spirit said, trying to feign some level of professional aloofness, although Cash would later inform Speaker that the spirit’s voice quaked with fear, at least to those who knew how to listen for it.

Looking around, Speaker caught Cash’s eyes and looked pleadingly at him. Speaker knew that Great Forks were on good terms with Lookshy, but how would they react to the ancient rulers of creation returning? Cash only managed to shrug at the confusion before another curious enforcer blocked Speakers view to him.

Had he been given time, Speaker might have been able to evaluate the situation and what to say a little better – but since he had already spent the last few weeks coming to terms with the fact that he would soon be well known throughout the east as one of the Solar anathema, he once again flared his caste mark for a few seconds.

All of the enforcers took a step back, the eastern gate of Great Forks falling completely silent. The marble-eyed spirit’s voice broke into a fully quaking voice, quivering in fear: “I… you, we have orders to bring all Solars to an audience with the three – will you come with us willingly?”

With some quick thinking Cash had his fellow Hoof of the Daystar practitioner throw him into the crowd of enforcers surrounding Speaker. With a loud shout of “Incoming!” the mare effortlessly did so, allowing Cash to land with supernatural grace right next to Speaker, sporting a big smile and as much swagger as his captain’s outfit could muster. Aside from the surprise, then Speaker mostly found himself thinking that he very much wanted to know how Cash had landed so well…

Cash quickly got around to saying that of course his friend Lord Solar would comply, provided that he could bring his friends, flashing the enforcers a soothing grin. The spirit was visibly relieved, sweeping sweat-drops of liquid stone off its brow.

Pulling Speaker aside, Cash quickly asked if Speaker had done anything to set off the alarm. Speaker adamantly claimed innocence, pointing out that if those chimes had worked right they should have detected Sunrise Glow coming to meet them on the docks, but they actually appeared a little broken and very out of tune, so they had probably only reacted to all of them having passed through at once.

“Okay, and they want you to meet ‘the three’, any idea who that is?” Cash said with a worried tone.

Sunrise strode up and noted that ‘the three’ were the three immortal gods that ruled Great Forks: The Talespinner, the Dreamweaver and the Dayshield. 

“Okay, but if the enforcers have standing orders to bring all Solars caught at the gates before them, is it safe to go?” Speaker wondered, looking around to see if it would be possible to escape should the need arise.

Cash confidently said that he’d come along. Sunrise insisted that she and her friends come as well. The spirit with the stone-hide and marble-eyes nodded in agreement, appearing quite unsure of how to otherwise handle the requests from the ponies to follow this mysterious Solar.

The group was swiftly escorted into the city, through the streets bustling with thousands of ponies. Ragged and tired pilgrims dragged their hooves from shrine to shrine, colorfully or more often scantily dressed cultist ponies danced and sang praises to their deity of choice in full view from the street through the open doors of their temples, merchants hawked everything from idols and effigies to strange herbal mixtures and exotic euphoric powders. Travelers from all over the scavenger lands trotted about on their way to or from places, and on every street corner there was a shrine with a barker, promising enlightenment and ecstasy if you simply joined in worship at the temples they advocated for. This was Great Forks: Home to the hundred god heresy, or so said the immaculates; home to hundreds of free gods and spirits say the locals.

Speaker marveled at the colorful temples and the many different spirits and gods that walked amongst ponies, all as citizens of Great Forks. They had many strange forms, all vaguely looking like ponies, but some had bodies of leaves, while other glowed bright purple, or left strange vapor trails of light. Some had manes that seemed alive, others appeared to be made of streamers of colorful silk. How ponies could live with such wondrous beings and not constantly trip over each other as one stops and stares was beyond Speaker.

The enforcers escorting Speaker and friends led the group out into the central temple district of Great Forks. A heavy scent of incense and scented oils hung in the air, as processions to various gods snaked through the crowds of pilgrims and worshipers that went to and from the myriad of temples and shrines that filled the district. Every now and then ecstatic cultists or pilgrims could be seen being hauled off, having passed out or become ill from the excitement. This was the constant revelry that Great Forks was famous and infamous for: the city with a pleasure cult for every vice a pony could imagine and each with their own patron god. For this, Great Forks was also known as a city of decadence and endless vice, as nearly every citizen was rumored to be part of at least one pleasure cult.

In the middle of the district, Speaker was led up the stairs to one of the three main gates to the grand temple of the three – the temples and homes of the three gods that ruled over Great Forks. This was the largest temple complex of the city, dwarfing everything else in Great Forks as it stood in the center of the city. The group entered through the gate to the fane of the weaver of dreams of victory, a grand structure that reached for the skies with silvery spires as if to pluck dreams directly from the moonlight at night.

Inside, it was clear that the temple also doubled as the seat of government, as Speaker and his friends were led past a lot of office space where dozens of clerks worked, into a room furnished with large cushions to sit on, and low tables with cups standing ready with hot, sweet smelling tea – the room obviously meant for audiences and meetings.

The enforcers closed the door after Sunrise Glow and her two followers had entered, stating that the three would meet the Solar momentarily in the chamber.

Speaker looked around while sitting on one of the cushions. The tea was sickeningly sweet, and the walls were decorated with drapes embroidered with text that spelled out the story of Great Forks’ founding in every language known to pony kind – with Speaker only recognizing the rivertongue and old realm, even if he couldn’t read the old realm embroidery.

“Hey, they even have the story written in sea-tongue!” Shimmer exclaimed, subsequently chuckling at the botch-job whoever had translated the story had done: “Oh this is rich. I think they got this wrong, or they're ruled by the bayshield and the weaver of scallops”

Noticing that Sunrise Glow was looking very intently around the room, Speaker finally found time to ask the hooded filly what she was thinking ordering him and Cash around so casually. Turning to Speaker, Sunrise calmly stated: “You aren’t the first pony coming to Great Forks with claims of have exalted by the light of Celestia. I exalted three weeks ago by grace of Celestia to walk amongst ponies as her prophet, so I needed to know if you were telling the truth”

Speaker and Cash both cocked an eyebrow upon hearing this. Cash was quickest to voice his thoughts: “Right, that still doesn’t give you the right to boss us around little lady”

Sunrise Glow threw her hood back, revealing a very young filly. Speaker again wondered if she even had her cutie mark, even if the filly sure did look cute as button.

“As I said, I exalted three weeks ago, as I was finishing my indoctrination into the cult of the illuminated. I got this at the same time” Sunrise noted, lifting up her robe up around her right flank, revealing a golden sunburst as her cutie mark.

Sunrise Glow explained that her exaltation came with a vision from Celestia to restore faith in her: “…but to worship Celestia is not something you do in public here. The enforcers have cracked down on the cult of the illuminated twice already”

Cash’s face soured: “So wait, the city of a hundred creeds won’t let ponies worship the most high? That doesn’t make sense”

“Have you not heard the baleful story of the Fields of Kumu?” Sunrise’s servant pony humbly commented, citing the story that many travelling immaculates liked to tell.

The story of the Fields of Kumu was a nasty one, and favored by the immaculates to show why worship of Celestia was bad and why worship of the immaculate dragons was good. Cash had not heard of this story, having purposely avoided ever speaking immaculate monks, him explaining his choice of ignorance with “They’re bad for business, they say their faith doesn’t allow you to hang a sign over your store with a picture of what you sell – they say it’ll lead to idolatry, but so few ponies can read… so a sign where you write what your business is just doesn’t work, so I've always avoided them out of principle”

“Well then, I will tell you the story” Sunrise Glow started, giving Cash a quick and abbreviated version: It had happened a long time ago, in territories then ruled by a warlord known as Blue Iron Hoof. A farmer named Kumu of the Apple who had fallen on tough times had prayed to Celestia and was rewarded the next morning when the sun shined unnaturally brightly on his apple orchard, which had suddenly grown a full and ripe crop of apples overnight. Such instant wealth through divine intervention made the fields surrounding the orchard quite famous, leading to a grand influx of pilgrims and worshipers seeking similar favor from Celestia. Then a few months later the whole area was annihilated by heavenly spirits that struck down everypony with bright fire, despite their only offense being their prayers to the most holy Unconquered Sun.

The servant pony noted that in Nexus the story was often used to demonstrate how unpredictable and dangerous worship of Celestia was, compared to the ‘obviously safe’ and divinely just immaculate dragons. There were other similar tales, all well known in societies where immaculate monks and priests preached. Sunrise Glow added that such events shouldn’t be able to happen at all, so something was most certainly wrong: “I want to see an end to that chaos. Praying to Celestia has been fraught with strange or dangerous results like that for far too long!”

“That would be nice, but that is not the matter to discuss right now” A strange but undeniably soothing and authoritative voice said. It sounded faint but distinct, like a chorus of ten thousand soldiers speaking calmly as one, coming from the now open door into the meeting room.

Everypony turned to look at the direction of the voice and were met with the sight of a mighty god in the guise of an armored pony. It was black-maned and with a coat of silver runes, wearing a suit of bright incandescent red armor that seemed ready to defy any attack brought against it – and the armor seemed to be as much part of the god’s body as the silver runes, with a cutie mark in the form of a red shield with a glowing silver aura on its flank-plates. At her sides were two slightly curved sabers in red, wooden sheaths. This was the god known as Shield of A Different Day, the Dayshield, one of the three.

Sunrise Glow immediately threw herself on the ground. Cash and the servant bowed deeply. Sunrise’s other friend, the thuggish looking mare, simply bowed her head in respect. Speaker didn’t really know how to react; etiquette had never really been his strong suit, and meeting gods face to face was not something he had ever really done before. Looking around at the others, Speaker suddenly felt a painful tug in his beard as Shimmer yanked his head down to her level, forcing him to bow his head.

“Rise, especially you, Lord Solar – for I would much rather see you as an equal on this most auspicious of days” the Dayshield said, lifting everypony’s spirits simply by her presence, her kind eyes of gray stone warming everypony with her gaze like a charismatic warlord giving comfort to his soldiers.

Speaker looked around at his companions, as if to ask why they didn't get up as well since most of them were also Solars, then got up and nodded politely at the Dayshield: “If you say so, your holiness”

The Dayshield chuckled: “So humble – but tell me Lord Solar, what is your name and what brings you to Great Forks?”

“I, uhm… I'm Bright Machine Speaker, and I think my friend here can explain that much better” Speaker somewhat clumsily said, gesturing towards Cash Charmer with his right hoof.

With the attention focused on him, Cash really wished that he’d had some time to get some new clothes – the dead captain’s old clothes were okay, but by no means suitable for an audience with a deity. Still, he cranked up his charms and politely explained that he was but a merchant, son of a barge captain, doing his business in the hundred kingdoms when he came across the then mortal pony Heart Speaker, at which point Speaker received the blessing of Celestia: “This had the unfortunate effect of having both of us accused of being anathema, so we fled to the river of tears. Speaker procured a ship, and then we sailed here for a safe haven”

“Such a tale is common here; Great Forks receives hundreds of ponies every year that flee persecution due to their choice of faith. If you choose to abide by our laws, then you are welcome to stay” the Dayshield stated, Speaker feeling great relief.

Appearing out of nowhere, a handsome-looking stallion with a graying mane, sun-bleached and travel-worn clothes and countless small baubles and talismans filtered into his mane and hanging around his neck, suddenly stood next to the Dayshield, with a glowing aura of sunflower-yellow revealing the stallion’s divine nature: “That is nice, but I personally find this Charmer’s tale of fiction more entertaining”

Looking at this oddly plain-looking god, then at Cash, Speaker wasn’t sure what to do. Luckily, the Dayshield acted first: “Oh come now Talespinner, it doesn’t matter where the two are from – I for one believe that they fled to seek a safe haven here, and that’s all that matters”

“Shimmer, who’s this guy?” Speaker quietly whispered to Shimmer, who’d also gotten up now that the ponies had started talking.

Shimmer gave the pony with the yellow aura a look over: “That would be the Spinner of Glorious Tales, another of Great Forks’ ruling gods”

Bowing deeply, the Talespinner gave off a smile that visibly emanated with a calm and confident demeanor in form of slight flecks of light, while his eyes glinted with crystalline excitement: “Oh, guilty as charged – and might I say, what a well-traveled pony you are young la- well, okay, young-looking lady”

Speaker quickly noted the raised eyebrow Shimmer got as the Talespinner seemed to discern her true age.

“Oh you think she’s interesting, I’ve seen those three’s dreams” a third voice spoke, sounding like smooth velvet on the ears. It was a deep and husky voice, and it came from another goddess as it materialized, revealing a being that was – compared to the Dayshield – far more obviously not a mortal pony. The god had a form made of the solidified expectations of all those around her: She appeared as an amalgam of all mares that each individual beholder had ever seen, but with a mane of sleek black liquid that flowed down around her into a long voluminous dress that seemed to fade into nothing as it trailed after her.

Speaker recognized his mother’s eyes, a mouth that curled just like his oldest sister, Shimmer’s nose and small cute ears of one of the fillies at the village Speaker had lived in until he had exalted… it was a strange sight, and yet oddly pleasing to look at – as if one was trying to imagine the mare of one’s dreams.

“So, who’s this?” Speaker turned to ask Sunrise Glow. To his surprise he found Sunrise looking worried.

Audibly swallowing and even revealing a slight shiver through her off-white robes, Sunrise Glow had to fight to exert no small amount of self control at the sight of this third god: “That, Bright Machine Speaker, is her highness the Weaver of Dreams of Victory, known to the common ponies as the Dreamweaver”

Having snuck in Speaker’s name, he didn’t feel like he had to introduce himself again to the gods – something Sunrise Glow would later berate him for – but Speaker bluntly cut right to the chase: “Okay, so you’re the three. Now tell me why you wanted to see me”
> Chapter 6: News from The Island
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Heart Speaker – or should he go exclusively by the name Bright Machine Speaker now? He really needed to decide on that, but this wasn’t the time to ponder such things – stood before the three gods that ruled the city-state of Great Forks. Around him were his friends Cash Charmer and Last Shimmer, as well the stern solar filly Sunrise Glow and her two henchponies, one of which was probably also a solar, although the three gods did not appear to know that.

The Talespinner cleared his throat – his yellow aura fluttering slightly: “Well my good Lord Solar, if you would let me tell you a little story that I heard while in Lookshy a few days ago…”

Speaker, being from Lookshy, started to feel a little trapped: Was the Talespinner going to tell the story of how Speaker had supposedly tried to kill the prince of a hundred kingdom’s Daimyo? Maybe the god was going to accuse Speaker of coming to Great Forks to kill them? Nodding slightly, Speaker beckoned the god to tell his story.

“I was just enjoying myself in a tea house in Lookshy’s market district when the news broke, a messenger running by, shouting quite loudly…” the Talespinner began.

Feeling a quick tug on his shirt, Speaker looked down to see Sunrise Glow whispering to him in a grave tone of voice: “Never disturb a god drinking tea – never!”

Without fully understanding the seriousness of Sunrise Glow’s little lesson, Speaker just nodded and looked back at the Talespinner.

“The news was quite interesting – and those who heard it around me had very mixed reactions. The news? The Scarlet Empress is gone” the Talespinner said, with an almost sad tone to his voice, but only almost.

There was a very pregnant pause following this bombshell. The Scarlet Empress, ruler of the Realm – gone? Was she dead? How? When? Where? The Bloody Red Queen of the Equestrian Realm, the most hated despot in creation, gone? Speaker took a step back, first looking at the three – they seemed calm… but that figured, as they would have known this already. Looking around himself Speaker saw that his friends were more on his level: Cash Charmer appeared lost in thought, no doubt pondering how to exploit this news. Shimmer was far more exuberant, leaping in Speaker’s arms: “Oh this is wonderful! With the empress gone the realm won’t stand a chance against the return of the Solars!”

“Well, yes and no – that’s still an unknown” the Dayshield said, clarifying that the Scarlet Empress had been revealed to have gone missing at the new year celebrations at Calibration five years ago, the story first leaking now as it had become impossible to hide the fact any longer. What exactly had happened to her Scarletness was actually unknown.

Now, the Scarlet Empress had quite a reputation. Many wondered if she was immortal. She was a dragon-blooded unicorn pony who had, up until her disappearance, lived and ruled the realm of Equestria for over seven hundred years – with even the most powerful of dragon-blooded usually not living beyond three hundred before dying from old age. Her power had been unrivaled, despite her inability to see the river provinces of the east properly conquered during her reign.

“The noble houses of Equestria are reacting to the news in... interesting ways – we’ve gotten reports of a lot of realm legions being recalled to the isle. I’m guessing that the houses are gearing up for a civil war for the throne” the Dayshield added, her voice hinting of both interest in the battles that might fall under her purvey as god of battles fought without bloodshed but via diplomacy, but also worry as the fighting might spread from the blessed isle to the rest of creation.

Speaker thought about these facts for a few moments. It made sense. Of what he’d learnt of the realm as part of his life and education in Lookshy, then the Scarlet Empress had been very good at centralizing power and giving it all to herself, making it impossible for would-be usurpers to get rid of her. But with her gone… there’s nobody in control. This did lead Speaker to one question: “Right, so you brought me here to tell me this? Or… what?”

The Talespinner smiled, appearing amused over Speaker’s bluntness. The Dreamweaver fluttered over in front of Speaker, her hooves not moving but merely floating over the polished stone floor: “No, my dear Solar – we want to know if you had anything to do with this.”

Again there was a silence in the room. Speaker dared not look away from the entrancing eyes of the Dreamweaver – it was as if her eyes were drilling into his very soul.

Cash was quick to react to this: “I can assure you that he did not. Speaker exalted a little over a month ago in the hundred kingdoms – and I’ve been with him the whole time, there’s no way he could have made off with her Scarletness five years ago – at least not as a Solar”

The three gods nodded intermittently, signifying their various degrees of believing what Cash was saying.

“Very well, the only reason we wished to know of this was because the danger that harboring the abductor of the empress would pose” the Dayshield said, sounding understandably apologetic.

With these unpleasantries out of the way, the three said that Speaker and his followers were free to leave, with the added detail that Speaker should inform one of their officials of where he was staying, as they might have an offer for his services ready in a few days.

Speaker would have tried to graciously accept and leave, but Cash and Sunrise both managed to stop Speaker before he accepted anything. The Three left, fading into nothing as they resumed their duties, politely bowing as they dematerialized.

Leaving the temple, Speaker was approached by a very disinterested-looking pony, the official from the ministry of residency. Pulling out a wax-covered tablet with a hoof and holding a writing stylus pulled from ornate leather saddlebags with his mouth, the pony said that he had been instructed to get where Speaker was living while in Great Forks, and in the case of Speaker not having a place to live then he had been authorized to set up housing for him.

Speaker was about to graciously accept the offer of free housing, but Sunrise Glow quickly stated that Speaker was staying with her in the north quarter of the city.

“Really? Are you certain you would not prefer a town house in the eastern quarter?” The official asked Speaker, seemingly ignoring the hooded filly trying to speak for the Solar.

Again answering for Speaker, Sunrise Glow reasserted that Speaker would be staying with her.

Speaker couldn’t get himself to tell Sunrise to shut up, although he would honestly have preferred to choose himself - he wasn't even sure what he was passing up on.

Walking up through the crowds of the temple district, with colorful powders being flung left and right, euphoric singers and dancers at every shrine and an endless sea of noise it was difficult to see where one was going. However, the moment they left the temple district and trotted into the northern district, Speaker suddenly understood why the official suggested that he live in another part of town: The northern quarter was a slum.

Densely-packed  tenements and slave dormitories took up most of the district. What few shops and stalls there were appeared to cater mostly to the fruit-tenders, street sweepers and building washers that lived in the district – there were a lot of tool makers, rag vendors and sellers of soap along the streets. There were equally long columns of slaves walking to and from their dormitories, led by pony slave-drivers clad in rough leather garbs, holding whips in their mouths.

If Speaker felt uneasy with going into the slums, Cash appeared positively repulsed. Indeed, even with his worn pirate captain outfit, Cash looked very out of place. The ponies that looked on as Sunrise Glow led her two henchponies along with Speaker, Shimmer and Cash were dressed mostly in grey and brown sack cloth, if wearing anything at all, as most of the slaves wore nothing at all, displaying their shame for all to see.

Sunrise Glow led the group into the courtyard of an apartment building behind a thick wooden gate. Okay, calling it apartments was a stretch: It was the courtyard of a large and filthy tenement, in the middle of which was a small shrine… or a wooden shed, with a few banners hung on its walls. Laundry and other knick-knack hung out of the largely shutter-less windows facing the courtyard and the ground around the shrine was littered with trash and splatterings of pony droppings and dirty dish-water, as well as anything else anyone just chucked out their window when they didn’t need it anymore.

Speaker sympathized with Cash as he recalled the gleaming palaces of crystal and gems him and his fellow Solars had lived in back in the first age.

Opening the door to the shed, Sunrise Glow ushered the others inside. A big brownish candle with a thick wick stood in one corner, giving off an uncomfortable odor, while the rest of the shrine appeared to be decorated with exceedingly humble hoof-made figures and idols, all venerating the many aspects of Celestia, the most high of the gods. The shrine was roughly four by six yards, with barely enough room for all six ponies along with the sparse furniture and decorations.

“Okay, this is just sad” Cash said, shaking his head.

Ignoring what Cash had said, Sunrise Glow trotted up behind a wooden alter and floated up a stick to slide open a hatch in the roof of the shed, allowing a beam of sunlight to fall down on the altar. Speaker quickly recognized that the altar and the hatch were set so the noonday sun would always hit the altar.

Pulling down her hood, Sunrise glow revealed a luxurious, long and bright orange mane that had previously been hidden quite well by having it tied up in buns around the back of her head: “Finally some privacy – I wish we could have gotten here before the enforcers picked you up Speaker, but at least we’re here now”

“So… formal introductions?” Speaker said, looking first at Sunrise Glow, then at the two other ponies next her and Cash Charmer.

“An excellent idea” said the thuggish-looking dark-brown mare as she stepped forward with a single heavy stomp.

Activating her caste mark, Red proudly declared with a voice fit for commanding legions: “I am Red, daughter of Chung Deep Root, the warlord and Shogun of the Chung lands in the hundred kingdoms – and by Celestia I am exalted of the Dawn caste”

“Shouldn’t that be Chung Red if you’re from a house of nobility or repute?” Cash wondered.

Red’s eyes soured slightly, looking down for a moment before they rose again to meet Cash’s gaze: “Many years ago, during a sparring match with my late older brother, the then heir, I accidentally, well... killed him. Well… he died, it was an accident, I swear, but my father the Shogun didn’t have a choice:  I could either commit seppuku or flee into exile, so I don't use my family name while in self-imposed exile. I am dead to my family either way. Been living as a mercenary since, exalted a while ago, and now I’m here” 

Red added that she certainly intended to earn her name again – or possibly an even better one – as Sunrise had apparently suggested.

“Why not let our guests introduce themselves” Sunrise Glow suggested, looking at Cash, Shimmer and Speaker from behind the altar.

Cash motioned for Speaker to introduce himself first, and so Speaker explained his plight – recounting most of what had happened up until arriving in Great Forks, ending with him noting that he was exalted of the Twilight Caste. Red was impressed by his military record, and Speaker agreed to tell Red all about it at a later date. Speaker explained that he would like to see more intelligent solutions to wars and conflict between ponies, as he felt that there was far too much ignorance and stupidity muddying the waters of creations in this age.

Last Shimmer then spoke up, flashing her caste mark which was a round, empty circle of silvery moonlight on her brow: “My name is Last Shimmer, of the Sun King Seneschals – the faction of Lunars that held on hope for the return of the Solars. By the fickle mare of the moon I am exalted in the No Moon caste”

“Factions of Lunars?” Sunrise quizzically asked.

Shimmer explained that over the thousands of years with no Solars, many Lunars either lost hope or accepted that they had to plan for a future with no Solars – so many currently operate with plans that do not account for or need Solar intervention or assistance: “…this might also mean that not all of them will be too happy to hear of you lot by the way, just so you know”
Cash chuckled a little and flashed his caste mark: “They’ll learn to accept us – or we’ll just make them. Speaking of which, I am Cash Charmer, of the Eclipse caste”

“Seriously? Then we’re all here! This is great!” Red announced triumphantly, looking over at Sunrise Glow with a big smile on her somewhat scared face.

Having essentially revealed that there was a perfect circle of Solars present, Speaker, Cash and Shimmer all looked at the straw hat-wearing stallion. Who was he? He had been silent since they had met, except during his comment in the temple of the three about what he’d heard from immaculate monks in Nexus.

“Come on, if you can’t show them, who can you?” Red bluntly stated, floating the straw hat off the stallion’s head. The beige-coated stallion, with a short-cropped mane and long flat tail, gave Red a mean stare.

“Very well, I guess that fate means us to work together” the stallion said, looking down as he reached up with a hoof and… changed his face… no wait, there were some clicking sounds, and suddenly the previously plain looking stallion had a short-cropped tail and he was wearing some kind of golden helmet or mask. Around the stallion’s face was a mask of angular plates that Speaker was certain were orichalcum. A magic mask that changed the color of your coat and mane? From the looks of it, it had probably even changed the appearance of the stallion’s face. Speaker found this most impressive, although he did wonder what the pony really looked like under the mask.

“I am Sullen Hoof, Night caste – master chef from Nexus” the stallion declared with a stern and proud voice of an indeterminate river province accent, bowing gracefully as the mark of the Night caste appeared on his brow, a symbol identical to Shimmer’s, only it was golden instead of silvery.

Red laughed: “Master chef? Come now, you can do so much more than cook – besides, you were never formally educated as one, so you can’t really say you’re a master”

“Okay, so I’m also a con-pony, forger, thief, contortionist and… let me think… oh yes! Master Chef, by the will of the heavens” Sullen Hoof declared, looking a bit like a thief proudly announcing a list of his misdeeds to a judge.

“Okay, thief and chef – how does that work?” Cash wondered. Speaker already had a fairly good idea, for Sullen Hoof’s introduction had stirred memories of legendary feasts in the first age.

Sullen Hoof explained that his skills of deception, disguise and trickery were originally developed as he had always aspired to be a chef, but had never had the proper credentials to work under the great chefs in Nexus’s more famous restaurants: “But a fake signature here, a stolen apprentice outfit there and they’ll let anyone into their kitchens. I have worked with some of the greatest chefs outside of the realm, although they never knew who I really was. It was through them I was introduced to their cult of Robed in Splendor, the chairman of fine cuisine… and as fate would have it the immaculate raided the cult that night, but it was also there I exalted and was subsequently chased out of Nexus, arriving here a few weeks ago”

“Robed in Splendor – I remember him, have you had contact with him since?” Speaker wondered.

Sullen Hoof nodded, explaining that the god of fine cuisine indeed did come to him after he had left Nexus, agreeing to train him in an ancient martial art: “And so, by the will of heaven, I will master the Orichalcum Chef Style, and I will become the greatest chef in creation!”

Speaker nodded respectfully, for he was already salivating at the memories of what Sullen Hoof had cooked up in the first age using that style.

“Oh come on, kung-fu cooking? That’s just silly. Why not practice some real martial arts, instead of throwing around rolling pins” Cash said laughing, finding the whole idea quite ridiculous.

Sullen Hoof sized up Cash and shook his head, then reared up and stomped down his fore hooves hard: “Fool! You can assault any pony with your hooves, but I can defeat anything with a tongue and a nose by assaulting their senses – when I have mastered this style, shoguns and guild factors alike will throw themselves at my hooves to just get a whiff of what I create. I will take their greed and vanity and use it against them to make them suffer as those they subjugate – all of creation will be at the mercy of the rolling pins I throw around”

Raising a hoof as if to make a rebuttal, Cash paused: “...Ya, okay, but I will reserve judgment for when I actually try some of your cooking”

Sunrise Glow finished the show and tell session by once again introducing herself as a Zenith caste Solar, with a mission from Celestia to restore faith in the most high.

“Well you’re sure doing a dandy job, with this most resplendent of temples you have here” Cash snarked.

Sunrise calmly explained that she and the cult of the illuminated, the cult that she was part of – and since her exaltation, defacto leader of this local chapter – had been petitioning the ministry of worship for a larger shrine for months, but had always been turned down.

“Ya, the Dayshield said she didn’t want to talk about that back at our little audience” Speaker recalled.

Cash nodded, adding that for the love of Celestia: “Speaker, you don’t get to talk anymore when we deal with heads of state, gods or anyone else for that matter. Ever. You have the blunt social grace of a sack of onions, just saying”

“Speaking of being blunt…” Speaker retorted, giving Cash a raised eyebrow.

Cash sighed and put a friendly hoof on Speaker’s shoulders: “Speaker, friend, you read like an open book – and I don’t know what the three have planned for you, but if there’s going to be any negotiations for what they want, I want to head up those negotiations”

Speaker begrudgingly conceded to Cash’s point, although Cash was far from done: “I’ve seen you ‘haggle’ with inn-keepers… you’re a pony pleaser who tries to ameliorate all ponies, but business is all about getting the best deal, which means that someone will ultimately have to get a bad deal”

“Alright, have mercy – I’m a doctor, not a diplomat” Speaker said, yielding to Cash’s verbal barrage.

What followed was an uncomfortable silence as the six celestial exalted ponies had to start coming up with ideas on what to do next…

To break the silence Shimmer turned into a seagull and flew up and landed on Speaker’s head. If it hadn’t been for her having braided his long black mane she could probably have nested in it.

“How about lunch?” Sullen Hoof suggested, everyone quickly agreeing – Shimmer screeching since she was a seagull, but she appeared to nod as well.

The circle of Solars left the shed and entered into what appeared to be where Sunrise Glow, Red and Sullen Hoof were currently living… and it wasn’t much of an improvement from the shed. It was one of the apartments, on the third story, facing the courtyard. The apartment was roughly the same size as the shed, with one window and one door out. A tiny fireplace probably allowed for some heating, although not much, and a bucket in the corner allowed for… relief, when needed. There were four bedrolls spread out on the floor, taking up most of the space, although there would be room for six if need be.

Cash once again asked out loud: “We passed up free accommodations in a town house… to this?”

“I see no reason why we need to indulge – we have a roof over our head, and Sullen Hoof can cook quite well on a sandal-string budget” Sunrise pointed out.

That was it. Cash had endured quite enough at the hoof of this little upstart filly. How she had exalted as a Solar was beyond him, but this? This was too much: “Okay little filly – here’s what we are going to do. Me and Speaker are going to march down to the ministry of housing, get a nice place to stay, while you lot can stay here with your bucket and bedrolls. I did not exalt to lower my standards of living. I have a ship to sell, and I’ll at the very least use some of that money to get a nice new tang-zhuang-style silk jacket and nice new shoes. Come on, Speaker”

To say that Speaker felt torn would be an understatement. On one side he could very well understand Cash taking issue with staying in a slum – but at the same time, Speaker really didn't want to split up his circle! They were meant to be together! He could remember them working great wonders back in the first age, so letting simple problems like where to stay get in the way of such things seemed silly.

“Come on Cash – do you think we plan to stay here forever? We only stayed here waiting for you lot – well, waiting for Shimmer and Speaker. She came here a while ago, found us, said she was looking for her Solar mate, said she’d be back in a few weeks – we’ve been waiting for you before deciding our next move” Sullen Hoof exclaimed, suddenly darting up in front of Cash Charmer with great speed, blocking the door out.

Cash remained adamant that he wanted to sell the boat and at least get some better clothes, but accepted that staying at the tenement, as it clearly wasn’t meant to be permanent.

What followed was Sullen Hoof pulling a pair of saddlebags out of elsewhere, which turned out to be full of fruits, vegetables and rice: “All politely donated by the central slave dormitory kitchen. The manager thins the stews they make for the slaves as much as possible, taking home all the good stuff. I’ve been having fun stealing it back, keeping the slaves well fed and keeping  enough to feed the rest of us”

Speaker was impressed, Shimmer even more so – as she changed back into a pony and commended Sullen Hoof on his efforts.

“Please, call me Sully” the pink-maned stallion said with a smile.

While Shimmer and Sullen worked together to make lunch, Red and Speaker got talking while Sunrise Glow had to leave on an errand.

Red wanted to know more about Speaker’s military career, finding Speaker’s very limited experience with ponies in magical power-armor endlessly fascinating. Speaker’s experience with the power armor mainly consisted of removing it to get to the injuries of the unicorns inside, something that was very difficult to do in the field without either damaging the precious armor or the injured pony inside. Still, Red was quite intrigued.

Speaker on the other hand was curious about Red’s name: “You said your father was called Chung Deep Root?”

“That sparing accident, it was many years ago, back when I was just a little filly. My father trained all of his foals how to fight from an early age. I’ve worked for several mercenary outfits since then, exalting a month and a half ago when I was on patrol and we got ambushed by the same bandits we’d been hired to kill off. The fang I was in was wiped out, except me, I got knocked out” Red began.

Speaker listened intently, Red reminding him of so many 7th legion ponies retelling war stories, as Red explained how she was then taken to the bandit chief and offered to tell where the rest of her mercenary outfit was camped in exchange for her life, lest she become a camp-mare to be passed around for all the stallions there to relieve themselves in. Then she exalted, choosing never take the coward’s option: “It got messy, but none of the bandits lived to tell about it. I took what valuables they had and bought passage here, arrived just in time to meet Shimmer”

“Okay, but what does this have to do with your name?” Speaker wondered.

Red shrugged and bellowed out a hearty laughter: “Isn’t it obvious!? I’ve never had a cute-cenera. Red is my foal name”
“Well, shouldn’t you then choose an adult name?” Speaker again wondered.

Red shook her head: “I lost part of my name once. If I am to get a new one I’ll earn it”

While he was about to comment that exalting as a Solar was as good an excuse as any to pick a new name, Shimmer announced that lunch was served. Sunrise Glow returned shortly thereafter, informing the circle that the other illuminate cultists had been informed of their arrival and would like to meet them all at sundown at the shrine.

“Hopefully not inside it – there won’t be room” Cash commented. Sunrise Glow ignored the comment while Red and Shimmer both giggled.

Over lunch the circle agreed on an at least a temporary plan on what to do. Sully needed a few days to wrap up some loose ends in the slave barrack food distribution administration to expose the corrupt manager, and Sunrise along with Cash both seemed to ponder how to best utilize everypony’s strengths and abilities best.

Speaker was quick to point out that as Solars, in a world largely either hostile or at best indifferent to what they were, then they needed a safe base of operations, supply lines and a long-term plan. Red was quick to joke how Speaker was sounding like some would-be general.

“No, not general. I don’t lead ponies into battle – can’t stand to fight when there’s no need for it” Speaker noted.

Red was just as quick to point out that the ‘need’ to fight was a very vague concept, but Speaker explained that generals and whatnot tended to decide when to send ponies to their death: “I prefer to keep ponies alive. I’ll fight in self-defense, to defend others, but not to conquer”

“And yet you speak of bases of operations and supply lines as if planning a war” Cash commented, chewing on a very tasty mix of rice and some sort green bean paste that had been seasoned with things Cash didn’t know the name of – but it sure was tasty.

Speaker explained that by base of operations he meant a safe place they either hide or fight from when the wyld hunt would come.

“Hold on, wyld hunt? You never said anything about a wyld hunt being after you.” Sunrise said, sounding a bit like a very young grandmother disappointed over hearing that unwanted guests would be showing up at her dinner party.

Shimmer told of how Speaker’s name would soon be well known throughout the scavenger lands due to the circumstances of his fight with a Daimyo’s son. Sunrise noted that this would complicate things, but Sullen Hoof added that it wasn’t all bad: “Remember, the brightest light casts the darkest shadows – so if Speaker becomes known as a Solar, it might be easier to hide our activities by passing them off as his”

“That’s brilliant – why didn’t I think of that?” Cash said, his mouth half-full of tasty green bean paste and rice.
Speaker said that he would like to visit the house of learning in the temple district. He’d heard of it back when he studied medicine in Lookshy, since his teachers were from Great Forks, and now that he’d exalted it was clear to him that his knowledge of history and recent events was sorely lacking.

Red couldn’t see the point in such studies – but Speaker explained: “I remember almost everything my past incarnation did. My head is full of priceless trivia and knowledge from the first age. But if that information is to be of any use to us, I need to know at least roughly what happened since my past life ended and my mortal life began. I remember cities, fortresses, names, locations, gods that owed the past me favors – but if I don’t know where they are now, then I’m of little use beyond patching you up after a fight”

Sunrise agreed that bringing Speaker up to speed wouldn’t be a bad idea – as she was actually very curious about the history of the Solars. The two agreed that Speaker would spend some time in the house of learning and then give the rest of the circle a nice history of everything as he remembered it.

“You sure you can learn that much in just a few days?” Sullen Hoof wondered. Speaker explained the nature of his educational charm as well as the fact that a Twilight caste exaltation automatically grants great knowledge and insight into history and lore, so this wouldn’t be as much learning new things, as it would be a quick brush-up of things he already knew.
“What’ll you be doing in the mean time then?” Shimmer enthusiastically asked Red as they were finished the meal.

Red glanced at Sunrise, the filly nodding back at Red. Red then explained that the illuminate cultists had, ever since Sunrise Exalted, been ‘bothered’ by local north district gangs who had been harassing the cult for protection money, with the alternative being the cult leaving Great Forks: “I can’t determine if they’re being paid by the enforcers or the three to just keep worship of Celestia down, or if it’s just a gang trying to shake the cult down, but I’ve been having great fun beating them senseless and then handing them over to the enforcers – but they always show up again, so they’ve either paid off the enforcers or there’s something fishy going on”

Cash noted that he could be very persuasive, especially if Red could catch some of the gang-ponies, so Cash could give them the choice between submitting to an oath never to attack the cultists again, plus them telling the circle what was going on, or... worse. If they were to break this oath they would suffer an unfortunate accident that would most certainly cripple the pony for life. Explaining how his magic oaths worked, Red eagerly agreed that Cash’s idea sounded good, as it would solve the problem with the gangs both in the short term but also on the long term.

Speaker felt that it was a bit harsh, but could understand the necessity when dealing with violent thugs – if all they understood and dealt in was violence, then talking to them in the same language wasn’t that unreasonable.

Cash, as he’d already stated, would spend the time selling his junk – adding that he would try to make those profits increase with a little day-trading, to at the very least buy some nicer accommodations for the cult and the circle.
> Chapter 7: Oldest Story Told
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

By the end of the day, Cash Charmer had managed to sell the pirate ship, crew and everything, to a local merchant house. Speaker never did learn how much money Cash got from the deal, as he was busy brushing up on the history of creation and whatnot in the house of learning, but he did understand that the crew had been sworn to serve its new captain faithfully.

The scholars in the house of learning were a strange mix. There were mortal ponies studying simply to enlighten themselves, but there were also lesser gods of various kinds of knowledge, some of which used parts of the house of learning as their spiritual sanctums and personal libraries. Equally, then Speaker quickly concluded that calling the place a ‘house’ was a gross understatement: The house of learning in Great Forks was a giant structure with almost countless wings and additional structures constantly being added, each containing multiple libraries, study halls and auditoriums where ponies from all over creation were reading, studying or writing tomes and scrolls on nearly every subject of academia imaginable. The whole place looked like a single library that had metastasized and grown uncontrollably upwards and outwards. It was a marvel that any of Celestia’s light reached the inner halls at all through their stained windows.

Apparently the place was popular for quite a number of reasons: Only the realm and Lookshy had libraries of equal size and content, but they both regulated the access and use of them, although for very different reasons. The house of learning allowed for studies of nearly anything, with the exception of anything involving demons or other topics that could endanger Great Forks. The catch was that would-be scholars had to fund their own studies, limiting the house of learning to ponies who either had a sponsor or saddlebags full of silver bits.

For Speaker, getting into the house of learning proved remarkably easy – but that also came with a price. At the gate he flashed his caste mark and honestly declared his intentions: To update himself on what had happened since the first age, so what he remembered from the past could be put to better use.

This caused a riot amongst the historians present in the house of learning, as Speaker found himself mobbed by ponies that were endlessly curious to learn of the first age – and some were apparently willing to literally step over others to get at Speaker first. As enforcers broke up the mob Speaker found himself in the office of the headmaster of the house of learning.

The office was decorated much like the rest of the house of learning. There were long, narrow tapestries covering the walls from ceiling to floor, each with a litany, prayer or koan to encourage and glorify academic achievement and the divinity of true enlightenment. Of what furniture there was in the office, most of it was wooden cabinets and shelves filled with scrolls of ancient wisdom. They were all decorated with lavish carvings that resembled spirits and ponies that playfully appeared to write on endless scrolls that would coil around them.

The headmaster turned out to be the very god of libraries. By Speaker’s reckoning, such a position probably wasn’t a fancy position to hold up in Yu-Shan, in heaven – so taking on a more direct position in Great Forks was probably infinitely more rewarding on a personal level. Appearance-wise, the god looked like a dragon with scales made of sheets of paper, each containing writings from every piece of literature that had ever been made and stored in a library. The god was roughly three times the length of a pony, making its serpentine body quite imposing, but its appearance made it look as if were made from living origami, except its eyes, which were swirls of rainbow ink and its whiskers of calligraphy brush hairs that kept dripping on the floor.

Explaining his plight, the god appeared sympathetic, but also very strict and incredibly well organized – to the point that the god had apparently developed its own unique divine indexing system for all the scrolls and tomes in the house of learning. It was so keen on indexing and proper labeling that the god had no name beyond ‘God of libraries’. It was also greatly interested in having Speaker look through many of the older documents or copies of ancient tomes, to verify the truthfulness of the content, so that they might be properly labeled as either fact or fiction.

In exchange for help in finding the historical records that he wanted to read up on, Speaker agreed to help the god.

For the next three days Speaker spent most of his waking hours in the house of learning, alternating between wracking his mind in trying to recall details from various first age events, and reading up on what had happened since his last incarnation. Spirits and ponies would come to him with an endless stream of well-preserved tomes and copied scrolls to have their contents verified in the golden glow of Speaker’s anima - although quite a few of them would get exceedingly upset whenever Speaker would claim that a scroll or book thought to contain scraps of first age lore was pure fiction.

Every morning Speaker would go from the north district to the house of learning, and in the evening return there to Sunrise Glow’s apartment. Both of these walks involved awe-inspiring treks through the temple district, which had new festivals and parades every day. Sometimes it was ponies flinging one hoof-full after the other of colored dust around in a bright whirlwind as part of some ritualistic dance, or choirs of colts singing in long processions with some high priest or priestess of some sort walking in front.

In the evenings Speaker would learn of what the rest of circle had been doing. Shimmer was trying to make contact with other Lunars operating in secret in and around Great Forks, with various degrees of success. Apparently there weren’t many, if any at all, as the few hidden messages Shimmer had been able to find were quite old and worn.

“Worn hidden messages?” Red curiously inquired, while enjoying Sully’s latest culinary creation.

Shimmer waved her right hoof around, as it became liquid silver and sprouted three silvery claws: “Some Lunars spend quite a lot of time in animal form, especially if hiding from wyld hunts or scouting around civilized areas. We've developed a written language based on claw marks and scratches that any Lunar with claws, fangs or talons can write as an animal”

Demonstrating a few doodles of this strange form of writing in the dust on the floor, Shimmer added that you could usually tell by how weather-worn the scratches were how old the messages were. Looking dejected, she also noted: “Lunars have usually stayed away from places where lots of ponies live, especially civilized areas – they’re usually targeted by immaculate monks and ponies who’d still hunt us down if we get too public”

Speaker couldn’t help but wonder if that meant that the Lunars had been completely inactive in the course of creation since the usurpation of the Solars. Shimmer gave him a smile: “Darling, of course we’ve been active in the millennia you’ve been missing – just rarely publicly, and usually with keeping creation safe one way or the other, making sure that the dragon-blooded didn’t botch things up completely. We just couldn’t take credit for much, as the dragon-blooded have an ugly habit of wrecking and killing everyone we influence”

In the meantime, Red had continued being bodyguard to the ponies that Sunrise Glow preached to, and with Cash Charmer’s help they had been slowly going up the hierarchy of the gang attacking them, finding the pony who gave the order to harass and extort the cultists, beating them up, and then finding out who gave that pony the order. Red was confident that they’d find the real source soon enough.

Cash Charmer had equally done as promised – having acquired himself a fine blue silken tang-zhuang jacket, with the edges of his sleeves and the mandarin collar being embroidered with golden thread. Beyond that, the Eclipse caste Solar had also spent quite a lot of time getting the lay of Great Fork’s economy, to see what would be easy to make money with. Sadly there were no immediate sources of profit, so Cash bemoaned the fact that his talents were being wasted, which apparently ‘forced’ him to spend his spare time entertaining himself in various brothels and massage parlors.

Sunrise Glow was not happy to hear of Cash wasting time with such frivolities– and surprisingly, Sullen Hoof agreed: “Most of Great Fork’s brothels are stocked with slaves in case you haven’t noticed. I personally find that practice deplorable”
Cash found Sully’s dislike of slavery amusing, considering that Sullen Hoof was from Nexus, where the Guild – creation’s single greatest merchant organization – sold enough slaves on a daily basis to populate entire city states.

Sullen Hoof reacted poorly to this, and in a flash he was holding a surprisingly sharp spatula in his mouth to Cash’s throat: “No pony should live in chains”

“Well then do something about it – but I doubt that the three would let you free the primary workforce for Great Fork’s agricultural production” Cash said, his voice only quivering slightly.

Releasing Cash, Sullen gave Cash an angry look: “Master of disguise remember – I won’t be doing anything, but who knows, you might”

“Calm down, the both of you” Sunrise Glow said, sounding like a stern old matron, despite her youthful voice. Speaker couldn’t help but get the feeling that Sunrise sounded and acted much older than her age. Maybe old memories from the first was affecting her as well? This made Speaker wonder if his first age memories had changed him in any way.

The next day, Speaker finished his brushing up on the slightly less than ancient history of creation and other more recent events. He barely needed to skim the scrolls or books at the house of learning to internalize the events, for with a little dash of essence he could perfectly recall facts and descriptions of events that he’d only glanced at for a split second

Before leaving, the god of libraries asked Speaker a personal favor: To transcribe any first age literature he might remember and send copies of such works to the house of learning. If Speaker was to do so the god promised to repay the favor most generously.

Speaker agreed, stating that he would like to compile a manual of exalted power to describe the Solars – so creation could once again learn of the glorious sun-touched that now trotted amongst them, without have immaculate blowhards twist the facts.

Entering the courtyard in the tenement with Sunrise Glow’s apartment, Speaker found Red and Cash Charmer embroiled in a furious fight with twelve or so other ponies, all of which were dressed in identical grey jackets, who seemed quite intent on killing Red and Cash.

Judging from the half-dozen additional unconscious and bleeding ponies in grey jackets scattered around the courtyard, Red and Cash were winning the fight, but it was a slow process: Their assailants were armed with what appeared to be the kind of knives and cleavers used in the fisheries out on the docks, while Red and Cash only had their hooves – well, they also had essence, but it seemed to be a fairly even fight at the moment, with Cash having acquired some nasty cuts along his back and neck. Red only appeared to have blood on her hooves, and that probably wasn’t her own.

Speaker would have preferred to stay out of the fight, but as he stepped into the courtyard two of the jacketed ponies tried to grab him, forcing him into the fray. If he could, Speaker would have loved to summon Gift to aid him, but he knew that he needed that precious half-minute or so of concentration to do something like that, so… time to improvise.

Red was spinning back and forth, landing heavy blows and powerful bucks that were sending ponies flying left and right into the walls of the tenement with great essence-empowered force, leaving bloody pony-shaped impact craters that somepony was probably going to have to fix later – but the ponies being smashed into the walls weren’t being hurt by it that much, as most managed to stagger back onto their hooves and rejoin the fight moments later, it was clear that Red was slowly beating them into submission.

Cash was having more trouble avoiding getting hit, as his wounds were slowing him down and he obviously didn’t have much training in how to dodge incoming blows, resulting in his only means of defence being to parry the incomming blows with his own hooves - a painful feat considering that he was parrying cleaves and knives.

Speaker managed quite well on his own, using his Gear Catches Gear technique to intercept each blade being swung at him, then disarming each opponent and throwing the blades in trough a doorway behind Red and Cash, preventing any of the ponies from retrieving the weapons again during the fight.

“Who are these ponies?” Speaker called out, holding off his two now disarmed assailants with a strong martial stance that clearly signaled that they would get hurt if they tried anything.

Red replied, in between punching and bucking ponies with a fury that only a Dawn caste Solar could muster, that they were thugs from the gang that she had been tracking: “Apparently their leaders have taken offense to our actions– these mooks were sent to kill us off”

The fighting continued for another couple of minutes. Anyone who’d ever been in a fight would know that such is a long time to be fighting, but in the end the gang ponies were chased off, at least those still conscious. Speaker instantly went about staunching the bleeding on the worst-injured gang-ponies, while Red congratulated a somewhat wobbly Cash and busy Speaker on a good fight.

Cash appeared elated, stating that he was just happy that he wasn’t wearing his new silks when the gang-ponies had arrived, but his gait revealed the serious nature of injuries as he dragged himself back into Sunrise Glow’s apartment, leaving a trail of blood as he hobbled along. 

While Red was hauling out the unconscious ponies as soon as Speaker was finished with them, other tenants from the tenement started coming down in the courtyard. Some were understandably frightened over what had happened, fearing later reprisals, while others who had witnessed the fight from their windows were amazed over Red and Cash’s ‘fighting magic’, saying that they fought like dragon-blooded immaculate monks. Red couldn’t help but find that amusing, considering how most immaculates would react to hers and Red’s true nature. The residents didn’t get the joke as they didn't know that Red and Cash were Solars.

Returning to Sunrise Glow’s apartment, Speaker patched up Cash, telling the wounded stallion that he needed to learn some better defensive charms – or just learn not to get hit. Cash said that it wasn’t his fault that some of the gang-ponies snuck up on him when he was fighting that many, but even Red agreed that such could be avoided with good hoof-work and knowing how to position oneself in a fight.

When the others returned and Red had told them of the big fight, Sunrise Glow appeared more concerned whether or not this would get them evicted from the tenement, but Cash assured the filly that such wouldn’t be an issue – him having apparently already used his silver tongue on the landlord, which prompted Sullen Hoof to jokingly inquire to whether that meant just talking to the landlord, or whether Cash had done something else with his tongue to the landlord. Cash coily replied: "I don't kiss and tell"

In the quiet of the moment Speaker told the circle that he’d finished his brushing up at the house of learning, so he now felt comfortable telling the circle what he knew of the first age if they were interested.

“Oh excellent, I’ve been looking forward to this” Sunrise stated with a decidedly youthful-sounding cheerfulness, which made everypony look at her in surprise.

Seeing as how everypony was acting very surprised that she was even able to sound happy, Sunrise quickly noted that Great Forks was in part ruled by the god of storytelling, so this was one activity that she had grown to enjoy – in moderation of course – since her very earliest of days.

“Well, okay then…” Speaker began, pulling out a stack of notes from his saddlebags.

Everypony gathered around the burly hazel-colored stallion as Speaker began to tell his story.

“You all know the wyld, right? With its soul-eating changelings and other horrors? That’s all there was to begin with. No rhyme, no reason, no steady flow of time or causality, only the random imagined whims of the unshaped changelings that would fade in and out existence as they fed on each other or devoured themselves. Then one ‘day’ a powerful conglomerate of changeling minds decided to bond together into a permanent form! The first of the primordials, Malfeas, the empyrean light and the first tyrant, who defined that from that moment on there ‘was’ something and that something was called Creation” Speaker began, Sunrise Glow assisting by conjuring up transparent but vivid images of what Speaker described as he went on. Speaker made a note for himself to learn how to do that at a later date, scribbled under where he’d noted to learn how Cash had bounced across spears and feathers when he had been thrown to him at the city gate a few days earlier.

“Other primordials followed and submitted to Malfeas’ rule. Sacheverell, who added the concept of future through its ability to foresee it and thus adding linear time and past to creation. Gaia… you may have heard of her. Her sub-souls are the elemental dragons, which defined the elements as we know them today” Speaker methodically explained, reading point for point off his notes. It wasn’t a terribly interesting form of storytelling, sounding more like a scholar reciting from a scroll, but it was news to everyone, even if it didn’t make all that much sense to some of them.

Raising a hoof to interrupt Speaker, Cash had a few questions: “Hold on, you mean the dragon-blooded and the realm all worship a primordial? And what do you mean by sub-soul? A pony only has one soul, everypony knows that”

“Actually, a pony has two souls – the primal hun soul for emotions, and the intelligent po soul for consciousness. If you knew anything about spirits or the occult you’d be aware of this” Sunrise said in a very matter-of-fact fashion.

Speaker nodded, taking a deep breath to think on what he remembered of primordial soul hierarchies: “True, and the dragon-blooded do worship the five elemental dragons – but I doubt they understand their origins, as few remember these facts. As for the thing about souls…  well, primordials are, or were, weird like that. Imagine if your primary consciousness, your brain if you would, could go down and have a chat with one of your kidneys, who was a thinking being just like yourself, who might be having a love affair with one of your eye-balls. Primordials were made up of many souls, and that’s just one aspect of how weird they were! One was a sea of acid, another a river of pain”

Going back to his original stack of notes, Speaker elaborated on a handful of other primordials, like the one known as ‘He Who Bleeds the Unknown Word’, the primordial who trotted around creation naming everything – including Malfeas and the other primordials. He also mentioned Kimbery, the sea that marched against the flame, the primordial who appeared as an endless sea of acid. Cytherea was the one who, together with Gaia, created life in Creation.

“…and then there was Autochton, the great maker, who added three things to creations that I think you’re all quite thankful for one way or the other” Speaker said, sounding very happy to finally having gotten around to his favorite primordial.

“That’s the one you said who made Gift earlier, right?” Shimmer asked, just to be sure.

Nodding enthusiastically, Speaker willed forth Gift for all to see: “Autochton devised the concepts of faith, dogma and tools. Cecelyne, the endless desert, might have come up with the idea of laws to codify Malfeas’ rule, but it was Autochton to came up with the notion of religious dogma and the spiritual mechanics that allow gods and primordial alike to be ‘fed’ via faith and prayer. He essentially invented the idea of religion as we know it. Oh, and he came up with the idea of tool use in every form imaginable. If you use fire to cook, or clothes to stay fashionable, you owe Autochton your thanks for coming up with that aspect of reality”

What followed was some brief by-discussion on the actual meaning of tools – to which Speaker simply explained that prior to that it was speculated that primordials and whatever else was alive, could only do what their given physical or spiritual bodies and powers directly allowed, but with tools one could do so much more.

“Okay, but come on – this is turning into a show and tell on primordials, give us some action, tell us what happened to birth the Solars” Red bellowed, causing Speaker to scramble forward through his notes.

Speaker quickly got to the point: “Okay, so the primordials created creation, making it the center of the wyld. The changelings outside of creation weren’t happy with that, since many of them considered form a kind of heresy to the formless chaos that used to be. Of course, the primordials preferred to have fun instead of constantly defending their new toy, so they made the gods to maintain creation. The problem was just that they made the gods with free wills, hopes, dreams and aspirations, just like the mortal ponies that had also been made at some point during that time”

As the story went, the gods quickly got tired of fixing creation over the course of untold ages whenever the primordials went on a rampage and knocked an elemental pole loose, or kept all the fun toys away from the gods. It was during this that Celestia, the unconquered sun, was formed, to take over from Malfeas as the sun of creation: “Of course, it turned out that Celestia’s sun was too bright and powerful, for its endless warm light burnt creation, so they came up with Luna and her moon to siphon off excess daylight every now and then, inadvertently creating day and night”

Shimmer found this part of the story quite interesting.

Speaker went on to explain how the gods still hated their jobs, but were bound by the nature of their creation to never rise up against their primordial masters – but… there was a loophole: “They could still make things that would rise up against the primordials”

It was in the early stage of that plot that Autochton got involved, for he had developed a great dislike to his fellow primordials. Autochton had made the ponies as perfect beings to exemplify dogma, faith and tool use, which they up until then had done just fine by building small tribal communities and worshipping the primordials, but the other primordials liked to kill them by the millions for sport – or similarly break whatever other new creations the great maker could think up for fun and games. So, Autochton created the soul shards known as exaltations to give rise to the Solars, the Lunars and Sidereals.

“Sidereals?” Sunrise asked, being absolutely certain that she would have heard of a fourth kind of exaltation if such existed.

Speaker explained that they were the exalted of the five mares of destiny, the five goddesses who oversaw the loom of fate up in heaven: “They could tell the future and advised the rest of us, but I fear that with the Lunars not having heard from them since, then the dragon-blooded probably killed them off just like they did the Solars. There were only ever one hundred Sidereals, so compared to the millions of dragon-blooded, it wasn’t a fair fight, even if one sidereal could manage to kill a thousand dragon-blooded before being slain"

Speaking of dragon-blooded, then Speaker noted that the primordial Gaia, long time lover of Luna, feeling similar disdain for the reckless destruction the other primordials wreaked so gleefully on creation, had her sub-souls spawn the unicorn ponies, the aptly named dragon-blooded: “Originally they were more elemental than pony, but after it was found that they could have foals with mortal ponies… well… we a lot of big armies to beat the hordes of demons that the primordials could spawn”

Thus came about the primordial war where the exalted ponies then did as they had been tasked: They killed that which had not been made to die – and they did a dandy job of it. However, the part about primordials not being able to die was real enough, for they hadn’t designed creation to handle such an event: “If you’ve wondered why ghosts exist… it’s because when we killed the primordials, the cycle of reincarnation that all souls usually follow, well… it broke, at least a little bit”

“So the shadowlands where the dead walk and ghosts haunt are from that?” Sunrise wondered.

Speaker thought hard for a moment to get the facts straight in his mind: “Some of them – the death of the primordials, as they ‘fell through creation’ created the first of the shadowlands, but after that all that had to happen for a shadowland to form was enough ponies dying in one area, like a battlefield that isn’t cleaned up fast enough”

Adding the little detail that right after the primordial war almost half of creation was covered in shadowlands, and that the cleanup took centuries, Speaker proudly stated that the gods gifted creation to the Solars via the mandate of heaven as reward for their efforts, the gods relocating to Yu-Shan, the great palace city of heaven.

“Do you remember what Yu-Shan looked like?” Sunrise asked, looking genuinely curious.

Speaker shrugged: “Glimpses, but to be honest, mortal words and standards of wealth and luxury simply aren’t good enough to describe it. The cobblestones they use are bricks of solid gold, and there are pagodas of pure jade the size of countries. It’s something you have to see”

Having reached what was arguably the highest point in the story, Speaker also explained that the Solars of what was then declared to be the first age, expanded a great deal on creation, using powerful charms to solidify bordering sections of the wyld into new parts of creation.

“You see, the biggest event I could find mention of after the dragon-blooded usurped us and formed their creation-spanning Shogunate, was the Great Contagion” Speaker said, his brows furrowing and voice revealing an unmistakable sadness.

The Great Contagion was known well, to a certain extent, across creation. Every pony was told as foals of the stories of the Great Contagion that killed entire nations, for it was this plague that essentially ‘reset’ creation and its nation states, as no known sovereign power survived the Great Contagion. Speaker elaborated that of what he could remember of maps from the first age, compared to the maps of creation he found in the house of learning, then the great contagion must have triggered massive and catastrophic loom failures: “Basically, creation continues to exist because there are animals and ponies around to constantly reaffirm it. When you walk on the floor here, you reaffirm that the floor is solid and that it is wood. When a bird flies in the air it reaffirms that the air is… air – but when nearly everything died during the great contagion, large parts of creation were left without anyone to say that it should keep working”

"Loom failure? Creation was wrecked because a weaver her hooves tangled up?" Red wondered.

Speaker chuckled: "Uhm, no - I meant the loom of fate, a big thing in heaven that tracks reality and causality. It records your fate and ensures that when we touch the fate of another pony the weave shows it, for otherwise it doesn't happen. Now, with the chaos of much of creation falling apart like tha-"

“Oh, I know what happens next!” Cash blurted, happy that the story had finally reached a point he was at least slightly familiar with.

Red gave Cash a hearty pat on back, with such force that it halfway knocked the wind out of the lithe stallion: “We all know that story. The changelings invaded creation when it saw us at our weakest, to eat our last dreams and plunge us into the chaos of the wyld. Then around  eight hundred years ago, when things were looking worst, a unicorn mare found an ancient weapon on the blessed isle that in one fell swoop either killed or chased off the changelings, and she crowned herself the Scarlet Empress of the Realm of Equestria”

“True, although I’m certain that Lookshyan historians would disagree with giving her all the credit… the remains of the unicorn shogunate were fighting horn and hoof to stay alive, and the biggest remnant to survive was the 7th legion, under Chumyo Never-Run, who fortified the ruins of Deheleshen, renaming it Lookshy – and aren't we lucky for that?” Speaker said, it being painfully obvious to everyone present that Speaker was still very loyal to his city state of origin.

Red agreed, recounting the dozens of times that Lookshy’s 7th legion had taken the brunt of the many invasions the realm had made, in attempts to conquer the prosperous river provinces of east: “If it wasn’t for Lookshy we’d all likely just have killed ourselves when we exalted, thinking we’d become demons like the immaculates say we are”

“I hope no Solar actually does that – that’d be just plain embarrassing” Sunrise Glow glumly noted.

Cash shrugged: “I don’t know. I wasn’t sure what’d happened when I exalted. I don’t think it’s impossible to some exalted ponies doing something stupid like that”

The circle stayed up late that night, discussing what to do next. Speaker was still adamant that they get a safe location to work from, where they could retreat to and regroup in case of trouble, as well as build up support for their ultimate return to power: “I mean; it’s not like I expect us to retake creation as just us six. There are hundreds of Lunars out there, and Shimmer said that she’s seen plenty of signs of other Solars reappearing as well. So we need to make sure that when they show up that they have a place to go and find help, especially if they’re scared or confused like Cash said”

With that in mind Sunrise Glow said that she had recently heard of a situation that might work out well for them: “Yesterday, I was looking for one of my cultists at the docks, when I saw that a medical relief caravan is being assembled on the north shore of the yellow river. Asking around I found that a quarter of Great Fork’s most potent medical supplies have been sold for this… and it’s a whole guild caravan build set up, so this is quite big”

“Yes I heard of that, considered buying supplies and trying to sell to them – but really, it’s a medical relief caravan commissioned by some smalltime shogun who’s got a rat problem, how does that benefit us?” Cash commented, making a good point that going to some place afflicted by plague, which was the second most feared disease known next to the Great Contagion, was generally considered a really bad idea.

Sunrise Glow stood up and arched her back, trying to look as tall as possible, as she declared: “If you had paid more attention in the markets, you would know that the shogun who commissioned the caravan is the shogun of the Chung lands – and the ponies I talked to said it was a colt who was the new shogun”

“WHAT?” Red burst out, shocked that Sunrise would keep such a secret from her.

Sunrise calmly explained that if they were to go to Red’s homeland and rid them of the plague, something Sunrise appeared supremely confident that Speaker would figure out, then they could either have Red claim the throne or gain a very grateful, powerful, and hopefully impressionable, ally - and a safe place to stay in the case that wyld hunts come after them.

“That sounds like quite a plan – I like it!” Cash said, while Red quivered slightly, appearing torn between being angry over Sunrise not telling her sooner, but also overjoyed to finally have an excuse to come home, as well as horrified over hearing that her home was being ravaged by plague.

“Wait a second, Red, you left home almost a decade years ago – do you have any idea who this young new shogun is?” Shimmer asked, remembering that Red had told them that her father had been the shogun when she had left.

Red pondered for a moment: “Well, Swift Hoof was supposed to be the heir, I was second in line. My parents hadn't born any other foals then, but I guess they could have afterwards - but why'd there be a new shogu- oh heavens, the plague”

It suddenly dawned on everyone that this meant that Red’s parents were most likely dead, which killed the mood of the planning session quite thoroughly. Red still seemed intent on going though, now more than ever: “If we save all of Chung and what’s left of my family, I will most certainly earn back my name – and the rest of you will be equally honored” Red said, sounding ever resolute, like a general confident in her battle plan.

Sunrise Glow noted that the caravan was just getting started. It would be weeks, if not a month, before everything was ready and loaded on the north shore. Red didn’t want to wait that long for obvious reasons, but Speaker was quick to point out that even with his powers he could do little to stop an outbreak of plague on his own – sure, he might cure some, but thousands of others would need help - and might not appreciate not being among the few chosen who get cured. The medicine that caravan would bring, most of which was still in production, Cash added, was crucial to allow all the ponies in Chung to be saved.

“So then what? I won’t just sit around and wait until some stupid herbs dry here!” Red said, the mare’s voice booming with fury.

Sullen Hoof cleared his throat to get everypony's attention: “I think I know what we can do in the meantime…”

“And what would that be?” Sunrise inquired.

Sullen Hoof said that yesterday, right before getting ready to set his final plans in motion to reveal the corrupt managers of the slave dormitory kitchens, he came across a strange shop in the southern district staffed by changelings. Speaker was quick to ask if Sully surely didn’t just kill them all, but Speaker turned out to have been too quick, as Sunrise Glow explained that there did indeed live a handful of changelings in Great Forks: “…and they’re well aware that they have to play nice. I do believe that the right word to describe them is that they have gone ‘native’. I know of the shop, they sell glamour and illusions. If you want a dress to actually sparkle, they can make that happen. They take their payment in dreams”

Speaker still didn’t like Sullen Hoof having anything at all to do with changelings, so he was even less thrilled when Sully turned out to have known one of the changelings in a past life: “Well, that’s what this guy claimed anyway. Said he knew from a guild merchant where a manse fitting the description of one I had once owned was located”

Being torn between his curiosity for what might be in the manse of ancient artifacts and his intense dislike of changelings, Speaker chose to just shut up and listen. Sullen Hoof explained how the changeling was willing to give the information in exchange for a small service…

“What do we have to do?” Cash asked, eager to do a little treasure hunting in an ancient first age manse.

Sullen Hoof said that they simply had to go fetch a some ‘pennants’ from a freehold not far north from the yellow river, a bit west from Great Forks. The changeling had apparently sent an apprentice to get them, but the apprentice should have been back over a month ago – and there wasn’t room in the changeling’s schedule to get them himself.

Speaker wasn’t sure if it was worth it.

“Come on Speaker – this guy is legit. Only eats dreams or emotions from ponies who let him. Heck, its apparently illegal for him to do anything beyond that, and these changelings have been living in Great Forks for centuries!” Sullen Hoof pleaded.

Sighing, Speaker agreed. The circle agreed to venture forth first thing in the morning.
> Chapter 8:Wicked Graceful Virtues
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With ‘confiscated’ funds that Sullen Hoof acquired overnight from the gang that had attacked them, the circle paid for the repairs to the tenement and equally paid out Sunrise Glow’s rent for a whole year, ensuring that they always had a place to live in Great Forks. One of Sunrise Glow’s cultists, a potter pony with a clay bowl for a cutie mark, was allowed to live in and maintain the flat while the circle was off finding the changeling’s pennants, as well as later when the circle would head to the manse.

Before leaving, Cash bought everypony saddlebags, and on Sunrise and Speaker’s request he also bought some blank books and scrolls. Sunrise apparently wanted to spend her time on the road writing the scripture of Celestia, while Speaker wanted to get started on that manual of exalted power of his. Red wasn’t certain if it was a good idea to commit the power of Solars to writing, as the dragon-blooded might find them and use it against all Solars, but Speaker was certain that that wouldn’t be an issue: “If anything, they might read this and come to their senses, seeing that we aren’t a threat if not attacked – us not really being ponies possessed by evil demons and all”

Red found Speaker’s idea of a manual silly, pointing out that the immaculates would simply blacklist it and demand every copy that comes into territories they influence destroyed: “Hey, it’s your waste of time – not mine”.

Following the directions of the changeling, whose name appeared to be Hahn-Hanar, the way to the freehold where the apprentice Hahn-Lee was would take a few days of travel to get to, plus the circle had to pass over the ten-mile wide yellow river.

Peering out from the shore, Cash marveled as the morning sun rippled over the calm river waters. The river was so wide that you couldn’t see the other side, appearing as an endless sea. Many less-informed peasant ponies probably thought the same.

As for how to cross the river, there weren’t many options. Most ponies would use prams or boats. The only known bridge across was six-hundred miles downriver at Nexus, which was part of why Nexus was such a great and aptly-named center of trade in the east and the river provinces. The problem was that the circle had no boats.

“We could always go back to Great Forks and buy passage at the docks?” Cash suggested, wishing that they had thought of this a little sooner instead of blindly following the changeling’s directions.

From out in the river, up to her neck in water, Shimmer called out: “Hey everypony – I got this.”

Shimmer then transformed into a giant western turtle, with a shell wide enough to load a wagon onto or strap a howdah onto.  Swimming in to shore, Shimmer, in giant turtle form, somehow spoke to the circle and had them jump on.

Speaker had to admit that it was a really strange experience, while Cash was far more curious in asking what other kinds of animals Shimmer could turn into. Shimmer said that she could do most of the marine life of the mid-west, plus a few birds and small land animals.

“What about something useful if we need to move a lot of goods around? Like a yeddim?” Cash wondered.

The giant turtle shook, causing everyone to stagger a little: “Do you have any idea how boring it would be to perform a sacred hunt on a yeddim? They’re just big, dumb and boring. Find me a tyrant lizard or a southern fire salamander, now that I’ll gladly hunt and drink the blood of.”

Shimmer explained that to be able to shapeshift into something, a Lunar had to perform a sacred hunt – a simple but time-consuming ritual hunt to learn all the ways of the animal she hunted. Then one simply had to kill the animal and drink some of its blood: “…Although, if it’s tasty enough, I don’t settle with just the blood... like this turtle. It was very tasty”

A few hours later, the sun sitting high in the sky, the giant turtle reached the northern shore of the yellow river. The directions that Hahn-Hanar had given said that the freehold would be two days travel on hoof north of where the circle was now, so Cash figured it to be around sixty miles away.

“You shouldn’t happen to have a form that would allow for swift travel on land?” Speaker wondered.

Shimmer said that she could fly fairly quickly in her various bird forms, although for long distance travel she preferred aquatic forms, as that took much less energy and was far more inconspicuous – unless a fisherpony caught you: “It’s a little embarrassing when that happens.”

The conclusion was that the circle had to travel on hoof for the time being, although Cash said that he was very certain that back in the first age this still wouldn’t have been a problem: “I… it’s like I just can’t remember how, or what we’d usually do… gah, this is really annoying.” he said, rubbing his temples while sitting down for a moment.

“I know the feeling.” Speaker said, having already lost count of the many times when he thought he could remember some spectacular bit of first age trivia, only to find it too vague, faint or wrapped up in symbolism and memories that just didn’t make sense.

Watching as Shimmer changed back into a pony from her giant turtle form, Sunrise noted that upon exalting she’d been gifted with knowledge of emerald circle sorcery, including how to conjure up a small cloud to fly around on: “It’s just not that big. Four ponies might be able to squeeze together on it, but six will not fit.”

Speaker was about to comment on something about sorcery, when he noticed that Shimmer seemed a lot smaller than usual. She was bigger than Sunrise, but not by much, although she was still proportioned like an adult pony so she didn’t really look like a filly: “Shimmer, you look… smaller.”

Looking down at herself Shimmer sighed: “Figures I’d forget it sooner or later.” It turned out that Shimmer, being a tribal pony, had not really benefited from the perks that more civilized ponies tend to take for granted as she grew up. Things like knowledge of how to design a balanced diet, or proper medical care, plus a handful of other factors mostly related to old tribal customs had stunted Shimmer’s growth at various stages of her foal-hood.

“The adult form I have is actually one that a very dear friend of mine sort of… made… for me, which I hunted and got the heartblood for.” Shimmer said, well aware of how odd that sounded.

Sullen Hoof was quick to pick up on the detail of the heartblood: “Hold on, so you hunted and killed an innocent pony just so you could appear as a fully grown pony? That’s horrible.”

“The ‘thing’ I drank the blood of was a hollow thing of flesh – it wasn’t a pony. It was a… blank copy from an elder Lunar who knew how to make such things” Shimmer argued, displaying a jaded side of her that none of the others had seen before.

Trotting around the diminutive mare Sullen Hoof wondered out loud how many other ponies Shimmer had cannibalized so she could assume their forms. Shimmer changed back into her ‘adult’ form and reminded Sully in an irritated and angered voice that sacred hunts for ponies follow the same rules, but are only all the more complicated: “Learning how an animal behaves is easy. With enough general knowledge on animal behavior you can finish a sacred hunt in just under an hour – but with ponies… you have to learn who they really are, how they behave, how they act, who they know, who knows the pony, everything – and that can take weeks of observation, or a few days of intensive interrogation and torture, but I’ve never done that…”

Looking over at Speaker, who was clearly concerned, Shimmer smiled: “In fact, after a long time I was able to refine my essence to the point that could learn some of the most advanced form-taking techniques – such as the one that merely requires me to sleep with another pony…” as she changed into a perfect copy of Speaker, her – his – clothes even changing from Shimmer’s usual choice of violet vest and equally violet fishnet draped over her back and flank changing into an exact copy of Speaker’s old Lookshyan uniform that he still wore.

“I don’t enjoy killing ponies, never have. In the west I’ve spent over half a century protecting pony settlements and tribes from slavers, pirates and changelings, so don’t think I’m some barbarian tribal that eats ponies for the heck of it.” Shimmer-Speaker said, Speaker finding it incredibly weird to see ‘himself’ speak to him. Sullen Hoof nodded, apparently satisfied with the explanation.

Shaking off a creepy shiver, Speaker asked Shimmer to change back, which she did with no further fanfare, her body once again dissolving into a silvery pony-shaped fluid for a few seconds as it shrank and rearranged itself into a her adult mare form.

“Now, to change the subject – just like Sunrise Glow, I too am initiated into sorcery, but I have been initiated into the higher sapphire circle. I know a spell that will get us to the freehold in just under an hour, how does that sound?” Shimmer confidently said, skipping over a few yards and jumping into the water.

A white light with a bluish tinge erupted underwater, and a thick white fog began forming over the surface.
“I do believe that this is our ride.” Speaker said, recognizing the spell from his first-age memories, even though he in reality knew next to nothing about sorcery. He stepped up on the blanket of mist as it thickened and rose up, forming a ground-level cloud. Shimmer then appeared out of the water, floating up to the surface of the cloud. She explained that since sorcery has the fun side effect of flaring ones anima, she found it much more subtle to shape the spell underwater.

With everyone aboard, the cloud rose up in the sky and rocketed north at breath-taking speeds, not that anyone on the cloud could feel it, but looking down over the edge of the cloud revealed the land bellow zooming by at a velocity that just wasn’t natural for a pony to move at.

Sunrise Glow was understandably intrigued by Shimmer revealing herself to be a sorceress. Cash didn’t see why sorcery
was supposed to be that different from the magic they had been doing up until now – but Sunrise quickly explained that: “Sorcery transcends what your exaltation allows. A unicorn, or a Lunar or a Solar can all learn the same sorcerous spells – but they can’t learn each others native charms, as they’re defined by our exaltations. I know how to banish first circle demons, do the most basic of countermagic, turn my hide into bronze for protection and summon a much smaller cloud than this – by the way, Shimmer, how big can you make this?”

Standing in a state of deep concentration, Shimmer didn’t turn to face Sunrise, but did say that she could easily expand the cloud to fit around half a thousand ponies, or an equal volume of goods, on the cloud. Cash suddenly found the idea of sorcerous clouds much more appealing: “Hey, trafficking freight at speeds like this would be worth a lot of silver – when we get back to Great Forks we could probably out-bid the guild caravan to ship up all that medicine!”

Red liked the idea, but Speaker quickly noted that the guild wasn’t likely to let a contract go without a fight – plus doing so would probably reveal Shimmer as a Lunar to the guild, making them want to either ‘buy her’ or get rid of the competition by informing the wyld hunt of her presence.

“So? They’ve undoubtedly heard of you by now Speaker – you could just take credit for her conjuring up a cloud – we get paid and get to save more ponies, I don’t see the problem.” Cash stated, ever confident in his own plans.

Speaker then tried to calculate in his head the probable tonnage for enough medicine to help an entire kingdom of plague-ridden ponies. He didn’t even have to spend essence to double-check his numbers before Cash was convinced that the cloud wouldn’t be enough.

It was a moot point though – as Shimmer announced that they had arrived near the freehold.

The Freehold, a warped demesne transformed by changelings, was part of a strangely normal-looking grassy hill, at least on the outside. It was a small mound of dirt with a three yard wide hole leading down into what appeared to be a dark cavern. On top of it a tree twisted and thrashed around, its branches seemingly alive with the intense flows of natural wood-aspected essence coursing through it – the tree dancing with movements that adhered to a twitchy and alien sense of aesthetics.

Around the mound, at a safe distance, wooden stakes marked a perimeter around the freehold, no doubt set up by fearful locals to show others not to enter. Small iron baubles and homemade wards hung around the stakes. Speaker guessed that if any of the locals were literate they would put up signs with warnings as well.

“If the pones that live around here are this afraid of the place, we should go ask around – we need to know what we’re getting into. There might be a changeling court down there.” Shimmer suggested, having had plenty of experience dealing with changelings back home west.

Red wanted to charge in, but saw the wisdom in getting information on enemy forces first.

“We don’t know if they’re hostile – if these changelings are affiliated with the Hahn-hanar changeling they have gone native as well. No sense picking a fight when diplomacy can finish the job quicker” Sunrise Glow noted as the cloud began to descend.

Shimmer dissolved the cloud near a small settlement close to the freehold. Speaker had identified the demesne as wood aspected, which explained the nearby farms: All that wood aspected essence concentrated in the area made plants grow much bigger and faster than they normally would, although Speaker was quick to note that it probably wasn’t that safe to eat the local produce either.

This last detail sorely disappointed Cash, who was gazing with greedy eyes at a pumpkin patch with pumpkins the size of adult ponies. There were other fruits and vegetables growing in the surrounding farmlands that were bigger than normal, but when the circle met the ponies that lived in the area it became clear what danger of eating the wyld-tainted food was.

The farmer ponies that the circle met were friendly enough, but their hooves appeared wooden – with their elders even sounding as if they ‘creaked’ when they walked. The ponies here were turning into living wood! Cash definitely didn’t want to sell any of their produce at that point. Sunrise applauded Cash for his honesty, although Cash refused to admit that it was for any care over the wellbeing for other ponies: “It’s just bad business to sell wyld-tainted food.”

One thing the farmers did point out was that one of the mares from the settlement had gone missing recently, and they feared that the changelings in the freehold had taken her. The elder that told them, Gerda Gourd, said that the missing mare was her daughter: “She’s been gone for almost a moon, and the gods haven’t answered our prayers…”

“I promise you, we will find your daughter – but tell me, do you have anything of hers? Something with her scent?” Speaker said, holding Gerda’s wooden hooves tightly, then looking over at Shimmer.

Shimmer seemed amused that Speaker thought she could be his scent-tracker, pointing out that she was mostly used to doing that in water, but she did know a charm that would let her track this lost pony – if the locals had something with her scent.

After the elder and some of the other farmer-ponies looked around, a colored ribbon was found that the missing mare used to tie her mane up with. Shimmer got her scent and the hunt was on. To nopony’s surprise it lead to the perimeter around the freehold, where she ended her tracking: “The wood essence here stinks of changeling.”

Before going in, the circle reviewed what they were going to do. Sunrise explained that she knew a charm that would protect her against changeling shaping attacks. It turned out that Cash knew nothing of what shaping combat was…

“Changelings don’t work like ponies. Their lives are based on a never-ending story: If the story ends they end. In the wyld they shape the areas and other changelings around them to fit their story, and they do the same to ponies in creation – but that’s only half of it.” Sunrise noted.

Rubbing his temples in confusion, Cash wondered what exactly what Hahn-Hanar’s story was.

“No clue – but that’s only half of it.” Sunrise began, conjuring up transparent images of ponies alongside images of jagged and weird shapes that looked like strange  attempts at making pony-looking figures. “Since they aren’t really native to creation, they can’t work without making an ‘assumption’, a fake body of their own design. This also puts a shape on their mind.”

“Right, can you cut to the chase here? This place is creeping me out.” Sullen Hoof interrupted, fidgeting with one of wooden stakes making up the perimeter and the rusty iron baubles tied to it with leather string.

Shimmer stepped inside the perimeter: “It’s simple.  Entering creation from the wyld, they basically make their own bodies and the ‘pattern’ they’ll think with – if you want to be an unbeatable swords-pony, make a body of a warrior and a mind that only thinks in carnage. It is usually an assumption that fits their story, and they’ll reshape everything and everypony around them to fit it – like making you into an adoring fan by draining your will and making you beholden to them, or make you quick to anger so you can become one of many feeble foes who’ll die by the changeling’s blade by the thousand. I’ve seen it happen so many times. Oh yes, and the only way they can replenish their powers is to feed off the dreams and emotions of ponies, but honestly that’s the least of what they do if you ask me.”

Shaking her body about a little, Shimmer terminated a charm that hid her moonsilver tattoos. The charm was handy when moving around in civilized society, as not everypony liked the idea of silvery anathema in their neighborhood: “My tattoos protect me from most shaping attacks – sunrise’s charm should cover her as well. For the rest of you, be careful… be VERY careful – and don’t do anything I don’t do.”

“Hold on, I think we’re good.” Speaker noted, looking thoughtful. He explained that thinking about meeting changelings had jostled up an old first age memory. Apparently, Eclipse caste Solars, being heavenly diplomats, had some kind of mystic diplomatic immunity when it came to dealing with changelings... so if Cash led them inside as his entourage, the changeling literally couldn't harm them, as long as they obeyed certain unspoken rules of politeness for guests.

With that settled, Cash cautiously led the others down into the freehold – which at first seemed completely dark, but then opened up into a vast and endless hall, with a ceiling far higher than what the dimensions of the mound should allow – it was obviously changeling glamour and illusions. The floor was tiled with strange yellow stones polished to a mirror shine, so was the ceiling. Glowing crystal growths in the ceiling shed a bright white light, illuminating a grand table made of a huge solid chunk of black granite, decorated with swirly patterns carved into the surface.

However, the real sight was what was on the table. A seemingly endless array of meat dishes, smelling absolutely divine, still steaming ever so slightly – decorated with impossible vegetables of strange shapes and sizes and delectable side dishes that smelled simply divine. It was a feasting table fit for gods and very obviously not made by ponies.

The circle approached the table, as there was nothing else in the vast expanse.

“There should be a bonfire somewhere here – the pennants would be inside, that’s the heart of the freehold.” Shimmer noted.

Running a hoof over the table, marveling at the physics-defying details of shifting carvings of the stone surface, Cash noticed that the table was warmer than the floor: “Hey guys, can this bonfire be inside something? Like… in a stove?”

“It might, although I’m more surprised that you know what a stove is – they aren’t that common outside of Lookshy or places with intact shogunate or first-age buildings – most ponies just just cook at the hearth.” Sullen Hoof noted, sniffing around at the meat dishes.

The circle began looking closer at the solid stone table. It honestly looked like a huge square slab of black stone, covered in food. A curious detail was that the dishes that the food were on were even made out of meat, somehow remaining as solid as porcelain.

Suddenly a thunderous voice boomed out, and part of the endless room on the opposing side of the table to the exit from the freehold was suddenly filled with a hazy cloud of oily fumes: “Ah, guests – come, feast at my table.”

The cloud solidified in certain places, revealing two eyes made of spheres of amber oil. Around the table wide charms of stone rose up from the ground.

“Nopony do anything – Cash, talk to this… thing.” Sunrise Glow ordered, looking at the cloud and oily eyes with a grim determination that was entirely unfit for a filly, soon-to-be-mare, of Sunrise’s age. Speaker said nothing, but decided that if they lived through this he would definitely want to know more about why Sunrise acted so grim.

Cash stepped forward: “Greetings, I am Cash Charmer, Solar Eclipse by grace of Celestia – and in who’s grand hall might we be in?”

The oily eyes floated down to Charmer, orbiting each other to the point that looking at them made one dizzy. It then somehow emitted a voice that was even louder than before, sounding as if it came from every direction: “I am the Great Unshaped – The giver of gifts and granter of feasts.”

Speaker blinked for a few times, his entire brain still ‘ringing’ from the intense volume of the voice of the changeling. The thing was that this couldn’t possibly be an unshaped… those things couldn’t exist in creation: “Cash, ask it if it is Hahn-Hanar’s apprentice.”

Cash took the advice and the oily eyes rose, quickly growing jagged crystalline edges, swerving around as if gazing into bottomless distances: “That chapter was but a small first chapter in my glorious legend – my cup will douse all of creation, and it will love me for all of eternity”

“I think this joker is nuts.” Sullen Hoof quietly commented.

Cash threw Sullen Hoof a smirk, without words saying “You don’t say?”

“No, its more than that – Hahn-Hanar said that he’d told Hahn-Lee of legends of the ancient glories of the un-shaped, I think Lee has delusions of grandeur. I’ve got good pony-reading charms… this thing is off the charts.” Sullen Hoof noted, while Hahn-Lee ranted on quite loudly about how it would pour gifts upon creation until there would be nothing but ponies grateful to him.

The room suddenly changed. The table with the endless feast of roasted meats was still there, with the circle around it, but now it was all in a grand ballroom. The floor and ceiling was the same, but now there were walls. Along the walls there were hundreds of… meat-puppets. Literally. Small figures of meat, in the guise of little fillies and colts. They all stood at attention, as if they were servants, not moving at all. Speaker knew better, recognizing the things as figments of Hahn-Lee’s imagination, minor character’s in Hahn-Lee’s own narrative – lesser changelings that would only exist while Hahn-Lee’s story required them to be around. Still, they were quite gross to look at.

The oily eyes were nowhere to be seen.

“Okay, what are we going to do here?” Cash said, looking around. The ballroom was lavishly decorated, but when looking at the same detail or extravagant little carving a second time it would change, be something else. A mural became a drape, or a painting of strange impossible geometric shapes would become an alcove with a golden statue with jade eyes.

Sunrise suggested that she say a few words to Hahn-Lee once he reappeared.

The circle didn’t have to wait long, as suddenly the ceiling height spiralled into infinity, and the eyes of oil reappeared, along with the impossibly loud voice: “You ponies – great heroes, are you not? In this life and in others. This is excellent! The challenges shall begin immediately!”

The eyes vanished and Speaker took a few steps towards the dirt tunnel out of the… mansion – a detail too ingrained in creation’s reality for the changeling to change outside of the raw potential presented by the underground demesne’s essence.

“This is bad – this is really bad.” Speaker began, looking more and more at the exit.

Red liked the idea of a good challenge, so she didn’t really see the problem. Speaker quickly filled the circle in with why he was worried: “Changelings only seek out un-shaped changelings to challenge them. They’re the most powerful of changelings around, primordials were made of multiple un-shaped. If you challenge an un-shaped you can name any reward you want, but if you fail… bad end.”

“Come on – this means we could challenge oil-eyes for the missing mare and the pennants.” Red suggested, looking eager for a good fight.

Speaker shook his head: “No, challenges like this – it’d be four rounds, based on the graces. This could be anything from us having to battle a magma-kraken, to seduce one. Only Sunrise and Shimmer can resist direct shaping attacks… we could end up looking like the meat-puppets lining the wall”

Red walked up to Speaker and looked him square in the eyes: “There’s an innocent mare held prisoner here. She could be one of the flesh-things looking at us. Honor demands we save her.”

Taking a deep breath Speaker nodded, looking back at the table that was still overflowing ever-alluring treats.

“Okay, I have no clue what this changeling will do to us – he’s not un-shaped, but being in here will give him more power than usual. Stay sharp and…” Speaker began, but suddenly the oily eyes reappeared and Hahn-Lee’s voice boomed out: “Let the party begin!”

The moment that the voice went silent the floor erupted in flames. The stone melted into burning putty, and everypony leapt for their lives. It was too far from the exit for anyone to get out, but Red was quick on her hooves and leapt up on the stone table which hadn’t changed. Shimmer jumped straight up and turned into a seagull, and Speaker scrambled up to the table before the stones melted beneath his hooves. Sullen Hoof stomped down on the floor and ran off at super-pony speed up the wall of the now burning ballroom, his hooves sticking to the wall by the use of charms and essence.

Cash was the slowest, and so his hooves, legs and belly was badly burnt as he slowly sank into the burning stone while trying to wade towards the stone table. He was screaming and crying as Red and Speaker hauled him up and patted down his half-burnt blue silk jacket. Speaker and Shimmer quickly began to tend Cash’s wounds, while Sullen Hoof continued up the wall and up the ceiling until he was above the table, at which point he dropped down into the piles of cooked and seasoned meat with a clatter of plates and hissing as meat fell into the burning floor.

Pushing his way out of the feast, Sullen Hoof emerged soaked in meat juices but smelling rather tasty.

With everyone out of the fire the floor suddenly changed back. Shimmer was the first to notice the nature of the next challenge: “The feast, the smell changed!”

“I don’t see the problem, it smells nice.” Sullen Hoof noted, carefully stepping down on the now suddenly normal stone floor and floating up a big juicy sausage before his face.

Speaker continued picking off ashen scraps of silks and stone from the sulking Cash Charmer’s burnt legs, but he quickly noticed Shimmer having difficulties staying focused on the task at hand.

“The challenge here is obviously to resist the temptation of the feast, lest we lose ourselves to the ‘gifts’ of this changeling and become his mindless slaves.” Sunrise pointed out, jumping down from the table, acting as if such simple temptations were beneath her.

Speaker agreed, weaving essence into Cash’s wounds to clean them from flecks of crusty burns and droplets of cooling stone. Cash moaned that it really smelled good and that some comfort food would nice right about now. Speaker shushed Cash and concentrated on healing the burns, consciously shoving away the lure of the feast from his mind by focus and will alone.

Red was already gorging herself, taking big bites out of juicy steaks. Shimmer joined her seconds later, leaving Speaker to tend to Cash alone.

Then Sullen Hoof vomited, loudly, wetly and messily, all over the food where he stood. Red and Shimmer didn’t take notice, but Sunrise Glow quickly walked over to Sullen Hoof and asked if he was okay.

“Its… gods” Sullen Hoof whipped his mouth: “You, gods – everypony, stop eating! This meat, it’s pony meat!”

The conflict of interests displayed on Red’s face was obvious, as she slowly pulled herself away from the table. Shimmer took a few more bites, then spat them out, muttering: “I prefer Mahasuchi's cooking over this”

Speaker didn’t want to know.

With everypony having stopped eating, the oily eyes reappeared – as did the painfully loud voice inside everypony’s head: “Impressive my little ponies – you best me at every opportunity! Before I give you your next challenge, let us discuss what you are questing for? What would you ask of me?”

Sunrise looked at Speaker, asking without words if there was any special way of wording such requests.

Before Speaker respond Red stepped up, allowing Speaker to continue tending to Cash’s wounds: “You have a mare held captive here from a nearby farm – we want her and any ponies you hold here turned over to our custody – and we also came for some pennants for one Hahn-Hanar.” 

The voice of the changeling boomed out: “That is your prize? No oath? No items of power? You ponies make no sense, but I graciously honor your request – and so, the challenge continues! Feast, my ponies.”

“What? He’ll tempt us again?” Sullen Hoof said, looking at his puddle of vomit dripping off the table in disgust.

Suddenly, a painting on the wall with the exit ‘opened’ into some kind of bottomless side-ways pit, that all the food from the table ‘fell’ into. It was really weird to look at, for none of the ponies present showed or felt gravity pulling sideways. The vomit, the flecks of once molten stone and other bits of dirt in or around the table was also sucked away – Cash screamed as flecks of stone tore from his wounds and flew into the hole left by the painting. The painted reappeared, ending the cleaning session.

With the sound of heavy rock grinding against rock, holes opened in the ceiling and dishes of flesh fell from them. They sounded like ceramic dishes as they hit the now clean and empty stone table, a few shattering only to reassemble themselves seconds later, but like the previous dishes they were obviously made of ‘hard’ meat… or made to look like it, as it was becoming abundantly clear that very little in this freehold was real.

From the holes in the ceiling, above the empty dishes, new food poured. Deluges of roasted steaks half the size of ponies and sausages twice the size of pony legs dropped down, all of it landing as if perfectly arranged by a master chef, instead of just landing in piles.

A quick taste test by Sullen Hoof confirmed that all of it was pony flesh.

“How do you know what pony flesh tastes like?” Red wondered.

Sullen Hoof floated out a waterskin from his saddlebags and washed the taste out of his mouth: “I’ve cut myself in the past, working in kitchens, haven’t you ever licked your own wounds? I’ve also been burnt a few times. You learn the taste of seared pony, it’s… tangy”

Speaker noted that the biggest of the steaks were way too big to be from a pony. The meat was just an illusion, just like everything there, he was sure of it.

Cash, now with a plate resting surprisingly well on his flanks as he lay on the table, with an artistic arrangement of sausages on the plate, groaned: “Right, but what’s the challenge then? Continue ea-“ and stopped mid-sentence, as suddenly a foul stench spread inside the room.

All the meat on the table, including the sausage-platter resting on Cash’s flanks, had instantly rotted as if left out in the sun and the rain for at least three weeks. What had previously been huge juicy red steaks, or sausages that just dripped with flavor, was now brown and black fibrous masses, covered in light green and white fuzz, dripping with foul murky puss-like liquids. The whole thing smelled like a latrine on a hot summer’s day.

“Yes, Cash, the challenge is to continue eating.” Sunrise said in a solemn tone, sounding very much as if she wished it wasn’t true.

Turning over to face the rotten feast, wincing in pain as crusty burn wounds cracked all the way up and down his legs, Cash reached out and grabbed the nearest bit of decaying meat – after the squishy noise of the sausage platter on his flanks falling off and spilling into the rest of the mold-pile had subsided: “I’m hurting enough as is, but we’re saving the damn mare – let’s just get this over with.”

The rest of the circle marveled – and Sullen Hoof vomited again – as Cash Charmer began eating the putrid food. Sure, he would turn and vomit out over the edge of the table with every other bite, but he displayed a truly amazing level of determination as he just took in bite after bite, even with the near constant puking in-between bites and reaching out for more.

It was sickening to watch, but as Speaker realized that Cash wasn’t giving up he saw that the ‘food’ was also disappearing at a much faster rate – as if one bite would consume an entire dish. Again, this was the strange narrative logic of the changelings, as Speaker guessed that the changeling was perceiving Cash’s struggle like some kind of montage, skipping the boring bits and… going straight to the end… as Cash had somehow cleared the whole table barely twenty seconds after taking the first bite, despite there having probably been the weight of 5 ponies in rotten food on the table. 

“Congratulations! My slaves are yours! And pennants for Hanar, here, have it all!” the voice boomed, the solid stone slap of a table suddenly flipping open, dumping Cash on the floor – him yelping in pain as he was thrown to the side. Underneath the stone slab, which appeared to have been hollow, was a terrible sight.

In a room carved into the dirt, lit by a bonfire with emerald and cobalt flames – literally – flames of blue metal and green gemstone, sat a heavily mutated pony. It wasn’t really possible to tell if it was a mare or a stallion, but considering the situation then it was a reasonably safe bet that it was the mare they had been looking for. She was absolutely horrible to look at.

Her flesh had been reshaped by the changeling so that it seemed to grow constantly, and knives and cleavers made of hunger and fire orbited her, carving huge chunks off that floated up over the bonfire to cook and transform into the dishes that would appear on the stone table. The mare appeared to be in a trance of some sort, Speaker guessing that she had been drained of any and all will to resist, her mind reshaped into that of a willing puppet – ‘dream-eaten’ being the common word for ponies who’s souls had been all but completely devoured by changelings.

“Can we… fix her?” Red said, looking at the mare in a mix of disgust, sadness and quiet rage. It was clear in her voice that she wasn’t giving up, but equally that she did not know how to proceed.
> Chapter 9:Southern Jungle Rules
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

A deal was struck with the changeling in the freehold. It would keep the mare it had ravaged safe, not alter her any further, nor use her in any way, only keep her in a form of stasis so she wouldn’t suffer another second of her current state of being – until the circle would return to take her away. The changeling was reluctant at first, but then Sunrise yelled at it…

“You will agree to the terms, or face the holy fire of the heavens and iron so cold one might think it was brought here from the underworld!” the would-be mare’s voice boomed, sounding almost as loud as the changeling had, her eyes blazing with holy fire and her anima flaring to the point that the young pony appeared to be wreathed in golden flames of solar essence.

The changeling unceremoniously agreed to the terms, Cash sanctifying the oath.

The circle then left, noticing that giant wolves of living wood had appeared around the mound.

“I guess Hahn-Lee took his new role as protector of the mutant mare seriously” Cash said in jest.

Shimmer sighed: “Do you realize how powerful an eclipse oath is to a changeling? They don’t work like they do on ponies. A changeling who swears to do something builds that into his assumption – it literally becomes part of his being, to the point that he can’t violate it even if he tried. You basically changed the way he thinks – please don’t be so casual about doing things like that, otherwise you’ll have endless legions of changelings coming after you to prevent you from doing it again”

Cash got a lot quieter after that, as the circle discussed what to do next. Speaker wanted to update the farmers, while Red pointed out that until they had a nice healthy mare to show they had nothing: “Better to tell them she is dead than to show her as is – do you have any idea what is done to mutants in the hundred kingdoms?”

“The same as is done in Lookshy I assume? Killed, chased off, left in the woods to die?” Speaker listed. “I didn’t mean that we should tell the farmers what had happened to her – perhaps just that we had found her, but that we couldn’t get her yet until we find something to ‘combat’ the changeling to secure her safe return”

Nodding, Red agreed that a little lie to make the farmers leave the freehold alone while still assuring them of progress wouldn’t be that bad an idea: “Plus, it won’t really be a lie. That changeling will pay for what it’s done”

Walking to the farmstead, Cash questioned Sunrise Glow about what charms she had used to get the changeling to cooperate. Sunrise told him of the essence patterns that one had to will forth to execute what she called an enemy-castigating solar judgment, for in the baleful glow of the sun no changeling, demon, ghost or other foul thing could resist the will of the solars, such was the will of heaven.

“Ok, really? I’m sorry, but I have to ask – because no filly your age, even if you are just one growth spurt away from being a mare, should be talking like that” Speaker burst out, his curiosity getting the better of him.

Sunrise gave Speaker a dirty look as her anima lit up again, golden flames of essence briefly erupting around her before fading again: “Don’t ask questions you do not want answered”

“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t want an answer” Speaker stubbornly pointed out. His medical background had allowed him to experience far too many young fillies and colts that had been blunted, jaded and hardened by experiencing the terrors of war up close and personal at a far too early age, and Sunrise Glow was simply too clear a match for these symptoms to dismiss them.

Sunrise stopped walking and sat down, ordering Red to go to the farmstead and deliver the ‘news’ to the farmers, then return so Shimmer could fly them back to Great Forks. As Red walked away Sunrise told Speaker what he wanted to know: “Do you know why Great Forks is also known as Decadence, or the city of ten thousand vices?”

It had begun four years ago, when Sunrise Glow’s parents had died in a fire. Some god’s party had gotten out of hand and somepony had knocked over a brazier full of burning coals, setting light to the tenement they had lived in. Sunrise Glow and her two younger brothers had survived, but faced a life without parents. While young, Sunrise’s beauty and singing talents had already begun to manifest, allowing her to sell her services to cults and temples – but it was hard to make ends meet without having to sell just more than ones singing voice.

Looking at Cash, Sunrise asked if he knew why gods so coveted personal cults and direct worship. Cash, knowing nothing of the occult mechanics that informed how worship actually worked, couldn’t answer. Sunrise nodded and explained: “Its will. When a pony sleeps at night, her soul recovers and regains power. It is by this power, your will, that all ponies rise above mere animals – because we can choose instead of constantly being slaves of our baser instincts. We even punish those who steal, rape or murder for not repressing those instincts”

“Right, and this has to do with your foalhood how?” Cash wondered, Speaker and Shimmer both remaining silent. Speaker had an idea about what Sunrise was talking, and he suspected that Shimmer knew as well.

“I will get to that – but you must understand this first” Sunrise explained, saying that gods did not benefit from sleep at all. Instead, their will to choose for themselves was only bolstered when they did what they had been made to do. So a god of rain could only regain the power to choose for itself if it performed the same mind-numbing labors every day that it probably wished it could choose not to do at all: “…and this is where cults and worship come in, for these empower the gods in exactly the same way, but without the gods having to work for it”

“Oh, so if you’re a bored god you just run off to Great Forks, start a pleasure cult and you never have to work again? Sweet deal – but again, what does this have to do with you?” Cash said, him obviously wondering if he could aspire to a similar goal.

Without showing anger in her voice, only revealing it in her stern expression and choice of words, Sunrise said that this meant that Great Forks was built around laziness, luxurious lifestyles and an escape from ones duties at the expense of the ponies who had to work to maintain those lifestyles: “Tens of thousands of slaves toil every day in hemp and poppy fields, so that the gods that live in Great Forks can watch in amusement as their anointed whores get high and flop around in stupors, while the things that the gods are meant to regulate and monitor go unattended – causing even more suffering and mayhem for ponies. That’s where I came in. I was the new pretty filly with tasty blank flanks. It was obvious that I’d grow up to be a beautiful mare, which made it all the more important for the cults to ‘buy’ me before my price rose…”

Sunrise grimly retold of how dozens of cults had attempted to offer her petty sums of silver bits to join them, hinting that they might even take care of her younger brothers if she joined, but Sunrise didn’t want her brothers to grow up watching her getting ravaged on a daily basis in pleasure cults while they would be made to sing the praises of whatever god who’s high priest was rutting her.

When she had turned down the initial offers the more underhanded attempts came – city officials were ‘made aware’ of her status as orphan, and were bribed to try to seize her and turn her over to ‘charitable orphanages’, all of which were fronts for cults and temples using them as early recruiting and indoctrination services. When that failed, because Sunrise would usually either be able to hide with her brothers or pay off the officials to go away at the cost of going hungry for a few days, the cults and temples started to try and kidnap her.

It had been at that point that she was found by the illuminates, which offered a different option: Instead of becoming a servant to some god that simply wanted to have fun, using vague promises of enlightenment and blessings as lures, she and her brothers could join a cult that actively believed in a better life in this lifetime, instead of merely praying that one might reincarnate into a better family with more wealth or power in the next life.

“So, Speaker, the reason that I act so jaded – and that think so poorly of Cash running around wasting time in brothels, not doing what he was meant to do – is because I genuinely hate these things, for to me they have caused me so much misery. When I get the power to do so, I will clean up both Great Forks and Yu-Shan of the corrupt and lazy gods, so help me Celestia” Sunrise Glow said with furious passion, her anima again sputtering to life briefly with licks of holy flame bleaching the grass around her until it was all white.

Speaker could do nothing but feel sorry for the teenage filly, while at the same time admiring her ability to resist the temptations that had been offered to her. Her hate of indolence certainly made a lot more sense now.

Red returned shortly after, with a radish the size of half a pony strapped to her back – saying that it was a gift from the farmers for having done so well. Shimmer quickly reminded Red how the ponies that ate those wyld-tainted veggies had been affected by it, to which Red said that she didn’t want to eat it… but maybe keep it as a trophy? “If nothing else I can keep it around to beat somepony with”

Shimmer summoned her cloud and the circle returned to Great Forks, setting down out of sight of the city wall – no reason to alert the enforcers or anypony else who might ask questions why a cloud descended from the sky all of a sudden, even if weirder things did happen on a daily basis in Great Forks, especially if the god of farts or the god of social awkwardness deigned to visit.

Hahn-Hanar was sad to hear of his apprentice’s madness. The changeling, who appeared as a beautiful if not stylized living obsidian sculpture of a pony, with hair made of colored bands of silk and eyes of infinitely regressing rings of brass, said that he had ‘made’ his apprentice in an attempt to reproduce as ponies did, teaching the newly formed changeling of the glorious past of the changelings, as well as teaching him of the fun things in ordinary pony life: “Like food, food is fun to try – and ponies make food, Hahn-Lee obvisouly didn’t understand just how”

“Yes, we found that Hahn-Lee had an interesting perception of how that worked – and we are still trying to find a way to cure a mare he dream-ate and reshaped into something that isn’t quite a pony anymore but a pulsating growth-vessel for flesh” Sunrise Glow stated, her voice sounding perfectly calm and neutral, yet with poisonous hate in each word.

The changeling shrugged uncaringly, saying that he would alert the enforcers in case Hahn-Lee ever returned, and equally write him off as an educational but failed experiment. With the pennants delivered over the changeling gave the circle the information he had promised. Apparently, then two seasons ago a scavenger lord came by Hahn-Hanar’s store and had a map of his enhanced with a simple glamour, making it glow it in the dark and the ink on it never face. 

The whole circle paid close attention as the changeling described the scavenger lord. The title alone meant a lot: The river provinces, the central part of the east of creation, were known as the scavenger lands for a reason – for after every rainy season in spring new wonders would be found, and the scavenger lords were the ponies with either wealth or sponsor who oversaw the exploration and looting of such places, as many of the old lost first age ruins were riddles with traps or monstrous leftovers from a bygone era.

Hahn-Hanar said that such glamours were usually ordered by explorers going into the south-eastern jungles, where the ever-present humidity and heat rots paper very quickly. The map detailed the location of a ‘crashed’ manse not far from the grey river, several hundred miles south of a city called Jades. The changeling also noted that this particular scavenger lord had been somewhat stingy with payment for the service rendered, so Hahn-Hanar felt no qualms giving the circle a copy of the map he had made. 

The crashed manse, as the scavenger lord had bragged, fit the description of a manse that Sullen Hoof had once owned, something that Hahn-Hanar knew because him and Sullen Hoof had been great friends in Sullen Hoof’s past life as a solar – or so the changeling said. Whether this was true or just another delusional changeling thinking too greatly of itself was beyond the circle’s ability to discern.

The circle left quickly, walking in the streets of the southern district of Great  Forks as they discussed what to do next. Hahn-Hanar having given them a copy of the map, so they could essentially leave at once. Shimmer objected to this, stating that shaping up the powerful sorcery that produced her traveling cloud tired the mind, to the point that she wouldn’t be fun to be around if she had to do so again without resting first.

Staying the night at Sunrise Glow’s flat, the circle discussed what to bring for their little expedition. Red had Cash do their shopping, as well as check up on the status for the medical relief caravan going to the Chung lands. The caravan turned out to be getting ready ahead of schedule, looking to be ready in two weeks’ time instead of four, supposedly due to the alchemist workshops producing medicine being surprisingly productive.

The next the day the circle left Great Forks with a few extra supplies, rope, grappling hooks, torches, lamp oil and enough field rations to last them a week, all stored away in elsewhere in sacks and saddlebags – although Shimmer was adamant that she’d rather hunt and forage wherever they camp than eat the dry tasteless bread and salted meat of their traveling rations, saying that the stuff upset her stomach.

Speaker couldn’t help but notice that Shimmer was acting a little different that morning as they walked out the west gate of Great Forks. She was playful, impulsive – not childish – but up until now she had always had a sage and calm demeanor to her, like some sweet old grandmother… who was in love with you.

Confronted with this observation, albeit indirectly thanks to Speaker’s wondrous inability to veil his intentions or in any way be subtle, Shimmer quickly apologized: “It’s the sorcery – sapphire circle spells work hard on your head, and with two big clouds yesterday… you just don’t have the power left to control yourself. I put that in the spells, that’s how they work – soften reality with essence, reshape it with your will”

“You up for making another one?” Speaker said, thinking hard about such abstract concepts as will and the essence patterns that inform them, while the rest of the circle looked around to check if they were far enough from Great Forks to be out of sight.

Shimmer gave Speaker a kiss: “For you, always”

The circle continued away from Great Forks to where they had landed the day before.

Speaker was so wrapped up in recollecting essence theory to somehow help Shimmer that he didn’t notice where he was walking, resulting in him bumping him into a pony clad in azure robes. This pony also had a horn. And everypony worth their salt knew that azure robes meant immaculate monk.

Some ponies might have wondered what an immaculate was doing near Great Forks, but nopony got the chance to ask as Shimmer suddenly shifted into her half-pony half-bird form and in the same instance ripped the unicorn monk’s head clean off, emitting a savage birdlike shriek in the process, leaving an arcing spray of blood sailing through the air.

Red deftly stepped aside to avoid getting hit by the thick blood-spray. Sullen Hoof ducked under the spray in a single elegant maneuver. Cash, with a new not-burnt silk jacket, watched in horror as his new silks got hosed down with blood.

“Oh come on!” Cash said, dumbstruck at the sight of his expensive clothing ruined, apparently not caring at all that another pony had just been murdered right next to him.

Having been sufficiently shocked back into the present, away from his deep thoughts, Speaker looked at the scene in horror. He hadn’t ever imagined that Shimmer was able to do such a thing. Such was Speaker’s shock that he wasn’t even thinking as he trotted up to Cash Charmer, who was half-way in tears, and struck the stallion’s new blue silk jacket with a wash of essence from his hoof that stripped the blood off in nearly an instant.

Sullen Hoof, who’d been hoof deep in the dead monk’s pockets, saw this and dropped the folded cloth he’d found, it landing with a wet sound on the ground: “How did you do that?”

Speaker blinked a few times, looking at his hooves as the last of the golden essence dripped from them along with the last of Cash’s silk’s stains disappearing. He then tried to explain the idea that solar essence could replace any tool imaginable, such as a wonderous device Speaker called a ‘washing machine’ from the first age, which could remove any stain from whatever was placed in it through purifying essence processes.

Sullen Hoof and Speaker ended up talking for the next half hour while Red and Shimmer got rid of the body, Shimmer in her bird-form using her long talons to quickly dig a shallow grave behind some bushes. Cash had fun evaluating the immaculate jewelry that the monk had, while Sunrise appeared strangely captivated by the ornate folded cloth that the monk had carried.
Shimmer, strangely pleased and revitalized by her stint of pony-slaughter, ultimately excusing her actions with a seemingly astute observation: “Look at these travel papers he had, he’s from Nexus – going to Grey Falls. That means that he’d know about you Speaker, he’d warn every pony he’d come across, plus give descriptions of the rest of us to anypony who’d want to hunt us down”

“Hold on – he’s on hoof, no transportation or anything – he would have left Nexus a long time ago if he’s trotted all the way to Great Forks from Nexus, so he couldn’t possible have known about me” Speaker said, having used a little math to add up how long it would take to get from Nexus to Great Forks – a trek of almost six-hundred miles, which would even out to at least twenty days on hoof, probably more if the monk stopped to preach every now and then, which was quite likely.

Realizing that the monk couldn’t possibly have known about Speaker, and thus hadn’t really posed a threat, Shimmer felt greatly ashamed of her actions. She tried to apologize, but Speaker didn’t want to hear it. Cash asked that Shimmer get on with conjuring that cloud, which Shimmer did, although the cloud had an unmistakable darker shade to itself, like that of a rain cloud.

Traveling across the sky Shimmer guided the circle right around the shadowland south-west of Great Forks known as the Walker’s Realm, while the cloud brightened as it silently shed her tears for having upset Speaker. Sunrise entertained the rest of the circle by retelling the story of how the three lord gods of Great Forks had bested the undead master of that shadowland, saving Great Forks:

“It was said to be a powerful ghost of a pony called The Black Heron, who had built a mighty fortress of bone and steel called the Ebon Spires of Pyrron, lit with ten thousand fires stolen from funeral pyres. The dreamweaver, talespiner and dayshield conspired to create a story, part fiction, part destiny, about a mighty pony rising to find an overlooked weakness in the Black Heron’s defences, laying the ghost to rest for good…” Sunrise described, as the sun approached its zenith.

Red was curious if this story meant that this Black Heron had finally been slain, but Sunrise explained: “The mere rumor that such a magical story was being made frightened off the Black Heron. To my knowledge only the three know the story, and for they hold on to it, keeping it as a guarantee that the Black Heron will never return to threaten their lands”

Sunrise told more stories as night fell and the moon rose. Shimmer guessed that it would be another week or so before it’d be another full moon.

“Why’s that important?” Cash inquired, having enjoyed the view but equally noticing how worried Shimmer had sounded when she made that observation.

Shimmer darted a glance at Speaker who’d returned to his deep thoughts on will and essence theory, then returned her gaze to the horizon as she maintained control of the cloud and the direction it was going in: “Luna blesses us with the moon each night, gifting every pony with dreams via moonlight. Lunars are… sensitive… to this, but only on the first night of each full moon. I’ve seen lunars do strange things on full moons, be it weep uncontrollably for past sins, mindlessly break into a gallop towards their nearest enemy no matter how far away that enemy was only stopping the next morning. Some dig a hole and hide in it until dawn… nothing bad, it’s just that the moon is sacred to us and our reverence of it gets the better of us every now and then, sometimes not more than once a decade, others every year or so”

“So… you’re worried that you might do something weird around Speaker?” Cash said, having caught Shimmer’s drift perfectly.

Shimmer nodded shamefully. In the west dealing with immaculates was simple enough: You killed them, especially if they were trying to convert anypony under your protection. That was how Shimmer had been trained. With Speaker around, her lunar bond to his exaltation made her want to protect him so very much.

Looking east to the desolate wastes around the empty city of Denansdor, Shimmer shrugged: “I doubt I’m the only lunar who’s been thinking about this, especially ones with strong spirit bonds to their solar mates. I’ve been told I get… possessive, usually of whatever pony I’m sweet for at the time when the silver chariot rides in full splender”

“So what, you’ll lavish him with kisses and show him how western ponies rut? This is the east my dear, we’ve got kingdoms ruled by mares here that mandate that all unmarried stalions must submit to a mare of age who chooses them” Cash chuckled, recalling some of the strange places in the hundred kingdoms he’d heard of while traveling as a merchant.

Shimmer laughed, suggesting that they go visit that place after they finish with the plague affair in the Chung lands, then fondly recalling: “I once came across this little tribe on an island back west. They had plenty of fruits growing there to sustain them, but it came at a price. Something in the fruit made the stallions barren shortly after they reached adulthood, barely enough time to sire any foals. The mares there would organize into raiding parties on their boats, and sail out and ‘rape’ all stallions they came across… and then mark any stallion ‘done’ by biting off their eyelids – hilarious!”

Cash forced out a chuckle, but really didn’t like how realistically Shimmer able to mimic the eyelid-biting maneuver without… batting an eyelash, and smiling while doing so. It was just another reminder that Shimmer was born a tribal; no doubt about that.

Shimmer flew the cloud through the night, the circle sleeping on the cloud, waking up to find a slightly tired but resolute Shimmer still controlling the cloud in the morning. By noon the cloud linked up with the Grey River, which fit the map the changeling had given them, only question was how far down the river they were. A few hours later the cloud passed over a city on the side of the river that matched the description they had been given of Jades.

There was of course a big difference: This Jades was burning, its wooden palisades toppled and almost every wood hut either knocked over or lit on fire. There was no movement visible from high up on the cloud, but Sullen Hoof had a charm for that. The hillside leading down the river that the city was built on was a mess of things that had been tossed down the side of the hill, as well as huts and the odd stone building that had been knocked over and tumbled down the hill in pieces.

With a whiff of essence he gazed down over the side of the cloud, muttering something about his vision now being augmented. He quickly concluded that there was no movement down below. There were plenty of dead ponies lying around, but no movement visible. No apparent survivors, and no conquerors setting up shop in the castle on the top of the hill, only fire taking away the last marks of civilization down below.

Cash proposed that they touch down to see if there was any salvage to grab, but Shimmer was adamant that she wasn’t setting the cloud down until they found Sullen Hoof’s old manse.

A few hours later, with Sunrise having said an earnest prayer for the dead ponies in Jades, a strange sight emerged on the east side of the river: A gigantic cube-like stone structure, overgrown with jungle vegetation, at the end of a wide bay, poked out of the ground.

A curious detail was that when looked at from above it was obvious that the bay wasn’t as much bay… as it was an elongated impact crater that had filled with water: This very much looked like where Sullen Hoof’s flying manse had struck down. It was a miracle that the tapered cube-shaped manse had landed in an upright position, not tipping over. It was also clear that it was far enough in land from the river, along with how high the jungle grew around the river, that it wouldn’t be possible to see the towering overgrown structure if you just sailed by on the river.

Speaker briefly wondered why the manse had been knocked off the demesne that usually powered it – but then realized that when the Great Contagion had hit, with so many ponies dying, that the very dragon lines of essence that form the demesnes in creation would have changed… so the manse simply lost its power supply.

Another thing clearly visible from the sky, especially in the noon sun, was the camp set up on the north side of the crashed manse and the two sail ships – a small schooner and a big junk from what Cash could tell, plus what looked like several barges being constructed – anchored in the cove. That would be the scavenger lord’s expedition.

“Ok, so how do we get in to this thing? Scavenger lords aren’t famous for sharing – and there’s no honor in slaughtering innocent ponies to get at something like this” Red noted.

Sullen Hoof suggested that they land on the top of the manse, approaching from the south side to avoid detection, but he quickly recanted that – spotting ponies clearing vegetation on the top of the manse.

Shimmer put down the cloud on the side river out of sight of the manse. Going down to ground level was tough: Up in the sky the air was cool and while the spell that made the cloud kept the winds rushing past the cloud, not through it, then there was a constant comfortable breeze.

Descending hit everypony with the tropical heat of the area hard. The circle had traveled almost two thousand miles south, putting them a lot closer to the elemental pole of fire. The air was hot, and because of the river it was humid to the point that it almost impossible to breathe. The proximity to the elemental pole of wood didn’t help either: The jungle around the river extended for thousands of miles in every direction, and it was so dense that you could hardly see three feet into the undergrowth before your view was obscured by vines, bushes, shrubs, tree trunks and dark shade.

Red retrieved a well-made dadao, a big three-foot saber that she wielded with expert skill as she floated it around, clearing brush and vines to allow the circle passage through the jungle towards the manse: “I have to admit, this makes using this so much easier! Holding weapons in your hooves or mouth seem silly now”

Speaker agreed, stating that this was the primary reason why exaltations came with enlightened essence.

Shimmer changed into a rat and scurried into the jungle, scouting, while Cash flailed wildly to keep the hoof-sized bugs away, occasionally shrieking as one would fly by him or try to land on him, with Sunrise in her cloak shushing him every time.

“Oh come on Cash, you think this is bad? I once spent three weeks up at the Nechara redoubt, up the end of Maruto river. It’s so close to the pole of wood that the bugs there are the size of foals and the bamboo grows up to three yards a day.” Speaker fondly recalled, adding: “ It was impossible to keep wounds from festering, but there was so much ambient wood essence that you could just hold a wound together and it’d heal on its own” with a far more somber voice.

Sunrise stoically ignored the buzzing insects around her as she asked: “You don’t sound happy that wounds healed that easily, why?”

Speaker explained that any broken limb was sure to heal in a wrong position, forcing him and his medical team to re-break limbs to set them right before they healed. This meant that they often had to break limbs repeatedly, as they would begin to heal before they even got to reposition them. Some of the ponies who had to go through that recovered physically, but the scars it left on their minds would never heal: “I wish I could find some of those ponies now – I can help them with my powers, couldn’t back then – plus, with all that ambient wood essence, any pony living there for too long would  end up looking like the ponies back at the farm we visited yesterday”

Shimmer returned a short time later, guiding Red as the two of them, with Shimmer in her birdlike ‘cunning beastpony form’ as she called it, cut a path to a spot near the manse. They ended near where the scavenger lord’s camp was, at the edge of the clearing made around the camp.

Hiding just beyond the treeline, it was clear that this was a big and well organized operation. There were at least a hundred ponies in dirty and rough cloth working hard at forges, a make-shift lumber-mill and tables where food was being prepared. Other ponies were chopping down trees to supply the lumber mill or make wooden stakes for a palisade that was being set up around the part of the camp with the tents in it.

Most of the ponies appeared to be working on chipping away at the manse’s outer wall, trying to tunnel into it. This made it clear that there wasn’t any readily available entrance, because otherwise the scavenger lord’s ponies would have already entered through that to loot anything of value.

A big and particularly colorfully outfitted tent, with a frilly curtain decorated with glass beads, in the middle of the off-white sail-cloth tents at the west end of the camp marked the scavenger lord’s headquarters. Sullen Hoof suggested that he or Shimmer sneak in and get an idea of what the lord knew, before they did anything else.

“Ok, Shimmer should do that – she’s better equipped to decipher any schematics or sketches of the place she might find, especially if they’re in code. Sully, you go disguise yourself as one of the workers tunneling into the manse, to see how far they are there. Red, you clear out a spot for us to sleep a bit further back, far enough away so nopony in the camp here might hear us at night. Cash… you… look pale, sit still for a moment” Speaker said, having thought carefully at what each of his circle-mates should do. 

Speaker slowly walked over and swatted off the blood-sucker bug that was sitting on Cash’s back, its swollen abdomen popping like a blood filled balloon the size of a big apple – no wonder Cash looked pale. Blood-suckers were mosquito-like insects the size of small oranges, and a single one could drain a foal to the point that it’d faint, while several could drain a stallion completely. They were very common in the eastern jungles, and made for a crunchy snack if roasted, assuming that you could stomach the taste. Shimmer said she preferred them raw.

Cash felt… tired, and now he at least knew why. To everypony‘s relief Cash was too tired to complain that his silks were once again ruined, but having seen Speaker’s little cleaning trick once he didn’t worry too much about the stains drying into the silk.

Everypony dispersed, Speaker taking Cash back the path to where Red was clearing a space for them to sleep. Cash noted that they shouldn’t sleep on the ground, as the bugs would clearly eat them alive – they should make a shelter up the trees if possible. Speaker was thinking up designs for a nice little tree house and how to make it without nails when Shimmer and Sullen Hoof returned.

Shimmer was the first to report: “The scavenger lord is called Jewel Dancer, a mare with the Guild – they’ve been at this for months, but the manse is armored, made out of a mix of stone and jade, so there’s no way in yet – at least none mentioned in her journal. That’s why they’re making raft-barges, to ferry all the jade-infused rock back to Nexus so they can refine the jade out of it. Jewel Dancer seems to believe that the profit from the jade-stone alone will pay for all of this, once the entire manse has been strip-mined away, so they aren’t afraid of breaking anything inside by destroying it completely”

Speaker wasn’t happy to hear what was being done to the manse, but then again it was crashed and probably damaged beyond repair, so salvaging it wasn’t that unreasonable.

Sullen Hoof said that there was a point at the end of the tunnel dug into the side of the manse that had opened up a few weeks ago, but the ponies working the rock were wearing out picks faster than they could be repaired, or melted down to make new ones – and the hole into the manse was the size of a foal’s hoof: “Oh, and over half the ponies here are slaves – and wild animals attack them at night, killing at least one pony a week, so everypony is terrified”

“We can’t waste time helping these ponies – we need to get inside before they do” Cash said, having regained his strength since being drained by the blood-sucker bug.

Speaker reluctantly agreed, but pointed out that that until they found a way inside they might as well find whatever was eating ponies.

Shimmer went back to the scavenger camp in the form of a common eastern song-bird, keeping a lookout for any progress in the tunneling operation. Speaker and Red made a make-shift platform out of cleaved logs lashed together with vines up in the trees, well out of sight and earshot from the scavenger camp. Sunrise tried to help where she was able, ultimately resigning herself to picking edible fruits and berries for them to eat.

When night fell Shimmer came back for a brief report, saying that the scavenger camp perimeter was lit up by torches, set up all around the tree-line. It would be almost impossible to sneak into the camp on hoof without casting long and easy to spot shadows. Sullen Hoof, as sneaky as he was, agreed that it would be hard getting to the tunnel dug into the manse unseen with that up.

“What about a diversion? Wait for the thing eating them to come at them, and while they’re looking for it or panicking we make our move… and uhm… what is our move?” Cash said, while chewing softly on some tasty fruit that Sunrise had found, occasionally stopping to spit out small black seeds.

Speaker said that he had talked to Red, and the two had agreed that a few good bucks enhanced by a little Hoof of the Daystar style martial arts should break open a hole into the manse at the end of the deepest tunnel, if they struck at the tiny opening already made. The trick was indeed a diversion.

The whole circle moved to the treeline, only to find the torches that surrounded the camp completely obscured everything in the camp, due to the glare. On the other hand, the same applied to the circle, so they were able to leave the tree line and walk along the row of torches without being seen by the very obviously twitchy sentries.

At the manse the tunnel leading inside was flanked by two guard ponies with spears, plus there was a constant stream of slaves going in with new sharp picks in their mouths and out with buckets full of orange jade-stone and bent and blunt picks in their mouths.

“You shouldn’t happen to know how to transform into some beast that has a really scary roar?” Cash asked Shimmer, sporting a mean grin.

Shimmer looked down and shook her head: “Sorry, I can do sharks and all kinds of other spooky sea creatures – but I don’t have much in land animals beyond bilge rats and a cow”

“You… hunted a cow? That’s barbaric. I know they’re always kept as slaves for the milk, but really?” Speaker blurted out.
Shimmer shrugged: “It was a bull leading a slave rebellion who was massacring ponies left and right, not some tied up milk-squirter. I did what I had to do to keep ponies safe”

Suddenly there were screams at the other end of the camp, near the tents. A loud feline roar sounded, followed by dozens of panicky shouts from ponies. It sounded like a tiger if Speaker heard it right.

The ponies around the tunnel to the manse quickly rushed inside, the two guards holding their spears out at anything that might approach the tunnel entrance.

“Great, now how are we going to get in unseen” Red frowned.

Cash whispered something into Shimmer right ear. Shimmer nodded and Sullen Hoof smirked. Cash then whispered some more to Shimmer. Speaker didn’t know what was being planned, but Shimmer walked confidently through the torch-line as she snuck up next to the tunnel entrance. She then let out an impossibly loud tiger-roar, followed by her shouting: “I am Tin Than, spirit of tiger fury! This is my domain and my manse! I will eat all ponies who trespass in it and defile it!”

Shimmer then quickly turned into a rat and scurried back into the treeline, out of sight. At the same time all the ponies in the tunnel came rushing out, fearing for their lives.

The circle quickly made its move, rushing back into the tunnel – the torches set in front of the tunnel entrance obscuring the circle as they galloped inside. The shouts from outside slowly faded as the circle slowed to a trot, quickly reaching the end of the tunnel.

The tunnel dug into the manse was roughly five yards deep, a testament to how thickly armored the manse was. At the end of the tunnel was a small hole that seemed to lead into a bigger room.

“I really wish we could do something to help the ponies being attacked out there” Sullen Hoof noted as rock chips crunched under his hooves.

Speaker nodded: “When we’re done in here we’ll make a pass at whatever is hunting them, Shimmer – you have any idea what kind of animal that was?”

“A tiger of some sort, why do you think I said I was a tiger spirit? But you know… tiger’s normally wouldn’t attack a place like this, too risky. But I should be able to track it once we’re out of here” Shimmer noted, stepping aside to let Red get up the end of the tunnel.

Red lined up for a mighty buck at the tunnel end, coils of sparkling essence gathering around her hooves as she focused her mind to form the essence patterns that made up the Pillar-Breaking Buck technique, Speaker ushering everypony further back. As Red released the might of her hind legs and rear hooves on the jade-stone there was an ear-piercing crack, as the stone was blasted away by the buck, showering everypony in pebbles and filling the tunnel with dust.

As the dust settled it was clear that the hole in the manse was now big enough for a pony to fit his or her head through, which Sullen Hoof was quick to do to have a look around.

Pulling his head out a few seconds later, he said that the room was quite dark, which explained why Sully had flared his caste mark, but beyond that it was a long room with a bottomless pit, with a bridge spanning over it. The hole was next to a platform with a wooden chest that the bridge connected to an open door at the far end of the room: “If Red bucks the stone again she’ll probably knock a hole big enough for us to fit through, but she risks knocking the chest down into the abyss”
Speaker was trying his best to remember what the room was for, why it was there, and where in the manse that would put them. He didn’t notice as Shimmer changed into a colorful coral snake and slithered through the hole, then changed into a bird on the other side and flew over to the chest, then changed back into a pony. 

Speaker did notice when Shimmer suddenly called out from the other side of the hole: “Chest is empty – just buck your way in Red!”

Red did as suggested, but this time it wasn’t just an ear-piercing crack that came out of the buck. Large cracks in the stone radiated out from where Red had hit, the rock quickly falling into the room and down into the abyss. However, cracks also radiated up into the tunnel roof, floor and walls and further back towards the entrance… and large rocks began falling from the ceiling as the tunnel began collapsing. Everypony quickly scrambled to get inside, making the quick little skip and jump to get over on the platform with the empty chest that barely had enough room for three ponies, let alone five – Shimmer sitting on the chest in the form of a seagull to save space.

“Damnit, now we’re trapped here” Sullen Hoof muttered.

Speaker took a deep breath, the musty mix of stale air mixing with the humidity leaking in from the outside making for a smelly mix that seemed to stick to your nose: “Hold on – I remember there’s a roof access, we just have to get to the central elevator once we’re done exploring”

And with those words the quest to explore the manse and get out of it alive began.


> Chapter 10: First age traps are pure evil
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With the tunnel dug into the manse thoroughly blocked, to the point that it wasn’t even possible to get from the ledge with the chest to the hole into the room, the circle gazed into the darkness.

Everyone channeled a smidge of essence to activate their caste marks to give them enough light to see, as there were no other light sources in the room – there might once have been, but if so it wasn’t working any more. The tunnel into the manse had been lit with foul-smelling smoke-less torches and oil lamps that had made the air hard to breathe, but they had allowed for ponies to see where they were going.

“Give me some room” Red said, stepping out on the bridge to the doorway that led out of the room. Suddenly a suit of red lamellar armor, made of small overlapping steel plates woven together with tough leather string. Red then bit on to the armor and flung it into the air, activating a charm that caused the armor to split apart into its component pieces, each glowing faintly with a golden-white hue.

It was spectacular to see as the pieces flew down around Red, reconnecting themselves. Ten or so seconds later Red was suited up completely, without the need for any other pony to help her tighten or adjust any straps.

“Ok, I want to know how to do that” Speaker bluntly stated, shaking his head in disbelief.

Shimmer, still in seagull form, flew up from the chest and landed on Speaker’s back: “Leave it to solars make putting on armor look spectacular”

Red then led the circle over the four or so yard long bridge. Speaker noted that Red’s lamellar armor was simple but functional, clearly made for and by mercenaries, as there were no crests or insignia stamped, painted or etched into the armor. Square spaulders covered her shoulders, while long lamellar sections covered her flanks, but would also allow for Red to rear up and perform martial arts properly. Her shins were equally protected by greaves made from long lamellar plating. A curious detail that Speaker noted was a black body-suit under her armor, made of black wax-treated cloth; Speaker recognized it as a very professional detail, as it would keep Red dry, if not warm, while wearing armor even in rainy weather, something that was normally the bane of any armor-wearing pony.

Then there was a sudden and horrible grinding noise and a split second later Red suddenly flew backwards over the rest of the circle and smashed into the wall in the back of the room, above the platform with the chest, Red never even getting the chance to scream before impacting hard. It sounded like a sack of potatoes covered in tightly connecting metal bits hitting something a surface that gave off no echo, followed by a whimper as Red fell from the wall down on the chest.
There was a flurry of activity as the circle tried to maneuver around  to allow Speaker to get to Red, while everypony tried to back away from the… the doorway across the bridge wasn’t there anymore – instead there was a large section of beige  stone wall that jutted out from the doorway, fully the size of the doorway.

It slowly began retracting, like some kind of piston reloading, it grinding against the stone bridge, revealing that it really was a big solid stone block, or at least the outer surface of it was of stone.

Suddenly Speaker shouted: “Shimmer, Sully, help me get Red in through the door before the piston resets!”

Shimmer quickly flew up on Red’s body, Red groaning as Shimmer turned back into her adult pony form, picking Red up – armor and all – in one swooping motion, while her Caste Mark flared and body momentarily rippled with unnatural muscle-growth.

“Wha- what’s going on here?” Cash finally managed say, everything having happened so quickly.

Speaker watched with no small amount of pride swelling in his heart from seeing Shimmer’s swift actions, then frantically gestured for everypony else to get through the doorway the moment the wall-section had retracted enough to make a hole: “This place is one big deathtrap – it was made to train young exalted ponies!”

That was all Cash needed to hear. Shimmer was through first with Red, followed by Cash, Sunrise and Speaker. Then there was a loud click as the wall section slid back completely – leaving Sullen Hoof halfway over the bridge, the stallion quickly stopping in his tracks.

Speaker looked back at Sullen Hoof with dread in his eyes.

“Do you remember how the trap is activated?” Sullen Hoof asked, staying calm and collected as he peered up from under his straw hat.

Speaker thought for a moment. He hadn’t pieced together that the place had traps or training facilities until after having seen the trap – and there wasn’t much beyond that he was remembering at that moment. Looking at the bridge and the wall sections, which didn’t even show any grooves or signs that it could separate from the wall, Speaker guessed that the trap was triggered by walking on the bridge near the doorway, even though there were no visible pressure plates… the whole manse appearing to have been made from one hollowed out stone.

“Probably with your singing staff – but that’s ok, I can get through this” Sullen Hoof said, making an impressive leap from having just stood still, landing on the wall section in front of the doorway, then leaping to the left away from the trap.
Speaker breathed a heavy sigh of relief, then turned to go down the right side of the doorway – which turned out to end at a corner almost immediately, Sullen Hoof rounding another corner to come around to face him. It struck both of them quite amazing how several yards of stone wall could project out of what turned out to be a wide column in a larger room – clearly there was magic involved. There was another open doorway leading out, away from the trap room. The sound of hooves on stone could be heard beyond the opening.

“Speaker, come on – Red isn’t breathing right” Shimmer voice called out from beyond the doorway.

Speaker and Sullen Hoof ran out the doorway, their Caste Marks emitting a dim light that revealed a curving hallway with other doorways, some closed with solid stone doors. Shimmer and Sunrise was sitting next to Red, who was lying on the ground and twitching slightly.

Speaker quickly ran up and willed forth a swirl of essence to aid him. First he gently rolled Red onto her back and poured essence into the mare to end her pain, to which she breathed a labored sigh of relief. Five now non-painful minutes of poking and prodding later Speaker confirmed that Red’s armor very much saved her life, having taken most of the impact: “All you’ve got is a hoof-ful of broken ribs, a punctured lung, and enough bruising to knock out any normal pony from the pain alone… how many ox-body techniques do you know?”

Red half-laughed up at Speaker and the others and recounted the ox-body techniques she knew, the special ways in which a pony could toughen oneself by rechanneling internal vital essence flows and thus withstand otherwise lethal injury: “Three, one for blood loss, one for flesh wounds and one for organ damage… also I can’t breathe right”

Speaker reminded Red of her punctured lung, saying that it was probably one of her broken ribs that had lodged itself into a lung.

“Well fix it then mister medicine – we’ve got a manse to explore!” Red said, sitting down – her facial expression revealing that she still expected moving to hurt, but to her surprise nothing happened.

Looking at Shimmer, Speaker smiled and shook his head. This was exactly like treating young Lookshyan troops: They were always so eager to get back into the fight. Red banished her armor back into elsewhere, allowing Speaker to have a go at her chest to fix her ribs.

Cash and Sullen Hoof both nearly vomited – well, Cash didn’t just nearly vomit, but was polite enough to run far enough down the curving hallway to be out of sight of the others, as Speaker used a scalpel from his medical gear to cut open Red’s chest.

Red was lying on her back, as naked as a pony could be, Speaker having already ‘disinfected’ her using essence, trying to look away as Speaker held the small sharp blade-on-a-stick his mouth and cut her open, peeling open her a big sheet of her skin like the front cover of a book. Red didn’t feel much of anything, Speaker’s anesthetic charm having left her in a sleepy opium-like haze, but it still wasn’t that fun seeing a bloody-hoofed pony poking around in your insides whenever you accidentally looked down.

The broken ribs were easy to spot, and a good hour of cutting out the pieces, cleaning them off with essence, patching up the hole in Red’s lung, putting the bits of ribs back in place, using strands of essence in lieu sutures patch everything up later left Red whole once more, although still in need of recovery. Speaker explained to Sunrise and Shimmer who looked on in silence, Shimmer occasionally lending a hoof to hold bit of rib, that with his charms he could ensure that there would be absolutely no scaring, so he wasn’t afraid of doing things in a bit more invasive style: “Usually we’d try to just cut open a tiny hole bit enough to fit forceps or maybe a single hoof in to root around, not bare a quarter of the patients ribcage – but this way I’m absolutely sure that I fix everything, and Red deserves nothing short of that”

Red appreciated the gesture, to which Speaker quickly told her to not speak as it would disturb the sutures on her lung.
With everything done Shimmer suddenly shrieked and leapt up into the air, turning into her seagull totem animal. Cash stood behind her, sniggering.

“This tunnel we’re in – it doesn’t just curve, its circular. Oh, and there’s some old realm writing and a door etched into the inner wall on the other side, and seven other doors on the outer  wall, but all the doors are closed” Cash smugly noted, a few purple tipped white feathers hanging from his mouth revealing that he’d bitten down and tugged on Shimmer’s tail to surprise her.

Over the next hour the circle explored the circular corridor while Speaker and Sullen Hoof waxed nostalgic. Shimmer and Cash uncovered more script in old realm and started to read up on it. Red wasn’t worth much, but Sunrise stayed with her and kept the wounded warrior-mare’s spirits up.

Together with Cash and Shimmer’s translations, especially since it turned out that Sullen Hoof couldn’t read, Speaker sketched a map of the manse. It really was an old first age training facility, and according to Speaker there was a way to open the roof to let in sunlight for a ballroom up at the top level of the manse.

They managed to force the door to the central elevator shaft open, Cash using the same Sledgehammer Hoof Blow technique that Red had used a variation of to buck through the wall into the manse, smashing down the solid stone slab that was the door after several great blows.

With the central shaft open, Speaker could see that the lower levels of the shaft were full of rubble, blocking any access to the lower levels without spending weeks excavating the place. Speaker suspected that the entire lower half of the manse was completely demolished: “A shame really – the light airship hangar was on the lowest level. Arrow had all kinds of toys down there”

“Arrow?” Sullen Hoof wondered.

Speaker apologized. Apparently Sullen Hoof’s name as a solar in the first age had been Gold-Shadowed Arrow. Speaker added that they were on one of the middle levels of the manse, the tougher of the training rooms.

Sullen Hoof and Cash both agreed that the one ‘training’ room they’d endured so far seemed more like a deathtrap meant to push ponies into an abyss or smash them against walls.

“Well, you weren’t looking for traps or prepared to dodge any – I’m sure back then it was safe enough to play around with” Speaker said, shrugging.

There were eight rooms in total on that level, with four rooms that were either caved in or where neither Red nor Cash could smash open the doors. One even had old realm glyphs on it that read “This is a door. It cannot be opened or broken down”

Of the four doors that could be opened, one of which having done so seemingly automatically to allow the circle to exit the room they had tunneled into, the circle decided to heed Speaker’s suggestion to check them out: “Yes they’re all basically death traps, but Arrow had a wonderful habit of rewarding ponies who completed a level. There’d be a chest like in the first room in all of the rooms – and in one of there’d be some simple little throw-away artifact, a reward for surviving. It wouldn’t be much by first age standards, but if we can find a suit of magical armor, or a demon-cleaving blade, then I’m sure we’ll all be satisfied”

“Any idea which room the prize is in – and that it’s not in any of the rooms we can’t access?” Sullen Hoof wondered.

Speaker couldn’t tell, but pointed out that as long as they were careful and worked together then the three other available rooms should be a breeze to run through, seeing as they were made for only one pony to go through them at a time, and they weren’t really trying to run the gauntlet here, so cheating or bypassing obvious obstacles should make things easier  - and if they were anything like the first room, with just one big trap, they just had to find that and they’d be safe.

Of course, Speaker didn’t know that in the room they had entered the central doorway piston was the only one left enough essence left in its capacitors, while the six other wall-section pistons that were made to squish, throw or otherwise smash trainees had run out of power centuries ago.

The first room that the circle tried their luck with was the first to the left of the one they had come in through, if one faced the door to the ‘first’ room. Speaker recalled the rooms being set up in a geomantically appropriate pattern, forming a sun-burst with the corridor around the elevator shaft. By that logic the room they had come in by was the east-most room, while they were now going into the north-eastern room.

The room itself was clearly of the same stone that the rest of the manse was made of, appearing to have either been cast or magically shaped into its current form, there being not a single chisel mark or groove to indicate that separate slabs or bricks of stone had been used. The surface of the stone, just as in the outside corridor and the first room, was rough but not uncomfortably so, allowing for good traction and the potential for nasty bruises and scrapes if you fell on it.

The layout of the room was deceptively simple: At the door there was a one yard wide section of floor, which then gave way to a five yard long pit, both of which spanned the four yard width of the room. Then the pit ended, a foot-wide stone wall rising the three yards that were the depth of the pit, followed by a wooly looking carpeted area the size of the pit, and finally a half-circle of stone floor around a chest at the end of the room, the half circle being built into the carpet, rising like a small platform.

The pit was full of very sharp looking spikes, and everypony agreed that it would be a bad idea to fall down on them. The skeletal remains of ponies down amongst the spikes were a testament to this. Above the center of the pit a thick rope hung, it coming out of a hole in the ceiling. It wasn’t possible to tell how secure the rope was to swing from, but it was obvious that such was the intention – whether or not that was a trap… well… considering that nopony had seen the wall-piston in the first room coming, then nopony wanted to take any chances.

“Sully, you can run on walls – why not skip the rope and go check the carpet” Cash suggested.

Sullen Hoof shrugged, saying that he could do that – but why not have Shimmer go into a bird form and fly over instead.

When Cash taunted him Sullen Hoof instantly accepted the challenge, taking a few tentative steps back, then running fully gallop at the wall running the length of the room, all the way to the end, coming to a halt at the chest: “Its empty!”

With everypony disappointed, Sullen Hoof walked onto the carpeting to go and use the rope to swing back to the others – with no prize he almost felt cheated, as did the rest of the circle.

…but on Sullen Hoof’s first step into the carpeting he sank in, and shouted helplessly as yard long strands of wooly threads enveloped him as if he had falled into a giant pit of yarn! Struggling or even trying to ‘swim’ in it only entangled him even more, and Shimmer quickly noted that Sully was too far from the chest platform for her to have any useful leverage to stand on or hold against – she couldn’t pull Sullen Hoof up as a small bird.

Looking at Cash who seemed too afraid to brave the pit of spikes, then Red who was still too hurt to make the jump to the rope, Speaker quickly nodded at Shimmer: “Fly over, I’ll jump – we’ll form a chain and pull him up, like if it was quick-sand”

Shimmer had to admit that was a good idea, and so she transformed to a seagull and was two thirds the way over the pit when Speaker suddenly yelled out in pain. Looking back she saw the serated metal blades hidden in the rope shining off the light from Speaker’s caste mark, and equally saw that Speaker’s Mouth and cheeks were bleeding from where he’d bitten on to the trap-rope… and Speaker had let go, and was falling into the pit of spikes.

Flaring with pale cobalt-blue flames of moonlight as the lunar surged with essence, Shimmer turned into a big ugly octopus that lashed out and grabbed Speaker – but she didn’t have enough leverage to prevent him from falling down on the spikes, so instead she shielded him with her own squid arms, placing two of them under Speaker both to pull him up and also be skewered by the spike as Speaker fell down.

The wounded Red, the frightened Cash and Sunrise Glow who by no means had the physical strength or abilities to help in situation looked on as the Shimmer-squid made some weird but definitely pained bubbly noises, then pulled Speaker up and changed back into the form of a deceptively petite mare, forgoing her usual normal-sized adult mare form, now with two bleeding but rapidly healing wounds on one of her legs.

“Thank you, oh thank you so much” Speaker tried to say. It didn’t come out right since his tongue had been injured a little. It wasn’t much, but it hurt like hell – even if his wounds had already closed, one of the benefits of exaltation: The ability to shrug off minor flesh-wounds, like what you get from biting on to what was essentially disguised razor-wire.

“Speaker – get sully!” Shimmer said frantically, nodding wildly towards the pit of fluff that by now had completely swallowed Sullen Hoof.

Looking desperately down at the mess of filtered fibres, Speaker could see the filtered clumps jiggle and move slightly in the dim light from his caste mark – so Sullen Hoof hadn’t stopped fighting yet. Thinking quickly, Speaker considered his options: It was woolen fibers from the feel of it, so it wouldn’t burn very well. Cutting into the stuff ran the risk of cutting Sully.

“Sully – can you hear me? Flare you anima so we can see you!” Speaker shouted, remembering that Sullen Hoof knew sense-enhancing charms… Speaker hoping that Sullen Hoof could hear him despite being buried in thick wool.

Nothing happened – but then he thought of Shimmer: “Can you swim in this?”

Shimmer said that she’d suffocate if there wasn’t water to breathe in while in the form of a fish.

“Just cut the stuff! You can patch up any wounds he get” Red shouted from the end of the room.

Speaker took a deep breath and slowly willed forth Gift, while Shimmer changed into her beastpony form and flew up above the wool pit, her talons several inches longer than usual and being put to good use slashing wildly at the stringy mess.

Gift appeared half a minute later, Speaker feeling that this was much too slow. Red appeared to agree, shouting angrily: “Oh come on Speaker, you don’t know how to summon a blade properly? What would you do in a fight?!”

While Sunrise Glow gave Red a stern talking to about not helping the situation, Speaker began throwing Gift into the wool.

He knew he could save Sullen Hoof. With the fury of a frantic surgeon scrambling to save a live, Speaker threw so Gift so quickly that it was mere seconds before it started coming back bloody… revealing in what direction Sullen Hoof was buried.

Shimmer refocused where she was slashing down, and Speaker made the hard choice to throw Gift into the fray a few more times to triangulate where exactly Sullen Hoof was buried.

As gift whirled out of the wool, again bloodied, Speaker knew exactly what to do: “Shimmer, move, grab my rear legs!”
“I can’t… ok, hurry!” Shimmer said, wondering how she’d ever lift two adult ponies.

Leaping into the pile directly above where Sullen Hoof was, holding Gift out to dig down for him, Speaker quickly got down to Sullen Hoof – Gift instantly deactivating with a sputtering of steam as Speaker saw a now bloody and cut up ear. Up above Shimmer howled as essence rippled under her feathers, her skin splitting in long bloody gashes as her body couldn’t contain the bulk growth, granting her enough strength to pull both ponies up and fling them to the platform with the empty chest, leaving her bloody and reeling on the coffin as she used charms to close her own wounds.

“Well that went well” Speaker said, panting slightly, while Sullen Hoof heaved to catch his breath after nearly suffocating.
Shimmer slowly flew Speaker back to Red, Cash and Sunrise, Sullen Hoof running along the walls.

Outside the room the circle discussed if they should even bother trying the two remaining rooms. Cash had to admit that no reward was worth their lives if one of the traps ended up killing some of them, while Sullen Hoof appeared more shaken about the fact that his past self had even dared to call such death-traps ‘training rooms’, as had been written on the walls in old realm glyphs in the circular hallway – Speaker equally perplexed. Even Red wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to continue.

Sunrise Glow was the only of the ponies who didn’t want to give up: “The changeling that led us here seemed sure enough that this would worth our time – otherwise I can’t imagine that it would have done so”

“Oh so you’re saying that there’s chance that the CHANGELING didn’t just want to send us to our death?” Cash wondered out loud, being surprisingly direct and accusatory.

Looking unimpressed, Shimmer walked up to Cash and yanked him down by his goatee so the stallion was looking the young almost-mare straight in the eyes: “We are solars – we have a solar healer among us – so far none of the traps we’ve encountered would kill any of us immediately. Certainly, these training rooms were made to challenge and possibly even maim, but so far we’ve charged into these rooms blindly. Let us be thorough and not just accept what our first glance tells us… because riddle me this Speaker, don’t think you that’s probably the lesson of this level in this training facility?”

Sunrise Glow’s impassioned speech had its effect. Sure, the rest of the circle couldn’t detect Sunrise’s use of charms to forcibly impose feelings of courage and gumption, but it was all for a noble goal – right? It did however tell Sunrise Glow two things: Both that she could use mind-control charms on her fellow solars – and that it could work.

With their willingness to continue restored, the circle pressed forward. There were two rooms left on the level.

The first of the two remaining rooms, the third of the four rooms, faced west. It had a very simple layout and appeared far more obvious in where its trap element was built in: The room was similar to the previous one, starting with a one-yard wide landing that gave way to a pit, only this pit spanned all of the room save for a half-circle shaped platform at the end with a chest on it at the other end of the room. A simple and decidedly rickety looking bridge of wooden planks bound together with frayed and worn rope spanned the pit, which seemed so deep that it just continued into an endless darkness, like the first room the circle had entered the manse through.

“Ok, so… something is bound to happen to the bridge, there’s no other option” Red quickly stated.

Sullen Hoof wasn’t convinced: “Don’t be sure of that, the first room we came in through had a section of the walls thrust out – the walls on the side of the pit are just as in the rest of the manse, no telling if something might jut out and push you off here”

Nodding, Speaker mentioned that he did remember something about traps that worked like that being built into the manse somewhere – but he wasn’t sure it was here.

“Might I suggest we use this?” Shimmer said, suddenly holding a large ten foot pole of dark wood in one off. The rest of the circle didn’t even bother asking where she’d kept it, as it was clear it was obvious that it had been stored in elsewhere, instead Red and Speaker, being the two strongest ponies in the circle, went about forcefully poking and whacking the bridge – both to see if it wouldn’t just collapse due to being ancient, but also to see if it would trigger any traps.

The bridge held – although a lot of dust was shaken loose, which slowly descended into the darkness below. The circle then started arguing whether it would be wise to try to brave the bridge or not. Sullen Hoof wanted to take to the wall and bypass the bridge, while Shimmer suggested she fly over as a bird instead.

Reaching down and biting on to the rope that tied the left side of o the bridge to their end, giving it a good tug, Speaker suggested that they get out some rope, tie it around him and let him walk out on the bridge instead. If something happened, he reasoned that the rest of the circle could yank him back: “Can’t have Sullen Hoof being the only one to risk his life here”
Rope was fetched from saddlebags stored in elsewhere and Speaker slowly stepped out on the planks. The sound of hoof on wood echoed dimly in the chamber, with nothing connecting to the wood to stop the bridge from acting as a giant xylophone. Speaker wasn’t sure, but he was sure that the tune the bridge seemed to ‘play’ as he walked over it was off… because it ‘ended’ at the middle. Oh dear.

“Pull me back! N-“ Speaker barely managed to shout, as the bridge snapped in half, him dropping down for a split second. Then a giant fan hidden in the darkness below triggered, blowing speaker up towards the stone ceiling while making an ungodly amount of noise. The circle heaved and got him out of the fan’s range, although thick clouds of dust were being whirled up by the fan, making it hard to see where Speaker was.

Finally being hauled back up to the landing to the rest of the circle, Speaker wanted to breathe a sigh of relief – but the high amounts of dust in the air was making everypony cough, so he resisted the temptation. The fan was making far too much noise for anypony to say anything.

When the fan stopped a minute later and the dust slowly settled the bridge had somehow reassembled itself.
“Well, that was a sneaky one” Cash noted, nodding to himself.

Speaker looked down into the pit under the bridge, pouring a little more essence into his anima to make all him glow, not just make his caste mark manifest. The large steel fan, now clear of the thick layer of dust that had previously prevented it from reflecting light, revealed itself: “That’s not all of it – if I hadn’t been tied down I would have hit the ceiling. That would have reversed the fan… sucking me in and slicing me to pieces”

“Didn’t you say that this place would only try to maim you if you failed to avoid a trap – not kill you?” Cash said accusingly to Sunrise, who just ignored the comment.

Having figured out the trap, Sullen Hoof raced along the wall and opened the chest at the other end of the room. The circle collectively held its breath as Sullen Hoof opened the chest, which was followed by a confused: “What?”

Sullen hoof held four nice looking horse-shoes up, the sort that ponies who wanted to dress to impress wore. This was not the kind of prize Sullen Hoof had expected.

Running along the wall back to the circle, Speaker and Shimmer Glow both quickly concluded that there was something odd about the horse shoes – Shimmer could sense moonsilver in them and Speaker could sense that it was essence-reactive. Cash said that if nothing else he wouldn’t mind wearing them: “Hey, they look nice”

Having found the ‘reward’ of this particular level of the manse, the circle exited into the circular hallway and discussed if they needed to check out the last of the rooms they could access. Sullen Hoof said he wouldn’t mind giving it a look, just out of curiosity now that the pressure to explore the place had abated. Speaker agreed, stating he’d like just quick examination so could write down some notes in his book about the room.

The last of the four rooms appeared simple enough. Again there was a one yard landing just inside the room, followed by a five yard deep pit. This time the pit didn’t reach all the way across the room, which otherwise appeared to be of the same dimensions as all the others. The pit ended a few inches before the leftside wall, when looking from the doorway into the room to the other end. This left a very narrow ledge to walk along on, around the pit, to a doorway on the other side, with stairs being visible just inside to the right of the doorway. The pit itself seemed oddly unremarkable. There were no spikes or anything, just a bare stone floor and some unicorn pony bones, including a telltale unicorn pony skull.

Shimmer brought out her pole, which while not long enough to reach the bottom from the top of the pit, worked just fine by being dropped into the pit. This had a very spectacular effect: As the pole struck the bottom, five obviously demonic spiders the size of large wolves appeared and reduced the pole to splinters in a matter of seconds.

Sunrise Glow and Last Shimmer both instantly began forming the ancient mudra of victory over primordials with their hooves, the rapid hoof-gestures the gods used to seal their beaten foes away with. Both then howled triumphantly as their animas flares to the point that both were enveloped in respectively silvery and golden flames – two of the spiders equally shrieking and then winking out of existence, having been quite thoroughly banished back to where they had been summoned from.

The remaining three spiders took no time to start scaling the walls of the pit, their grotesque spider-feet hooking into the stone. Red instantly called her large saber from elsewhere and proceeded to smite each of the three spiders in a most spectacular way: Even though the spiders were several yards away, Red swung her blade three times and each time from the edge of the saber a brilliant arc of energy blasted down, hitting each spider. Two fell down to floor of the pit, their heads having been cleaved in half by the cutting force projected down onto them, their bodies twitching as they faded into nothingness.

The last of the remaining demon spiders managed to climb up to the landing, its hideous head chitterling something decidedly impolite in old realm – with its fanged mandibles held open to strike and bite. Its chitinous exoskeleton was mottled blue and purple, covered in razor spines and light fuzz. Its eight eyes were dark orbs that seemed to look at everything at once – but that didn’t last long, as Cash punched the thing with a hoof blazing with golden essence, knocking the demon spiders down and into the wall on the opposite side of the pit where a loud wet cracking sound confirmed that its carapace had cracked, allowing Red to deal a final blow with her saber, at range, cutting the giant spider in half. Purple blood and viscera sprayed all over the floor of the pit, the blood hissing as if acid upon contact with the stone, while the body faded back into the demon realm.

Red caught her breath while Sunrise and Shimmer exchanged glances of approval towards each other – as sorceresses should.

“Well, now we know what happens if you end up in the pit” Sullen Hoof noted: “…let’s not fall in the pit”

Using his perfect balance charm, Sullen Hoof quickly made it around the narrow ledge around the pit. He revealed to the circle that it was a spiral staircase that turned to the right of the doorway on the other side of the pit – and it led up to another landing with a chest. Suddenly, from up the stairs, was a quiet thump. Seconds later a previously unseen hatch at the top of the far wall in the pit revealed itself, letting a trickle of dust fall down. Much to the relief of all the ponies present, the dust did not trigger another demon summoning.

Sullen Hoof emerged a few moments later down the stairs, saying that the landing with the chest had been trapped – a trap door right in front of the chest, which of course was empty, having triggered the moment he had opened the chest: “I was lucky I still had a hoof on the last stair when I opened the chest…”

Finished with the training area, the circle decided to wrap things up. The venture to the manse had so far not yielded any loot or rewards worth mention, aside from snazzy horse-shoes that Cash were now wearing, but as pretty as they were they wouldn’t fetch that much if sold.

The central elevator shaft was blocked for passage down, and the elevator platform was a few levels up. Much to the relief of everypony the platform slowly began descending to their level when the appropriate glyph on a dusty crystal display was pressed.

Going up to the top level, the ballroom, Speaker explained that he remembered the ballroom ceiling opening up to let in sunlight. Assuming that this still worked, it would be their way out. None of the doors to the two levels between their point of departure and top level would open, even with Red and Cash each having a got at beating them down. Speaker suspected that they still had enough essence in them to prevent damage.

The sight that met the circle when they emerged at the top level was a gruesome one. The ballroom was strewn with the dusty skeletons of unicorns, along with ragged remains of what might once have been banners, clothing, or tablecloths. It certainly appeared as if the manse had been in use up, until the great contagion had changed the geomancy of creation enough to deprive the high flying manse of its power source, causing it to crash with all of its inhabitants trapped inside of it – at least those who for some reason didn’t make it to the hangar on the lowest level.

One of the unicorn did have something that stood out from the others: It was a very nice looking white silk jacket. It’s style was that of a sharp cut and with a wide stiff colar. It wasn’t tang-zhuang style like Cash’s silks, but Sullen Hoof quickly ran over to it and shook the bones out of it, shouting: “It’s real! It really exists! Ha!”

It turned out to have been an article of clothing that Sullen Hoof had dreamt about for weeks: His old first age chef uniform. Speaker noted that the make of it, its texture, and the sown in white jade revealed it to be a lot more than just a chef’s garb from the first age: “This is silken armor”

Speaker quickly demonstrated by trying to stab at it with the jagged end of a broken bone. There wasn’t a single torn seam or loose thread.

Sullen Hoof hugged the garb as Speaker explained that it would turn most small blades be fairly handy in hoof to hoof combat as well, not unlike chainmail barding – although the arguably best feature was that its essence flows allowed for additional armor to be worn on top of it.

With the mood of the circle raised by the discovery of a prized position from a past life, the hunt was on to find the switch to open the sunroof. Speaker recalled it being hidden somewhere – or that there certainly was a hidden switch, so everypony looked around.

The ballroom itself had very obvious dragonblood-themed motifs. The walls were covered in elaborate if not dusty and dilapidated murals depicting writhing elemental dragons defeating golden demons, and the ceiling had even been painted to depict the five immaculate dragons as bringers of the sun.

About an hour into scouring the ballroom, the circle having covered about a third of it – leaving no bone or stone unturned – Cash suddenly shrieked and toppled over.

Everypony else turned to look, finding – to their great amazement –that the new horse shoes Cash were wearing had projected long sharp metal claws, although only on Cash’s right forehoof, but it had happened suddenly and forcefully enough to tip Cash over before he could react.

Speaker instantly recognized the effect: “That there are shoes of distant claws, I’ve seen them in use in Lookshy – you must have attuned to them without even knowing. You can retract the claws with a thought, or shoot one from your forehoofs at stuff, reel back them back in, pull stuff, pull yourself up, do all kinds of things. Your hind-hooves should also be able to project claws, but not fire them. Great for climbing”

Cash Charmer looked at his hooves in amazement. He admitted that he’d put essence into the shoes to make them feel warmer. Red commented that the shoes should harmonize with Cash’s Hoof of the Daystar martial arts, allowing him to deal even deadlier blows, to which Sullen Hoof wondered why Red didn’t ask to have them instead.

“I use my blade more than I fight hoof to hoof – although I can already think of a lot of fun stuff to do with those things” Red noted, nodding her head back and forth as she momentarily lost herself to daydreams of martial glory and hilarious combat moves.

While Red zoned out Shimmer found a button at the bar area – it didn’t seem to do anything. Pressing it a few more times just for kicks ultimately did yield a result: The wall next to the bar burst from the wall near the bar, raining plaster and stone chips all over what might once have been a bar that served fluids of intoxicating natures for which there aren’t words anymore.

Rushing to help Shimmer, Speaker found her dusting herself off while admiring the box that had ejected itself from the wall.
Seeing as Shimmer didn’t need any help the circle began looking into the box that had popped out of the wall. Speaker wondered why it had been built over; Cash wanted to know what was in it and Shimmer found it very odd that button hadn’t been removed.

It turned out that Cash was the one who felt the most vindicated, as the box contained six exquisite jewel bracelets, made of some kind of solid diamond – not just gems set in precious metals, but six bands of solid diamond, etched with arcane runes of impossible detail and cut with impossible facets that reflected the golden and silver light of the caste marks around in hypnotic patterns. Everypony could see the endless rain of coin in Cash’s eyes… first age jewelry! You couldn’t just name your price with these things, this was the kind of treasures that wars were fought for. The paltry immaculate jewelry looted from the monk Shimmer had killed outside of Great Forks seemed like muddy pebbles compared to this.

“Why yes Cash, they’re worth a lot – and we’re not selling them” Speaker noted, sensing the latent essence stored in the items, all the while smiling like a foal at hearths warming eve because he knew what he wanted to do with them…

Suffice to say that Cash Charmer’s reaction to hearing this was not a pleasant one, but it did allow Cash to exercise his exaltation’s grand linguistic powers – as Cash very clearly, in many different languages, swore at Speaker for even daring to think that they could stop him for making a fortune off these priceless diamond bracelets. How could they even think of keeping these? The kind of money the sale of these could bring would allow them to buy off every immaculate monk in the east! They could buy kingdoms for this! Armies! No immaculate Wyld hunt would ever be able to touch them!

Cash would probably have continued his tirade if Red hadn’t smacked him over the head. “Quiet you – just listen for a moment, I’m sure that Speaker has good reason for us keeping these – and no need to shout” Red said, looking somewhat accusingly over at Speaker, who nodded furiously.

“I do – these aren’t just jewelry. They’re ‘spiritual equilibrium enhancing modulator-emitters’ – they protect your mind!” Speaker enthusiastically said, as if that was enough to explain the potential Speaker saw in the devices.

Cash obviously wasn’t convinced by this, but Speaker elaborated: The bracelets, when worn around a hoof and activated using the proper thought pattern and a little bit of essence, would shield one’s mind from ambient mind control effects: “It makes perfect sense… the changeling, Hahn-Hanar… if changelings were brought here for parties, this would be the kind of devices that would protect you from succumbing to subtle manipulation caused by their presence”

“Right, but what about more direct shaping attacks?” Shimmer wondered.

Speaker digressed that these devices weren’t made to protect against such – but for a changeling to attack a solar in his own manse would be very stupid, so that probably wasn’t going to happen anyway.

Cash still wasn’t convinced – and again reasoned that if they were this useless they should still sell them.

To this Speaker seemed down right disappointed: “Cash, what is the largest and best known persistent ambient mind control effect known in the scavenger lands?”

Cash’s lack of general education beyond reading and writing betrayed the would-be merchant prince once more, as Cash had to admit that he had no idea what Speaker was talking about. Sunrise Glow on the other hoof seemed very intriqued: 

“Are you certain that this will counteract the miasma?”

Speaker shrugged: “No clue, plus they aren’t meant to work for extended periods of time outside solar aspected manses – they’ll only work once activated for twenty-four hours outside and I don’t know where to recharge them – but this is far too big an opportunity!”

“Ok, so you think they’re useful – I get it – useful for what? What are you two talking about?” Cash shouted, terribly annoyed that the two ponies weren’t getting to the point.

Red patted Cash on his right shoulder: “Easy now champ – what are you so upset over?”

Turning to Red, Cash quickly stated: “We’ve been through this whole place without finding anything of value beyond these fancy claw-shooting shoes, and while they’re nice, then I was hoping for real riches – like what we could get selling these things. I do business, I don’t do ancient mysteries, or slave emancipation, or monster hunting, I do business. I can’t do business without something to buy or sell”

“Well how about selling whatever we find in Denansdor?” Speaker suggested.

> Chapter 11: Hunter and Hunted
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Cash blinked a few times, then swallowed: “Denansdor? Seriously?”

Sighing in relief that Cash had at least heard of the place, Speaker nodded.

“If Speaker is right and that these things can protect us, we have the chance to enter into a city that hasn’t had ponies within it since the changeling invasion that followed the great contagion, and its untouched by that too – If we can somehow gain control of the city while the bracelets still have power, we could set up a city state to rival the might of Lookshy and the wealth of Nexus!” Sunrise Glow triumphantly stated.

Red shook her head: “Now hold your horses there missy – to defend a city state you’ll need an army, we don’t have an army… yet”

“True, and if we deactivate the miasma somehow we’ll have to fend off legions of scavenger lords who’ll descend on the city with their mercenary forces, not to mention that Lookshy and the guild would probably go to war with each other AND us to gain control of it and its first age arsenal” Speaker noted, sounded notably less enthusiastic about the prospect of locking horns with Lookshy over control of Denansdor.

“Ahem” Said Sullen Hoof: “Could any of you kindly explain to me what this Denansdor place is, say, assuming that up until recently I had only been ‘educated’ in Nexus back alleys?”

Speaker and Sunrise elaborated, while Shimmer tucked away the bracelets into elsewhere much to Cash’s annoyance, and Red continued looking for the switch to open the roof. Denansdor was a famous city in scholarly circles, for up until the changeling invasion, known as the Baloran crusade to those who’d read about it, Denansdor had been the shogunate’s largest source of magical artifact production and craftsponies of unequaled excellence in every field possible, from master gem cutters to smiths who could hammer out swords worthy of kings. 

Speaker added that it had been so, even back in the first age, with numerous twilight caste solars entombed in Denansdor after living there for millennia. According to him the city had even been built with several factory cathedrals: “They were sacred workshops of unparalleled productivity and sanctified creation. Thousands of ponies labored in sacred unison to create magical artifacts using crafting sutras written by the great maker himself.”

As for why Denansdor was known as the ‘dead city’ was due to the mysterious circumstances surrounding its ‘fall’ during the peak of the baloran crusade. It was known, mainly from records that Lookshy carried with them when the then 7th shogunate legion made a fighting retreated towards the blessed isle, that when the baloran crusade hit Denansdor some device in its first age arsenal was triggered or activated… and no changeling or pony left the city or its surrounding artist colonies alive. These days the city was known only for two things: 

The first was madness, for any pony who ventured into the barren lands around the city would run out screaming moments later – or go completely insane, such was the mental trauma of exposure to the miasma of terror that had kept the city empty of invaders, scavengers and changelings for centuries up until present day. The second was death, the ponies that lived around the city told many tales of those who ventured into the dead city never coming out, or running out screaming, only to curl up and wait to die - just out of reach of those who might help them.

Both Cash and Sullen Hoof could see how this could easily net them wealth beyond imagining, although Sullen Hoof seemed far more curious in the artist colonies that surrounded the city. He didn’t know which one, but Sullen Hoof figured that there’d be a colony where artists of the culinary craft once congregated. Speaker noted that such a place was bound to exist – the trick would be finding it: “If we can find a map or directory of the colonies around the city it’ll be easy – but until then let’s focus on getting into the city proper… or just out of this place”

Looking around some more for the button to activate the roof proved futile. Either the button had been plastered over, in which case the circle would have to rip the entire place apart, or it had been disabled entirely and removed.

Ultimately Cash proved far too keen on getting to Denansdor, to which end he aimed one hoof up at the ceiling, shot a claw up into it – it firing itself from his horse shoe with a rattle of the crystal chain followed, then hoisted himself up to the ceiling by willing the chain to retract. A few good blows enhanced with essence and a magic martial arts technique later and half the roof was coming down over the rest of the circle: “My bad!”

Speaker hadn’t been hurt due to his elemental immunity charms making things like ‘rocks fall’ a non-issue. Shimmer appeared to have grown a second hide of thick armor plates that was already receding again. Red had dodged the stones. Sunrise… had broken half a ton of rock over her face, and didn’t have a scratch, although she did appear help getting unpinned.

“How’d you do that?” Speaker wondered, looking at Sunrise Glow as he and Red tipped the stones away. He could see how the rest of the circle had avoided being hurt, but he hadn’t thought Sunrise capable of defending herself with anything other than words…

Sunrise wasn’t impressed: “Oh come now Speaker, I know the same protection charm you do – and Zenith caste solars are meant to be resilient to withstand the trials and tribulations of this world. I know more advanced shield charms than the simple one you can do”

Speaker made a note to learn those charms as well, in addition to the perfect balance charm, Red’s weapon summoning charm and Sullen Hoof’s jumping charms. Red joked that Speaker wouldn’t be satisfied until he knew all the solar charms around.

Shimmer began to conjure her cloud, reminding the rest of the circle that before they went to Denansdor they had a small bit of monster hunting to perform. The circle ascended through the hole Cash had knocked in the ceiling, surprising some already very shocked ponies who were up on top of the mans, apparently working as lookouts.

“None of you saw us! The roof just exploded for no apparent reason – so says the prophet of the holiest holies” Sunrise shouted, her caste mark flaring as essence spun her words into undeniable truths that the ponies on the manse roof could do nothing but accept.

As Shimmer’s cloud brought the circle out over the scavenger lord camp, making it appear as if the manse was leaking a cloud of vapor, it became obvious for the circle that the camp down beneath was still on alert.

Tiny ponies that appeared to be the size of ants from the cloud scurried around the camp with torches, Cash Charmer figuring that they were doing a headcount to check for anypony missing.

“Any clue where the monster that attacked them earlier is? I mean, it couldn’t have gotten that far” Red wondered as an open question.

The sun hadn’t dawned yet, so it was quite dark aside from the lights down in the camp, making it difficult if not impossible to spot a creature hiding in the jungle down below. Shimmer said that if she wasn’t piloting the cloud she could have gone down and tracked the thing by scent – but with the cloud that wasn’t an option.

“Circle around the camp, let’s see if we can spot it” Sullen Hoof suggested, already looking down at the thick jungle canopy around the clearing the camp was built in.

Speaker was quick to note that the jungle was too dense to reveal motion on the ground to anyone up in the air, but Sully persisted, pouring essence into his sight. On the cloud’s second pass around the camp Sully suddenly perked up and said that he’d spotted a tree that was shaking.

“Shaking?” Cash wondered, looking down at the endless jungle and only seeing a sea of green.
Sullen Hoof noted that it was a big tree, meaning that whatever causing it to shake had to be really big and heavy – yet able to climb up in trees: “Oh, like say… a tiger?”

“Would make sense if it’s a tiger attacking the camp – it would drag its kill up in a tree to avoid having to share with all the bugs at the jungle floor” Shimmer added, Speaker agreeing.

Shimmer quickly maneuvered the cloud down to the canopy, allowing Red, Sullen Hoof in his white magic chef’s coat and Cash in his dirty silks to leap onto the branches, Red’s armor swirling around her as it magically applied itself to her body. Speaker once again marveled at how they all could balance so effortlessly on such impossibly frail footing. Shimmer laughed: “I take it you haven’t learned how to perform the graceful crane stance?”

Speaker nodded, saying that it was very much on his to-learn list.

Red and Sullen Hoof both quickly disappeared under the thick foliage, which prompted a fearsome roar from underneath. The unmistakable sound of fighting ensued – the grunts, heaves, shouts, the sound of blood spraying on leaves and Red’s armor ringing out the jingle of claws on lamellar plating.

Then there was a single pained yowl, followed a few seconds later by a wet thump further down on the jungle floor. Red called the all clear.

“You go have a look, verify what it is – I need to stay here and keep the cloud going” Shimmer said, looking annoyed that she couldn’t go have a sniff of the beast herself.

Speaker tied some rope to the cloud, a weird enough accomplishment, then rappelled down to into the jungle. The sight that met him down on the jungle floor was Red in damaged armor, the claw marks and torn lamellar plates clearly showing where the monster had swiped her, but at least she wasn’t hurt. Sullen Hoof and Cash were still up in the trees, Cash quickly latching on to Speaker’s rope and beginning to climb back up to Shimmer – no reason for him to get down into the dirt and mud.

The monster had not been a tiger. To an untrained eye it might look a bit like one, it clearly being a big feline carnivore, but its paws were wrong… they were unnaturally long and it had four eyes.

Speaker quickly realized what had happened to this beast: “Wyld mutations. There’s probably a wyld pocket around here – the mutations aren’t that severe, but they probably made the thing more aggressive, prompting the attacks”

It was then the ground started shaking a little. Shimmer shouted down, asking if everypony were alright. Moments later she shouted: “There’s something BIG coming at you guys! It’s knocking over trees!”

Speaker, having seen the beast, and Cash who didn’t want to get dirty were both going up the rope to the cloud when the approaching giant monster started to stomp through the undergrowth, attracted by the noise and the irresistible smell of blood. Then the Speaker and Cash suddenly felt the rope they were pulling themselves up by coming lose.

This was quickly followed by a small pony in white robes falling through the canopy. A golden sheath of brilliant energy enveloped her as she fell silently – most ponies would usually scream during a hundred foot drop, but she didn’t say a word, merely holding her hood in place with her hooves. Sunrise Glow landed on her back against a gnarled tangle of roots, an impact that Speaker instantly recognized lethal – but while he only fell a few yards and got a nasty bruise, allowing Speaker to get up quickly and run to Sunrise’s aid then the young mare just got up and began wiping dirt off her robes.

The sound of branches creaking and leaves being brushed aside at an ever increasing pace quickly got Speaker to look upwards: Shimmer was leaping from branch to branch, silvery claws of essence protruding from her hooves allowing her to swing around like a monkey as she made her way down to the ground, meeting an angry Speaker as she landed.
“I do something wrong?” Shimmer hesitantly asked.

Speaker was beyond words for Shimmer’s recklessness and was about to shout at her to never ever drop pony from the sky like that – but then the monster approaching the circle burst through to them out of the thick foliage. It was a giant thirty foot tyrant lizard. Huge red scales covered its side and back, while leathery greenish scales covered its belly. It walked on two thick scaly legs, while its two comparably short arms appeared mostly vestigial, although both its hands and feet sported long curved claws well suited for rending flesh and pinning down prey – or possibly picking your teeth.

Tyrant lizards were known throughout creation. Outside of the central or south-east they were mythical monsters known to stalk the eastern jungles. In the east they were the kind of pony-eating monsters that mares told their foals would come and eat them if they didn’t say prayers or do their chores. While uncommon in the scavenger lands, due to pretty much every forest having been purged by various military forces and nobles over millennia to allow for more useful wild game or logging industry, then the surrounding wild jungles outside of civilized areas still had tyrant lizards stomping around.

Looking up at the monstrous lizard Speaker quickly did the one thing that normal ponies do when they see something with a large maw of six inch fangs and a mouth big enough to swallow a pony whole: He shat himself and froze in paralyzing fear.

Red was quick to summon her sabre again – but Shimmer shouted for her not to do anything: “Stop, wait – you can attack it, but I need to make the kill”

Looking somewhat confused and perplexed in the face of the giant predator barreling at them. Shimmer hastily said something about her wanting to take the form of the lizard, so she had to be the one who killed it.

“Shimmer! What are you talking about? Don’t you have to hunt it first?” Speaker shouted, him just as confused and increasingly desperate - . It was bizarre.

Shimmer quickly glanced around at the circle before turning into her half bird half pony form, this time it growing twice as large as usual – the tyrant lizard still dwarfing her, but making Shimmer twice as big as normal pony: “I’ve always wanted to hunt one of these – I’ve dreamt about it for so much that I don’t even need to hunt it anymore!”
What happened next didn’t take more than twenty seconds. 

The tyrant lizard had heard prey, now it had found prey. It went for the weakest and easiest kill, which turned out to be Cash – who’d fallen from the rope just like Speaker, but from a greater height. He hadn’t broken anything, but was woozy and had a lot of nasty scrapes and surface wounds, nothing serious, but it had put the scent of pony blood in the air.

The tyrant lizard completely ignored the mutant tiger carcass – it probably didn’t even register as edible to the predator – as it lunged for Cash who was still trying to get up on his hooves.

Red leapt at the monster, her blade trailing a brilliant rain of golden light behind it as she buried it in the monster’s neck. The tyrant lizard roared and blood flowed from the wound, giving Shimmer a perfect opening to claw at its throat, but its scales were too thick. Red also appeared to have trouble pulling out the sabre. A quick whip crack from the giant monster’s tail sent Red flying into the surrounding undergrowth.

Sullen Hoof suddenly came out of nowhere, dropping from a tree branch down on the monster’s head. Standing with supernatural steadiness on rough scales, the stallion assumed a stance of burning purpose, his eyes blazing with passion and fury, as well as golden flames. He drew a slightly rusty meat cleaver from elsewhere and with the precision of a master chef attempted to slice at the giant lizard’s eyes – but despite its size its eyelids closed, covering the melon sized eyes in inch thick leathery scales that he just couldn’t slash hard enough at before they moved, which only presented Sullen Hoof with more thick scales to cut through.

Speaker, without Gift ready, didn’t see many options for him. Having wrestled control of his body back from his fear he gauged his options:  with the tyrant lizard ready to goble up Cash who was busy slipping around in a mix of his own blood and mud, his fall having hurt him too much to allow quick reactions, saving his friend seemed like the only thing he could really do, besides running away – which honestly didn’t seem like that bad an idea.

Rejecting his impulse to run away, Speaker threw himself in front of Cash, barely managing to will forth the essence patterns that strengthened and informed his thousands gears wound form in time. It didn’t do much since Gift wasn’t in play, but the essence patterns toughened his skin and hooves just enough so that holding off the dagger-sized teeth of the tyrant lizard bare-hoofed wouldn’t hurt Speaker, as he desperately held his ground against the tyrant lizard who was now trying to close its giant mouth around both Speaker and Cash.

“Brilliant – hold it right there!” Shimmer shouted, running around the giant beast and into its mouth, her body half-way through another shapeshift.

Speaker struggled to hold the monster’s maw open, especially as he saw Shimmer turn into some tiny little fish the size of a mouse that slithered down the monster’s throat.

Feeling his strength fail him, Speaker gazed horrified into the maw that was about to overtake him. The worst part was that he knew from how he was reared up at the moment, holding the monster’s mouth open with both forehoofs and his right rear leg, while bracing himself against the ground with his left rear leg, that if the tyrant lizard managed to chomp down on him he’d get half his flank caught in the teeth… which would shatter his hips, probably rupture or cut open his bowels…  not to mention the lower jaw of the monster cutting into his nads – ok, this wasn’t not a fun train of thought!

Speaker suddenly felt the tyrant lizard pulling away, the pressure on  his legs quickly fading – making him fall over face first in the dirt – as the tyrant lizard started to twist and turn around, Sullen Hoof now appearing to have difficulties in staying up on the monsters head, despite his ‘I can stand firm on any surface’ balancing charm. The tyrant lizard then started feebly clawing at its throat, not where Red had buried her saber, but further down.

It made a pained bubbly groan – then lurched backwards for a split second before bulging grotesquely – and exploding in a meaty shower of giblets, gore, blood, sharp bits of bone, organs torn asunder and… a fourty foot long, twenty foot tall shark with an oddly familiar purple triangular pattern on its skin, as well as moonsilver tattoos, covered in blood, which appeared to be chewing on the tyrant lizard’s heart: “Tastes like chicken!”

The aftermath of the fighting mostly consisted of Shimmer sniffing out a stream for everypony to wash off in. Speaker was still angry at Shimmer for having dispelled the cloud and dropped Sunrise out of the sky, but Sunrise insisted that she’d consented to it, noting that with her advanced self-shielding charm she could render herself invulnerable for a brief moment, namely when impacting the ground: “As long as I stand firm in both belief and body, even mid-fall, and keep my composure, nothing can harm me unless I allow it”

Speaker patched up Cash’s wounds from having fallen, noting that Cash must have fallen on some sharp rocks – but finding none where the rope had hung. Returning to the remains of the tyrant lizard, Cash pointed out a patch of bamboo shoots, which were always pointy when at ground level to allow the plant to burrow up through tough layers of dirt or move aside stones to reach sunlight. Sullen Hoof backed this up, saying that in Nexus isn’t wasn’t that uncommon as a cheap torture method to tie a pony down over a fresh bamboo shoot and leave the pony there – it could pierce and grow through an adult pony’s chest in less than a week: “Nasty way to make anypony talk, but it works…”

Beyond what little harm the circle had suffered, Red seemed to have lost the most: Her sabre had been flung far and wide by the explosion. It wasn’t for any sentimental value, but more the fact that Red felt naked without her weapon. Speaker promised that he’d make her one that’d make even war gods envious.

Shimmer, feeling very much invigorated from the event, began shaping up a new cloud while Cash tried to talk Cash into somehow recovering the tyrant lizard’s skull: “Come on, it’d probably sell for a fortune in Nexus!”

Speaker, the only of the ponies present with a weapon strong enough to even make a dent in the tough hide of the dead monster, its head and neck having been blown off in one whole piece, declined, reminding Cash that they had what was basically an untouched first age city, last visited by mortal ponies at the fall of the shogunate, waiting for them.

The circle got up on Shimmer’s cloud and was racing north high above the endless jungles in no time at all, with everypony else except Shimmer sleeping until noon. Around sundown Shimmer’s cloud reached the scavenger town known as The Node. It was about ten miles south of Denansdor, set up just outside the ‘dead zone’, along with two other small towns that lived off the stupid, the brave or the desperate ponies who dared venture into the madness.

It was a strange sight when viewing The Node from up above. The tin mine to the east of the town that gave the place its name was a big bare spot of dirt in the otherwise endless jungle. Shimmer set the cloud down out of sight of the town. Cash argued that she should just have put them down in the middle of town: “It’s not like there’ll be an immaculate shrine in a place like thi- damnit”

From the edge of town one could see a bright white stone shrine with draconic decorations, denoting that it was dedicated to the immaculate dragon of earth, Pasiap.

“I’ve seen immaculates convert entire villages in days after arriving – unicorn mind-control charms take a little time, but mortal ponies are powerless against them, especially if they’re always tired from work. You have no idea how much work a single diehard immaculate monk can ruin in just a week” Shimmer pointed out, sounding very much like she’d had this happen to her before.

“I’ll bet you all I could undo that in an hour – they’ll be tearing the shrine down by sundown” Cash said with a sly grin.
Shimmer gave Cash a look as if to dare him to try it. Sunrise Glow cleared her throat: “As the actual priest amongst us – I consider it my duty and burden to de-program these ponies and show them the light of Celestia”

“Well actually, the no moon caste of the lunars are the priests of Luna by divine right – I don’t use it often, but it happens” Shimmer noted. Speaker didn’t pick up on it, but both Sunrise and Cash noted that Shimmer very much sounded as if she didn’t want to talk about this.

Speaker’s inability to pick up on subtle social cues striking again, combined with his memories of the first age, bid him point out a strange ‘flaw’ in Shimmer’s statement: “Hold on, the Waxing Moon caste are the lunar priests – not the no moons”
Shimmer stepped back from the bushes they were standing behind, the faint shouts of joy or frustration of foals playing around from the town coming closer. A leather ball flew overhead, followed by more shouting.

“The unicorns hounded us – all the lunars that survived the usurpation hid in the wyld for centuries. Anyone that had died at first and reincarnated in creation were killed by wyld hunts. We hid, tried to rescue any newly exalted lunar we could get our hooves on, but hiding in the wyld for centuries did… something… to our exaltations. They destabilized. The stories from the elders who lived through this are horrible. Their castes would literally change according to the phases of the moon. It took our best sorcerers over a century to come up with the moonsilver tattoos to stabilize and lock down our castes” Shimmer explained.

Speaker was horrified to hear this. Sunrise Glow was intriqued. Shimmer explained that when a lunar exalts they become what they call casteless, their caste mark and anima shifting according to the phases of the moon. That much had always been normal, but usually a lunar would grow into one of the castes, depending on their personality and behavior: “…but what happened after the usurpation was that lunars starting reverting to casteless, and never stabilizing. Today they never do, unless you cover your body in moonsilver tattoos, like mine, to nail down your true form and caste. Lunar elders hold trials to see what caste you should be locked into”

“I can’t imagine how horrible that would be” Speaker said, giving Shimmer a big hug.

As the two hugged a group of foals came running up behind the bush. At first they seemed surprised, then they began shouting “Strangers! Strangers!” and running back to the town.

The confused and frightened look on Speaker’s face said it all: Were the foals going to gather a mob to run them out of town? Were the- why was everypony else smiling and looking at the village?

The rest of the circle gazed calmy as the town assembled a welcome party – stallions and mares in plain clothes came out of their houses, holding knick-knack and other wares obviously meant to be sold to would-be explorers and scavengers venturing into the dead zone… and judging from the variation in quality, deterioration, colors and markings then a lot of the gear was from previous explorers and scavenger ponies who had ventured into the dead zone.

The towns-ponies came up to the circle and sure enough, the sales pitches began. Speaker instantly recognized a lot of the equipment as useless: Trinkets and baubles, small wooden effigies painted in bright colors and other knick-knack now being sold as ‘mystic wards’, ‘blessed amulets’ and ‘divine fetishes’ all supposedly protecting their owners and wearers from harm. All of it obviously meant to suck as much money out of anypony passing through town.

With but a single gesture and a stern “Begone. You should tend to your homes and families, not leech of travelers!” Sunrise somehow had them all returning to their homes. Even Cash was impressed how she pulled that off with none of the townsponies objecting.

“Ok, so what now? Why not just put the bracelets on and head in?” Red wondered, looking anxious due to the loss of her saber. To her chagrin none of the townsponies had tried to sell them weapons.

Shimmer was very clear on what to do. She wanted at least two or three days to gather her strength: “I’ve been doing a lot of sorcery the last two days…  and not very much sleeping - if you lot want to fly a cloud both in AND out of Denansdor, I need to rest”
Cash looked as if he was about to get angry again – but looking around at the town he began nodding, seemingly accepting that even exalted ponies had to rest after a couple of days of potentially deadly adventures.

The circle settled into a rickety tavern, a leaky building like everything else in the town: Bamboo strips woven together to make square wall sections that looked like wicker, tied together to form houses, and roofed with large palm-leaves. It was leaky, drafty, and the smell of sour mold was everywhere.

“Just like roughing it with the Arrow Root’s Scale, good times” Speaker noted, reminiscing of back when he had been in the 7th Legion of Lookshy, scale being the common term for a unit of twenty-five ponies-at-arms. 

The rest and relaxation Shimmer wanted apparently meant turning into a bird and sitting perched on treetops. This left Speaker down on the ground looking for something to pass the time. Looking at Sunrise Glow getting into shouting matches with the local immaculate monks at the immaculate shrine was more than enough entertainment to begin with.

The local immaculate monks didn’t include any actual unicorns, although the priest in charge did claim to be a dragonblooded pony who had simply not ‘received the dragon’s blessing’ yet. Sunrise, displaying her own blessing, was of course accused of being nasty evil demonic anathema, but the locals didn’t seem willing to form into the prerequisite armed mob needed for an impromptu wyld hunt. It was hilarious to see the monk try to intimidate the locals with threats of incarnating as lower beings in their next lives, while the locals started to flock around Sunrise as she spoke of Celestia’s glories. That Sullen Hoof was experimenting with local water fowl and cooking up things that smelled wonderful and tasted even better, to hand out at Sunrise’s sermons, didn’t hurt either.

Speaker figured that he could do some good as well. Sure enough, with the tin mine – a guild operation – there were plenty of old ponies, crippled by decades of backbreaking work, their teeth ruined by a lifetime of holding pickaxes to break out tine ore, or local hunters injured by wild animals. Speaker helped every pony that wanted help, and rumor quickly spread that there was a healer in town. Sunrise Glow wasn’t slow to capitalize on Speaker’s medical services, holding her sermons outside whatever hut Speaker would be visiting to fix a broken leg or restore someone’s teeth. Speaker couldn’t object to Sunrise doing so: It helped keep the few diehard immaculate supporters left in town away from him while he worked. Cash chose to let Sunrise do her thing largely alone, focusing more on resting to allow his wounds to heal while enjoying the evening show:

By sundown the immaculate shrine had been torn down. By sunrise the shrine had been rebuilt as one dedicated to Celestia.

Beyond undoing three dozen ponies’ crippling conditions, Speaker found himself approached by Sullen Hoof on the morning of their third day of ‘rest’. Sullen Hoof had a very specific request.

“I want to learn how to read and write” Sullen Hoof said dryly, while tossing veggies and meat from local wildlife around in a big stir-fry wok over a large open fire.

Sullen Hoof had apparently been working up his courage to ask for this, his honor and pride having stood in the way – plus he didn’t want to ask Speaker anywhere near Cash. Speaker congratulated Sullen Hoof on letting reason stand before pride, then told Sullen Hood to meet him after dinner.

Sullen Hoof found Speaker a while later, Speaker trying to climb a tree. It was a largely futile effort, but Sullen Hoof offered Speaker a deal: Writing lessons in exchange for learning the essence focusing techniques needed for the graceful crane stance. Speaker readily accepted and tapped Sully on the forehead with his hoof.

Looking up at the hoof on his forehead, Sullen Hoof was about to ask – but then Speaker channeled a torrent of essence and wisdom, letters and words, motions and movement patterns of quills and brushes into Sullen Hoof’s mind. Sullen Hoof fell back on his flanks, sitting still with a dumbfounded look on his face, his mouth agape.

Speaker found Sullen Hoof sitting on the same spot the next morning, drooling. A little poking ‘woke’ Sullen Hoof up. Getting up, Sully dizzily staggered around for a moment, getting his bearings. Speaker informed Sullen Hoof that he would need to wait a week before his mind had fully internalized what it had been given.
Speaker’s training began after breakfast.

Two days later the circle gathered outside south of The Node, the villagers this time not looking upon them with hungry eyes for what they might loot off them – but instead they were begging the circle not to enter the dead zone.

“They’re talking as if it’s a shadowland” Speaker mused, gazing into the jungle wilderness. Sunrise noted that the locals didn’t know any ponies who ventured towards Denansdor that didn’t die… and the few who came back weren’t really ponies anymore.

Looking understandably worried, Cash inquired into this ‘not being a pony anymore’.

“They say that if you don’t just come run out screaming, or curl up and die, you go mad. The immaculate monks here would usually catch them and put them out of their misery…” Sunrise elaborated. She also noted that she’d told the townsponies to keep doing so, especially since the majority of the mad ponies that came out of the dead zone were often either ravenous or raving and trying to eat, kill or rape anything that moved – or sometimes a combination of all three. Speaker noted that this explained a few of the injuries he’d treated in the town, as some looked like pony bite marks.

“I’ve instructed some of the town elders, initiated them as acolytes. They can sanctify the graves of the mad ponies, to put their souls to rest. Last thing this town needs is hauntings by mad ghosts” Sunrise Glow noted. She did not sound particularly pleased.

> Chapter 12: Industry of silence
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shimmer conjured a cloud, the circle affixed their diamond bracelets and Speaker instructed them how to activate them. It was noon and the sun was bright and warm as they ascended into the sky.

Up above the trees, less than a mile north later in the direction of Denansdor, the circle discussed what and where to go first as they approached the dead city.

Sunrise recalled what she knew of the dead city: “Back in Great Forks I heard the story of Denansdor many times. The great contagion had killed almost everypony, then the changelings came. Story has it that Denansdor had survived the great contagion due to their vast stockpiles of first age wonders, but against the changelings… one day all the ponies in the farming communities around the city ran away from the city, screaming. No pony from the city ever came out alive”

Speaker confirmed that Denansdor had been a paradise for ponies of any creative inclination in the first age. Artists, artisans, chefs – Sullen Hoof’s past incarnation included – any pony who created, drew, built or imagined new things into existence who were of any importance had a mansion there, even if it wasn’t their primary residence.

Cash suddenly looked oddly pensive. It wasn’t like him to appear so contemplative. Finally he started talking: “We have twenty four hours once we go in. If we’re want to recover as many valuables as possible we need to hit wherever there’s the largest concentration them”

As per Cash’s plan, Speaker recalled that the city had a grand central manse that powered most of its factory cathedrals – the hallowed omni-workshops where thousands of ponies prayed, worked and assembled the wonders of the first age: “Things is, the manse also has an extensive  vault system – its where all the valuable raw materials used in the various production lines were stored. It also housed all the finished wonders before they were shipped out”
“The manse it is!” Cash declared, gesturing wildly with a hoof towards Denansdor.

Speaker noted that it was a little more complicated than that: “The manse closes its armored gates at sundown – and they would have to be manually opened, usually at dawn when work begins… began”

This raised the question of how to open the gates. Speaker couldn’t remember: it had never been anything he’d had to deal with.

Cash didn’t take this too hard: “We’ll cross that bridge when we get there – we’ll have to find the manse first”

“That won’t be hard. The city was built around the manse – it was the second tallest structure in town, and it’s in the geomantic center of the place. The city is patterned around it for perfection in craftsponyship” Speaker said.

Looking around at the circle, all the blank stares coming at him, Speaker could only wonder: “What?”

Shimmer was the first to point out the problem: “I don’t think the others know what geomancy is – I’m not even sure what you meant, although I know what it means”

“Right, we don’t – what is it and keep it short” Red asked, looking unimpressed and uninterested, but still asking just so she knew what she was getting in to.

Speaker took a deep breath: “Geomancy… ever heard of feng shui? It’s what manse-construction-ponies use to shape demesnes into useful structures. Feng Shui is the philosophy informed by geomancy. Lookshy still uses it for city planning to strengthen their defenses. If you build things in harmony with local geomancy you can turn anything into something akin to a lesser manse. Fortifications become stronger, farmlands and orchards yield more, and workshops with craftsponies produce better goods. Denansdor was built in every way to maximize quality and production”

Red, Cash and Sullen Hoof all remained confused. Sunrise Glow at least appeared to understand the basics.

“The city is built in a weird pattern, so the roads will be all screwy, and ponies who made stuff got something like a built in blessing while working there – but the manse with the vault will be in the center, can’t miss it” Shimmer explained
With that out of the way, the question was once again how to enter the manse. Cash remained certain that they would figure it out once there.

“If we can’t get into the manse, then getting into the factory cathedrals should be our second priority. The tools alone there are wonders beyond worlds – assuming that the unicorns didn’t replace or run off with it all, but I can’t imagine that they would do that, most of the cathedrals were made only to work with the plasmaforges and harmonic adamant drills we built those cathedrals around” Speaker mused.

Sullen Hoof was quick to notice that those things sounded really big. Speaker agreed, but pointed out that the cathedrals contained a lot of far more portable devices that were sure to fetch handsome prices in Nexus or Lookshy.

“I’m surprised that you’re willing to let your toys be sold like that” Shimmer noted, having imagined that Speaker would want to keep anything from the factory cathedrals for his own use.

Speaker admitted that he certainly planned to keep the most useful things for himself – but at the same time, then the most valuable items wouldn’t necessarily be the most useful, so both goals could in theory be achieved. Equally, then back in the first age most of the city had relied on thousands of automaton ponies made of brass, bronze and jade, and while eight hundred years of no maintenance probably hadn’t been to kind on them, then it shouldn’t be impossible to recover some for later repair. Cash estimated that each of such robo-pony servants would fetch a good price in Nexus: “I mean, a servant who cannot in any way betray its master? Guild merchants will pay princely sums for something like that”

After a little more discussion, including Sullen Hoof pointing out that he would love to get his hands on some first age cooking equipment, Shimmer began moving her cloud north at full speed.

The landscape quickly changed. The jungle gave way to endless grasslands with not a single tree in sight. Before arriving at Denansdor proper the circle flew over some of the southern outlying  artist colonies. There wasn’t much left of them, beyond the ruins of first age buildings – some looking oddly pristine, indicating first age magic having been built into them so they never got dirty or wore down. The dead patches of grass around some of the buildings hinted of darker contents or broken essence flows, but the circle agreed to go for easy pickings: They had risked their lives more than enough in Sullen Hoof’s old manse, so they were going straight for the big load of valuables in the central city manse.

Approaching the actual outskirts of Denansdor gave the circle an amazing view of the city. Speaker hadn’t been wrong when he had said that the city had been built in a special geomantic pattern: The whole thing looked like a giant circular gear, the roads inside the city following similar strange patterns: Roads twisted to form strange gear-like patterns – and many buildings had metalic sheens, and some of those were again rusty while others had a pristine silver gleam. Speaker explained that it was geomancy patterned on the great maker, the primordial Autochton. It could allow even the most inept pony to make pretty much anything:  be it a food dish, a sculpture, an artistic wood carving. It wouldn’t necessarily be good, but it wouldn’t be bad either: “Basically the geomancy of the city prevents a crafts-pony from doing a botch job – it doesn’t guarantee a masterpiece, solars have essence for that”

Sunrise suggested that Speaker sketch down the layout of the city – so they could replicate the pattern in other places. Speaker declined, explaining that it would require weeks if not months of examinations of the essence flows all over the city to map out the effects.

“Ok, we get it – it’s too fancy, even if it’d probably be worth a fortune” Cash said, hungrily ogling the exquisite skyline they were passing through.

Denansdor truly was a nearly whole relic of the first age. The city was a gleaming marvel of towers clad in sheets of colored glass, gemstones the size of adult ponies, and stone polished to a mirror shine that still held their luster almost a thousand years after they last had been cleaned or maintained. At ground level were hundreds of thousands of workshops with elaborate and twisting ceramic chimneys, glass skylights and still pristine polished cobblestone. It was an awe-inspiring experience for the whole circle to fly over these ancient marvels and past the towers.

It was less awe-inspiring to see the unicorn skeletons inside the glass towers. Untouched by the elements, the towers had become glass tombs for the unlucky dragonblooded denizens of the city. Even just flying past them, Sullen Hoof and Speaker both agreed that it looked as if the pony had died in a messy state of panic, not while packing or evacuating the city. Cash was impressed at Sully and Speaker’s deductive powers, joking that if they kept those eyes and ears peeled for portable wealth they’d be able to buy out of the Guild once they left Denansdor.

Approaching the center of the giant gear-shaped city the manse that Speaker had talked about became incredibly obvious: It sat in the center of a huge empty square, a gigantic solid white stone cube, one hundred yards in every dimension, with four giant gates on each side with a bulbous white tiled dome on top that was nearly just as big. It was clear that the doors were meant to open and allow traffic through the manse from the stone markers that outlined roads leading up to it.

“The floor in the middle of manse contains a large round platform. It’ll send us down into the vaults or up to the hearthstone chamber… and that dome used to be golden” Speaker said, looking at the top of the cube-like manse: the gigantic onion-shaped tipped bulbous dome was covered in tiny gleaming white jade tiles.

Setting down near the southern gate into the manse, the circle was almost instantly mobbed by limping, twitchy robo-ponies that came out of nearby alleys and open doors. It was a bizarre scene: Most of the robo-ponies showed clear signs of deterioration, aside from their somewhat unsettling appearance: Their body, limbs and even their head were thin rods of jade, oxidized bronze and other metals. In the case of those who’s limbs were made of metals that could rust or erode there were just rusty stumps, making over two thirds of dozens of robo-pony servants swarming the circle limp quite a lot – although some of them had figured out that by lashing their bodies together they could hobble along at normal speeds. Apparently their programing was so powerful that it forced them to continue no matter what.

As a perfect choir the whole assembly suddenly said, with jittery voices from barely functioning voice-boxes: “We require access to the city manse for our duties. Please open the gates”

Looking around at the circle, Cash couldn’t stop smiling: “Well, looks like payday”

The half-jade automatons became surprisingly cooperative after Cash flashed his caste mark and started to order them around, having them line up in order of how damaged or in need of maintenance they were. Speaker was quick to note that to fix these he’d need a lot of jade, as well as amble amounts of other metals.

“Didn’t you say the manse vault stored all the valuable raw materials used in the city?” Sullen Hoof pointed out, his face obscured by his straw hat that he had put very low. The other’s didn’t ask why he did so, but after leaving the automatons he said that he really didn’t like how they were all staring at him.

Speaker found this amusing: “Better get used to that – Denansdor had hundreds of thousands of those, all controlled by a central consciousness housed in this neat crystal brain set up in the city manse”

“So… if I tell one automa-servant, can I have all of them come here?” Cash wondered as he quickly ran back to the manse square to test the theory.

Sadly it didn’t work. Speaker noted that the Central Harmonious Equilibrating Monitor, or CHEM, only kept automated records, maintenance logs and controlled the… oh dear

Everypony else in the circle recognized the look of surprise on Speaker’s face. He quickly began looking around, trotting backwards in a circle, then Speaker suddenly froze after pointing at a giant pony statue.

It was a huge thirty-foot statue of a pony in thick armor made of bright red jadesteel and alloys with enough orichalcum to make most of it shine like warm gold.

“That’s not a statue is it?” Sunrise Glow said, spotting three other similar statues of ponies in glorious battle regalia down the road from the square, plus several other on other roads leading away from square. Somewhere of other color jadesteel, some were silvery, one had a rainbow sheen. They were all different, which seemed quite odd if they were meant to be a single unified force as Speaker explained.

Speaker said it was the guardians of Denansdor. He was surprised they were still there: “I built a few. It was considered the journeypony test of a twilight caste solar. I am going to hazard that they didn’t reprogram CHEM, because if they were told to attack anathema on sight we would dead. The guardians were made to police the city, act as its military – they were made to ‘handle’ rampaging solars after we’d go on a month-long bender, or if other grander threats attacked”

“Sounds like you tried it” Sullen Hoof joked. Speaker smiled sheepishly, but pointed out that if they tried anything – anything – those guardians would be there to stomp, roast and chop until you stopped. Speaker was quite adamant that these guardians were built to handle even solars.

Red was thrilled by all of this. Not to fight the guardians, but to use them: “We’ll need an army to hold Denansdor – it has one, this couldn’t be easier!”

“CHEM is hidden in the manse – I have no idea where it is – and we’ll need to get inside the manse first anyway” Speaker said, looking back at the giant white jade dome.

Shimmer paced about uneasily as the solars discussed where to look for a way into the manse that wouldn’t get them stomped – the lock mechanism could be picked with some effort, but Speaker insisted that the guardians were watching. Red suggested finding an armory with jade weapons, as that might allow her to fight off the guardians in case something happened. Speaker was inclined to agree, but pointed out that carrying weapons out in the open would also get the guardian’s attention.

“Come on – a stumbling giant like that? We can just tip it over, I’m sure I can give it a push” Cash suggested, casually waving a hoof about while doing some simple punching moves.

Speaker walked over to Cash and leaned in close: “They work together – most have essence-fueled flame projectors built into their mouths, or something just as deadly – and they can move just as fast as you, which is very fast for something that big”

“Guys…” Shimmer said, fidgeting with her hooves next to a dead flowerbed. The others paid her not attention, too busy arguing over what to do next.

Sunrise Glow suggested that they walk around in the city looking for open doors. That way they wouldn’t be breaking in when entering to look for valuables. Red insisted that they seek a way into the manse so they could take over the guardians – Cash supporting her, although mostly to get access to whatever riches might be stashed in the vaults.

“Moot point – we’ll be doing it all. The automatons at the manse were made to just carry freight; that was why they were there. They’re also dumb as bricks. We need to find a house-keeping automaton, they were made smart enough to work as home secretaries. One of those should know who usually opened the manse” Speaker said, nodding to himself as slowly worked through his memories.

So the hunt was on for a house with an unlocked door. These turned out to be easy to find, but those didn’t seem to be any automatons – maybe they had wandered off in search of their masters? Most of the homes all sported equipment that would be considered miraculous even in Lookshy or the realm, and Sullen Hoof wasted no time snatching up still pristine cooking utensils – he even tried to pry off the ever-hot firegem crystal plates set in a stove, but they wouldn’t budge until Cash and Red helped smash the stove completely.

Speaker was about to help Sullen Hoof when Shimmer pulled him aside: “There’s something really wrong here…”

“You mean aside from the pervasive aura of terror and insanity being emitted from somewhere here?” Speaker said, looking over at Sunrise Glow who was busy turning the skeletal pony remains over in the corner of the house into ash.

Shimmer swallowed nervously, her eyes and ears darting all over: “There’s no noise here”

Speaker didn’t see the problem.

“No, there’s no noise – no insects, no birds, no worms in the ground. I checked. That’s why there are so few trees inside the dead zone. No bees to pollinate…” Shimmer said, fidgeting nervously with her hooves.

Speaker still couldn’t see the problem. Shimmer tried to explain that being so in touch with nature and animals… and now being in a place where the truly were no other animals… it didn’t just feel wrong, it felt terrifying.

Cash was trying to judge how much worth some jewelry he’d just found in the last house they’d raided when he heard Shimmer crying. Speaker found Shimmer inconsolable, her weeping uncontrollably.

A few homes later the circle found an inactive servant automaton. It had corroded to the point that it couldn’t move anymore – and its internal essence engine had apparently burnt out trying to move, so it was no use. At Speaker’s request Shimmer spirited the pony automaton away to elsewhere, so Speaker could tinker with it later. She still wept quietly.

Two hours later Red finally found a working servant automaton, hiding in a closet in a pile of rags that had mostly degraded into dust. It had probably once been beautiful silken dresses judging from the few faded colors that were still visible. The automaton’s polished brass eyes looked terrified…

“Show it your caste mark. That should override any orders it might have been given by unicorns” Speaker said.

Red flashed her caste mark, a golden sunburst icon appearing on her brow, shining brightly in the dim closet. The automaton jostled to life, bowing deeply to Red as the smooth oval gem set in the thing’s mouth sparkled with blue and white light. It then said: “What is your command oh resplendent one” in a language that only Red understood.

As the others inquired into what the pony automaton had said, Red explained that it was speaking in High Realm – the noble language of the unicorns in the realm. Her father, the Shogun of Chung, had seen to her being taut the language as many nobles in the hundred kingdoms thought it the language of the elite – of the best ponies of good breeding. Speaker figured that the unicorns had probably just changed the automatons to speak in their language instead of reprograming them entirely.

Upon questioning the automaton revealed that the Daimyo of Denansdor would usually open the manse doors at dawn, the doors closing automatically at dusk.

“Of course… the daimyo of Denansdor would have the key – the seal” Speaker noted, his memories making a tiny bit more sense.

Cash wanted to take the automaton with him, but it humbly said that such wasn’t possible, claiming that it drew its power to function from the Denansdor manse.

The circle made their way to the Daimyo’s castle. Speaker was certain that the key to open the manse gates would be in the Daimyo’s office.
Finding the castle was easy enough. It was situated in the south end of the city and stood as a tall multi-tiered pagoda, clad in beautiful tiles that appeared to be painted with magic paint that made them look as nacre, the beautiful iridescent substance that most seashells had on the inside, more commonly known as mother of pearl. Shimmer was fascinated by the sight and started talking endlessly about all the different shiny seashells she apparently had a big collection of back west. It seemed to cheer her up again, much to Speaker’s relief.

The whole castle sparkled in the sunlight, every tile on every tier of the pagoda shimmering with a mix of white and faintly blue light. The walls around the castle had similar tiles covering its battlements, and inside the courtyard… were two gigantic guardian automatons. Speaker started willing forth Gift.

“Usually guards prevent uninvited guests from walking into a noble’s castle – I don’t think those two jolly rusty giants will let us pass” Red noted, looking in through the ornately carved gateway into the castle courtyard.

The guardians stood still as gleaming pillars of steel, jade and orichalcum, but there was no doubt that their ever-vigilant multifaceted crystal eyes were watching for intruders. There was a musty smell in the air, the courtyard having pony skeletons scattered all over. Some were unicorns, others were regular ponies. Two of the skeletons close to the gate even still had rusty bits of armor on, indicating that they had been treasure hunters or scavengers who’d somehow braved the miasma, but still been killed by the guardians. Their front ‘halves’ had been stomped into gravel-sized bits, probably with but one powerful stomp from the guardians.

“You know, this castle is bound to have a lot of valuables – I’m sure we could find something good in there, maybe a treasury?” Cash wondered out loud.

Looking at the very obviously guardian-stomped scavenger remains, Speaker sighed: “The Denansdor treasury is part of the city manse vaults”

Cash didn’t frown. He didn’t sigh. The brown-coated pony with the slick blond mane and ruined silk jacket remained stoic: “Bright Machine Speaker… you have no sense for business – this here is a first age castle; of course there will something that some rich guild factor will wa-“

The was a brief rattle as Red’s armor, showing much wear from the traps in Sullen Hoof’s old manse and the fight with the mutant tiger, along with Red, stepped into the courtyard. Cash stopped talking instantly, as he held his breath fearing that the guardians were going to come stomp them all. Speaker shook his head: He knew he was going to end up stitching some pony up when this was done… maybe even grow a leg or two back on some pony.

The guardians in the courtyard came to life as if they had but stood idle waiting for intruders, instantly jerking to life with smooth and fluid motion – unlike the jerky unnatural gait that the rusty automaton-ponies at the manse had. They were on Red in seconds, shooting unbearably hot gouts of flame from their nostrils at her, yard long blades thrusting out of their metal hooves like giant claws, claws big enough to slice and dice a pony in one blow.

Red took it all in stride, using her jumping charms to leap up onto the robots, making them strike each other as she weaved and ducked their blows and fire – although it quickly became clear that they weren’t strong enough to damage each other that much either.

This went on for another few seconds, loud clangs ringing out each time one of the two guardian automaton ponies ended up hitting the other. Red suddenly shouted: “What are you foals waiting for! Leg it!”

Speaker quickly realized what Red was doing – it was a distraction. Why hadn’t she told them first? Speaker quickly broke into a gallop, racing across the courtyard which now felt much too big. Cash was just behind him and Sullen Hoof had apparently already made it to the other side.

Reaching the large wooden door that led into the castle, a beautiful red arched wooden door, Speaker looked back to see how Red was faring. He hadn’t looked back while running, but the sounds of giant automaton killing machines striking the dirt, each other or landing glancing blows on metalic lamellar armor had been everywhere.

“Hold on, where’s Shimmer?” Speaker asked, looking at the courtyard – which now looked like a burning battlefield, full of deep gouges from guardian hoof-blades, sprayed liberally with liquid flame.

Before Cash could think up a snide remark Sullen Hoof yelled: “Sunrise!” and gestured out at the courtyard.

There was Sunrise Glow, slowly and purposefully walking through the fight. Red occasionally landed down by her when struck by the guardians, her armor soaking up most of the damage the giant hoof-blades would have done, as well as the impact of striking the ground so hard, only to get up and leap back on the face of one of the guardians, trying to get the other one to hit it in the face.

“I knew that mare was cold, but this… this is crazy” Cash said, looking as the fight continued.

One of the guardian automatons now featured a big gash in its head, exposing its internal mechanisms and other fun things that Speaker would probably have loved to examine, giving Speaker the idea to try to aim Gift to strike at that exposed area, but Cash’s comment confused Speaker: “Red or Sunrise?”

Cash gave Speaker a half-glance while rolling his eyes: “Sunrise of course – Red is just doing her dawn caste thing”

Speaker shook his head, then reared up and flung Gift as hard as he could, having taken careful aim, at the exposed spot on one of the guardians. It was by no means an easy shot, as the guardians and Red were constantly twisting, turning and jumping around as they tried to snatch Red who kept dodging and weaving to make them strike each other. Indeed, Gift missed – but as with the pirate captain Gift didn’t just stop there: it banked and came around for another strike and this time it hit, burying itself into the guardian’s forehead, emitting a shower of sparks and metal shavings as it dug in.

The giant guardian automaton didn’t flinch, didn’t reel, and it didn’t fall over. Speaker felt a pang of despair as it just kept on fighting, Gift stuck.

“Ok, so these things aren’t stupid – they’re coordinating with each other somehow because Red is getting a run for her money, but why aren’t they attacking us?” Sullen Hoof suddenly asked, having pondered this question ever since making it to the castle gate.

Speaker looked pensive for a moment, looking intensely at the guardians as they tried to catch Red in rings of fire – which she would jump out of – or catch her in the air with their mouths, which she would just buck mid-air instead, launching her in a different direction: “None of us can hurt them – she’s the only one with powerful enough combat charms to hurt them, or in this case make them hurt each other”

“They’ve obviously identified her as the most dangerous of us, choosing to focus on her first” Sunrise noted, arriving at the castle gate.

“Ya I guess these things are even tougher than the tyrant lizard – I couldn’t cut through its scales, doubt I could make a dent in their armor plating” Sullen Hoof said, nodding.

Speaker wasn’t sure: “Cash and the two of us know more hoof to hoof martial arts than Red does – and she doesn’t have a blade! The only thing she has going for her right now are dodging charms and her armor… and where is Shimmer, I haven’t seen her since I made a run for it across the courtyard”

Suddenly the other guardian automaton, the one that Speaker hadn’t thrown Gift at, cracked in half with a violent explosion of metallic shrapnel and broken pistons and gears – and a tyrant lizard appeared out of the remains, with red scales that had purple tips.

“There she is” Sullen Hoof pointed out, sounding remarkably unimpressed – although the smirk on his face was easy enough to see.

Cash, Sullen Hoof and Speaker all cheered on as the Shimmer-saurus wrestled with the remaining guardian automaton, her and Red quickly getting it over on its side and pinning it – allowing Speaker to run up and wrest out Gift from its head.

Speaker barely managed to get the gyroscopic chakram out when four more guardian automatons suddenly landed – jets of searing hot steam slowing their descent and blowing up far too much dust for anypony to see anything.

Shimmer and Red made a hasty retreat, everyone quickly getting inside of the castle and shutting the door behind them. Shimmer had several wounds that her own regeneration charms were already busy mending, while Red was limping and bleeding from several minor cuts – a miracle considering the size of the weapons the guardians had used against her.

Aside from breathing a couple of well-deserved sighs of relief, Cash apparently felt an overpowering urge to ask why Shimmer hadn’t pulled her little Shimmer-saurus trick a little earlier.

“Well, I flew into the guardian’s mouth wanting to go down its throat – but hey… it didn’t have a throat, only nasty spiny grinding things in there, so first I had to get out of its mouth, then turn into a gecko, crawl around on it until I found a hole to go in through – and Red had to lure the other guardian into making that hole first, then I had to dodge you throwing your death disc in where I was – then I had to get in and make enough room for me to start turning into a tyrant lizard… I need a bare minimum of space to do that and not just get crushed as I expand” Shimmer explained, gesturing wildly and passionately with her hooves as she told her little story.

Speaker nodded understandingly, but was in truth far more absorbed by the looks of the interior of the castle, while absentmindedly tending to Red’s injuries, Speaker hardly even bothering to try as his medical excellencies did all the work for him.

This was untouched first age architecture, still maintained by a working staff of robo-pony automatons, if the butler-automaton approaching them was any indication. The lobby they were in was decked with exquisite jade and gold ornaments, plus five large jade statues – one for each of the elemental dragons adorning a large circle at the center of the lobby – while circular doorways leading into other parts of the castle, as well as stairs that led into the upper levels, all invited one to explore.

“Do you have an appointment?” The butler said, speaking in high realm, its voice sound deceptively as that of a real pony’s, like that of an old but dignified stallion despite the automaton having no gender-specific design features.

Red once again translated, while Speaker finished up her closing Red’s wounds – and due to Red’s rhadamanthine use of dodging charms, the few injuries she had gotten being nothing more than inconsequential cuts due to her now thoroughly wrecked armor.

Red was quick to flash her caste mark, the butler automaton – in its fine black silk jacket, which looked slightly awkward due to the way that its metallic frame didn’t quite fill the jacket out right – instantly dropping to its knees: “Oh your lordship – you grace us with your presence. What can I do for you?”

“We need to get to the Daimyo’s office, the key is usually kept there in a special case – and unless the unicorn’s changed how these automatons work, which it doesn’t look like, then we should be able to just take it” Speaker said, recalling fragments of conversation with the unicorns he’d overseen constructing the castle several millennia ago.

The butler complied with Red’s commands, leading the circle up to the top floor of the castle. Along the way Cash tried to talk Red into requesting a complete inventory of everything in the castle, but Sunrise was quick note that it would probably take the automatons weeks to compile such a list. Red found it far more expedient to request that an inventory of the castle’s armory be made and delivered to her verbally post haste…

The shogun of Denansdor’s office was the kind of office a pony might imagine the Scarlet Empress herself envying. The floor was tiled with brick-sized orange gems, the walls were covered in dark fragrant woods, all carved with beautiful decorative motifs – such as images of unicorns defeating gilded demons, or unicorns with jewel-encrusted horns and draconic cutie marks magically creating wonders of jade. Speaker was reasonably sure that the jewel-horns were added later, and the wonders of jade had once been wonders of orichalcum. Still, there had probably been spent more pony-hours and wealth in decorating this office than what the realm’s tax collectors brought in over the course of a decade, including the bribes they get to not collect the taxes of various realm nobles who thought themselves too rich for taxation.

Suffice to say that Cash had a giggle-fit, followed by him just standing still and drooling for a minute or so – and he wasn’t just dripping from his mouth.  Everyone walked in a wide circle around the financially aroused stallion.

Speaker quickly made his way to the large wooden desk. It was made of dark wood with clearly defined white veins, and aside from the mirror-polished top surface then every inch of the table was carved with beautiful vine and leaf patterns, with small studs of red jade as berry clusters. It had two drawers, both locked, and behind the desk there was a pile of dust from what might once had been a chair, along with a few scraps of leather from the seat cushion.

Sullen Hoof was quick to start fiddling with the locks on the desk-drawers. A bit of essence had both open in no time. Inside the first drawer was a book. It was a ledger for wages paid to castle servants, nothing of any use or interest, but that the paper hadn’t turned to dust after so many centuries or yearly rainy seasons. Speaker guessed that the book was made using solar crafting techniques, as only solar essence could make something so that it would last forever without automatically slowly deteriorating.

The other drawer had a small wooden box in it with a dragon motif etched into the lid. 

“Butler, by right of my mandate of heaven I am taking this seal – don’t you go send any guardians after us for this” Red said. The butler-automaton instantly prostrated itself on the floor, apologizing profusely and saying that Red was so very much within her rights to take the seal.

The small wooden box opened when Sullen Hoof fed it a tiny mote of essence: A white jade seal with a coiling dragon motif, made as a bracelet to be worn around a hoof so one could easily touch it at surfaces or use it for making wax seals, as well as a blue jade seal. The seal of blue jade had a roaring dragon motif, and Sunrise was quick to float it over in front of herself, examining it intensely: “A solar seal… well, a unicorn knockoff, but this… this is perfect”

Sunrise explained that the blue jade seal, when used for wax seals on scrolls, would magically ward it so if anypony other than the intended recipient opened the seal the content would disappear. Shimmer nodded, noting that her elders often used artifacts, since they made it very difficult for wyld hunts to spy on messages being sent back and forth between lunars.
With the Shogun’s seal in their possession Speaker wanted go get back to the manse as quickly as possible. Red wanted to check out the castle’s armory first, and Sullen Hoof wanted to check the kitchen. Sunrise Glow supported Speaker, 
reminding everypony that they didn’t have forever before their mind-protection bracelets would run out of power. Shimmer meekly said that she would follow Speaker wherever he was going.

Speaker sighed. He knew that the circle needed Red armed and ready in case the guardians would come after them again – and so he reasoned that Sullen Hoof should be able to ransack the kitchen while Red found some weapons. 

The butler automaton led Sullen Hoof off to the kitchen, while another servant automaton that appeared to have lost its outer plating, looking like a stick-pony made of brass and green jade tubes, with a head that looked like a small box with two red orbs of blue and red jade, led the rest of the circle to the armory.

The armory turned out to have very little in useful weaponry and armor. There were some rusty scraps and bits of what might once have been weapons, but any weapons made of magical materials – like jadesteel or moonsilver – had been taken a long time ago, probably in preparation for defending the city, or by unicorn nobles looting the place before running away. Red was deeply disappointed, but Speaker and Shimmer made the best of it, using the scraps of steel there to fix the damaged parts of Red’s armor. It wasn’t a perfect fix, and there wasn’t anything to paint the new lamellar bits so they weren’t red like the rest of the armor, but now the armor was whole again – and it had only taken a few minutes, thanks to Shimmer and Speaker’s crafting charms having sped everything up to.

This led the circle to seek out Sullen Hoof, who they found in the castle kitchens stacking large pots of blue jade on top of each other. Turned out the blue jade pots had a very unique and reasonably useful feature: anything put in them would either be frozen or just stay at some other cool temperature, depending on how much essence you fueled the pots with. Shimmer appeared especially impressed by such a large number of these: “Oh, winterbreath jars! These things will get you your own weight in silver back west – especially the big ones”

Cash was, once again, very pleased – especially as Shimmer began folding the pots away into elsewhere, something that Speaker found quite odd: “I thought I could only banish stuff to elsewhere that I could lift with one hoof?”

“Never doubt the size of the implausible lunar panoply dear – I’ve had a lot of fun in the past pulling siege artillery out of my saddlebags to surprise pirates and slavers. It’s a lunar trick though, not something solar’s can do” Shimmer said, as she packed the last winterbreath jar into elsewhere.

Red seemed less impressed: “And you couldn’t have done this with the medicine that’s being prepared to be shipped to the Chung lands?”

Shimmer gave Red an unimpressed glare and shook her head saying: “When we left a week ago they were still making the medicine needed – and honestly, I don’t want the guild chasing me around for quick and easy freight services, I got better things to do than that” while clinging to Speaker’s thick muscular legs.

Sullen Hoof, satisfied with the things he’d recovered from the kitchen – which beyond the winterbreath jars and pots included some nice enchanted cooking utensils, including a shiny ‘new’ cleaver that Speaker was sure had some oricalchum and jade mixed into it, since it – unlike nearly every other metalic object or fixture in the kitchen – hadn’t crumbled into rusty dust.

> Chapter 13: Depth of Madness
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Leaving the castle was easy enough. Convincing Cash to leave the castle: less easy. Cash was so enamored with the castle that he wanted to stay – and it took a good right-hoof blow from Red to bring Cash back into reality. Speaker equally estimated that the bracelets had spent about four hours of power, and so he urged everypony to hurry back to the manse so they could get down to business.

However, upon exiting into the castle courtyard the circle came across a strange sight: Dozens of pony-sized automatons were scavenging the destroyed guardians. Red quickly scattered them with easeand directed Speaker to salvage one of the guardian automaton giant blades. With the aid of Shimmer in her Shimmer-saurus form, as well as Red using a strength-increasing charm and Cash landing a well-aimed buck enhanced with essence, the circle managed to wrest free one such blade. It was a gigantic steel blade, evidently made with an alloy of white and black jade mixed with steel to give it a deceptively mundane appearance along with nearly indestructible features. Shimmer and Speaker managed to fashion a simple handle, although Speaker still felt it took too long.

With a new and ridiculously oversized blade for Red, which weighed accordingly, the circle quickly made their way to the city manse.

The white jade dragon seal worked as intended. Touching it to the locking mechanism on one of the four giant gates of the cube-shaped manse caused the massive bronze doors to fade into elsewhere.

“Tread lightly. These grounds haven’t been disturbed since the fall of the shogunate” Speaker quietly.

Looking around at the dusty interior Sunrise Glow shook her head: “Considering how few ponies were recorded to get out of Denansdor I’m surprised we have not yet run into ghosts”

“It’s the miasma… it scares off everything. There aren’t even insects here. It’s creeping me out – probably affects ghosts too” Shimmer looking around at the ground floor of the manse.

A lone cargo-lifter automaton, similar to the dozens ordered to sit in the square around the manse earlier, stood motionless on the floor of the manse. The floor itself was an impossibly detailed and ornate stained glass floor mural of blooming lights, and aside from the automaton, it was empty. In the middle of the room, at the center of floor mural was a large circular black granite platform twenty yards in diameter. This would be the device that would lift ponies up and down the manse, from the deepest vaults to the temple up in the onion-shaped dome on top of the cube structure.

The circle quickly rushed inside, Sully and Cash quickly spotting the crate that was stuck in the grotesquely extended mouth of the automaton lifter pony. The wooden crate crumbled to dust the moment Cash touched it, revealing the content as it clattered to the ground. It was jade bracelets of some kind. The rest of the circle quickly gathered around as Shimmer quickly identified the devices: “There is at least twenty jade hearthstone bracers here”

Looking around at the circle Sunrise dryly noted that they would only need six for all of them, while Speaker put on a green pair and began attuning to them so he could put his tomb-manse hearthstone into its socket. Cash didn’t see the problem: “We’ll sell the rest in Nexus, make a fortune! Let’s bag it and dive into the vaults; I want to see the treasury!”

Sunrise walked over on the black granite platform. The moment she put a hoof on it the rough surface reacted and like rings on water the stone became smooth as if polished to a mirror shine. This also revealed a circular pattern around the edge of the platform with a series of first age glyphs in old realm set at regular intervals around the platform marked out a strange pattern. Knowing how to Speak and read old realm on account of having been taught to read ancient scripture as a foal while part of various cults, Sunrise Glow quickly found that one simply had to touch the right glyph with your hoof and the platform would go up or down to the desired level of the manse.

As the rest of the circle gathered on the platform Sunrise stepped on a glyph, and the platform began to rise at a brisk pace, accelerating quite quickly – but at the same time its passengers didn’t appear to feel it. Speaker figured that there were inertial dampeners built into the stone disk, maybe underneath it.

Cash thought that Sunrise had pressed the wrong glyph, since they were going up – but Sunrise insisted on checkout out the hearthstone chamber first, since Speaker had previously mentioned that it would be up in the dome.

As the platform rose up to fill a perfectly sized hole in the ceiling of the ground floor of the manse, it quickly merged to become part pof the floor of the temple level of the manse. The immaculate iconography was everywhere, and it was clear that the unicorns had done a thorough job of removing, covering or otherwise modifying everything that had looked as if meant for the worship of Celestia or other obvious anathema idols.

Sunrise quickly made for the altar, ignoring the scattered bones of several hundred pony skeletons that were strewn around the place, mainly around the seating areas for the worshiper. It was clear that there had been a lot of ponies who had taken refuge in the manse when disaster had struck. Speaker could only shudder as his vivid imagination brought him horrific images of ponies maddened by the then new miasma tore each other apart as they lost their minds.

“It’s not here” Sunrise exclaimed calmly, sounding very disappointed none the less. She was standing next to a bowl behind the altar. The essence flows of the manse were incredibly strong here, to the point that one could taste dirt and stone in one’s mouth just by standing near the bowl. This would certainly be where the manse’s hearthstone would form. That it wasn’t there meant that it was somewhere else… and there was no real way of telling where that was.

It was clear why Sunrise Glow had sought the hearthstone. Like the hearthstone Speaker had from his tomb manse, then the one from this manse would undoubtedly yield very powerful magical effects on whatever pony who carried it in a proper receptacle, such as the hearthstone bracers found downstairs.

“Once we retake Denansdor, I want this temple rebuilt to Celestia – and it must be our top priority” Sunrise said solemnly. Red merely nodded and told her to hold her horses, stating that they had to take over the place first.

Before they left for the vault levels Sunrise had one last suggestion for what to do in the temple: She suggested that they all attune to the manse, so they could benefit from the latent essence while there. Shimmer was quick to point out a problem with this plan: “A place as powerful as this – even with its previous owner undoubtedly dead so there’s nothing to prevent us from doing it – but it will take hours attune to essence flows as powerful as these, hours that could be spent down in the vaults”

Sullen Hoof, Red, Cash and Shimmer all wanted to go exploring down below. Speaker and Sunrise were the only ones who thought it would be a good idea to attune to the manse. The circle thus split up, leaving Sunrise and Speaker to perform the quite easy but very time consuming meditative rite that made one’s essence one with that of the manse one was in, while everypony else descended down into the depths of the manse.

As they left, Speaker told them to stick together no matter what: “The vaults extend for miles out under the city in some places. If you get lost and your bracelet runs out… none of us want to see that happen, plus between the lot of you only Cash can appraise, Shimmer will know enough ancient lore to identify whatever you find and Sully can open locked crates”
Five hours later Sunrise and Speaker both breathed a heavy sigh of relief and elation as they suddenly felt incredibly aware of their surroundings within the manse.

“Well, glad to see this wasn’t a waste – that’s good” Speaker said, looking around as he felt the essence flows of the manse around him.

Sunrise wasn’t sure what the Lookshyan stallion meant. Speaker explained that their attempt to attune would have failed if the hearthstone was outside of the manse: “So with any luck we might find it down in the vaults – if memory serves right then it would usually be the governor of Denansdor who held it…”

That said Speaker and Sunrise summoned the platform, which came up with Shimmer and Sullen Hoof. They had left Cash and Red down at the treasury, busting down doors to reveal the riches held inside. The rest of the circle joined them, finding Red and Cash absolutely decked out in golden jewel-encrusted jewelry. The stone vaults’ dim lighting from glowing crystals didn’t emit enough light to make all the gold and silver shine, but there was enough to illuminate the ocean of wealth stored in the treasury.

“What do mean we can’t take this with us!?” Cash said, sounding equally confused and skeptical. 
The issue was that Cash, for obvious reasons, wanted the whole hoard out of the manse. Speaker, Sunrise, Shimmer and even Sullen Hoof could see how that would simply be too much wealth for any one pony – or group of ponies – realistically spend unless Cash was planning on buying a seat on the ruling council of the Guild, or maybe purchase an entire kingdom. Plus, while Shimmer could store items far larger than one might expect in elsewhere, then a hoard of riches large enough to fill a lake was still beyond her abilities.

Ultimately Cash managed to find a satisfying compromise. Shimmer folded a stack of jade talents, mostly white jade talents but also some of other colors, into elsewhere, giving the circle a portable fortune large enough to buy an army – in cash.
Gawking at the stack while Shimmer trotted around it, the edges of the talents slowly fading away, Cash marveled. A talent was a sixty-eight pound slab of solid material, jade in this case, although silver talents supposedly also existed. Fact was that talents were usually just values seen in banking ledgers. Not that many actual solid talents of jade or silver were known to exist, and the realm held most of the jade talents in the imperial treasury, while the guild pushed their own silver based currency instead to make them less dependent on the realm’s treasury. To this end a stack of ten talents of jade, four white, two blue, two green, and a single red and black one was a fortune to be reckoned with. 

A single talent could be carved out into a little over a thousand jade obols, the coins of the realms – for the unicorns. A single jade obol could buy a house, or pay for a good suit of steel barding. The guild’s silver currency was worth a bit less less, but was far easier to produce since it didn’t involve any magical materials, making it the defacto currency for most non-realm controlled lands, meaning most of the east, the scavenger lands and the north – but it was still used all over creation, wherever guild merchants went.

“You know Cash, you may say that those slabs were each sixty-eight pounds, but they felt more like six-hundred” Red commented, stretching out after having hauled and pushed the talents into place.
Cash sighed: “Come on – don’t you know that magic materials are crazy heavy unless you put essence into them?! They weigh sixty-eight pounds when you do that. Without, they weigh… I don’t know, but I once saw a unicorn punish a slave who was carrying a hunk of green jade on his back, by retracting his essence from it. Poor thing just collapsed and broke both hind legs from the sudden increase in weight”

When Shimmer was done Speaker wondered why they hadn’t gone any deeper into the vaults, seeing as the treasury levels were some of the first levels encountered when going down.
“To be honest – we saw the piles of loot, didn’t figure we needed to look much further” Sullen Hoof noted, his saddle bags filled to their breaking point with gemstones and golden trinkets.

The circle proceeded further down the vaults. Most of what the circle found on the various storage levels were half-finished artifacts or piles of arcane components. While a lot of the materials were probably very valuable, then the jade taken from the treasury was both worth more and easier spend – that was at least Cash’s argument: “Why bother trying to sell a half-finished gadget when I can just show up with my own money?”

While Cash’s argument to leave the ‘work in progress’ storage levels alone was sound enough, then Speaker noted that it would be on one of those levels that CHEM would be housed. With that in mind the circle searched each level – although with Speaker’s description of the crystal pillar that was CHEM they didn’t bother looking into nearly as many boxes or crates. Speaker did snatch a sack full of frozen lightning, plus a few other things, saying that he could use them later to reforge the makeshift blade Red had made into a proper grand daiklaive.

It was fifteen levels later that Sullen Hoof came across a strange room in the vaults which had a crystal pillar set in the middle of a statue garden. The room was large and somewhat odd, considering that everything around the room was storage facilities filled with crates and broken down cargo-lifter automatons: It had an arched ceiling with intricate glowing lines of runes going around in circles, going down the walls and on the floor – all leading to the crystal pillar. Calling the rest of the circle to the room, Speaker confirmed that this was without a doubt CHEM.

“I thought it would be hard to find” Red said, noting that something so critical to the control of the city’s guardian automatons should be better defended.

Looking carefully at the other statues in the room, all of marble and appearing as ponies that looked stoically to the sky, Shimmer said: “These statues… they’re automatons – even the winged one. I can hear the essence engines inside them”
Speaker glanced at the statues. The winged one was of a pegasus pony; there was no doubt about it. It was the first of pegasi Speaker had seen outside of his own first age memories to hint of the existence of them. Where had they gone?
“Did ponies really once have wings?” Sullen Hoof wondered, looking at the pegasus statue.

Turning back to the crystal pillar, Speaker sighed: “Sort of – the solars created the pegasus ponies in the first age as highly mobile shock troops for the primordial war. Heck, a good number of pegasi even exalted as solars, lunars or sidereals. At their peak they accounted for a third of all ponies”

With that settled, or at least everypony’s immediate curiosity about the missing pegasi, the focus returned to the crystal pillar. Nearing it, Speaker accidentally triggered a defensive mechanism: A shell of orichalcum appeared around it, snapping shut and nearly clipping off Speaker’s right hoof. The stallion managed to pull his hoof back enough that he only lost a chunk of hoof and not enough it to make it bleed. A quick wave of the white jade seal that opened the manse up near the shell got it to retract, allowing Speaker to bring up the interface.

Touching the crystal with a hoof caused it to glow, the light forming into swirling patterns of glyphs similar to the ones on the floor, walls and ceiling of the room. It took almost no time for Speaker to figure out the state of CHEM and its primary orders: “Ok, so the good news is that it hasn’t really been altered that much – it hasn’t been ordered to kill solars or lunars on sight, probably because of all the first age tools and iconography still in use around Denansdor and the factory cathedrals. The bad news is that it is waiting for a dragonblooded unicorn with the seal here, to claim command of it…”

Looking at Speaker’s furrowed brows, Shimmer could easily tell that there was more than just that. An inquisitive nod and a raised eyebrow was all she needed to get Speaker to add the final caveat: “You can’t just alter a small part of CHEM – it needs a total rewrite of all code if you want to change anything… and that’ll take time”

“How long?” Red asked. Speaker said it would be maybe half a day… maybe less, depending on how quickly he could get new code to work. It didn’t help that it had to be written in old realm glyphs either, or that screwing up might cause the guardians up in the city to malfunction if they started getting mixed commands from a lobotomized CHEM.

“Half a day, won’t need more than that – but considering the circumstances, that’s not really a good use of our time” Speaker pointed out.

“If we can find the source of the miasma and turn it off we’ll have far more time – plus then we could order the guardians to ward off intruders” Sunrise Glow noted. The rest of the circle had to admit that the two goals seemed unavoidably linked in that sense.

With that in mind, Sunrise suggested that the quickly look through the rest of the vault – mainly to locate the source of the miasma, so they could do a proper evaluation of their options. Speaker agreed.

Back at the lift platform, the circle descended deeper into the manse’s vaults. Shimmer, having counted the runes on the edge of the platform marking different floors, counted a total of forty levels. This meant that they had covered almost half at this point.

Past the twentieth level the vault layout changed. Previously the platform had come through a hole in the ceiling and come to a half at floor level, with each level consisting of a single vast cavernous room, with smaller rooms along the edge of the main room, such as the one with the CHEM in it. The new layouts of the lower vault levels all centered on the theme of broad hallways carved into the underground stone with fifty yards to the ceiling, with several rooms along their length, each with a door of rock that appeared to be ‘reabsorbed’ by the walls, floor or ceiling when a glyph-etched button on the wall next to the door was pressed.

The halls were also patrolled by guardian automatons – and a friendly but unmistakable warning sign on each level at the elevator docking point explained, in no uncertain terms in old realm, that unscheduled removal of vault contents would be met with lethal force. The circle quickly learned why: it was on these levels that finished artifacts were stored. If what Cash had experienced at the sight of the Denansdor governor’s office could be called a giggle-fit, then the whole circle had an episode once they realized how many wonders were stashed on these levels. Sure, it was clear that the unicorns had taken most of all the fun or immediately valuable things, judging from the empty crates the circle occasionally found – but there was a little of everything to found… the only problem was the guardians never let the circle look at anything unattended, following them constantly with five guardians on every level. It was clear that CHEM didn’t mind the circle looking around, but it was also more than ready to stop them if they tried to take anything.

Red became increasingly vocal about wanting to destroy the automaton watchdogs, and Cash despaired at the gadgetry they were forced to leave alone, like the ship with a black jade keel which, according to the label on the crate, could sail through dirt and rock as easily as it could water – that the ship could also fold up into something the size of a small crate only made it all the more awesome.

“Come now – if we can get control of CHEM, this will all be ours – don’t worry” Sullen Hoof was quick to remind the two, while looking hungrily at a beautiful sword of red jadesteel that gleamed with a fiery hue.

Shimmer, who was just as impressed as the others with the amount of first age relics and wonders in the vault, also pointed out how useful these artifacts would be: “If it’s ok with the rest of you, then the lunars would be most friendly and forthcoming if you choose chose to share this – I mean, this would allow all lunars to return to creation and be armed well enough to ward off any wyld hunt”

The circle debated the potential use of the artifacts and each pony took note of favorite artifacts and called dips every now and then, as they ventured deeper down.

Drunk on the wonders they had so far identified, like the ship of jade that could fold up into a small package and also sail through soil and rock as easily as it could water, or a cloak of jade feathers that Speaker was certain could unfold into actual wings to allow flight, the sight that met the circle at the bottom floor of the vaults came as a tremendous shock.

As with the previous nineteen floors, it too was of vast hallways lined with doors, some open, some closed, that led into large storage rooms. However, the hallways and rooms were full of cannibalized artifacts tossed into great piles. What shocked Speaker the most was that most of the artifacts that appeared to have been taken apart were of orichalcum and moonsilver – the materials that the immaculate philosophy deemed heretical.

“So this is how the unicorns kept Denansdor going… by ripping apart anything that looked solar and putting every non-anathema part to use in their own jade artifacts” Speaker said angrily, holding up a steel rod with scratched up orichalcum bands, as well as empty sockets where gemstones or other arcane components had been removed. It was impossible to see what the device had once been, but it was clear that it, along with almost everything else on this floor, had been gutted. 
“I’ll give them points for initiative – taking apart some of these things must have been difficult, but if it was spare parts they were looking I guess it wasn’t that bad a source” Cash noted, getting an angry glare from Speaker.

Walking these halls was if walking through a mock graveyard of the first age. The guardian automatons that paced the halls trudged through piles of broken magical machinery and discarded bits of orichalcum as well as puddles of moonsilver, making for a constant noise as they stomped on piles or pushed aside large hulks.

The circle quickly trotted through the halls, checking behind each closed door to see if there was anything of use still in one piece. The circle didn’t suspect anything when they opened yet another nondescript door… but then all hell broke loose.
The doors opened automatically once a pony brushed a hoof against the gem set in the glyphed wall switch next to the door, and couldn’t be made to close until it had opened completely. It was a split second after beginning to open this one door everypony’s mind-ward bracelet started emitting a high pitched bleeping noise, as well as turning bright red from its usual semi-transparent clear crystal and gem material.

Speaker barely had time to recognize it as the bracelet letting its wearer know that a highly potent source of mind-warping emissions were nearby… but then the door was open, and everypony’s bracelet fizzled and all the gemstones in them turned mat black as they almost instantly ran out of power due to over exposure.

Speaker felt a sudden wave of unspecifiable dread wash over him. His vision momentarily blurred, and sounds became faint as his mind failed him for a split second.

It was the feeling of being shook hard that woke Speaker up, and there was the noise of heavy breathing.

“Thank Celestia you’re awake – do you know what is going on?” Sunrise Glow’s voice sounded. Speaker tried to orient himself. He was on the ground and the endless feeling of dread was still there. It was like a constant screaming in his head, bidding him to flee, to run, to get away: It was pure terror… and with that he knew what is was.

This didn’t make shaking off the constant flow of terror in his mind any easier to shake off – but with a deep breath and a very conscious choice of not following his oh so tempting instinct to running away, Speaker stood up and looked around.
Sunrise Glow appeared oddly unaffected. Even now with the difficult choice to ignore the feeling of dread already made, Speaker still found himself twitching a little, but Sunrise appeared perfectly steady.

“Come on – I need your help to get the others out of here, and Shimmer keeps trying to bite me” Sunrise said, looking over at Shimmer.

The lunar pony was rolling around on the ground, frothing at the mouth, snarling and flailing her hooves around. It didn’t look good.

Sullen hoof and Cash didn’t look much better: Cash had curled up in a fetal position and wasn’t moving at all – Speaker couldn’t even really tell if he was breathing. Sullen Hoof was digging himself into a pile of scrap with no regard for his bleeding hooves as he dug into serated edges and orichalcum spikes alike. It was the madness of the empty city that the ponies of the Node had warned of.

It was like a bad flashback to some of the chaos at the battle of Mishaka Speaker had been a field doctor in. Solders crying for their mothers, trying to scoop their guts back in after having their bellies slices open, or soldiers dragging the front half of a dead comrade back to the field hospital and just shaking the remains of that old friend as Speaker would try to explain over and over why he couldn’t do anything…

A swift slap over his muzzle brought Speaker back to reality. Right. Triage – Sullen needs to be stopped, Cash needs to be carried away and Shimmer...

Quickly trotting over to Shimmer while telling Sunrise to start hauling Cash back to the platform, Speaker grabbed Shimmer by her hears, like an animal trainer disciplining a dog that wasn’t obeying commands, and held her head so he could look straight into her eyes: “Snap. Out of it”

A few tense moments later Shimmer stopped struggling and got up. Speaker didn’t ask why she had momentarily gone feral, instead acting like a responsible doctor and ordering her to grab Sullen and get him back to the platform.

It was then that Speaker noticed that Red wasn’t anywhere to be seen. This was bad – but with everything else under control, and Sullen now wrapped up in Shimmer who was in the form of an octopus, Speaker breathed a sigh of relief, steeled his mind to further resist the relentless torrent of terror that was in the air and took stock of the situation.

A quick glance inside the room that had just opened confirmed his suspicion. Those crystal spheres, the soulsteel web that encased the spheres… Speaker knew for certain what the source of the miasma was – but this also meant that he knew very well that none of them had the power to turn it off, as that require a countermagic spell of far greater power than even Shimmer could muster: One needed adamant circle countermagic, a spell of the first circle, one that only solars with their purest essence could ascend to. The unicorn bones next to it, still clad in imperishable silks similar to Sullen Hoof’s chef garb, were probably that of Denansdor’s last ruler… having activated a first age doomsday device in hope of saving the city. Speaker had to admit, in some sense it had sort of worked.

Getting Cash’s curled up form up on his back, Speaker and the rest of the circle – sans Red – quickly made their way back to the platform. Approaching it the circle heard sounds of hoofs beating furiously against stone. It was Red, gripped with the terror, trying to work the platform’s glyph controls without any luck: She couldn’t read old realm, and so couldn’t find the right glyph to active the large stone platform. 

Unloading Cash and helping Shimmer hold down Sullen Hoof, Speaker watched as Sunrise Glow roused the platform and send it speeding to the ground floor, with Red clinging to the platform in absolute terror.

In the minutes it took going up, the three still sane ponies of the circle briefly discussed what was going on. Speaker quickly explained that the device had originally been made as lure: “Remember that I told you about the dam that could not feel or be felt? The one used to trap and ultimate slay the river of all torment back during the primordial war? This was the lure. It generates unfettered terror. Only adamant countermagic can turn it off”

Shimmer, no longer in the form of a squid, although her limbs were still wrapped around the bleeding Sullen Hoof to keep him from doing anything stupid in his maddened state, sighed as she realized that this meant that none of them could end the miasma – at least anytime soon: “Curse the thing to malfeas – why would the unicorns ever activate something like that?”

“It’s complicated. We don’t have time for details right now, but emotions normally need… well… a reference. You stub your hoof on rock, which hurts and you remember that. That memory can form the basis of an emotion of sadness. This thing did the impossible: it makes ‘blank’ emotion, of terror. It was something never felt before, so the river of all torment found the allure irresistible. Later we found it worked great against changelings too, because without an emotional reference they couldn’t feed off that energy, so some of these were built into first age wyld defences. The unicorns that took over here probably just read about the device as a changeling repellant and didn’t know about how ponies too would be driven mad by… Shimmer are you ok” Speaker said, suddenly looking very worried over at Shimmer.

Shimmer had begun frothing at the mouth again, shaking and jerking. It was with only a split second to spare that Speaker managed to wrestle down Sullen Hoof as he quickly got out of Shimmer’s grip while she was in her bestial state of mind. Sullen Hoof appeared to want to leap off the platform, despite how quickly it was moving up and the fact that doing so would mean an eighty yard fall – a fatal fall for any more pony, and in his currently crazed state of mind Speaker couldn’t tell if Sullen would be able to use charms to cushion his fall.

A few moments later Shimmer snapped out of it and explained herself, seeing how Sunrise and Speaker were looking at her. “It’s a lunar mental defense charm – it reduces my mind to that of a beast. I have to fight not to run off or do anything ‘animal’ like” She said, giving Speaker a suggestive look: “but it also prevents any mind control from working, including the terror aura that your bait device makes… speaking of which, Sunrise, why aren’t you curled up on the ground as well?”

Sunrise Glow shrugged as if her not being crazy or paralyzed in terror wasn’t impressive: “Like you said – mental defense charms. When you know the proper mental spirit-maintaining maneuvers, then to seize the mind of a solar is as futile as for a waking pony to try to seize a dream in his hooves”

“How poetic” Shimmer said, sounding a little bit too sarcastic for Speaker’s like. Sunrise didn’t seem to care.



Looking up at the ceiling of the vault level they were in, the hole where the platform would go through was getting bigger and bigger as they neared it. The only thing that was visible from the hole in the ceiling was the spec of light in the distance of the sun on the surface, and seemingly impossibly tall walls of the above vault levels, looming in the dry air. Sunrise drew her hood a bit further over her head, obscuring her face even more than usual: “Exalting in Great Forks showed me a lot of things, such as how selfish and vain gods truly are, and how willing to use their powers on mortal pony minds they are. My first reaction was to teach myself charms to defend my mind. I can list you over a dozen gods in Great Forks who would love to rope in a solar and use any of us as a trophy, toy, spokespony or anything else they could think of. No, no will beside my own ever control me – I have even taught myself a little meditation trick that makes the mind rigid in the face of mind control, should my own defenses ever falter. You won’t ever be in doubt if I’m suddenly…”

Sunrise’s speech was interrupted as Shimmer once again started frothing at the mouth and snarling for a moment. Speaker noticed that the amount of time the lunar had to go mentally feral was getting shorter. That seemed to indicate that they were getting away from the concentrated effect of the… oh what was the name of that device, right: “It’s called the horrorfex by the way”

Appearing somewhat displeased by both Shimmer and Speaker interrupting her speech, Sunrise continued once she had a moment of silence: “None of you will ever be in doubt if I’m under mind control – and if you want Speaker, I can teach this technique to you as well, although you will have to learn some basic meditation techniques first – I assume that with your educational charm you can do that yourself much faster than I could teach you myself”

There was a loud rush of air as the platform came up to a ceiling port and shot up from the floor of the next level.
“Why thank you, I’ll keep that in mind” Speaker said, trotting over to comfort Shimmer.

As Speaker gently brushed some of Shimmer’s dreadlocked mane away from her face, she suddenly jerked her head away: “Oh don’t bother – and please don’t get too close. My beast-mind regression charm only works if I can make the animal me focus on something other than the fear… and honestly that’s you.” Looking over at Sunrise, Shimmer forced a smile: “I don’t think Sunrise would like it if part of my staying sane here led to me trying to fuck you in view of everypony else, plus Cash might get ideas – if he wasn’t curled up like that”

With that said Speaker hauled Sullen Hoof over to the opposite side of the platform and once again made the hard choice to ignore the terror himself. It was not an easy choice. It felt as if having to voluntarily step into the blade of an unseen foe trying to murder your mind with silent screams of thought pain. Plus, remembering part of the ‘tests’ done in the first age following the primordial war to see what the horrorfex could be used for, Speaker knew that eventually his mind would faulter – for no pony could resist the horrorfex indefinitely without the aid of charms like Shimmer and Sunrise. He knew that only bad things would happen if his will should fail him before they got away.

After a ride up that felt as it had taken far too long, the platform finally came to a rest at ground level. Red instantly ran into the square surrounding the manse and desperately called for the others to come quickly – and for Shimmer to conjure a cloud to fly them away.

“I… the charm I’m using to stay sane, I can’t use that as well as sorcery – going feral for a moment doesn’t work with concentrating for sorcery” Shimmer admitted, not appearing too pleased of this herself.

Red took this news very badly. Unlike the others she hadn’t so much gone mad from the terror, as she had embraced it: She was genuinely scared for no reason what so ever – powerfully so – and wanted to get away from the city, get away from the miasma. Looking at the terrified mare made it all the more difficult for Speaker to stay put himself, but they needed a solution.

“Speaker, in the first age – there had to be experiments going on here that might affect the mind – how would you ‘fix’ someone who’d gone mad like Sullen or catatonic like Cash back then?” Sunrise asked, sounding calm and collected as always – to the point of sounding indifferent.

Thinking for a moment, Speaker tried to recall anything like this ever happening while he had been in Denansdor: “Hmm… oh of course! The most harmonious temple of serpentine reconvalescence! This way!”

Speaker ran off down the square towards one of the larger roads through the city. The rest of the circle followed suit as well as they now could – Red appearing understandably very conflicted about why they weren’t just getting away right now the same way they got in – but ultimately the mare managed to suck up the courage to fight the terror long enough to catch up with the rest.

Leading the circle to a grand structure with two large green jade statues of intertwined serpents out in front, Speaker quickly led the circle inside. Sunrise and Shimmer quickly recognized the place as a healing house – although the amount of pony bones and skeletons that were scattered around its halls and in its rooms were quite disconcerting.

It didn’t take Speaker long to find what he was looking for: The mind shroud refuge – a room specially insulated against all psychic and mental emanations, in case ponies were psychically sensing something that was upsetting them. It had originally been made to treat failed experiments in mind reading charms and sorcery, but Speaker figured that it should keep out the horrorfex’s miasma as well.

As the heavy metal door etched with runes that glowed with a calming blue light closed, the pressure on Speaker’s mind eased. Red also calmed down, and Shimmer breathed a sigh of relief. Slapping Sullen Hoof around eventually got him to stop trying to dig into every surface he got near to burry himself, and Speaker, using an obscene amount of essence channelled through a hoofful of solar medical charms, restored the night caste solar’s mind to its proper state over the course of an hour or so. Shimmer had to admit that seeing such a miracle of mind healing was impressive: “Ridding ponies of madness induced by changelings usually takes monts or years – if it’s possible at all…”

Cash eventually woke up as well, remembering nothing but being trapped in a horrible nightmare, followed by him crying quite a lot. Speaker found it strange to see a pony such as Cash, usually so confident and sure in himself, crying, but having felt the miasma himself it was understandable.

With everypony calmed down the circle decided to spend the rest of the day and the night in the dark but thankfully safe room. There were no sources of light beyond the slightly mesmerizing sight of blue glowing runes and glyphs that covered the door and door frame, probably to seal the place from all thought and thought reactive essence flows, plus the circle’s own glowing caste marks.

The next morning, with everyone well rested – although still harried from the previous day’s sudden turn of events, and weary of going out into the miasma again, Speaker told the circle that there was one other thing he wanted to do before leaving Denansdor…

> Chapter 14: Escaping the Past
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“So, a final treasure hunt before we hightail it out of here?” Red said, nodding slightly. It was clear from the apprehensive look on the warrior pony’s face that she wasn’t that much for it…

Speaker tried once again to explain his plight: The healing house that they were in was really old, first age old. This meant that he remembered the layout of the place – that was how he had recalled the ‘blank room’ in the first place – and during the night he had recalled another feature of the healing house that, if still present, would be immensely useful. However, this usefulness was not entirely apparent to the rest of the circle.

The device that Speaker wanted to find was a ‘Pattern Reassertion Rectifier’. Back when Speaker had been a solar in the first age, he had overseen the use of the device on multiple occasions, as it would – literally – restore the ‘pattern’ of what its emitted beam struck. Shimmer had a slight idea of what Speaker meant, but the rest had no clue. It didn’t help that the blank room they were in had no illumination outside of the faintly glowing runes that lined the walls, floor and ceiling, or the glow from the caste marks of the exalted ponies present, neither of which gave off enough light for the ponies present to see the complicated gestures that Speaker had made as he explained the purpose of the device.

“Ok, again – a pony’s pattern is like the schematics for them. You know, four legs, hooves, a single head, with two eyes and ears, only one mouth and a nice soul made of a Po and Hun soul. Wyld mutations change that pattern, as can demonic essence, and any number of other nasty things. I can find this thing while you lot get up on the roof of the building and conjure up a cloud, then I’ll be right there” Speaker said, the faint glow from his caste mark only showing the top half of his face in the darkness.

Cash was quick to point out that spending any more time than necessary in Denansdor really wasn’t healthy for anypony – well, aside from Sunrise.

Shimmer threw Cash a mocking look: “Your sudden interest in the wellbeing of us all really does warm my heart – but come on everyone, remember: We left a heavily mutated mare in the hooves of a deranged changeling a couple of weeks ago. We promised to fix her. This device should do that”

Red and Sullen both nodded in agreement that this was a worthy cause for a little detour.

Shimmer, having had one too many encounters with changelings and their victims back west, found this last bit very interesting: “By the way Speaker. How much of a pony’s pattern is… rectified… by this thing?”

“All of it. In the first age a lot of solars dabbled with wyld energies in their experiments here, so accidents happened every now and then – especially for mortal assistants or young exalts. It didn’t matter if you had suddenly developed a taste for rusty nails, or sprouted three eyes on your flank. This thing would identify the target’s original pattern, and then restore it to that pattern” Speaker explained. Again, it was too complicated for everypony else, but Shimmer did nod slowly, having understood that it the device could fix mental derangements caused by wyld exposure.

Sullen Hoof shook his head: “Look, I get that you want to help this mare – but honestly, we’re risking our own sanity here. You might have that stubborn Lookshyan streak going for you to shrug off the effects of this, but the rest of us don’t.”

Getting up, the light from his caste mark revealing his golden orichalcum mask, Sullen Hoof paced around the small room: “I don’t want to see what happens when you succumb to the miasma while running around alone – and I’m even less excited to see if I’ll go mad, so I’m not exactly that hyped about seeing the only pony I know who could probably cure whatever crazy we might pick up getting out of here wandering off alone…”

“Look, the horrorfex doesn’t make you into a crazy pony just like that – its takes time – and for us, even more so. Trust me, even if your mind takes damage from the ‘fex, its nothing I can’t fix. As for me, then I’m a twilight caste in a house of healing from the first age; it would take quite a lot to bring me under in this place” Speaker said, drawing on his knowledge of the first age and the horrorfex to soothe the circle.

It didn’t really work, but it was equally clear to the others that Speaker seemed to think that he knew what he was doing.

The main problem was that opening the door to the chamber would let in the horrorfex miasma – so Speaker’s plan was that he’d go off looking for the rectifier while the others would head to the roof. The main issue there was ensuring that Shimmer could time her beast-mind mental defence charm so she wouldn’t have to do it once she’d conjured her cloud.

“Moot point really – I’m still tired from yesterday. Once I shape the cloud I won’t have the will left in me to resist the miasma… but we’ll all be heading out the city very fast that point, so it wouldn’t hurt to give in to it then” Shimmer said, trying to sound as if she at least thought it was possible to pull off.

“…you can tell when you’ll run out of will to live?” Cash wondered.

The lunar let out a forced laugh: “No, but after a century of fighting changelings I know the limits of my mind – and I’m on thin ice here, so is the rest of you”

There was a moment of silence. Everypony’s caste marks faded, leaving the blank room only faintly lit by the dim glow of the runes that covered its interior. One could only see the silhouettes of the others.

Speaker gave the rest of the circle directions that would lead them to the roof of the healing house. If the elevator platforms worked that would be the fastest route, but baring that it was a long run up around thirty flights of stairs.

“Thirty levels up? We’ll never make that – we’ll go mad before we get to the top” Cash whined.

Thrusting a hoof into Cash’s chest, Red leaned in close to him: “Then you better hope that the platform is working”
On a page torn from his notebook, Speaker sketched directions. These were entrusted to Sunrise, as she was the only among the circle who could be trusted not to go nuts from the miasma and drop the map. She would lead the rest of the circle to the roof.

“I’ve been in some hairy situations before, back with the seventh legion – but I have to admit, this takes the cake” Speaker said, resting a hesitant hoof on the door.

Putting her hoof on his, as they prepared to pull the door open, Red gave Speaker that special kind of trusting, hopeful and equally sorrowful look – like a soldier about to walk into battle looking at a commanding officer: “If we get through this, you’re going to tell us all about that when we’re done”

Speaker nodded and looked at the door with renewed determination.

Just before they opened the door Sunrise spoke somberly and quietly, advocating for valor and conviction in this time of trials. Calling on the light of her anima, Sunrise shone a beautiful glow as she used charms to brighten everyone’s mood. It made it a little easier when Red and Speaker pulled the stone door open and the invisible miasma of maddening terror rushed into the room like a cold and acidic spike to one’s mind.

Speaker looked on as the rest of the circle vanished down the hallways of the healing house. Turning and looking for the rectifier, Speaker found himself drawing on analytical methods to find his prize he had never really thought of before. He wasn’t sure if it was first age memories of highly efficient search patterns, or whether it was purely from his exaltation. Either way Speaker found that he could channel essence to speed his vision and thoughts as he scanned eerily familiar direction tags. Most were in high realm, a language he recognized from Lookshy’s unicorns but not one he spoke, and yet he knew what they said for he could remember what they had read back in the first age – and it was very clear that none of the function or the layout of the healing house had been changed, only signs and nametags had been swapped.

This reminded Speaker all too much of missions when he had been younger. Being the bright pony he was, he’d often been the loremaster as well as medic for missions where seventh legion gunzosha had been sent to retrieve ancient relics, or accomplish other important objectives – like sabotaging enemy supply trains, or covert attacks behind enemy lines. For a moment Speaker found himself caught up in old memories, most of which were tainted with the pain of knowing that all but a few of the ponies he’d served with were dead by now – if not from battle, then from the rapid unnatural aging that their special equipment cursed them with, in exchange for near invulnerability on the battlefield. Speaker had lost so many friends that way – their bodies and often their minds wasting away before his very eyes – but not today, no, today no pony in his care would die!

Jumping over dusty pony skeletons, peering into rooms lit by glowing crystals that illuminated depressing tableaus of pony skeletal remains that sang of the horrible and sudden end of Denansdor, Speaker slowly made his way to the Hall of Heavenly Form. This was where the Pattern Reassertion Rectifier had been used, stored and charged back in the first age.

The HFR department was a mess. Scattered pony remains everywhere. Splayed across the platform in front of the mount where the rectifier would usually be affixed were the skeletal remains of what was clearly a heavily mutated pony. Its bones were all wrong. Some were longer, some shorter, some twisted back on themselves. It must have hurt so very much to have lived like that.

The rectifier was on the floor next to the mount, dusty, with a few bits loose. It had apparently been knocked over during the brief chaos that had ended Denansdor. Still, it could be fixed, it had to. Speaker knew that he could: He had made it thousands of years ago, so he could make it again if need be.

The device itself looked like a large polished slightly ovoid bronze tube with bands of blue and white crystal set around it, as well as orichalcum gem settings, with some of the gems cracked from when the rectifier had hit the floor. Speaker was so wrapped up in examining the device and its beautiful internal starmental circuitry, the ornate moonsilver essence capacitors or the sublimely perfect adamant lenses that he for a perfect moment forgot the miasma was there.

The moment didn’t last. Carefully floating the device up and willing it into elsewhere, Speaker ran to the elevator platforms.
To Speaker’s surprise the door to the elevator still functioned, but the control panel also said that the elevator was out of order. The brief moment of despair shattered the rush of having recovered the rectifier. The miasma encroached on Speaker’s mind. The urge to flee, to cower, to curl up on the floor and cry, it was so powerful. It was if it was crushing his skull… and Speaker was finally getting near his wits end. Still, he wasn’t there just yet.

With his thoughts on the mare trapped in a mutated body of ever-growing flesh, Gift flew from one of Speaker’s saddlebags and with a quick rev of its internal essence engines and a puff of steam the gyroscopic chakram had cut open the elevator door’s control panel. The crystal circuitry on the inside was quickly dealt with, indeed puzzling that kind of first age magitech felt… refreshing. Speaker prayed to whoever would hear that he would live with his mind intact to engage in similar intellectually stimulating puzzles later.

With the control crystals properly fiddled with, the door opened up, revealing a circular and empty shaft with but a hoof-full of cables running down the center. First Speaker identified what cable was attached to the counterweights at the top and which cable held the platform dome that would normally go up and down in the shaft. Speaker leapt out and bit on to the one holding the platform dome of the particular shaft he was in now. He then sent Gift flying to cut the jade-steel cable under him.

The first hit on the cable only sent out a hot shower of sparks under Speaker, as he repositioned himself so he didn’t have to hold on with his mouth. Clinging on to the cable with three legs, while wielding Gift with his right foreleg, Speaker flung Gift out again to strike at the same spot. The problem was that he couldn’t really see what he was aiming at… and the miasma  wasn’t making it easy to hold on to the cable; oh how he wanted to just leg go and flail his legs in terror… but didn’t, even though part of him wanted to…

In a brief moment of terror Speaker remembered dangling over mountainous cliffs down south, near the borders to the zebra lands in the south, near Harborhead. There the fang of gunsozha he’d been attached to  hauled him up, for such was their duty to never to leave a fellow pony behind. Here Speaker had no such luck, but instead he knew that he had a greater purpose, to heal creation from sickness of the body and mind, a purpose he had a duty to see done. He flung Gift again.

It took four nerve wracking tries to get the jade-steel cable cut. The moment Gift severed it Speaker felt the sudden jerk and fast vertical acceleration as the counterweight designed to pull against up to twenty ponies now pulled a single one – and it did so very quickly.

Rushing up the twenty eight floors Speaker needed to cover, he prayed that he would meet the others on the roof. He could see the fast approaching light from the stained glass window of the maintenance doors at the very top of the shaft. It suddenly struck Speaker that he had to slow down at some point… and he really didn’t want to slow down by hitting the ceiling, or get a hoof jammed into the pulley system that the cable he was holding on to was threaded through… ok, this might have been a good idea to get to the top floor with, but it could also have benefited from a little more planning, or better gear to hold on to the cables with.

With a few deep breaths as Speaker saw the end of his ride nearing at terminal velocity, the pony leapt to the side, landing on a surprisingly sturdy rivet on the side of the wall. Now, this rivet was maybe the size of half a pea sticking out of the wall… and yet Speaker had, mostly by luck, ‘landed’ with the edge of his left rear hoof on it. 

Oh right, that perfect balance charm ‘Graceful Crane Stance’ that Sullen Hoof had taught him, what was it Sully had said? “With this you can stand firm on but a blade of grass, or a single strand of hair from a pony’s mane, and it will be as if you have firmly planted your hoof on a slab of stone the size of the imperial mountain”

With his somewhat odd but none the less handy place to stand, Speaker was able to spot the door and ledge he needed to get to. Carefully ‘trotting’ along the wall, standing uncomfortably firm on the rivets that the held the jade-steel plates to the healing house super-structure, Speaker reasoned that he definitely needed to familiarize himself more with what this particular charm could do.

As Speaker got the door the miasma crept up on his mind again. It hurt to think. It hurt to want to resist it… but he had to! He had to focus on the task at hoof! Speaker remembered drill sergeants shouting back at basic training, calling on him to tough it out and keep going. He remembered fellow legionnaires cheering and urging him on at chili pepper eating contests. He remembered that he was a proud stallion of Lookshy, one who never gave up in a fight.

Having done so, it suddenly didn’t hurt so much again.

He couldn’t feel that tiny part of his mind breaking, giving the rest of his mind pause to recover. 

Stepping out on the roof of the building, smelling the fresh air again, it was so refreshing. Speaker felt whole again – and his circle was there to greet him!

Shimmer ran towards Speaker with tears in her eyes. It was reasonably clear that the circle had thought Speaker dead or worse. With her hopes restored Shimmer was quick to shape a cloud of her silvery essence. In no time at the entire circle was heading due north toward Great Forks, to rest their weary heads.

It seemed as if the cloud couldn’t go fast enough, and Shimmer equally made it rise to great heights to get out of range of the horrorfex.

After a few minutes of the cloud going at top speed, the circle almost out of the miasma, Shimmer began to twitch… first the eyes, then the mouth, then a leg…

“Oh no, come on – you can resist the miasma, you just have to want to! Don’t give in to the fear!” Speaker desperately said, but even with her solar mate there to comfort her, then Shimmer’s mind was tired from resisting the miasma and conjuring clouds… and so it dispersed into wisps of silvery essence around the circle’s hooves.

Falling from the sky, both at great downwards speed but also great horizontal speed, with Shimmer twisting and bucking in the rushing air as she snarled and frothed at the mouth, Speaker looked on in despair as the ground started getting closer.

The rest of the circle didn’t fare much better. Not even her armor could save Red if she hit the ground at this spped, and Cash and Sully had equally joined the chorus of panicked screams as they all plummeted to the ground. 

In stark contrast to everypony else, Sunrise Glow appeared to give absolutely no damn, remaining silent and calm, but then again – she had that damn invulnerability charm, so she didn’t have to worry.

After falling for a minute or so the circle cleared the miasma. This was nice, at least to Speaker, as Red, Cash and Sullen Hoof stopped screaming nearly as loud. Still, they were screaming, and for good reason. They were all maybe a mile from the ground by now, and it was only getting closer.

This did not make it easy to come up with good ideas. Then suddenly a shadow eclipsed the sun, making Speaker look – but he saw nothing.

“Hey, you need a ride?” a familiar voice suddenly said from bellow Speaker.

Speaker looked down: “Shimmer!”

In her beast-pony form, looking more bird than pony, with her third eye glowing with silvery light, Shimmer slowly came up under Speaker, allowing him to balance on her back – and with the graceful crane stance he didn’t weigh her down or impede the lunar’s ability to fly.

The two quickly caught up to the others. Red and Sullen Hoof both did as Speaker and balanced on her wings using the same charm, bobbing up and down with her wing beats.

It must have looked very silly, as Cash was mainly laughing when he saw them come up to him – or maybe the pony had just lost his mind from being in mid-fall to his death? Of course, there wasn’t that much room left on Shimmer, so Cash had to settle with being carried down in Shimmer’s talons.

This left Sunrise Glow who didn’t seem to care much for the aid of the others: “I’ll see you when you land”

The circle watched on as the adolescent filly plummeted to the ground. She fell into a forest, but it was easy to see where she landed: One needed only seek out the plume of dust that was thrown up by the impact.

Shimmer landed at the edge of the forest and turned back into a pony, the circle quickly heading in to find Sunrise Glow.

By seeking out the slowly settling plume of dust, the circle quickly came across a clearing… no – clearings do not have trees that have been knocked over. This was a crater. As the dust settled it became clear what stood in the center of the crater: Sunrise Glow, giving the rest of the circle a disapproving frown: “Took you long enough”

That night the circle camped out near where Shimmer had landed outside the forest. Their very souls ragged from the miasma, none of the ponies wanted to move on before they had at least recovered a little – all except Speaker. He felt fine was more than ready to get back to the scavenger lands.

“You finding that Rectifier really cheered you up, didn’t it?” Sullen Hoof mused, as he stirred in a pot placed on the campfire. The scents from the vegetable stew in the pot were soothing to both mind and body, and everypony relaxed to the view of the flickering lights from the campfire.

Speaker nodded, feeling just as good as he did when they had first entered Denansdor: “True, but its broken – I need tools to fix it, first age tools”

Cash wanted to make a comment about how it’d be up to his powers of business to purchase such rare tools, a challenge he’d gladly face compared to having his mind dissolved by Denansdor’s miasma – but he was too mentally exhausted: “I… I feel like when father would make me memorize sales ledgers… my poor head…”

All the ponies in the circle slept like rocks that night.

The next morning Circle began to take stock of exactly what they’d gotten out of this whole trip.

The amount of jade that Shimmer had spirited away… it still baffled everypony’s mind. Cash was most impressed, for he alone in the circle knew what that much wealth could purchase. Sunrise urged caution, pointing out that the jade had Denansdor stamps: “If you show up with that in Nexus it’ll be a day before all of Creation knows where you got it  - and ponies will want to know how you go it”

Cash didn’t seem worried: “My dear holy mare – while I do appreciate your concern, then Speaker here could probably whittle down each slab into a thousand jade bits. Nobody would have to know where it came from, only that I, Cash Charmer, have my saddlebags full of them”

“Well, don’t plan any spending sprees just yet – I’m going to need another day or so before I can conjure another cloud safely…” Shimmer commented, sitting perched in the form of a seagull on a nearby.

“Are we going to have to wait around a few days every time we go out and do something?” Red wondered with a slight hint of annoyance in her voice, while marveling at the giant blade detached from the wrecked guardian automaton that Speaker and Shimmer recovered after she had defeated it.

Speaker trotted up to the oversized blade. He explained that sorcery is trying on the mind, and that he was working on recalling ancient charms that could transmit the patterns of essence that inform pure will so that he could lessen Shimmer’s burden. Red nodded to that and joined Shimmer as they undertook the daunting but welcoming challenge of relaxing all day.

Looking at Sunrise, Speaker motioned for her to come over. The adolescent holy mare got up from her meditations, adjusted her hood, and approached.

“I need you to take a quick trip back into the miasma – your immunity is still working, right?” Speaker plainly stated.

Sunrise Glow nodded and listened as Speaker floated out his notebook from his saddlebags: “I’ll sketch you up a map – Shimmer can carry you up into the sky so the two of you can spot where to go. I need you to find my old workshop in the Heaven Peach Commune, the tinker-town resort that I occasionally resided in back in the first age. In there is a hoof-boot of orichalcum and adamant, decked out with tiny gears and essence condenser rods. I need you to bring me this”

“Is this device the tool you will need to fix the rectifier?” Sunrise inquired, sounding more as if she was questioning Speaker’s motives for fetching the device, rather than wondering what it did.

Speaker blinked a few times. He hadn’t expected Sunrise to ask such a question. Looking down at the sketched map, then back up and Sunrise, Speaker sighed: “Yes and no – this Hoof of the Great Maker will be invaluable for fixing things in the long run. But no, it will probably not be useful to mend the rectifier, but if you have charms that immunize you from the miasma, then other solars might use the same charm to raid Denansdor as well. The Hoof of the Great Maker must not fall into the hooves of anypony who might just sell it as an ancient relic, it is far too priceless for that – not to mention far too destructive if used wrong”

Sunrise Glow beheld Speaker from underneath the hood of her cloak. It was hard for Speaker to see what she was looking at, or really look her in the eyes, but ultimately the adolescent nodded, stating that since they do not have anything else to while Shimmer rests her weary head, then she would do this: “…but you will owe me a favor for this. I will be walking into old places where they might be traps or other hazards. There is no telling what the unicorns have done to your workshop since you last saw it”

Speaker nodded, thanking Sunrise. Moments later Shimmer flew off with Sunrise held gently in her talons, leaving Speaker to join Red and Sullen Hoof around the ember of last night’s campfire.

“So, Speaker, those seventh legion war stories you mentioned back in the blank room – I’ve been dying to hear ‘em” Red said.

Speaker gave Red a quizzical look: “What in Celestia’s name are you talking about?”

Red reminded Speaker of what he had said back in the blank room. Speaker looked confused.

“Come on – we don’t have anything else to do here, and I’m my head is still reeling. Tell us a story from your tours of duty. What was it you said you’d served in back at the Great Forks gate? The 7th legion, something something field force, something something Gunzosha scale? You must have seen a lot of crazy things there” Cash said, having gotten quite comfortable on a thick patch of moss.

Speaker looked at Red and Cash as if they were crazy ponies. An uncomfortable silence followed. Sullen Hoof was the first to piece together what seemed to be to the problem:

“Speaker, what is your earliest memory?” the nexus pony inquired.

The Lookshyan stallion stroked his beard for a moment: “Hmm… that’d be back in the first age, just before the primordial war started…”

“No, I mean from this life – do you remember what you spent your mortal life as, before exalting” Sullen Hoof corrected, sounding increasingly conserned.

Speaker couldn’t see what the fuss was about: “I lived in a nice lodge in a forest in the hundred kingdoms, what of it?”
“Where did you get the uniform you’re wearing?” Red asked, having caught on to what Sullen Hoof was suspecting – and not liking what she was hearing one bit.

Speaker looked down at himself. The faded uniform which had once been bright red, now more of a soft pale red, seemed… alien, yet he was sure he’d always worn it. Speaker brushed off this cognitive dissonance as nothing: “It was probably a gift from a friend”

Cash, Sullen Hoof and Red all looked at Speaker, speechless that a Lookshyan pony couldn’t recognize his own uniform. A few questions later and Speaker was getting annoyed… and it was becoming increasingly difficult not to accept the apparent truth: Speaker could not remember anything but the last few weeks of his mortal life before exalting. The Miasma had eaten his memories.

> Chapter 15: Minding Your Own Business
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shimmer had only able to fly Sunrise to the edge of the miasma and back again from there while in her beast-pony form, but that still saved them both a good day of travel on hoof, allowing them to return to the campsite shortly after the sun had set.
Sunrise easily found Speaker’s old workshop. It was sealed off and built over in an attempt to hide what must have been an otherwise indestructible building. It had been made to look like a pool-house with no doors or windows. How unfitting for a place of such glorious creation.

Returning, what they found was Red, Cash and Sullen Hoof silently listening to Speaker lecture the three on motonic science and the importance of keeping all gemstone-based essence foci clean and… quite a lot of other things that none of them had understood.

When Shimmer and Sunrise set down, handing the Hoof of the Maker over to Speaker, Speaker was ecstatic .
It was a strange looking device that Speaker’s right fore-hoof fit into quite well, covered in orichalcum gears and solid tubes of adamant crystal. It was pretty, but had an alien aesthetic to it: This was not a device designed by a pony… even if it was made for one. Speaker quickly launched into a joyous tirade about what one could do with it, most of which sounded far too fantastic to be real: “…and armies! Entire armies with a wave of your hoof, coming into existence. Cities, kingdoms, entire new continents could rise out of the wyld and be ready to worship Celestia in mere minutes!”

While Speaker spoke fondly of the device, with Red trying her best to nod along to it, despite not understanding half of what was said, and finding the other half too impossible to be true, Sullen Hoof motioned for Sunrise to step away from the show and tell to update her on their grim discovery. Cash had drawn the shortest straw and had to inform Shimmer.

From what Cash could tell, then the lunar’s reaction was… mixed. At first she was understandably horrified, but then she seemed to quickly calm down and seemed to at least for a moment consider whether this wasn’t a good development.

“Shimmer, he’s forgotten his entire mortal life prior to exalting. His loyalty to Looksy, his dislike of the guild, every aspect of his personality not formed within the last couple of months are gone. He doesn’t even remember his birth-parents or where he got the old 7th legion uniform he’s wearing right now” Cash said, sounding oddly enough far more concerned than Shimmer for Speaker’s mental health.

Looking over at her solar mate, Shimmer carefully considered the situation. In her cunning beastpony form her intellect was even sharper than usual, putting her on par with speaker, if not actually making her smarter. It was only Speaker’s booksmarts that made him smarter in that respect – but then again, in the west mares weren’t treated as well as they typically were in the east, so she had long ago developed a habit of not revealing her insights and wisdom in order to better blend in wherever she infiltrated.

In Shimmer’s mind the idea that this development might actually serve her elders’ interests well floated around. The sunken city of Luthe might rise again if Speaker, now free of anything binding him to the east, could be brought to the west. Sure, Leviathan would be displeased that Speaker wasn’t the solar he seeks, but still, a solar with no loyalties to any contemporary agencies? The silver pact could benefit greatly from this.

Cash was approaching the issue from a very different point of view. As a businesspony his reputation and the other businessponies he knew was his bread and butter – or had been. Losing your memory of all of that? To Cash Charmer this was horrible beyond all reason. Equally, then together with Sullen Hoof Cash had ‘evaluated’ Speaker: “Listen, Speaker is different now. He’s more aggressive. The loyalty he had to Lookshy and his desire to remain on good terms with them have obviously made him refrain from any crazy schemes: Speaker has been talking about using that mitten of making to spawn entire legions, all mindless flesh-drones of living metal and fangs that’ll march across creation, to scour creation of all unicorns. He wants revenge… and honestly, he seems perfectly happy to bring down creation to do that – he says with the hoof and his singing staff he can rebuild creation from the ground up if need be – and we can’t talk him out of it. He’s as stubborn as ever, but not in a good way now” 

Shimmer’s birdlike face soured. It was a little tricky for Cash to read her, since beaks didn’t convey emotion that well, but his charms aided in that: She definitely had a hidden agenda she was considering to further here – but he didn’t want to ask, honestly considering Speaker’s mental health more important.

It was then that Sunrise Glow called Shimmer and Cash over to her, next to Red and Speaker who was looking ever so pleased to have his Hoof of the Maker back.

Addressing Speaker with a less than pleased scowl on her lips, Sunrise Glow stepped up on a small broken tree-stump to get up on the same level as the tall and sturdy Lookshyan stallion: “Speaker, I’m being told that you’re experiencing amnesia, is this true?”

Now, while Red, Sullen and Cash had initially caused Speaker to panic, Speaker had quickly taken refuge in his first age memories, recalling them even clearer than before, acting as if he was almost still in the first age, ignoring their questions as the answers to them unnerved him so.

This time he could not ignore the question. With eyes filled with fear Speaker looked around, looking for support, for someone to intervene. How was this possible? Wait – charms, obviously! It was the Terrifying Apparition of Glory rhetorical technique, the denial of denial, only allowing him to come up with a counter-argument of which he couldn’t. How dared she!? How dared that little foal try to command his mind!

In an instant Speaker was furious and would have lunged at the diminutive Sunrise Glow, if not for Red – having far more combat charms than Speaker – having heightened her reaction time to a point that even war gods would envy her, to grab, flip and pin Speaker in a heartbeat the moment he aggressed.

Lying painfully on his back, with Red keeping him down, Speaker could do nothing but cry out in rage and anguish. It was a long and painful wail, one of impotent fury in the face of both overwhelming force and a very real existential dread.
Shimmer looked on in horror. This most certainly would not do, Sunken city or not.

Sunrise Glow, with her scowl never having changed from previously, her having not even moved as Speaker had tried to lunge for her, approached Speaker again, this time stepping down to the ground and Looking Speaker in the eyes as she peered down from her hood: “Do you have amnesia?”

Speaker’s heart was racing and his breath was deep and fast. Lesser ponies might have passed out from the strain he was putting up against Red’s grip, but when it came to clinches then Hoof of the Daystar style was simply superior: “I… I am told that that is the case – but I don’t see the problem”

Sunrise Glow wasn’t impressed, her stone-faced expression never changing: “You just tried to attack me – to hurt a fellow solar in your circle. Is that not a cause for concern? Why would you do such a thing if there was no problem?”

“I… You… If you’d let me go and stop asking me stupid questions there wouldn’t be a problem!” Speaker shouted.

Sunrise continued asking questions which could not be ignored, only answered. Speaker would try to resist the unnatural compulsion to not ignore the question out of sheer force of will, but after his second attempt at this Sunrise Glow’s caste mark lit up: “Speaker, we only want to see you well, will you let us help you get better so that we all can get on with our lives?”

Speaker was silent for a moment. Then he started thrashing about under Red’s tight grip as he screamed: “I could feel that in my mind! You’re trying to get me aren’t you! I won’t submit you old fool! The hierophant will not rise again!”

Red, appearing to use almost no effort at all in pinning Speaker down, despite him being almost a head taller than the warrior mare, turn to look at Sunrise: “Hold on, I thought he was having amnesia, not being paranoid or talking crazy?”

Of what little facial expression Sunrise Glow showed under her hood one could see her mood souring: “I attempted to use a hypnotic charm to make Speaker more agreeable. I will have to hand it to Looksyan stubbornness, resisting that charm is not easy”

Cash’s ears perked up at the mention of the hypnotic tongue technique. He knew it well, but had yet to really find any excuse to use it: Since he could already talk someone in the southern deserts to buy sand if he wanted, the charm’s use seemed limited to him.

“Hold on – what’s the point of even trying to make Speaker cooperate if we don’t have a way to fix him? I know some healing charms, but they’re mostly about healing and regenerating wounds of the flesh, not those of the mind” Shimmer noted, looking evermore concerned.

Sunrise nodded but said that she knew someone in Great Forks who would certainly lead them to a healer of minds, since she was equally certain that such a feat was actually possible for unicorns to do.

“He’ll never live this down if a unicorn has to fix him up…” Cash joked, Sullen Hoof nodding, whatever facial expression he had hidden behind his mask and straw hat.

Sunrise Glow took a deep breath and once again bid Speaker to be cooperative, the hypnotic suggestion in her charm ordering him to submit to her orders until his memories were restored. This time Speaker could not fight the effect, but Sunrise did warn the rest of the circle that he might still resist the compulsion momentarily from time to time.

“I thought when you got hypnotized that you were completely in the hypno-pony’s power?” Red wondered, having only ever heard or seen of the concept from traveling entertainers and whatnot.

Cash was quick to point out that ponies do not work like that, and neither does hypnosis: “You only see stuff like that at carnivals and whatnot. That kind of traveling shows usually plant a member of the troupe in the audience then chooses them to be hypnotized. It is all an act. This charm work by planting a compulsion you aren’t aware of. You do things you don’t know why you’re doing. The trick is to make the compulsion something that isn’t questioned, otherwise you’ll get suspicious and start to question your actions. That’ll make you resist the compulsion, thinking consciously about why you would want to do such things”

“So making a pony run around barking like a dog?” Red wondered, having mostly figured out the answer in advance.

Cash shook his head: “Fake. Ponies either want to play along on the game and willingly do as told just for fun, or are part of the show already”

Red carefully let Speaker go, with Sunrise telling him to remain quiet and occupy himself until Shimmer could bring them back to civilization. He did so, walking to the edge of the crater they were camped in and sitting down to meditate, not speaking a word, his Hoof of the Maker in his lap.

Shimmer found it difficult in the following days to relax, Speaker only ever getting up to join the others to eat, or when they were to sleep, spending all his time in meditation. Talking with the others she found she wasn’t the only one. Speaker was usually so nice, sage and willing to help… now he came off as stern, with a grim determination that by no means matched what Shimmer had been told about her solar mate’s first age behavior…

“What exactly do you know about Speaker from the first age? Do you remember anything from back then?” Cash wondered.

Shimmer sighed: “I only know what I’ve been told, or read, often via writings that my own past incarnations left behind. I’ve always reincarnated in the west, so I’ve been a regular with the eastern elders for many reincarnations whenever a wyld hunt would finally catch up to me, or changelings would kill me – but because of the multiple reincarnations then most of what I remember from past lives are from those lives, not what lives I had in the first age…”

“A shame, would have been nice to get an idea of whether this was how Speaker acted back then” Sullen Hoof said.

Looking over at Speaker, his face contorted into a grim frown, his eyes closed and his ears flat down the side of his head, Shimmer breathed deeply as her longing eyes wished for her solar mate’s kindness and compassion to return: “From what I’ve read he was a kind pony, who would put helping others before personal glory and luxuries. He would enlighten hundreds of tribes of ponies, granting them knowledge of medicine, writing, how to make better homes and how to give thanks to Celestia. During the primordial war he was horrified by the uncaring nature of the river of all torment, so he punished the river that wanted to feel all things by trapping it behind a dam that could not feel , nor be felt. This sensory deprivation allowed others to slay the primordial. I’d need my old scrolls back home west if you want to hear more stories…”

Sullen Hoof nodded, secretly wanting very much to hear more stories of the first age, but right now there were more important things to do: “That sounds more like the Speaker we know. I’m guessing that his compassion was lost when he lost his mortal memories. I guess if you only have power, but no memory of having no powers or others without power you care about, you stop worrying about the consequences of your actions”

The rest of the circle agreed, Cash noting that that sounded a bit like how some guild factors he’d heard about acted from time to time.

The next few day went by far too slowly, until three days later at sunrise when Speaker approached Shimmer who was still not fully recovered from the mental rigors of performing so much complex sorcery.

“Have you recovered sufficiently?” Speaker spoke, plainly and without sounding as if he truly cared at all.

Shimmer shook her head and lowered her gaze in shame, not wanting to look at Speaker while he was in such a state, but her solar bond compelling her to remain in his presence to ‘support’ him. Suddenly light from Speaker’s direction drew her gaze up again.

Speaker had reared up and around his hooves circled streams of glowing runic script in tight bands: “Stand still”

Shimmer stood paralyzed in both fear and unwilling loyalty as Speaker struck her gently on the shoulder, the infinitely complex glyph patterns of essence that swirled around Speaker’s hoof seeping into her painlessly.

It took a moment to realize, but suddenly Shimmer felt… refreshed, as if she didn’t need to think as hard to… think. It was weird, but also felt very nice, as if she had just spent a few weeks in a spa surrounded by supple young yet strangely well hung colts who all shared with her copious amounts of hashish.

“You may now transport us – NOW” Speaker said with a stern tone, standing to attention with his eyes to the skies. Speaker might not remember his time in the 7th legion, but he sure acted as if in it now.

The rest of the circle quickly gathered around the two. Shimmer admitted that she felt refreshed enough to return to civilization. Sunrise Glow said that she looked forward to returning to her congregation, while Red, Sullen Hoof and cash all noted that they weren’t fully recovered, but felt well enough to travel.

As with the three days of waiting, the flight north seemed to take far too long.

Red did note that Speaker at least seemed to have made good on all his talk about developing a charm to ‘transfer will’ – although she wasn’t entirely sure how that worked. Sunrise Glow enlightened her: “It is by will that you can control yourself, pure and simple. You may have natural inclinations, instincts and behavior shaped by your foalhood, but with will you can choose. It is with will that you hold back when beggars shout obscenities at you for not giving them money, or will that informs not doing something you might want to, when you know you shouldn’t”

“I guess that makes it easy for you then – you don’t want to do anything but pray and make others pray, makes for easy choices” Red noted, smiling at her attempt to be funny.

Sunrise Glow didn’t appear impressed.

The circle arrived near Great Forks in the afternoon. Cash marveled at the distance they had crossed, explaining how many months such a trek would have taken via hoof or cart, especially when moving through thick eastern jungle.

Sunrise Glow instructed the circle to wait for her at her apartment – she would go meet whoever it was she knew. It was clear to everypony, except Speaker who did not seem to care, that Sunrise was not interested in telling who it was she was meeting.

Returning in the evening, Sunrise said that she had at great personal cost been given information that could aid Speaker: “There’s supposedly a wood-aspected unicorn, a former immaculate monk, living as a hermit under mount metagalapa. If we fly there we should fly low, at night, and avoid the skies”

Shimmer was quick to ask if they should go right then and there. The rest of circle saw no reason not to, although Cash was quick to point out that even former immaculate monks tended to regard anathema with some hostility.

“Then we will have to see if we cannot make this hermit agreeable” Sunrise Glow said, the eager tone of her voice revealing that she was eager to engage in a religious debate, but there was also a great deal of confidence in her voice, making Cash silently wonder if she wouldn’t try to hypnotize the monk into renouncing his faith and converting to worshiping Celestial while they were at it.

For some reason this scenario actually pleased Cash, and not in the ‘sticking it to the immaculates’ way, but because it might show him whether Sunrise ever did let her personal goals, such as perhaps stamping out all other creeds than the one she advocated, interfere with her stated ‘official agenda’ of peacefully and calmly spreading the worship of Celestia. He didn’t speak of this, but chose to observe the following events carefully.

For Shimmer controlling her cloud at night would have been difficult if not for her beastpony form’s third eye as well as a few perception-enhancing charms.

Mount metagalapa would – during daylight – have been a strange sight to behold, for indeed it was.

It was situated in roughly the eastern center of the upper hundred kingdoms. It was a big mountain… and it hovered about five hundred yards above the ground, with a huge mountain-sized hole in the ground under it where it had probably once rested. It was a lone mountain in a landscape of rolling plains with hills and minor rivers and streams, and it was half a mile up in the air.

Cash had heard of it through herb dealers, as the constant shade under the mountain had allowed for  strange breeds of plants to grow there, making for lucrative herb and mushroom harvesting: “…although last I heard, then raiders had begun attacking ponies all around the mountain, so there might be raiders camped in or around the crater when we get there…  so we should be on the lookout for campfires”

“If it’s anything more than idiot outlaws they’ll know to hide their campfires so the light can’t be seen at a distance. They’ll probably have camps just inside the crater rim” Red noted, her dawn caste giving her insights into strategy she’d never really had before exalting.

“Fair enough, but I doubt they’d disturb a unicorn monk, speaking of which: Do not talk to the unicorn while there. He is a hermit who meditates in solitude. We must respect this and only burden him as little as possible” Sunrise quickly added.

Approaching the mountain while flying just above tree-level, with frightened animals making for brief chirps and howls as the cloud zoomed by overhead, the circle found no campfires or raiders under the mountain.

The hermit was surprisingly easy to find – Shimmer using her third eye to track the essence of the unicorn: “Normally this would be quite difficult, but there’s hardly any residual essence here in the crater… it’s weird, but handy”

The circle followed the half-bird beastpony as Shimmer led them through the crater to a small cave that appeared to have been ‘dug’ by large roots that equally grew around it and held the dirt and rock up. Inside was an old unicorn who sat motionless in a meditative position. Before getting too close Shimmer turned into a pony again.

The unicorn did not move nor did it speak as the circle approached, and yet they could all sense that the unicorn was keenly aware of them.

Sunrise Glow calmly walked up to the dark silhouette of the unicorn and whispered something that could not be heard – well, it wasn’t meant to be heard, but Shimmer already had charms active that improved her senses, and so did Sullen Hoof…

The unicorn’s horn glowed green, revealing an equally green horn and – in the light from the horn – a bald unicorn in ragged robes of coarse sack cloth. With a jerk and a cough the unicorn got up and spoke in a language that neither Sullen Hoof, Speaker or Sunrise Glow could speak – but Red and Cash instantly recognized the high realm tongue, as well as its accent as being from the blessed isle: “So the favor has been called… twenty years of solitude only to be disturbed for this? Oh well, bring forth the patient”

Cash translated and Sunrise Glow bid Speaker step forward.

The dim light from the unicorn’s horn faded, only to suddenly be replaced by bright green light from the unicorn’s eyes. He spoke again in a language that Speaker did not understand: “You have been traveling… to old places… and succumb to ancient madness… interesting…”

The unicorn then closed his eyes again, plunging the tiny cave into darkness once more. A sweet smell of peaches spread in the air, and Speaker felt and heard leaves rustling around his hooves, the rest of the circle hearing them as well. This was the anima of wood-aspected unicorns: Like all unicorns, when they used their essence their elemental nature would show. However, unlike fire aspected unicorns who’d simply burn their surroundings when their anima-flux appeared, then wood aspected unicorns would poison their surroundings like poisonous berry juice… and Speaker knew this, so he hoped this wouldn’t take too long – he had things to do, armies to conjure, realms to reduce to ash.

“Lean down” the hermit unicorn said. Speaker did so, and felt lips on his forehead… followed by a torrent of memories and emotions flooding into his mind, causing him to drop to the ground as his mind readjusted itself.

This didn’t look all that dramatic to everyone else, standing behind Speaker. In fact, it looked rather undignified as Speaker lost all control of his bodily functions, resulting in him pissing, pooping and even puking a little, all the while jerking spastically on the ground. An ugly smell began to spread in the small cave.

A few moments later Speaker slowly staggered up, breathing heavily from the exertion. To Shimmer’s horror Speaker’s caste mark had also lit up, shining a golden light in the darkness of the night. She started feeling that itch in her hooves, and her eyes started darting to and from the glowing caste mark to the silhouette of the unicorn…

“I guess the rumors were true… I pity the realm once more of you start appearing” the unicorn said, his voice coarse and reflecting his rough living. Cash, Red and Sullen Hoof would later question how a hermit under a mountain would hear rumors at all.

Speaker got up to the point that he could look the unicorn in the eyes. It was strange, but the need to scour the land of unicorns with armies of metalic drones didn't feel that important anymore: “Oh there’s more of us… but it doesn’t have to come to blows – I am quite thankful for your service and would prefer to leave peacefully”

Shimmer let out a sigh of relief: “True that – three hundred lunars, three hundred solars and maybe a hundred others… and we’re not all bad”

“Anathema by another name, the scriptures call for your destruction – but I got out of that rat race a long time ago… now please, leave, I wish to return to my meditation” the unicorn said, sighing heavily as he was probably the first unicorn to ever get the true number of supposedly active ‘anathema’ – and it was far greater than what any preacher or monk he had ever met dared theorize…. And six of them were standing in his presence if his senses hadn’t dulled that much. He was a healer, a unicorn healer, and he knew enlightened essence when he felt it – but none of the ponies in his company had the air or look of unicorns, nor the marks that usually identified godblooded.

And up to a thousand anathema in creation at any given moment? The wyld hunt rarely had more than fifty hunts back when he had still been in good standing with the rest of the immaculate order… Oh it would require much meditation to settle his mind, for this news – even if it might be a lie – had upset him so.

Looking up the unicorn saw that the other ponies were gone… but this wasn’t the first time he had lost himself in thought. 
The dawning light could even the seen at the edge of the crater, doubly-visible due to the shadow cast from the mountain floating overhead. Oh what madness had he released upon creation? Only time would tell.

Back in Great Forks, following a surprisingly somber cloud-flight back and a quick pit-stop at a pond for Speaker to clean himself, discussions were had on just how Sunrise had come to learn of this oddly cooperative dragonblooded unicorn.

Sunrise wasn’t in the mood for telling – and even Cash with his silver tongue couldn’t wrestle that fact out of her. With the discussion having reached a deadlock, and Red having already bowed out stating that they should all just be happy that Speaker was ok again so they could start focusing on the plague in the Chung lands, the circle went to bed as the sun rose.
It probably hadn’t been that long before a noise woke the circle up.

In the tiny and unfurnished apartment with six sleepy exalted ponies a little voice was shouting: “Hey, wake up! Come on”
It was a piercing shrill voice, typical of the tiny and relatively mindless messenger spirits that even unicorn sorcerers could summon fairly easily once they learned the spell. It appeared to want to talk to Shimmer.

As the lunar got up the spirit wasted no time to deliver its information, a short verbal message: “The silver pact has learned that Anointed Starfall has acquired a double-boon from a solar, reply back if you know what solar, also please report on your last month’s activity. Elder Moonglow”

The whole circle looked at Sunrise, who under her hood was frowning furious – her scowling mouth was the only thing the others could see, but oh how it was scowling.

“Got to love messenger spirits with no sense of timing or secrecy” Cash remarked, smiling far too much for.

Shimmer shook her head as the spirit faded away: “They probably expected me to be somewhere alone – it’s normal for lunars to take private time this close to the next full moon”

“Right, but now we know who told Sunrise – so, my dear, who is this Anointed Starfall?” Cash was quick to ask.

Sunrise Glow was oddly enough still reluctant to speak of her contact, even with the name revealed.

“Hold on, I’ve heard of him. He’s the pony that runs the Secret Thunders lodge here in Great Falls, a sorcerers club – I came across the name while going through city records while looking into that slave food scam I busted earlier” Sullen Hoof chimed in.

There was an audible sigh from Sunrise Glow: “Right, and now that that cat is out of the bag my oath to never mention where I got my information from is null and void – but yes, a lunar named Anointed Starfall gave me that information, and for a price I might add”

“So what is the price of a solar’s sanity?” Speaker said, curious at what another lunar might charge for such a precious thing.

Shimmer glanced nervously at Speaker. She did not like the prospect of the circle getting a negative image of lunars. It would make her plans so much more complicated.

Sunrise Glow, standing a full head shorter than the other ponies present, one and a half head shorter than Speaker, cursed herself inwardly as her body betrayed her reluctance to speak, as she absentmindedly scraped at the floor with her left forehood: “I… Anointed Starfall swears you to a magical oath when you undertake his tutelage. One to never speak of him or reveal where you have learned your skills. It also obligates you to grant him one favor or service to later in life, to which you have no choice but to obey. I bargained to take over the unicorn’s obligation in exchange for the information, in addition to the boon I already owed him”

“Sounds like two boons owed alright. I wonder; could I make you owe me as well if I promise not to inform my elders of what I now know?” Shimmer said, with a smile on her lips and a face full of jest, revealing both the cruelty of her joke and that she had no intention of really carrying out her threat.

Shimmer could feel the icy glare from underneath Sunrise Glow’s hood while Speaker told her not to joke about something like that.

“Wait, what did you do to owe this lunar anything in the first place?” Red wondered. Sullen Hoof quickly filled in the warrior pony that the Secret Thunders Lodge trained sorcerers – something that many of Great Forks’ godblooded ponies apparently had taken advantage to. It was obvious that it was via Anointed Starfall that Sunrise Glow had been initiated into sorcery.

“I can’t believe that the wyld hunt would allow a lunar to operate so openly…” Speaker said, having finally woken up enough to piece together that a lunar training sorcerers should have been noticed a lot sooner.

Sunrise Glow knew the answer to this. Apparently Anointed Starfall was known to the three ruling gods of Great Forks, who liked having someone around to make sorcerers out of their godblooded population – because sorcerers were powerful tools when it came to both war and commerce. So it was sort of a ‘public secret’ that had government sanction: Every pony in Great Forks with enlightened essence knew of the lodge, although Sunrise also noted that with that in mind the number of favors owed to Starfall had to be staggering…

Shimmer  couldn’t help but smile at this: “Well, a wise lunar knows when to hide and when not to – sounds like this Starfall fellow has a good setup”

There was some discussion on the ethics of accruing favors in such a way, as well as the military use of sorcery, but ultimately the circle went back to bed. It was noon before they got up again, as some of Sunrise Glow’s cultists came knocking on the thin wooden door, calling for their priest to preside over their daily noon ceremony for the sun.
Sunrise Glow obliged.

The rest of the circle slowly got up, cleaned themselves up and got something to eat. Cash walked off, checking up on the medical caravan. Red and Sullen Hoof thought it would be amusing to check up on the gang they’d so thoroughly beaten up last they were in town, to see what they were up to. Shimmer wanted to find this Anointed Starfall, while Speaker wasn’t sure what to do:

“I’m still having trouble reconciling what I did while I had amnesia – I mean, attacking Sunrise? Why would I do that?”
Shimmer smiled as the two of them slowly walked along the edge of the temple district. There were so many parades and colorful ceremonies going on… not to mention the very public displays some pleasure cults were putting on.

Looking at her solar mate, Shimmer urged him to be calm about it: “I’ve seen brave warriors back home have their minds eaten by changelings – they’re left hollow and confused, so were you. This makes you scared, because you fear the unknown, both in that it’s unknown but also because it makes you aware of the fact that part of you is missing… and that fact hurts. Fear leads to anger and anger leads to hate… and in that brief moment that hate can make you lash out”

“I can see what you ended up exalting in the no moon caste and not the full moon caste” Speaker remarked, bowing his head to Shimmer’s wisdom.

“Me, a full-moon? Come on, I’m not that much a warrior – I think before I act. My elders all agreed that when I was tattoo’d as a no-moon” Shimmer said, smiling again, both at Speaker appearing to feel a little better and that he was feeling well enough to make that kind of un-related inquiry.

It was then that Cash came running, wearing brand new silks that had probably cost far too much, shouting: “The medical caravan left three days ago!”

> Chapter 16: Road to Perdition
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shimmer and Speaker both blinked for a moment. Shimmer spoke, sounding tired as ever: “I’ve conjured three clouds within the last day – I’m not doing any more of that right now. Guild caravans are slow; we can catch them on hoof”

Speaker raised a hoof, sigils of essence and will already swirling around them: “That’s not an excuse anymore”

“One day you’re going to run out of charity to give, you know that?” Shimmer said, feeling as the calming feeling of mental vigor spread through her body, Speaker giving her of his own willpower to soothe her tired mind.

Cash sighed: “Come on you two – gods, Red will be pissed. She doesn’t even have a proper weapon yet”

“I’ll make her one on the go – you said that that guild caravan was scheduled to take three weeks to get to Chung lands, if it’s a full caravan they’ll have a smithy for repairs to their wagons” Speaker quickly noted, thinking about what last minute purchases they might need to make before leaving.

Cash Charm was way ahead of Speaker with regards to last minute purchases. Aside from his new fancy silk shirt, which looked surprisingly much like his last blue one with the stiff gold-embroidered collar and sleeves, Cash had bought a cart, as well as supplies; several bars of reasonably good steel for Speaker make into a sword for Red, a few herbal remedies for themselves and what appeared to be a sturdy but sizable lockbox to stash valuables in.

The circle quickly left the city by cloud, eliciting quite a few angry shouts from various Great Forks enforcers as the circle flew over the city walls at great speed.

It took no time at all to spot the guild caravan. Indeed, it wasn’t made to be hard to miss.

Guild caravans were always a sight to behold. Any pony who had ever witnessed a guild caravan coming to town would likely be speechless, or run away screaming since apparently giant monsters were coming.

A guild caravan typically consisted of several guild wagons, gigantic multi-storied buildings on wheels, pulled by equally gigantic yeddim. The guild wagons of the caravan that Speaker and the gang was tracking all appeared, from quite a distance, to be at least six stories tall, pulled by equally huge and monumentally stupid and docile yeddim.

Yeddim were strange beasts of burden, easily the biggest known land animal in creation. They had enormous trunk-like legs and broad muzzles, their entire body covered in thick shaggy fur. The amount of cargo that could be strapped on their backs alone made most run of the mill merchants blush and guild yeddim all had large howdahs built on top of them, usually with houses constructed on them again, used as offices and living quarters for high ranking guild merchants and overseers while traveling with a caravan. All the workers and slaves bunked in the guild wagons, each wagon easily having a few hundred ponies on board as crew or cargo.

Suffice to say, then any pony who knew of the guild knew that a guild caravan was essentially a whole town on wheels, selling and dealing in nearly anything imaginable, often traveling halfway across creation and back over the course of several years. This also made guild caravans really easy to spot from the sky, even with it currently moving through a forest – one had only follow the trail of knocked over trees… again, yeddim were really stupid: If trained well and told go to in a direction they would, even if it meant barging through a forest, knocking over trees. Incidentally, then the guild also did in road-work, as well as any other business you might profit from in any way.

Shimmer landed the cloud on the forest canopy several miles behind the caravan, her solar passengers using their balancing charms to walk down from the smallest leaves and twigs to the thicker brances, then making a short hop, skip and jump down to the ground. Cash Charmer’s wagon and goods were retrieved from elsewhere by Shimmer, and Red refused to let an ‘old’ pony such as Speaker haul it, even if he was more than physically fit to do so thanks to his exaltation. With that settled they began to catch up to the caravan.

Now, Speaker had never seen a guild caravan before – but he had heard plenty of stories, so he had a fairly good idea of what to expect. What he didn’t expect was what trailed the guild caravan, but now he at least understood why Shimmer had put them down so far behind the caravan.

Up the ‘road’ plowed and stomped by the yeddim hauling the guild wagons, and subsequently mowed over by the massive wheels of those guild wagons, the back end of a long line of smaller carts and pony-drawn buggies could be seen.

“Guild caravans are always guarded by mercenaries. A caravan always gets followers who try to stick close to gain cheap safe passage – I’ve done it a few times myself” Cash explained.

As the circle began trotting up towards the wagons furthest behind the caravan Red suddenly said, with a quiet voice that somehow also burned with sudden intensity and focus: “Into the bushes, now!”

Knowing very well from his time in the 7th legion that when the pony taking point tells you take cover, you do not stop and question why, Speaker quickly leapt behind a tree. Sullen Hoof, Shimmer and Cash were just as quick. Red was on the other side of the road, gesturing ahead.

It appeared as if the wagon and owner of said wagon who’d enjoyed the dubious honor of being the one furthest back from the caravan was being robed.

Sunrise Glow just walked ahead, ignoring Red’s hushed calls for her to hide.

The rest of the circle approached while in cover, ready to jump out and rescue the adolescent prophet – but the need for that never came.

“Bow to me!” Sunrise Glow suddenly shouted. Speaker could online imagine what madness was going through the teenage filly’s mind. It was difficult to hear what happened next: there were frequent shouts from adult ponies but no audible sounds of fighting. Speaker wondered if there’d even be enough left of Sunrise for it to be worth to recall his medical bag from elsewhere.

Ten minutes later Sunrise Glow shouted for the rest of the circle to come out.

What met them was a reasonably gruesome sight, although that had nothing to do with Sunrise Glow. A dozen or so bandit ponies, clothed in worn rags if anything at all, most of them with gnarled and scared appearances, all of them looking strong but malnourished, were bowing and scraping to Shimmer, begging for her forgiveness and repeatedly declaring their undying loyalty to her.

Part of Speaker was afraid to ask, part of him thought that whatever Sunrise had done would be incredibly handy to know when dealing with uncooperative patients. Cash was certainly impressed, quickly calling dips on two of the bandits as servants. Sunrise Glow would hear nothing of it.

As Sunrise Glow and Cash Charmer began arguing over whether these brainwashed ponies were to become penitent acolytes or productive servants and bodyguards Speaker surveyed the wagons. This was the gruesome part of the ordeal. The bandits had evidently murdered the previous owner of the wagon, a merchant pony from the looks of it, and had been in the process of hauling away the merchant mare’s corpse – as well as the corpse of her husband and their two foals. Apparently these bandits didn’t take bother with prisoners or slaves. Suddenly the idea of having these bandit ponies working for either Cash or Sunrise didn’t seem like that good an idea.

Red agreed to this, saying that in the years she’d worked as a mercenary there was only one punishment suitable for this kind of crime – to which end she also looked at Speaker quite sternly, without words reminding him to make her a new sword, as she sorely missed having one right now.

“Such waste of life would be foolish. They will all obey my every command – they will not harm another pony unless I give such orders, of which I have no intention” Sunrise Glow stated from underneath her hood. 

Cash was similarly unphased by the fact that he was arguing for the ‘ownership’ of murderers.

Then the dozen or so bandits all suddenly dropped dead from their previously humble bows – all at the same time. Sullen Hoof then proceeded to walk over to each of them and retrieve a hoof-long and quarter inch thick needle from the back of each of their heads: “I didn’t become a solar to take slaves, nor to pardon the first murderers we come across simply because it’d be nice to have henchponies and lackeys. If you lot want serfs and acolytes go hire or recruit them the usual way, not like this. We’re better than this”

Red seemed hesitant to nod in approval, but ultimately did so as well. Speaker followed suit, noting that in Lookshy slavery was forbidden: “We see it as a liability. Slaves rebel, since all ponies yearn for freedom. It is basic pony nature. Even if Sunrise had them under her control, they could try to resist it or might even break free at some point. They would be a liability to us”

Shimmer looked at Speaker with a face full of surprise and shock: “And here I thought you a healer, not one to endorse executions like this”

Speaker sighed and shrugged: “I’m perfectly willing to help those who need help, but I will equally always prefer to see those who bring misery and death to innocent ponies punished. Besides, we don’t need an entourage right now, especially where we’re going”

Cash, accepting that now wasn’t the time for henchponies or delightfully obedient employees, quickly began appraising what the dead merchant had in his cart. As he was about to begin looting it, Sunrise loudly objected: “You will touch nothing of this – the wagon and all the goods in it are to be given to the dead merchant and his family as grave goods. They’re not yours, they are for the pyre”

Some more arguments followed, Cash wanting what little valuables there were among the dead ponies’ possessions. Ultimately Red settled the matter by pointing out to Cash that they already had a fortune in jade and gold waiting to be cashed in, so sifting through scraps here was a waste of time when sick ponies were waiting for them in Chung Do.

The funeral pyre was bright but contained. Speaker and Shimmer ensured that the rest of the forest didn’t take catch on fire, while Sunrise used her powers as a priest of Celestia to instantly and unceremoniously reduce the dead bandits’ bodies to ash. With that the circle resumed their attempt to catch up with the guild caravan.

By nightfall the circle had linked up, the guild caravan slowly mowing through the forest as it headed north-east towards Chung Do. Cash later reported that the ‘going through the forest’ was mainly because the guild factor who was the caravan master had thought it faster than taking the trade roads… despite it slowing down the caravan greatly.

“He’s probably just trying to dodge tolls – that’s normal for any guild merchant” Cash noted.

Shaking his head at this folly of the caravan master, Speaker realized that there was one part of it he didn’t understand: “Why are they called guild factors? Why not merchants like everyone else?”

Sullen Hoof laughed from within his orichalcum helmet-mask, it not obstructing the sound of his voice at all somehow: “What? The all-knowing Bright Machine Speaker not already knowing something? This is amazing – but really, you’ve answered your own question. Regular guild merchants are just that, regular merchants. A guild factor is... just that – he’s a factor, a merchant to be reckoned with, who is far more influential and wealthy, can screw with economies at a whim and establish monopolies wherever he wants. It’s not a title you earn, it’s just something you become when you get big enough to be a deciding factor for the market you trade in”

Speaker frowned but also nodded. He had no doubt that this guild factor heading the caravan was going to profit endlessly from the suffering of sick ponies of Chung Do. With this in mind he asked Sullen Hoof to investigate the medical cargo of the guild wagons. What exactly was the guild planning to sell in Chung Do as cures to the plague? Medical treatments to plague were rare and costly, not something ever manufactured on a large enough scale to require a guild caravan to transport it.

Cash agreed, adding that he’d try to chat up the factor’s people as well, but mostly just to try to sell off some of the valuables they’d taken from Denansdor: “I am supremely certain that a guild factor would love some shogunate era jewelry…”

The next day Cash and Sullen Hoof were nowhere to be seen. The absence of the two weren’t questioned, due to the plans laid out the day before, but it did leave Red hauling the wagon and Speaker and Shimmer sitting all alone in the back.

The wagon that Cash had acquired as a simple and plain wooden traveling wagon, basically a small one-room wooden hut on four wooden wheels, and while there were shuttered windows to allow those inside to look out, then it offered a good of privacy none the less. It wasn’t big enough for the whole circle to sleep on the floor, but Shimmer solved this by sleeping as a bird up under the ceiling, perched on a rafter.

Speaker found the privacy… awkward, as Shimmer seemed interested in building on their relationship. This wasn’t the first time they had enjoyed private time together, as the river-junk they had sailed from when they had met at Speaker’s manse to Great Forks had allowed them several weeks of time together – but back then there had been the wonder and novelty of meeting for the first time, again, but now? With the two lying on the floor, cuddled up in blankets, Speaker just didn’t feel like wanting to do anything.

Over the last few weeks they had fought and bled together, narrowly escaped madness and death in Denansdor and fought giant pony-eating monsters in the south-eastern jungles. Equally, with Speaker’s brief brush with amnesia and the madness that followed, Speaker didn’t feel that comfortable letting Shimmer get close…

Speaker remembered trying to kill Sunrise, oh he remembered it so clearly. There was nothing in his first age memories which helped or explained it to him, at least nothing that he could make sense of at the moment. But if he’d behaved like that, even if it was during a moment of weakness, how might he not one day behave towards Shimmer? Speaker didn’t like hurting other ponies. In retrospect he even thought that letting the bandits live might have been best – Sunrise and Cash could easily have reformed them, with Cash sealing the deal with a sanctified oath never to harm another pony again, but Speaker… having seen the murdered family, he hadn’t thought clearly.

The lunar mare was not slow to pick up on Speaker appearing worried and apprehensive, although she couldn’t figure out the source of the problem. To her Speaker’s madness had been fixed. She was used to problems arising, problems being fixed and then moving on. Dwelling on what was lost or might have been lost was not in her nature – for she had lost so much back in the west, to changelings who ate the dreams and hopes of friends and loved ones or to unicorn immaculates who would rather see heretics burn than to let them sully their souls any further by living in any other way than by what the immaculate scriptures demanded.

Shimmer tried to explain her point of view to Speaker, but he wasn’t very receptive: “Speaker, you’re going to live over a thousand years. You will have to learn that mortal ponies die. In this age even more so. You have to learn to let that go. Focus on the ones you can save, but don’t begin to doubt yourself by dwelling on the ones you couldn’t save”

“Ponies don’t become bandits without a reason” Speaker said, gazing out the front window of the wagon at Red. “They might have been outlawed for offending some noble or maybe it was farmers whose crops had failed and they had no other means to buy food. Sunrise said that she’d made them open to suggestion by offering the three things that they all wanted deep inside: Food, shelter and safety… I should have listened to the two of ‘em”

Shimmer stroked Speaker’s beard. The stallion’s nose twitched. Speaker felt a tongue tickling his left ear – but Shimmer on his right? Looking left there was nothing. Quickly turning to look at Shimmer he caught the lunar wiping her mouth.
“Really?” the solar said.

Shimmer opened her mouth and stuck out her tongue – and it just kept coming out and out… sticking it out in front of Speaker’s face, almost half a yard’s worth, then sucking it back in with a slurping noise: “Hehe, I do that with my legs too, but that feels weird – want to see what I can do with my tail?”

Speaker wasn’t feeling up to whatever lunar kinks that Shimmer wanted to indulge in. He needed time to think about the last few days.

Getting up and donning his old Looksyan uniform, Speaker said nothing as he moved the one chair in the house-wagon to the centre of the floor and got up on it, then reached up and opened the hatch in the roof, then pulled himself up and sat himself down on the roof. Speaker then drew a deep breath and exhaled slowly as he flipped the hatch over to close himself off from Shimmer. He didn’t want to get her hurt, but he didn’t know how to say it.

Later that day a scrawny pony with a cream coat and no mane, who looked as if he hadn’t eaten well in days, snuck into the wagon and was nearly killed by Shimmer. This was until his cream coat rippled and turned into grey, with brown patches on his hooves and throat. An orichalcum helmet-mask also appeared over the pony’s head. It was Sullen Hoof, with a magic disguise.

“Sorry…” Shimmer said, looking embarrassed.

Sullen Hoof shrugged: “We should have agreed on how I should identify myself when I’m disguised. We can talk about that to the others later. Where’s Cash? I have a copy of the caravan’s cargo manifest, need to talk to him, then Speaker”

Cash had not returned from his attempted audience with the guild factor leading the caravan, so Shimmer couldn’t oblige Sullen Hoof on that point, but Speaker was still up on the roof.

Up on the roof of the wagon Speaker had been trying to understand why he’d behaved as he had back when he’d lost his memories. Suddenly Sullen Hoof landed next to him, having jumped up to him, landing silently.

“I figured you’d be best to evaluate the medicine the caravan is bringing” Sullen Hoof said, retrieving the cargo manifest from elsewhere. It was a hastily scribbled, but at the same time very well written scroll, listing everything the guild caravan was bringing along.

Speaker skimmed through the lists. Sullen Hoof carefully observed his facial expression. A certain seagull landed on Speaker’s left shoulder, reading along as well.

From what Sullen Hoof could tell then Speaker’s face seemed to alternate between a frown, deeply furrowed brows and wrinkled forehead. After a while Speaker took a deep breath, looked to his left and raised an eyebrow at Shimmer in her seagull form, then to his right at Sullen Hoof: “Some of this stuff makes sense, but a lot of it will only make things worse”
Sullen Hoof, whose main medical experienced could be summed up as ‘Poison is bad for you, and stop the bleeding when cut’, had no idea what Speaker meant, but listened on.

Speaker explained that most of the medicine that the caravan was bringing was aimed at combating the symptoms of the plague, but wouldn’t cure it. There were dried herbs that could be made into medicinal teas which would help break fevers. There were other herbs and powders would which cause constipation, and then there were a ton of drugs – the bad sort.
“Ok, hold on, stuff to give make a pony constipated? Why would that be good when you have the plague?” Sully wondered, looking confused even with his helmet-mask on.

Shimmer jumped down from Speaker’s shoulder and turned back into a pony, looking at Sullen Hoof: “Have you ever seen an outbreak of plague?”

“I’ve heard of some of the dock areas and sailor hostels in Nexus occasionally getting outbreaks. The emissary usually just swoops in and kills everyone infected, then the council sends in the sijaneese with their ghostblooded morticians to clear out the dead. If it gets really bad the council orders the area burned to the ground… then it’s back to business” Sullen Hoof regaled, not entirely at ease with the memories of seeing entire blocks burning down, with any pony who tried to escape the flames being shot by archers and other mercenaries.

“Well that’s Nexus for you – anything that can disrupt trade getting killed” Speaker said, shaking his head: “Plague starts as a fever with diarrhea, then you get rashes a week later, which turn black. They form at the soft tissue around your nose, mouth, ears, groin. Then they swell and the boils form. The fever doesn’t break and two weeks after your first symptoms you die from not being able to hold food inside and your body cooking from the strain of the fever. An ugly way to die… although luckily there aren’t that many worse diseases… anymore”

Sullen Hoof was silent for a moment. Shimmer asked Speaker if he’d ever treated plague victims, to which Speaker said that what Sully had described was the usual ‘cure’: “Quarantine and fire. Wood aspected unicorns can cure any disease, even plague, but with a city of ten thousand then you’d need an army of unicorns to sweep the city, and only Lookshy and the realm can field that kind of forces in this day and age – and they have to match the realm militarily, so Lookshy can’t spare that many unicorns for the healer’s trade”

“So… what are you going to do then? If an army of dragonblooded unicorn healers can’t be raised to cure a city of the plague, how will you?” Shimmer wondered, sounding like a young filly asking a pony she was a great fan of how he would surely solve a problem.

Speaker shrugged, said that he would have to see the situation first, then his face grew grim: “Secondly, this caravan is carrying a lot of drugs… so it looks like the pony in charge thinks that if he can’t profit from selling medicine that won’t cure anypony, his merchants can sell enough opium, hashish and heroin to make them forget they’re sick as they die” 
One didn’t have to be a master of social subtleties to see that Speaker didn’t appreciate this business model. Cash returning to the wagon moments later, smelling of wine, whores and his silks stained with various bodily fluids, didn’t improve Speaker’s mood, especially not after bragging triumphantly about how the guild factor in the front wagon has a whole brothel set up there, or how the guild factor had a brilliant plan about selling drugs to the sick to ensure profit no matter what.

The next day the caravan made a halt. It had come across a creek in the seemingly endless forest and the massive guild wagons took a while to be hauled through the mud as they kept sinking into the water. The rest of the caravan spent the time refilling their water supplies, and the circle chucked Cash in the stream to clean him up as at this point, after another few visits to the brothel up in the front of the caravan, he smelled like a brothel himself. Suffice to say then caravan travel meant that you didn’t get to bathe very often, and even the dragonblooded espoused cleanliness as a virtue if nothing else.

The following weeks passed marvelously uneventfully. Speaker, Sullen Hoof, Sunrise and Shimmer all agreed that it wasn’t that good that the guild factor leading the caravan wanted to sell tons of drugs to the plague-ridden city of Chung Do. Red was understandably conflicted about the situation: “We need the caravan to get the medicine there – the drugs is just how they plan to turn a profit…”

Speaker didn’t push the topic anymore after that. It was clear that Red still had the mercenary spirit going for her: Money was to be made, and Cash was doing a great job in befriending the guild factor. The two were in fact getting very friendly, to the point that Cash even got the guild factor to agree to sponsor him to join the guild once done in Chung Do, when the guild factor would return to Nexus. A few days later Cash was strutting around all proud and cocksure, having been made the second in command of the caravan in all but name, after Shimmer identified a grove of very large mahogany trees and mentioned it to Cash. Apparently one of the giant guild wagons included a fully functional lumber mill and carpentry workshop, both for continuous maintenance of the guild wagons, and for constantly making new goods to sell – and fourty-eight huge mahogany logs could be made into a lot of really profitable furniture, especially with slave labor used for manufacturing it.

Speaker spent the time taking turns with Red in pulling the circle’s wagon. Shimmer would keep Speaker company while he had wagon-duty, but to her disappointment then Speaker didn’t seem ready to talk to her yet.

While not pulling the wagon Speaker spent most of his time meditating on his first age memories. He had to understand why he’d been so violent when all he remembered was the past. As a result of this Speaker ended up slowly recalling a number of martial arts techniques relating to his thousand wounds gear style, and him and Sullen Hoof had great fun sparing, especially once Speaker figured out the Rearing Crane Release technique, which was a special essence-augmented throwing technique for when you had grappled your opponent. It allowed Speaker to toss other ponies up in the air… and make them stay there, especially after he recalled how to make them not fall down again after a few seconds using essence to extend the effect.

Sullen Hoof wasn’t sure he could see the logic of a style based on an exotic chakram having tossing techniques as part of it. Speaker wasn’t entirely sure either, but deduced a good theory on it while watching Sullen Hoof drifting helplessly about four yards up in the air as Red pulled their wagon further away to keep up with the caravan:

“It’s simple: I need to keep my opponent both at range and standing still so I can hit them. Leaving you floating in the air makes you a nice big target to hit. It’s brilliant in this way; now brace yourself so you don’t hurt yourself when I let you fall down”

There was a brief rustling of leaves and broken sticks as Sullen Hoof landed exceptionally gracefully. At first it looked like Sullen Hoof was going to land on his back at an awkward angle, but a sudden essence-powered flipping motion allowed the night caste solar to shift his position mid-fall to land perfectly safe. Speaker was impressed.

It was a week or so later that Red told the circle that she was starting to recognize where they were. The caravan had finally cleared the large forest and had entered the Chung lands. Red figured that they were maybe two weeks away from Chung Do.

It was barely dawn a few days later at another stream where the caravan had made halt for the night to refill its water supply – and for Cash to wash off several weeks of partying hard with the guild factor. The two now spoke to each other as if brothers. Cash was certain that with his hoof in the door with the guild he’d have control of the whole organization in a month once he got to Nexus. Considering how he had the guild factor eating out of the palm of his hoof at this point, that wasn’t entirely unrealistic. Speaker wasn’t sure if that was good or not.

It was Sullen Hoof who woke everyone up in the small wagon, screaming from the top of his lungs as he burst in: “They’re dead! They’re all dead!!”

A frantic scramble quickly saw everypony tumbling out of the wagon, half-dressed – except for Sunrise Glow who slept in her white hooded cloak, never seeming to take it off, which showed from how dirty it was getting.

The sight that greeted them was so gruesome that none of the ponies could utter a word – except Sunrise Glow, who upon seeing the rotting remains of almost the entire caravan ahead of them, including the guild wagons which had been reduced to moldy bits of collapsed timber, plus the thousands of dead ponies that had been in the caravan being in equally advanced states of decay, said: “Well fuck me”

Sunrise then gasped sharply in reaction to her own surprised statement, reaching for her mouth as she looked at the others, but everyone’s eyes were fixed on the carnage ahead of them to notice her lapse of self control.
Only the very back end of the wagon train trailing the main guild caravan hadn’t been obliterated.

Approaching the scene a sudden wave of horrible smells met the circle. Then other sleepy ponies started popping their heads out of their wagons, wondering what the shouting was about: “Oi, some of us are trying to sle-“ but their voices quickly fell silent when they saw the scene. Some shrieked in terror and popped their heads back in, several others fainted on the spot.

Speaker walked up to what had probably been three of the mercenary ponies that had been part of the guild caravan. They seemed to have been killed very quickly while patrolling, as they appeared to have just fallen over from a normal standing position. A second issue was everything being so incredibly rotten considering the short amount of time that had passed since Speaker had gone to bed. This wasn't just unnatural, it was weird. You would have to hose everything down in lukewarm water for a day at least first, then sprinkle loads of mold spores and other rot-catalysts, just to get everything to rot so evenly. To get everything to decay this quickly… Speaker didn't even want to know how you achieved that.

There was an eerie silence as Speaker walked down the length of the caravan and surveyed the damage. No wild animal noises in the darkness beyond the few still lit torches lying on the ground, or the few fires that had started in some some of the smaller wagons. To his horror the guild wagon that had carried the many tons of medicine to Chung Do was just as decayed as everything else. All that medicine. What was the ponies in Chung Do going to do? Sure it wouldn't have cured them, but it would have brought hope and given Speaker more time to work.

Speaker was about to break down in tears when Cash suddenly ran past, fresh smears of vomit revealing that he’d puked up last night’s dinner. Cash ran up to the guild factor’s wagon. Now, this wagon was the only one still standing, as it was partially made of a steel framework with thin stone slabs set up as walls and floor. Speaker had never been up to the guild factor’s wagon. The mercenaries protecting the caravan didn’t let anyone but the ponies ‘on the list’ anywhere near it. It was quite a sight. The massive stone wheels looked like oversized mill stones, and yet they were gilded on the rims! The stone slabs that made up the wall sections were carved with colorfully painted decorations that showed the guild factor heroically carving paths through new land, swimming in jade, and other illustrious ways of saying “I am filthy rich, you’re not, suck it”. What amazed Speaker the most was that it hadn’t been a yeddim. It was a tyrant lizard. Now it was but a hollow out pile of bones and rotting flesh in a large pool of putrid blood, but still, a guild factor who’s private wagon was pulled by a freaking tyrant lizard? Now that was impressive.

Cash stormed into the wagon, smashing through the moldy remains of the large dark mahogany doors that led into the lobby of the wagon. Speaker could then hear how Cash stopped very quickly and vomited again, then continuing up into the wagon’s higher levels.

Moments later Speaker heard Cash cry out, signaling that the guild factor was probably dead – and so were Cash’s dreams of a meteoric rise in the guild.

Cash came out a short while later, hauling a thick red jadesteel lockbox behind him. It looked pristine. At least Cash got something out of the situation – assuming that he could get it open. Sullen Hoof could probably help in that.

It turned out that Sullen Hoof was just as heartbroken as Cash. Speaker found the orichalcum-masked pony mourning next to one of rotting hulks of the guild wagons. Apparently Sullen Hoof’s cooking hadn’t just improved during their time in the caravan from Sully cooking for the circle: Sullen Hoof had been stealing food from the caravan to cook for and feed the slaves the caravan was bringing along. His plan had been to get them strong enough to rebel once they got to Chung Do, allowing him to free them all. He seemed well aware how this would rustle a lot of ponies’ jimmies, but he expected Sunrise and Cash to talk down anyone who wanted the slaves back.

The caravan had been transporting over five hundred slaves, crammed into one of the holds of that one guild wagon. They had been stuffed together like fish in a barrel. That Sullen Hoof had been able to bring food to them all seemed impossible enough to begin with – but now it had all been for naught, and it was evident that the slaves hadn’t been killed in advance of the necrotic horror that rotted away the caravan. What a horrible way to die.

Speaker and Sullen Hoof were both disrupted from their mourning when a new wave of horrified shrieks pierced the eerie silence. The sun was dawning, shedding light on the carnage, and in that light Speaker saw the source of the commotion: Shimmer had shifted into her beastpony form – which had freaked most of the other still living ponies out quite a lot.

Shimmer ignored this as she took off and flew the length of the caravan. She returned minutes later, landing near Speaker while giving off a shriek like some freakishly huge seagull. Shaking her feathered head she then spoke, with a grave tone of voice: “I know what did this”

This got the circle’s attention, as well as that of the few mortal ponies present who didn’t run away screaming from Shimmer: “I’ve seen essence like this near Skullstone. Necrotic essence. Necromancers did this – although I’ve never seen a necromancy spell do anything like this. They usually just mind-control ghosts or raise zombie ponies”

Speaker didn’t really know what to say. He remembered necromancy from the first age, when solars ‘invented it’ as they researched the mysteries of the newly created underworld following the primordial war. How could anything like that end up being used for something this destructive?

“The spell didn’t do all of this. Someone killed most of the mercs here first” Red noted, having recognized the injuries on some of the rotting merc corpses. Speaker wondered if she had any medical training since she was able to spot that – or maybe she was just good at recognizing the handiwork of other killer ponies?

Shimmer’s beastpony form’s third eye had allowed the lunar to spot essences traces of a large circle of glyphs that marked the area of effect of the spell. Someone had made them in a hurry, and to make it worse there was a really weird blood trail where the ethereal glyphs had been traced.

“Weird blood? I’ve seen a lot of blood, how’s it weird?” Red said. It was clear from her voice that she was only asking to distract herself from the fact that Chung Do now wouldn’t get any medicine. There was a quivering in her voice that betrayed her. It was so obvious that even Speaker noticed it.

“It wasn’t shed from anything living – it trailed off into the same essence that made the glyphs that outlined the spell. Magic blood made from necrotic essence. Never in over a hundred years at the edge of madness in the west have I seen anything like that” Shimmer said, drawing on her wisdom and experiences from back home.

There was an uncomfortable silence. Sighing, Cash Charmer asked the obvious question: “So, what do we do now?”

Looking at Red, who was clearly looking to the rest of the circle, Speaker wondered what to do. Shimmer was pondering the nature of the necrotic essence-made blood. Sunrise Glow wasn’t present. Sullen Hoof was distracting himself with the jadesteel lockbox.

To Speaker it seemed clear. With the indecisiveness of youth combined with a strange situation that none of the ponies present had any experience with, Speaker fell back on his gut instinct: “We do as solars must. We go to Chung Do, we save it from the plague and reunite Red with her family. Shimmer, a cloud please”

Red raised a stern hoof before Shimmer could reply to Speaker’s request: “Hold on – if we’re about to go into this kind of trouble, then they’re not going anywhere until you make me a new damn sword – you’ve been putting this off for weeks Speaker, and all the merc weapons have rusted into nothing from the spell”

It turned out that waiting a little before leaving was necessary even without having to make Red a new blade. Sunrise was walking around briefly touching each dead pony, using a tiny bit of essence to reduce their bodies to ash and to send their souls on to lethe for reincarnation. She wouldn’t be done with that for a while, and she was adamant about not leaving a single pony corpse behind, to avoid a shadowland forming:

“This much death here will do us no good. Plague is bad enough, shadowlands only make it worse”

Cash retrieved the steel bars he had purchased and Red marveled as Speaker used his essence to essentially wring a large an absolutely perfect broadsword out of the them. Sullen Hoof was equally intrigued at how Speaker had worked the metal without a forge or anvil. Speaker said that he could teach Sullen Hoof how to cook without the use of tools aside from his own essence if he wanted – but not now.

It was late evening before Sunrise Glow was done, having sent well over a thousand pony souls on their way and drained herself of essence quite thoroughly many times over, even with the hearthstone from the Denansdor manse set in her jade hearthstone bracer, one of the pairs also recovered from Denansdor, helping her respire more essence and thus allow her to incinerate more bodies.

The circle’s last act before leaving was giving the other survivors directions away from Chung lands – so they didn’t have to contend with any plague. They then lit the remains of the guild caravan on fire and flew off towards Chung Do.

> Chapter 17: Family Portrait
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was Shimmer’s idea not to fly all the way into Chung Do. In her experience, when meeting other ponies for the first time who did not know of your exalted nature, it was best to use more normal ways of travel – unless of course you wanted to really make an entrance, but that would usually just end up scaring the ponies you were meeting, especially if they were primitive tribals.

Landing on a nearby trade road that led north the moment they spotted the most outlying farms surrounding the city, the circle debated exactly how they should approach Chung Do.

Red was worried that after having been gone for so many years that she might get into trouble for coming back, even with the plague going on. Exiled ponies weren't supposed to come back. Shimmer offered to use her shape-shifting powers on Red to make her look like a different pony, but Cash argued against it: “A crisis as big as an outbreak of plague is, in my humble opinion, a perfectly valid reason that a daughter might return to check on the health of parents, no matter the circumstances. You can always excuse yourself that you will leave as soon as the crisis is resolved, but we will need the real you present to get us before the shogun”

Red nodded, understanding the necessity of her presence to get things moving once they got to Chung Do. With that settled Red and Speaker took turns at pulling the wagon the final stretch north to the city.

About ten miles from Chung Do the circle came across a roadblock. Armed ponies in lamellar barding and with helmets bearing a stylized white flower as crest told Speaker who was pulling the wagon at that point to stop and identify himself.
“I am Bright Machine Speaker, retired lookshyan doctor. I heard of the plague and I’m here to help” Speaker said, speaking honestly but without mentioning his supernatural abilities.

One of the pony soldiers manning the roadblock approached Speaker: “We have orders not to let any ponies through until next spring when the sickness in Chung Do should have run its course”

Speaker didn’t have to act or behave in any different way - his medical training experience took over the moment he heard the soldier say that they were essentially keeping other ponies away until everyone was dead in Chung Do: “Do you have any idea how many ponies live in Chung Do? Are you just going to condemn them all to a slow and painful death? Even the most disciplined soldiers from Lookshy know when to disregard their orders when lives are at stake like this!”

The soldier took a few steps back. Speaker hadn’t intended to appear to menacing, but his compassion for the lives of those suffering seemed to have made an impression. An officer mare, if the extra blue decorations on the mare’s helmet were any indication, broke ranks from the roadblock and approached: “We have our orders from Daimyo Crane Lotus to prevent the plague from spreading, and to prevent further loss of life – letting you go in there will only get you killed. The only ponies allowed through are the ones from Sijan, and they’re using the eastern trade road, not coming here from the south”

From behind the shuttered window which faced the ‘forward’ direction of the wagon, Cash peeked out and whispered to Speaker: “He means we could sneak in by joining a corpse caravan from Sijan…”

Speaker shook his head and gave the officer a stern look: “I will take a detour for this. The sick will not wait. My life is my business, now move aside”

Unimpressed the officer turned around and began to calmly trot back to her position at the blockade: “Not my problem. You’re not getting through here”

“Hey Speaker” another whisper said from the shuttered window, this time from Red: “The Crane clan’s land is at the far end of the Chung Lands. Soldiers from nearby nobles quarantining the city would make sense, but not soldiers from this far away – there’s something wrong here”

Speaker untied himself from the reins connecting himself to the wagon, quickly, not caring if the soldier ponies at the roadblock saw the golden glow around the bits of rein being manipulated with his essence as he floated them around. Approaching the shuttered front window of the wagon, Speaker asked Red if she had any idea what might be going on.
“No clue, but it should be ponies at arms from whoever is Daimyo of the Ox clan having soldiers here. It’s almost a month’s travel to the Crane clan’s land from here. If the crane clan has forces near Chung Do... I don’t like this” Red whispered, her hushed voice clearly transmitting her increasing sense of discomfort at the situation.

Speaker looked back at the roadblock. The soldiers there didn’t seem to care or mind that Speaker was conferring with the occupants of the wagon – it was normal for entire families to travel in house-wagons, so they probably thought that Speaker was talking to his family about whether to head south or take the detour around to the eastern trade road. In return Speaker didn’t notice the soldiers chatting and pointing at Speaker.

Turning to face the blockade, Speaker called out: “Why are Crane clan soldiers holding this roadblock? Shouldn’t it be Ox clan soldiers?”

One could hear five simultaneous facehoofs from inside the wagon, followed by Cash noting: “Didn’t I once already tell Speaker not to be the one to talk to strangers? We seriously have to enforce that better”

The officer threw a few quick glances around and nodded at Speaker. Four soldier ponies approached, the officer in front: “Didn’t you say you’re from Lookshy, how do you know we’re Crane?”

Speaker hesitated for a moment as he tried to come up with a quick answer: “I… I have family in Chung Do”

The officer didn’t buy it and gave Speaker a nasty look: “Sure you do. Now who’s in the wagon who knows Chung noble crests? And what was your name again?”

Red exited the wagon and came around to Speaker’s side, already clad in her bright red lamellar armor: “I know the noble crests. I was drilled on them quite a lot when I was a foal”

The officer looked at Red, then glanced at her flank to check her cutie mark – but her lamellar barding covered her flank: “And who’re you?”

“The name is… was… Chung Red, now just Red, exiled daughter of Daimyo Chung  

The officer laughed: “Oh this is rich – too rich. The prince-killer anathema and you both here to finish what you started? But tell you what, go to Chung Ko and talk to the Ox clan Daimyo, he’ll be a lot happier to meet the both of you compared to what either of you’ll get in Chung Do”

Speaker was stunned that the officer had heard of him and his being anathema, even if the mare didn’t seem to care that he supposedly a demon-consorting heretic and bane of all that was good and righteous.

Red on the other hoof seemed more focused on who and where the officer was talking about, then she didn’t appear to understand why she should go there: “Why should I go to the Ox Daimyo?”

The officer suppressed a chortle, while most of the dozen or so soldier ponies at the roadblock broke out in scattered laughs: “You don’t know?”

Red look at Speaker who shrugged, then back at the officer: “Apparently not, what is it?”

The officer drew a deep breath and plainly explained that Red’s parents were dead due to the plague and so the title of Shogun had passed to Red’s younger brother Chung Onyx, but the Daimyos had decided that the Chung lands needed better leadership than a foal so they first sent emissaries to Chung Onyx asking him to nominate one of the Daimyos to be shogun instead: “Chung Onyx refused, so now we’re at war – this isn’t just a roadblock to stop the plague from spreading, it’s part of the blockade set up to cut the city off while all the clans marshal their forces at Chung Ko. I’m sure that Daimyo Ox Hoofhorn would let the two of you join his forces, well, at least you Red, Hoofhorn is probably a bit too friendly with the immaculates to let anathema join his army”

Red stumbled backwards, tripped, and landed on her rear. The shocked and dumbfounded look on her face was unmistakable, as were the tears in her eyes. Still, Speaker understood the officer’s proposal: Exiles rarely had any love for those who exiled them, especially if it also meant losing access to your name and family – but it seemed that Red hadn’t held on to such a grudge, indeed the suggestion that she help kill the last of her family seemed to horrify her.

Two seconds later the officer’s head rolled around on the ground, emitting intermittent spurts of blood as it rolled around a few times before coming to a halt. Red was all over the rest of the Crane clan soldier ponies before Speaker was even able to draw breath and say anything.

Seven second later the ten Crane clan soldiers were dead, messily so, Red was glowing with golden light and breathing heavily, the exquisite blade that Speaker had made earlier floating next to her, dripping with blood.

“Honestly this shouldn’t have come as a surprise. This is how the hundred kingdoms work: You prey on the weak and seize whatever opportunities you get to gain more power” Cash noted nonchalantly inside the wagon.

Red made short work of the wooden roadblock, then had Speaker and Sullen Hoof help strip the soldiers of their barding and weapons: “No sense in leaving these for the usurpers… the shogun’s troops can probably use them just as well”

After Sunrise Glow had turned the bodies of the dead soldiers to ash, the circle continued on to Chung Do. Red was trying to keep her emotions in check, but Shimmer ultimately coaxed a good crying session out of the warrior mare, arguing that learning that your parents were dead was a perfectly acceptable reason to feel sad: “Besides, you’ll have to keep your head clear when you meet the new shogun, you know, your brother?”

Red shook her head. Her parents must have had Onyx after she had been exiled, because at that point she and her older brother had been their only foals. Cash pointed out that this was not good: “If all that Onyx has heard about you is that you’ve killed what should have been his older brother, then I don’t think we should expect that warm a welcome… that officer was right about that much”

Sunrise Glow agreed that this might be a problem, but reminded the circle of what the officer had said: “We were told that he is only a foal – not an adult. We must put our faith in Celestia that this Chung Onyx is still young and impressionable enough that we as adults can reason with him”

Cash made a joking remark about how Sunrise Glow could probably make friends with Onyx since they might be just as old – but Sunrise ignored it.

The approach to Chung Do was slow and without any further disruptions. The road they were going on led up to the greater eastern trade road, at which point Cash blurted out that he’d probably been to Chung Do – in fact, he was certain: “Of course, this is where that big old bridge is!”

The bridge was easy to see, as it was a very tall one which reached far above the city walls. It also revealed the strategic location and purpose of Chung Do: The city was built as a crossroad for river and road traffic. The bridge allowed for traffic over a tributary river to the yellow river known as the Brown River, which led all the way from the north-eastern end of the hundred kingdoms to the yellow river. 

Sure there were hundreds of other bridges over the river, but the significance of this bridge was that it was a shogunate era bridge big enough to support guild wagons, making Chung Do a key point in the north-eastern hundred kingdoms trade routes. The great eastern trade road wasn’t called that for no reason: It spanned from the avarice river in the north-west end of the hundred kingdoms to the rock river at the eastern end of the hundred kingdoms, so it saw a lot of merchant traffic. The fact that the brown river led all the way down the yellow river, which among other things led to Nexus, made Chung Do a very good place to go if you had exotic goods from the north-east of creation and wanted to sell it at the endless markets of Nexus. Cash Charmer was suddenly very adamant that he got to meet the young foal shogun. Speaker could practically see the silver coins in Cash’s eyes.

“And why do you want to meet my little brother all of a sudden?” Red wondered, not liking the prospect of Cash doing whatever he did to that guild factor to what was left of her family.

Cash briefly gave Speaker a sly look, then smiled gleefully at Red: “My dear friend, correct me if I am wrong, but the wealth of the Chung lands chiefly comes from the taxes and tolls levied against the merchants who come through Chung Do, am I right?”

Speaker wasn’t sure what Cash’s plan was, but after the look Cash had given him, he was all ears. Cash elaborated that the circle’s plan to help the ponies of Chung Do was very good indeed, and with a foal as a shogun they could easily turn him into a puppet ruler with the circle as advisors and protectors. Equally, Cash made a very good point on how this could make their lives far easier in so many other ways: “The merchants who will come through here will hear of us, assuming that we save the place – and they will spread the word that solars saved the city from the plague. The wyld hunt has probably already heard of Speaker thanks to the idiot prince he almost killed after exalting, but if we can pull this off we would undoubtedly not only undo the damage Speaker has done to the overall reputation of solars, but it would improve it greatly. This will let us operate a lot more freely in the hundred kingdoms and anywhere else these merchants end up, and since a lot of them will end up in Nexus the word will eventually spread across creation that solars are good”

Speaker thought Cash’s scheme over for a moment while the rest of the circle was quicker to agree that Cash’s plan sounded very good. Ultimately Speaker agreed that it really was a good point: Getting a good reputation by saving a key part of the hundred kingdom trade routes from plague, the circle would be able to operate a lot more openly – and it would be easier to the wyld hunt that was undoubtedly being formed right now to hunt him down and kill him.

Shimmer did point out that she had tried similar tactics to gain influence in the west – but noted that once you got big enough the wyld hunt would come for you and any supporters you had. The east might not be part of the realm, but wyld hunts could still track you very easily if you left a trail of stories about your deeds for them to follow. Cash agreed, but pointed out that a wyld hunt would be far from the support of the realm while in the hundred kingdoms: “And if they track us to Great Forks, Nexus or Lookshy they won’t even be allowed to enter – so as far as I’m concerned, then when we pull this off we’ll home free” 

With their spirits reinvigorated with new purpose the circle set about dealing with a more immediate issue: getting inside the city. The city gates were of thick oak reinforced with wide bands of wrought iron – and it was closed. After shouting for a bit it became clear that there weren't any ponies listening, so there was either nobody around to let them in or the guards were just being dicks.

This all turned out to be a moot point, as the gate slowly creaked and swung opened after Red gave it a hard push. An unguarded and unlocked city gate? This didn't bode well.

Inside the city the circle was met with a strange view: For a city that Red had told housed over twenty thousand ponies, the streets were empty. The only sounds the circle could hear was a mix of hoof-held bells being rung accompanied by strangely accented voices calling out: “Bring out your dead”

Speaker once again reassured the circle that with their exaltations they could not die from plague – they might get ‘slightly debilitated’, but they wouldn't die. With that said, Speaker pulled the wagon through the empty streets towards the bridge over the river.

It was almost like walking in Denansdor again. Speaker could feel the eyes of those watching him from inside the homes and buildings that lined the street, but no ponies dared to come out and greet them. There were no vendors set up along the street, nor did the docks along the banks of the river give off the noise that one should expect from a popular trade route connection point. It was quite sad to trot along the main street: The houses and buildings were primarily wooden, or made with sun-baked bricks, all painted in bright colors. The bright paintwork was a sign of wealth, but without ponies to give life to the streets it might as well be a colourfully decorated graveyard.

As a reprieve from the depressing lack of traffic in the streets, the bridge turned out to be quite impressive. Two large stone towers on both sides of the river held a very thick and sturdy wooden bridge aloft. The bridge was set high enough up that junks with full sails could pass under, although it appeared that most of the ships down in the docks were barged. The wood appeared strangely fresh and not worn, considering how Red had explained that the bridge was over a thousand years old – maybe the shoguns of Chung Do had regular maintenance done on it? Would make sense.

When crossing the bridge one could see all of Chung Do. It was a roughly circular city, centred on the bridge, with endless expanses of farmlands surrounding it. The west side of the city seemed to be mainly large warehouses when you looked beyond the buildings that lined the trade road going through the city, while the east side contained smaller houses and larger tenements where most of the city’s population seemed to live… depending on how much was still alive.

At the southern end of the eastern part of the city the Chung Do castle was situated. It was a very pretty castle, well built, and it showed the wealth of the city. A moat fed by the brown river surrounded the castle and a single white stone bridge connecting it to the city. Above the whitewashed stone walls a grand keep, built as a giant multi-tiered pagoda with gleaming green ceramic tiles projected the might and power of Chung shogun for all to see.

There was a large square where the bridge spanning the river connected to the eastern part of the city, from which a large road went south through that part of the city to another square at the southern end of that half of the city. It was here the castle was located, and it was here that the circle saw their first living ponies in Chung Do: At the large fountain, which appeared to be fed via an aqueduct that crossed the moat and connected to a spot on the castle’s wall, three mares with buckets were collecting water.

They kept their voices quiet and hurried off with their cargo while the circle approached the bridge that led into the castle. As he neared the bridge with the wagon behind him Speaker was hailed by archers on the castle wall on the other side: “Halt! What is your business at castle Chung!?”

Red got out of the wagon and introduced herself, saying she had returned to help save Chung Do. There was a moment of silence, the muffled sound of hooves on stone. An old stallion’s voice sounded: “Let her in – we’ll hear her out inside”

The gates opened and Speaker and Red both pulled the house-wagon into the castle courtyard under the watchful eyes of the archers in evidently green livery on the walls. 

The first thing that Speaker noticed as they entered the castle grounds was the sudden change in the air. Suddenly there was a distinct smell of pine in the air, and while there were pine trees along the inside the castle walls for decoration, then they were not enough for the powerful scent of ground pine needles that was in the air.

An old and sturdy looking stallion approached Red. He was clad in lamelar barding and wore bright green livery – and was as big as Speaker. Red seemed to recognize him: “Captain Bighoof, is that you?”

It turned out that Red’s memory of the captain of the castle guard was correct, and the captain seemed surprisingly friendly to Red, asking why she was here and who Speaker was. Red introduced Speaker as a Lookshyan doctor she’d met, and called out the others.

Captain Bighoof approved of her bringing a doctor, stating that they were in very short supply, but seemed apprehensive about the usefulness of the rest of Red’s friends. Red assured him that they all had useful talents, even if they weren’t all doctors. Beyond that then it seemed as if the captain didn’t even care that Red was supposed to be in exile.

The shrill voice of an old mare shouting: “How dare you return!” marked the appearance of another pony, one who clearly did mind that Red had come back.

Red took a deep breath and clearly held back the urgy to shout/punch/decapitate the old mare as she approached, introducing her as Roju Riceflower. The mare was dressed in fine silk garbs fitting that of someone part of the shogun’s court, and Cash noted to Sullen Hoof who looked confused that RoJu was high realm for ‘elder’, so the mare was some kind of old wise-mare the shoguns kept around as advisor. Sullen Hoof, to avoid looking suspicious while inside the city, had earlier used his magic mask to appear as a cream-coated stallion in a brown shirt with a shaven mane, making him look like a servant of some sort.

“Elder Riceflower, I came here when I heard that Chung Do was in trouble – so spare me the indignity or I’ll demand my satisfaction, something I can assure you I am far more capable of getting now compared to last we met” Red said bitterly, sounding very much as if she did not have fond memories of this advisor to the court.

“Satisfaction?” Sullen Hoof again wondered, looking at Cash who was merely nodding to what Red had said.

Cash leaned over and whispered: “Red basically just said that if the old mare gives her lip, Red will challenge her to a duel for her honor – it’s quite common for nobles in the hundred kingdoms to duel whenever they feel insulted”

Sullen Hoof nodded, but doubted that such a duel would be as clean and orderly as those in the Great Forks dueling clubs he’d seen – they always stopped when blood was drawn, but Red looked like she was talking about a duel to the death.

The elder gave Red a poisonous glare, but said nothing beyond that she’d notify the shogun of Red’s presence. Looking at the rest of the circle she disinterestedly inquired in a monotone voice whether any of the ponies present were worth announcing to the shogun, sounding very much as if she would most prefer if they all just got lost.

After the elder mare returned inside the keep Red let out a deep breath: “Oh wow I thought I’d have to really hurt her…”

“What’s her problem?” Shimmer wondered, her quizzical expression revealing that she was already forming ideas of her own on the topic.

Cash sniggered: “She probably hasn’t gotten laid in ages…”

The rest of the looked accusatorily at Cash.

“No I don’t intend to sleep with her” Cash in a mocking tone while looking very disappointed that the circle hadn’t found his joke funny.

A few moments later the elder came out and gestured for the circle to come in.

The keep looked incredible on the outside, even by Speaker’s standards who was used to the wonders employed on a regular basis back home in Lookshy. It was while walking the steps up from the courtyard to the large doorway into the keep that Speaker made the connection: The white stone steps they walked on didn’t give off the sound of hoof on stone – this was subtly carved solid wooden blocks that appeared to have been painted with a special texture-paint. This was not how mortal ponies built castles, but then again castles usually didn’t have a powerful omnipresent pine scent in the air.

This was a manse – a wood aspected manse. Speaker wondered what the exact properties of the manse were as he followed the circle inside. The entrance hall of the keep was that of a grand feasting hall. Two large hearths had bright fires burning in them on the left and right end of the hall relative to the entrance, while along the opposite wall a long dining table seemed built into the floor. Only one chair was set at the table, at the middle of the long table looking at the door – a throne decorated with gold and green jade. The walls and ceiling were covered richly carved wooden panels, all of them combined showing a rich floral motif, although much of the wall decorations were obscured by the bright green tapestries that covered large parts of it. All this green also explained why the livery of the soldiers outside had been green. 

The elder led the circle out a door on the right side of the hall into a long hallway, then directed the circle into a lesser hall where a young colt looking barely nine years old sat on a large chair in front of a desk, wearing fine silken garments that were clearly made for an adult stallion, the elder waiting outside.

The colt was evidently being taught statecraft by an older pony, a cream-colored stallion in blue robes who wore one of those silly black hats with a ‘thingy’ that stood up straight at the back of it. The colt’s desk and the halls many wooden shelfs were filled with scrolls, books and ledgers, and as the circle entered the old pony appeared to have been in the middle of trying to no avail to explain the meaning of the content of the scroll currently rolled out in front of the confused looking colt.

Speaker had never understood why some ponies wore such silly looking hats, but Cash seemed to know as he bowed deeply to the old pony: “Honorable councilor, may we steal a moment of your pupil’s time?”

The old pony threw a quick glance at the doorway, then looked at the circle and spoke with a voice that revealed the old stallion to be a frequent tobacco smoker: “We will see. Who are you and wha- YOU!?”

Red felt the old pony’s eyes pierce her very soul. The old pony stormed up to her and shouted: “How dare you show yourself here! Murderer! Have you no shame?!” and many other far less kind terms in a brutal tirade of indignation.

Evidently this pony was even less happy to see Red. The colt behind the desk covered his ears with his hooves and looked as if he was trying to burry himself in his oversized clothes.

The old pony’s shouting of obscenities ended with the old pony completely out of breath, so as a last act before pausing to catch his breath the old pony with the weird hat raised a hoof and struck Red right in the face.

There was a pregnant pause. Considering what Red had said outside the keep about the elder, then the circle all fully expected Red to explode in rage as only dawn castes could – all except Cash for some reason. Speaker couldn’t determine what he was to look at: Cash who appeared far too pleased with himself which indicated that he knew something the rest didn’t, or Red who looked like she was about to redecorate this archive of scrolls so it would appear as a Rorschach test of blood and unbridled fury.

Suddenly the old pony, who at that moment was catching his breath, appeared as if he was struck by lightning. It also sounded as if he was struck by lightning, as an impossibly loud boom rang out, coupled with a blinding flash of light.
When Speaker was to see again and his ears had stopped ringing he noticed the old pony cowering under a celestial spirit which had appeared – the spirit was screaming and shouting at the old pony, with such force that its divine words were pinning the old pony to the floor as well as making every loose piece of paper or unsecured scroll fly around the room. Speaker couldn’t understand a word it was saying, neither could the old pony from the looks of it, but the spirit sounded oh so very angry – but one felt almost compelled to look at the celestial being: it was of the purest and most beautiful of multicolored light, not blindingly bright, but it still hurt the eyes a little to look directly at it. It was difficult to discern any actual features of the spirit, although the noisy end was probably its head.

Cash stepped up and gestured for the spirit’s attention, then spoke in words similar to that of the spirit which then disappeared – allowing the previously airborne scrolls and bits of paper to clatter to the ground.

“And that is why one does not strike or otherwise aggress against an eclipse caste solar or those in his company while he is on official business” Cash said, grinning from ear to ear.

Speaker looked around at the mess. It would take a dozen scribes weeks to sort all the jumbled up scrolls and papers. He also recalled that there was something to what Cash had said: Eclipse caste solars had a special blessing built into their exaltation, one that granted them safe heaven where-ever they went for diplomatic missions and other functions of officious nature, provided that they did not harm or similarly assault their hosts. The result of attacking an eclipse cast pony or his followers? Divine retribution - very loud retribution from the sound of it. In the first age this had been invaluable to ensure that eclipse caste solars acting as messengers could travel creation without fear of being intercepted by primordial forces.

The old pony staggered up on his hooves and feebly tried to dust off his robes before lurching towards the door and breaking into a hobbling gallop, all the while heaving wildly. This left the circle alone with what was ostentatiously the overdressed young Shogun Chung Onyx.

Sunrise Glow was the first to approach Onyx while Cash explained what had happened to Shimmer, Red and Sullen Hoof. The young colt peered up from his makeshift hidey-hole dug into his own clothes, shaking, twitching every time Cash made a grandiose gesture or, in his eagerness to toot his own horn, got just a bit too loud while explaining his heavenly mandated diplomatic immunity.

Speaker looked on as the adolescent mare spoke softly to the young colt. She told him with a soothing and reassuring voice that it was ok to come out, that there was no danger – and that she and the circle was there to help.

The colt peered out of his silk robes. His black mane with white stripes and his white coat were well-groomed, and he looked at the circle with a mix of fear and amazement.

After having looked all over the room, then at the door, the colt finally got up in his little chair, took a deep breath, then jumped up on the table – no small feat considering his oversized clothes: “That was amazing! And you chased Fuku away! Thank you!” The colt then seemed to catch himself in his sudden burst of joy and relief, swallowing for a moment, then trying to look stern and officious: “Now, who are you all and what is your business here?”

Looking around in the room, nodding as if to agree with herself that she was remembering the layout of the castle correctly, Red gestured for the colt’s attention, then pointed at a painting that hung over in a corner of the archive. It was barely visible from the paper lanters that hung over the colt’s desk so it was hard to see what was painted, but Red walked over to it and flared her anima a bit while standing under the painting, illuminating it while again pointing at it: “See the Stallion, colt and filly up there?”

The painting featured the portrait of a stern looking light-brown coated stallion with a black mane in the clothes that Onyx was wearing, as well as that of a young colt and filly, both with a slightly darker coat and equally black manes, wearing smaller versions of the stallion’s fine garbs.

Onyx nodded, trying to look very attentive and serious despite the sudden shock of seeing the armor-clad mare shine a golden light: “Yes, that is my late father and his first two foals, also both diseased”

Red didn’t look that surprised that Onyx had simply been told that she was dead. It wasn’t even that far from the truth: From the moment she was exiled she had officially been dead to the family, even if Red still remembered her mother crying as Red was escorted out of the city.

Drawing a deep breath Red looked Onyx straight in the eyes: “The filly up there – she… she didn’t die – she was exiled. Did your parents ever tell you how Shadow Stomper died?”

Onyx’s expression wavered for a moment at the mention of his dead older brother’s name. He nodded hesitantly: “They said he died in an accident”

Red nodded, like an officer nodding after having received orders that she was duty-bound to fulfill which would certainly lead to her death: “It was a sparring accident. Father had to exile me to save face. I came back when I heard about the plague – and I've brought friends who can help cure it”

Onyx looked once again at the circle, then back at his supposed sister. His mouth moved as if to speak, but he did not. It was clear that he had been schooled well in how to maintain proper discipline and court etiquette – but in the face of meeting a long lost older sister, especially after his parents recently dying to the plague that was ravaging Chung Do… and all the stress of having to fix that – and the rebelling nobles...

Sunrise motioned for the rest of the circle to give the two some privacy.

Shutting the door to the archive, the circle found itself flanked by the elder and the other old pony – who seemed to have recovered somewhat from his heavenly smiting, although he still had a pronounced limp on his right rear leg. Speaker wasn’t sure if the councilor would let him treat that injury – and that made him sad.

Cash seemed content letting the two glower balefully at the circle while one could hear faint soft weeping and hints of quiet voices from the archive.

“So…” Shimmer said, not liking the uncomfortable silence.

The old pony broke the silence when he sucked in a deep breath, no doubt to shout at Cash – but just as he was about to speak the door opened and the shogun colt, followed by Red, stepped out: “Councilor Fuku! Why didn’t you say she’s my sister!”

The councilor – so that was what the hat meant – half-gasped most of his breath away as he mentally scrambled to figure out what to say. Cash beat him to it: “It simple really. Allow me to make a few educated guesses as to why?”
Onyx nodded.

“Your councilor and elder here – they’re all that’s left of your court right now, am I right? With the daimyos rebelling against you, they’ve withdrawn all their courtiers and advisors – and with you still evidently being taught statecraft, that leaves them in charge of the city?”

Onyx nodded again, switching his gaze back and forth from the elder and the councilor, both of which started to look very uncomfortable.

Cash continued: “So, with your parents dead they’re basically in charge of everything. Even with plague in the city that kind of power isn’t something to be taken lightly – so they’ve probably been doing a dandy job of keeping you out of the loop as much as possible. Tell me, have they ever said that ‘you shouldn’t worry about the details’ about something, or that ‘It is beneath a shogun to handle such matters’? They like to choose for you, don’t they?”

Onyx nodded again, slowly this time, while his expression became more and more dissatisfied as Cash made him consciously aware of what exactly was going on. Speaker was amazed at how quickly Cash had figured all of these things out.

“So here comes your long lost sister – by the line of succession she is the rightful heir, but her status as exile renders that moot – but you… no other family left, it looks like the two of you have reconciled. So if you decree her exile over she has a rightful claim to the throne… and considering how little she likes your elder and councilor, then they’d both stand to lose all the power they have over the city as well as their jobs… and maybe their heads So they try to chase her off. If it wasn’t because the good captain let us in first, or that once inside she looked as if she could kill every guardspony in the castle – and trust me, she could – the two of them would probably simply have ordered the archers at the gate to kill her” Cash said, hammering home his point.

Onyx didn’t look dissatisfied anymore. He looked angry. To the councilor he vented his childish rage: “You said she was a murderer”

“She killed your brother – she was exiled for a reason!” Councilor Fuku tried to explain. Onyx didn’t buy it – he said that Red had explained everything, how it had been an accident.

“And you believed that? She only made it look like an accident. It was clearly to move up the line of succession so she could become shogun!” Elder Riceflower said, managing somehow to both sound bitter and desperate at the same time.

It was clear that the elder and councilor were both finding it difficult to explain themselves. Whatever Red had said inside the archive seemed to be far more convincing than anything they could come up with.

Onyx told them to return to their quarters and remain there until he summoned them – and he did so with a voice filled with righteous indignation and firm resolve. Speaker could see Red swelling with pride at how her younger brother told off his treacherous advisors.

“I… I should have known what they were doing. They wouldn’t even let me sign decrees. I… what'll I do? Now I only have Bighoof to talk to, and he’s busy keeping the city from falling apart” Onyx said, the full effect of his orders dawning on him: “I’m not a good shogun”

Cash stepped up, with a gentle hoof raising the chin of the young colt shogun: “Cheer up: You now have a full cabinet of advisors, all blessed by the gods”

Onyx looked around at the circle with new wonder in his eyes. His gaze stopped at Red as he realized that she’d glowed a bright golden light just before...

Turning to Speaker, Cash cleared his throat and smiled: “Right – now go fix this plague business”

> Chapter 18: Death
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Over the following week the circle discerned the grim state of Chung Do. Cash Charmer seemed to revel in playing city administrator – although he took care to ensure that the young Shogun had a say and a hoof in on everything he did, something that Chung Onyx seemed to enjoy greatly. Red teamed up with the aging captain Bighoof of the castle guard, who turned out to be the last living senior officer in the city. This had been why the western city gate had been without guards: With the blockade that the rebellious nobles had set up, then no pony could get out of Chung alive, so monitoring in and outgoing traffic had become less of a priority.

In the shogun’s study the circle met to discuss their findings. There was nothing but bad news:

Cash had the somewhat predictable bit of news that the two elders had somehow escaped custody, apparently having left Chung Do to join up with the rebel nobles: “They will undoubtedly tell of our arrival – although they don’t really know that we’re all exalted, as well as how to be best exploit our weak defenses. They’ve also galloped off with a chest full of what little money that was left in the treasury. We’re bankrupt”

Red understandably found this a little hard to believe: “How can two ponies empty an entire treasury?”

It turned out that the ledgers and castle purchase records that Cash had gone over showed that the treasury had been all but emptied to pay for the medical relief caravan from Great Forks: “If any of the remaining guards ask for pay we’ll have to get creative… and I think you’ll agree Red, that unpaid soldiers aren’t happy soldiers”

Red nodded, knowing as a former mercenary how great an affront it was to miss a payday or to get stiffed by a client. Sure, the castle guards weren’t mercs, but with both plague and a siege looming it really wouldn’t do if the few dozen remaining guards left their stations and went to care for their families, leaving the city to fall to looting or honorless usurpers.

With that said Red made a detailed account of the state of the city’s defenses and guard forces. Before the plague, under normal circumstances, the other nobles would send tribute in the form of troops to the shogun’s command – so with them in open rebellion all of their forces had been withdrawn. Normally this should leave Chung Do with three thousand guardsponies, five hundred of which would be stationed in the castle, the rest in barracks built into five blockhouses that were part of the city walls. Right now that number was down to three hundred total and dropping due to the plague, so it was very difficult to just keep the peace in the streets.

Sullen Hoof agreed, reporting that he’d discovered a rather nasty situation in the docks along the river. Previously there had apparently been five gangs operating in Chung Do. One had operated in the western part of town in the warehouse district, the remaining four having fought over control of the docks, with two gangs on either side – one usually controlling the north end and the other the south end of each side. They had all dealt in the usual protection rackets on shops, docking ships and warehouses, with the city guard keeping them from getting too out of hoof. The problem was that one of the dockland gangs, the Water Walkers, had apparently recently managed to take control of the entire city’s underworld, wiping out the other gangs. Sullen Hoof had no idea how they had done this: “…but honestly, then that isn’t the worst of it!”

None in the circle liked how Sullen Hoof, still disguised as a humble servant pony with a shaven mane and a cheap grey shirt, said that: “The Water Walkers have taken control of the warehouse district. The western city wall blockhouses are empty and the gang has raided them for weapons. With weapons and the warehouses they’ve taken control of the city’s rice supply. That’s the city’s food supply. I know the castle has its own stores, so we won’t starve, but the Water Walkers have already begun selling the rice to the townsponies for a grossly marked up price. A lot of ponies who aren’t sick but who can’t afford the rice have been forced to prostitute themselves to the gang members in exchange for food… it’s sickening”

“In a siege the food supply is always the first thing to go and the most important thing to keep under control” Speaker chimed in, being very familiar with that particular stratagem from his service in Lookshy.

“This isn’t just about the siege Speaker, its exploitation! I won’t stand for this! If it’s ok with the rest of you then I’ll just sneak in and kill the gang’s leaders in their sleep tonight” Sullen Hoof said, his face remarkably grim – even more so considering that his expressions were usually obscured by his orichalcum mask.

“I would advise against that” Cash Charmer quickly noted. Sullen Hoof shot him a dirty look that wordlessly demanded an explanation.

Cash Charmer cleared his throat and quickly swept back his lush golden-blond mane with a well hooficured hoof: “Don’t you think that this gang knows that they’ve made themselves a target for the city guard? I’ll bet silver that their leaders have given their goons orders to ruin the rice and sneak out of town if they’re attacked. This doesn’t mean that I don’t support getting back at them for this, but we’ll have to secure the rice first”

“It’s late summer. Shouldn’t the rice harvest be coming in now anyway?” Shimmer asked.

Cash Charmer shook his head: “Between the plague wiping out the closest farms and the blockade then Chung Do is cut off from any proper food supply”

“So if the nobles wait another four or five months for the plague to die down completely the city will starve to death if the plague doesn’t get it” Red said with a bitter tone, her eyes crying out of vengeance.

“Well, if we can end the plague it’ll be a lot easier to marshal what resources we have left for a defence, what’s the situation on that Speaker?”  Cash said, looking hopefully at the Lookshyan pony.

Speaker sighed deeply. The circle braced itself for bad news. Looking first at Shimmer, who’d helped him during the week to get a read on the situation, then at the rest of the circle, Speaker took a deep breath and spoke: “I can fix this”

The whole circle breathed a sigh of relief, but then Speaker added: “…but I can’t do it as well I know I could once”

Speaker explained: He had the memories of legendary medical techniques from the first age – but he didn’t have the power or knowledge of how to replicate them: “In the first age I’d simply weave together the essence of a given sickness in a region and form into a sentient spirit, then give it a buck in the head and tell it to remove itself and its ilk from the area, curing all ponies in but a few hours…”

While such an amazing feat would indeed have been nice, Sullen Hoof inquired if Speaker simply couldn’t start going from house to house, curing ponies as he went along: “That should be easy enough for you, right?”

Sighing again, Speaker looked at Sullen Hoof: “Sure. For each sick pony in Chung Do I could give of my essence and see that every pony I treat is guaranteed to recover – but I’d only be able to treat a few dozen a day like that. What of the other thousands of ponies in the city? Imagine the riots in streets when it becomes known that a healer is in town, but he can only cure a few ponies a day”

Sullen Hoof’s ears slumped down, signaling his disappointment.

“I need to come up with an actual cure that can be distributed to the whole city. My medical charms with help with this, no doubt, but until I have something that can help all the ponies here, then I cannot help any” Speaker said, sounding very much as if he wasn’t happy with this course of action either.

Cash Charmer shrugged: “Ok, but I imagine that you are able to make such a cure, right my friend?”

Speaker shot Cash a look with old tired eyes: “You do remember that I’ve told you that the usual ‘cure’ for plague is just quarantine and waiting it out? It is, outside of ludicrously expensive and rare alchemical potions or magical charms, impossible to cure”

“So? That just means that it’ll be difficult. You’re a solar Speaker, you’re supposed to be able to do the impossible on a regular basis” Cash said, sounding oddly inspirational.

Speaker slowly began to nod. Cash put a reassuring hoof up on Speaker’s right shoulder: “I have faith in that you’ll fix this. The lives of thousands of ponies depend on this, but like you said then this should be a cakewalk if you just draw on your first age memories”

Speaker’s nodding was now more steady and resolute.

“Alright. Anything else that needs to be covered? Sunrise, what’ve you been up to?” Cash asked, looking at the young not-quite-mare covered in white robes.

Sunrise somberly stated that she had been walking the streets and surveying the Sijaneese corpse collectors. She didn’t like them, saying that she’d rather see her own ability to instantly cremate the dead used instead of the rotting bodies being stacked in sijaneese owned guild wagons which would go west to Sijan for burial.

“It’s not just that I’m from Great Forks – I know that it’s the only place in creation that doesn’t send its dead to Sijan for burial, but walking around the morticians… there was something that just felt wrong while being around them. They’re so pale” Sunrise explained.

Cash Charmer nodded: “Oh that? That’s because a lot of them are ghostblooded. I’ve talked to their pony in charge, a mare by the name of Shadowmoor, there’s nothing to worry about there. I’m just happy they’re here to take the dead away. No pony wants a shadowland forming here”

Sunrise gave Cash a look that couldn’t be seen on account of her hood, although the tilting of her head revealed her confusion: “Ghostblooded?”

“That’s when the ghost of a stallion, when materialized, ruts with a mare… I guess that the Sijaneese really do take ‘servicing the dead’ seriously…” Speaker said, sounding a bit disturbed by the implications, although he was a bit surprised that Sunrise didn’t know of ghostblooded when compared to how common godblooded were in Great Forks, them being the mortal offspring of spirits or gods sleeping with ponies.

With that creepy detail out of the way, Sunrise Glow added that she’d mainly spent her time learning what gods were worshiped in Chung Do. The goddess of the brown river that flowed through the city was the deity mainly worshiped, but there were also a few shrines to the local gods of farmlands and agriculture. She had also noted a shrine to the immaculate earth dragon Pasiap in the northern end of the warehouse district, dedicated to worshipping the immaculate dragon in its aspect as dragon of craftsponies.

Sunrise Glow plainly stated that she would endeavor to see all of Chung Do worship Celestia above all other gods. Compared to the more critical issues of the plague, the city’s food supply and the rebellious nobles this didn’t seem very important, but Sunrise Glow spoke well in pointing out that she reasoned that the ponies of Chung Do needed something to comfort themselves with in these times of tumult, so she considered her charge to be crowd control while the rest of the circle handled the more tangible challenges.

With the circle now familiar with the lay of the land the question was what to do next. Cash said that he would approach the Water Walkers and try to negotiate for the rice, to secure the city’s food supply. Speaker noted that even if the current food supply was taken back the city would starve come winter since the current rice harvest was going to waste out in the patties – or just being confiscated by the rebellious daimyos surrounding the city as soon as it was harvested.

Red said that she’d start probing the roadblocks and whatever other siege camps set up around the roads leading into the city to deal with that. She was also curious to see if there were more ponies at arms camped near the city, or if they were all camped at Chung Ko which was five days to the south-east of Chung Do. Speaker said that he’d like Sullen Hoof’s help in making medicine, something Sullen Hoof wasn’t entirely sure if he could be of much use with, but Speaker insisted.

The circle was about to adjourn from their meeting when Captain Bighoof entered the study. With him the old stallion had a messenger scroll, a message from the northern villages. It was dated to have been sent a couple of weeks ago, and the news it carried was dire: Something was stealing young foals in the night and leaving them to be found in the morning impaled on dark rods in the middle of the villages.

“…and why hasn’t this been resolved already?” Speaker wondered.

The captain looked embarrassed and averted his eyes in quiet shame. Red spoke up: “The lands due north of Chung Do are governed directly by the shogun as part of his personal hold. They’re cut off by the blockade just like everything else, so sending troops wouldn’t have been possible – but, hey – how did that message come through?”

The captain said that it had been delivered by a lone pony from the northern villages who’d snuck around the blockade – and left the same way, although whether the pony had made it back in one piece was unknown.

“How do we prioritize this? We can’t just ignore a foal-killer running rampant” Sullen Hoof said urgently.

Shimmer perked up: “If we’re just looking for a single killer then I can track whoever it is by scent. We can fly up there now, find the creep and be back here by nightfall. If we’re here to earn goodwill then resolving this quickly will only work to our favor”

The whole circle quickly agreed to this. The captain was a bit more curious about this ‘flying’ deal – to which Shimmer explained her sorcerous powers.

“A sorceress? So both Red and you have enlightened essence?” The captain said in awe.

Looking around at the circle quickly to establish eye contact, Red said: “Castemarks”, prompting the whole circle activate their caste marks – each pony willing the mark of their exaltation to glow on their brow. Red smiled: “We’re all exalted”

Leaving the dumbfounded captain in the study the circle quickly moved to the castle courtyard where Shimmer did her cloud thing. To the amazement of the foal Shogun looking on from his balcony on the keep, or the few dozen guards ponies on the castle walls, the circle flew off and quickly headed north.

Zooming north of Chung Do the blockades around the city became quite obvious. Red had Sullen Hoof use his vision enhancing charms to spot the number of soldier ponies at each roadblock, with Speaker taking notes. There were roughly a dozen ponies at each blockade, with no larger camps in the areas the circle flew over.

An hour or so of high speed cloud travel and the circle spotted the first of the ‘northern villages’. Red explained that the name was quite apt: Geographically (A big word that Speaker was a little surprised that Red knew…) the northern villages were located in the most northern area of the Chung lands. The holds that the daimyos managed were to the east and south-east of Chung Do. Adding to that, the Chung lands were located at the northern fringe of the hundred kingdoms. This was part of the key to Chung Do’s wealth of trade, for further to the northeast, beyond a few hundred miles of largely unsettled wilderness and occasionally contested border territory were the endless forests where ponies lived up in the trees, as well as other strange places were exotic crafts were made which could sell for a lot down in Nexus.

The positive thing of the northern villages being so remote compared to everything else was that the rebel daimyos didn’t appear to have bothered sending troops up to the villages. Of course, that might also have prevented this murderer from running around and staking foals in village squares…

Shimmer landed the cloud outside the first village they got to. It was made up of two dozen simple wooden huts with thatched roofs, with most of the land around the huts having been tilled into nice and orderly rice paddies and a few fields of grain.

The villagers appeared cautious but at the same time amazed at the group of ponies that came down from the skies – but when Cash and Red approached they were met with pitchforks and angry stomps on the ground: These villagers didn’t seem friendly to strangers, which was quite understandable considering what was going on.

Red introduced herself as the long-lost older sister to the now Shogun, while Cash elaborated that they had been empowered by the shogun as magistrates to enforce the law and seek out the culprit who’s been killing foals. To show proof of his claims Cash presented a scroll a lot of writing on it, with the shogun’s seal.

It turned out that none of the villagers could read – but one of the elders recognized the shogun’s seal, so the pitchforks were put back in the haystacks. The village elder who’d recognized the seal seemed willing to talk to the circle, one Granny Plumtree: “You’re too late magistrates… the monster that stalked us and took our foals finished here weeks ago. All that is left of his work is the rods with the dead foals in the square as a cruel reminder of our loss”

The elder led the circle into the village square where they were met with an absolutely gruesome sight: Ten jagged three yard long rods of a strange metal that had no shine or luster, but instead seemed eerily alive… with tiny tortured pony faces pressing out against the surface of the metal from within, only to fade back into the metal.

On these rods were impaled the remains of several young foals – most in very advanced states of decay, the ‘freshest’ of the foal corpses still having most of its skin on, with only its eyes having shriveled up into dry little raisins, and maggots were wiggling in the foal’s nostrils and mouth. The oldest of the corpses had sunk to the ground, its flesh having rotted to the point that it had simply fallen apart into two parts – one half that had fallen to the ground having been removed for burial, the other half, which appeared to be the back half, was still clinging to the jagged rod via some bones and sinew caught on the spikes jutting out of the rod.

There were the remains of seventeen foals distributed on the ten rods. It had been all the foals of the village, an entire generation killed and put on display.

A question that quickly arose was why had the dead foals not been removed from the rods for proper burial. The elder seemed ashamed and reluctant to answer – but Cash quickly picked up on the elder’s reluctance and figured that there was a good reason for it.

Speaker was way ahead of them, having an uncomfortably good idea of what the rods were made of – which would explain the whole macabre setup – but the implications, if his theory was true… oh that would be so very bad. Cash was about to ask Speaker when he noticed that Speaker appeared to already know the answer.

Speaker stepped up the rods and briefly touched one of the less blood-covered rods, to which he quickly pulled back his hoof – as if having touched hot coals: “They can’t get the dead foals down because touching the rods is… I guess with foals, yes… yes that would be bad. These things are made of soulsteel. It has captured the souls of the foals, and any pony touching the rod will briefly feel the tortured cries of the souls of the dead foals resonating in their minds”

The rest of the circle looked at Speaker and the gory rods with dead foal corpses in a mix of disgust and disbelief. The elder seemed happy to finally learn something about the mysterious horror-rods, but at the same time one had to wonder how Speaker knew about a material so grotesque.

Shimmer trotted up and braced herself, the briefly swiped at a rod with a hoof. She fell over backwards with a loud shocked gasp and landed on her rump. Speaker helped her up: “I told you – bad touch”

Getting the foals down to be buried wasn’t key to finding the monster who had killed the foals, but the circle agreed that this would be a very nice start – plus, there was a very real chance that there were similar gruesome scenes to be found in the other villages.

After Sullen Hoof and Cash Charmer also had to admit defeat in trying to touch the rods Shimmer got the bright idea to change into the form of a humming bird – for such could hover – then use another shapeshifting knack to grow the humming bird form to the size of a pony… but it turned out that it very difficult to flap your wings that close to the soulsteel rods without touching them ever so slightly, which resulted in Shimmer crashing into the ground after a psychic horror-induced wing-spasm.

With seemingly no way to reclaiming the remains of the dead foals Sunrise Glow finally walked up to the rods. From under her hooded cloaked she peeked up at the rotting remains of the foals, then made a series of swift motions that Speaker would later identify as essence-fueled body hardening techniques. At first when she touched a rod the others could see a shiver run down the length of the young adolescent pony, and Shimmer picked up a barely audibly whisper of Sunrise resolutely saying “No” without jerking back her hoof.

Sunrise Glow then proceeded to climb up the rods, hooking her hooves into the spikes that jutted out of the rods – but because of her body hardening techniques no blood was ever drawn. Still, her robe was ripped in many places but ultimately the little pony made it up and got the first foal corpse free, calmly calling for someone to catch the remains as she dropped them down.

Several climbs later left Sunrise Glow’s hooves caked in gore and rotting blood and her robes in tatters, but she would accept no cheers or thanks from the villagers, asking only that Speaker fix her robes and find a way to actually remove the rods…

Speaker was, along with the villagers and the rest of the circle, amazed at how Sunrise had withstood the mental barrage that was constant contact with the soulsteel rods. The constant onslaught of the wails of the tortured souls of pony foals who had died it the utmost agony… Speaker had no words as he washed essence over Sunrise Glow’s robes and reformed the strands of fibers to restore the cloth.

Ultimately the circle did agree that Sunrise had a very good point with getting rid of the rod as well as getting the corpses down – they were nasty reminders of this killer’s work, and Speaker seemed equally curious and worried as to who would have made them…

“Ok, honestly, what’s so special about the stuff anyway? Soulsteel? I’ve never heard of it – and I’ve heard of a lot of steel, from haslanti feathersteel, Nexus crap steel to Lookshyan jadesteel” Red said, looking at the dark rods. A few tosses of buckets full of water had cleaned them up to a certain extent, so they didn’t smell like rot anymore, but they still looked like spikes of pure misery, the grass around them having withered from prolonged exposure.

Speaker stood motionless next to the rods, slowly recalling his Singing Staff from elsewhere: “In the first age, after the primordial war, when the dead primordials had formed the underworld to ‘exist’ in… the solars explored this strange new dark mirror of creation. A strange cold ore found in some places there, when alloyed with the ghosts that inhabited the underworld… you literally beat these ghosts into the ore to make the soulsteel, not as a smelting process, but as an act of domination and violence… It is a cruel material, and it drains the soul of anything that dies in contact with it…”

The next moment Speaker stood with the white jade singing staff in his mouth. He looked at it unsure if he could use it properly – despite the last few weeks of him having used his educational charm to learn basic musical skills… which led to him realizing that he needed a rosined bow. Shimmer quickly fetched a fresh inch thick tree branch, which Speaker made break apart using his essence into the perfect shape of a musical bow. Shimmer volunteered a dozen of her tail-hairs and then somehow coaxed a nearby pine tree to weeping a spoonful of resin to rosin the bow with. It all only took a few minutes.
Speaker sat down in front of the rods with the singing staff in one hoof and the bow in the other. Cash and Red had bought a cart from the villagers and parked it next to the rods. The idea appeared to be to use the singing staff to manipulate the ground around the rods to move the rods up onto the cart – mainly because the circle had no clue how deep the rods went. This was their only options seeing as Sunrise wasn’t strong enough to pull the rods up, and none of the others could touch them for more than a brief moment.

The first few cautious tones that came from the staff were calm and seemed to make the earth and grass ripple. Shimmer and Cash held their breath, the others unaware of the singing staff’s power to move earth and stone.

Speaker’s challenge at this point was remembering what melody would make the earth eject foreign objects. His first attempt accidentally made dozens of hoof sized rocks shoot up into the air around him, forcing all the ponies around him to leap for cover.

After a few more tries the ground heaved as Speaker played the right tune, ejecting the rods out of the ground. For a tense moment they balanced, but quick thinking from Sullen Hoof saw each of the ten rods hit with a myriad of kitchen tools that the solar apparently had stashed in elsewhere, making them fall onto the cart with an almighty crash as the axel on the cart broke from the monstrous weight of the rods. Speaker sighed and said that he should have warned the circle about that: “Soulsteel is a magical material, just like jade, so it weighs deceptively much…”

Despite the cart’s axel being broken – something shimmer tried to fix while Speaker examined the rods – the question was now what to do with these dark rods. Being of a magical material they were nearly indestructible, something Red discovered quickly after trying to cut one of the rods in half, at the expense of her still reasonably new blade breaking in half at the point of impact. Speaker fixed the blade with a whiff of essence and told her not to do that again, to which Red told him to simply make her a better blade: “In time Red, but not right now”

Since they had several other villages to check out, there clearly wasn’t much left to investigate in this one with the killer having apparently moved on weeks ago and all the evidence taken into custody, Shimmer suggested that she spirit the rods away into elsewhere for safekeeping for the time being: “I know places where we can hide them permanently if we just want them out of the way – but right now we have to catch whoever did this”

The rest of the circle agreed and then turned to Speaker, eager to hear of what he’d learned of the rods and the killer.
There wasn’t much that Speaker could tell. The villagers, many of which had approached the circle while they got the foal remains down in order to get theirs, so they could bury their children, had told of what little they knew of the killer to Speaker: They all told of a dark horror which made them faint the moment they saw it, and could find them no matter where they had hidden, even if they had left the village and hidden in the forest with their foals. The killer left no hoofprints on the ground and the rods had simply appeared overnight the day before the killings had started. The whole thing had stopped when all blankflank foals in the village had been skewered on the spikes. Sunrise Glow wanted to stay behind and console the grieving parents, but she understood that she was now key to retrieving any remains on any other similar spiky rods in the other villages – and the villagers confirmed that similar events had taken place in the other villages.

“Are we too late?” Red felt that she had to ask, considering that the original message to the shogun’s court had been sent weeks ago. It wasn’t a comfortable question to ask none of the ponies in the circle wanted to guess at the answer to the question. Sullen Hoof optimistically said that if they could find a village that still had foals left they might be able to catch the killer in the act.

With Shimmer having stored the rods in elsewhere she conjured another cloud – and the circle landed in another village less than half an hour later. It was the same grim scene. Grieving mares, a village square with an obscenely gory display of blood, death and pain with no foals alive. This time the circle was quick and deliberate in what they did – and the moment Sunrise Glow had gotten the remains down she immediately rounded up the parents of the dead foals and spoke essence-fueled words of condolence and hope to them. Before Speaker and the rest of the circle had done away with the soulsteel rods Sunrise Glow had done the impossible: The mothers and fathers of the dead foals were smiling again. Sure, the memories of their dead foals still hurt the ponies greatly, but somehow Shimmer had somehow given them hope for the future.

Before they left Sunrise Glow talked Speaker into giving all of the mares a quick medical examination to see if there was anything preventing them from having additional foals, as part of her counseling to the grieving parents had apparently been guarantees that they could have new foals to love twice as much instead – Speaker blew away a few simple infections with waves of curative essence, Shimmer then conjured another cloud.

This time while flying Sullen Hoof and his vision charms were put to scouting, to spot a village with empty rods – because there had been one or two foals impaled on all the rods of the two previous villages, so an empty rod probably meant that the killer’s monstrous work wasn’t done yet.

The fourth village that the circle flew over had empty rods. At this village the circle was greeted with even greater hostility and suspicion than at the previous two combined – Red had to protect the circle from a few thrown stones and angry farmhooves who clearly needed something to vent their rage and sorrow on.

Having beaten down their ‘welcome party’ Cash introduced the circle as shogun-mandated magistrates. It turned out that the document he’d been showing was one he’d snatched from the castle, a real magistratial empowerment document that Cash had somehow gotten the Shogun to sign and give his seal to during the previous week.

In the village square the circle quickly sprung to action. Between the ten soulsteel rods there were eight dead foals skewered, and a hoof-full of them were clearly very fresh. Indeed, a curious side effect of the bad touch effect of the soulsteel that Speaker had noticed, was that flies and other scavenger insects and animals were very slow to pick at the foals, slowing the rate of decay ever so slightly, or at least the rate at which the foal corpses deteriorated, as most of them were in advanced stages of rot anyway.

Sunrise Glow retrieved the remains and consoled the parents, while the rest of the circle spoke to the other ponies in the village.

The ponies in the village told the same story: The spikes had appeared a week and a half ago, the killings starting the next night. Any pony who glimpsed the monster would faint and wake up after the grim deed was done – and the killer left no hoof-tracks. Shimmer even confirmed that there were no non-local scents aside from those of the circle present, which was most mysterious.

The ponies of the village were eager to catch the killer and exact their furious vengeance on the mysterious murderer, so they let the circle do whatever they wanted in preparation to stop these killings.

Speaker noted that the fainting effect the killer seemed to hide behind was probably quite simple – against unenlightened mortal ponies you didn’t actually need that much power to influence their minds and bodies, so he reasoned that the circle should be immune to the effect. This alone should give them a nice tactical advantage for the ambush they were planning.
Shimmer and Sunrise herded all the remaining foals of the village into a single hut, along with their parents. This way they would sure that the killer would only go towards a single location for an ambush. Sullen Hoof found a good hiding spot on the roof, crafting himself a masterful disguise to appear as a barely noticeable lump of straw in the thatch. Speaker and Shimmer disguised themselves among the parents along with a ‘foal’ in the shape of a well-crafted foal-sized doll that the two of them put together – which also resulted in the two having spend most of the rest of the day making similar toy dolls for the other foals in the village.

Red spent her time trying to talk the adult ponies of the village out of joining in on the ambush – if Speaker was right about the faint-on-sight spell that the killer was using then they would only be in the way, of course, convincing the pitch-fork and torch wielding would-be mob of angry villagers not to also join in on the ambush… wasn’t really working. In the end Red talked them into patrolling in and around the village when night fell, as an early warning system.

Unlike the rest of the circle Cash Charmer was bored to tears. There was nothing of value in the village for him to work with – and most of this year’s rice harvest from the village had been taken by the rebel daimyos’ forces. Sunrise Glow spent her time reassuring the village ponies and spreading the good word of Celestia, although for the ambush she vehemently pointed out that she was not a warrior, and thus chose to stay out of that fight.

According to the ponies in the village the monster came after the sun set – to which Speaker had to resist elaborating that its proper name was the Daystar Dirigible and that it didn’t ‘set’ but simply sailed into the wyld in the west to circle creation and appear in the morning in the east, but this fact still gave the circle a time table for their ambush.

Shimmer had infused the foal-doll that Speaker had expertly made with some kind of lunar trickery which made it look very much alive, and she had positioned herself closest to door of the hut so her ‘foal’ would hopefully be snatched when the monster came.

When the daylight faded and the darkness crept across the land a fog spread from the rice paddies. What happened next took barely any time at all.

The first sign came when Sullen Hoof discretely pulled the string which rattled the small clay cup with sand, signaling that something was approaching. Whatever it was didn’t even try for subtlety, as it just moved at a steady walking pace towards the village in the twilight. The village ponies that were patrolling outside the huts with torches and pitchforks converged on the shadow - but they all fell to the ground with their farming tools and torches besides them, a scant few managing to emit horrified shrieks or shouts before passing out.

It ripped the door off the hut, revealing a dozen foals with their parents all huddled as far from the door as possible – the smell of urine and tears everywhere, along with a sudden influx of a cold and dry smell of blood. All the foals and their parents passed out instantly.

Speaker and Shimmer both felt a great temptation to give in to the shock and surprise, barely managing to get themselves to protest properly as the beast snatched their foal-doll with a semi-transparent shadowy tentacle, but they kept their composure and Shimmer gave a nice shout of “No, my baby!”

The monster took no heed of this and continued dragging the doll out into the darkness. There was the sound of two great sniffs then there was a ripping sound and suddenly a leg from the doll flew back into the hut, quickly followed by a loud growl and the shadow tentacle returning, seeking proper prey.

Shimmer leapt at the tentacle, shapeshifting into the form of a unicorn foal. How she’d acquired that form was not a question Speaker wished to ask, but the monster seemed satisfied as she instantly began to squirm and cry quite convincingly, calling out for a mother that Speaker knew that Shimmer had lost over a century ago to soul-eating changelings…

This was the cue for the ambush to be sprung. Speaker reached out with a roof and Gift sprang to life from under a pile of straw, buzzing with essence fueled vigor. Red came charging out from another hut, and Sullen Hoof threw small clay jugs of burning oil and rags on the ground around the killer to both light the fiend up and to let the others see what was happening.
What the circle saw was not meant for the eyes of ponies.

Limps of semi-transparent shadow, with a head of the same substance but shaped like some grotesque mix of pony, bat and wolf with bright red orbs as eyes and long pitch black fangs. All four legs of this shadow-pony monster were equally semi-transparent, with one leg currently extended as a freakish tentacle shadow – now with a very real Shimmer in the form of a foal in its grasp. The monster pony’s flank bore no cutie mark, indeed its entire hindquarter and rear legs were as much shadow as its forelimbs and head, with a tail of blood that didn’t drip and its chest clad in black armor made of a dark metal which did not reflect the light of the fire around it… soulsteel.

The monster pony gave off a surprised grunt at the sudden bright light, but beyond that it didn’t react – simply turning around and moving towards the soulsteel rods with Shimmer held firmly.

The whole circle had stopped in their tracks when they had seen this horror. It wasn’t entirely clear whether it was a pony or not… Ghosts didn’t usually wear armor like that, and changelings would never use a material which would rob them of souls to feed on. This was something entirely different and far worse.

The moment Shimmer was outside of the hut and at minimum safe distance from the hut with the foals she instantly shifted into the form of a giant tyrant lizard. The monster pony’s shadow tentacle limb had no chance of holding on to such a giant beast – and with the element of surprise from her split-second transformation Shimmer leaned down to bite the monster in half.

She succeeded in the first part of her plan – biting the monster pony – but with armor wrought of tortured souls and ore of the underworld she could not harm the monster. Instead it retaliated by freeing itself from her maw violently, dislocating her jaw in the process.

Howling it pain Shimmer stumbled backwards, in her giant tyrant lizard form nearly trampling a hut with ponies sleeping inside…

Of course, the noise woke most of the village up fairly quickly, at least those not already fainted – but the moment any of the villager ponies looked out at the shadowy horror they too would faint.

Red charged in next, her blade swirling above her with a bright trail as her essence set it alight with her righteous fury – its cutting edge blazing cherry red from intense heat. The monster responded in a somewhat unexpected way: It reared up into a fighting stance and between its forehooves it formed out of darkness a blade the length of three ponies and as wide one in an instant, parrying Red’s blow effortlessly.

Sullen Hoof tries with a sneak attack, but the fiend parried everything with its giant blade as if it had eyes in the back of its head – of course, with a semi-transparent head and seemingly solid eyes maybe it really could see all the way around?
Speaker ran out of the hut only to see the monster pony returning once again for a proper foal, its face a nightmare in its own right – but with Gift he held fast and lunged at the beast with a series of precise and deadly swiped augmented by his essence and focused with his knowledge and skill of his unique martial arts style.

Where Gift didn’t simply bounce off the soulsteel armor it plowed through the shadow flesh as if it wasn’t there – indeed the shadow flesh reforming instantly.

The monster pony batted Speaker aside with the very large flat of his even bigger blade, it easily the size of the hoof-blades of the Denansdor automaton guardians. Speaker found himself flying several yards through the air before hitting the ground, luckily with little but a few scratches.

Cash had held back so far, trying to aim his shoes of distant claws for a good shot – and now he finally took his chance, aiming for the beast’s one solid feature: its eyes. Unfortunately Cash had absolutely no schooling in the art of archery so he failed to take into account the slight breeze or to aim a little above his target when shooting a heavy solid steel projectile, so the claw instead plowed through the monster pony’s mouth, with the monster pony biting down on the thin but indestructible chain that connected the launched claw to the shoe, the monster then yanking Cash forward, swimging him around and then letting him fly off into the roof of another hut where he landed with a loud crash. The monster chuckled with a disturbing guttural voice in a slow and simple dialect of riverspeak: “Ha ha! Flying pony crash!”

Shimmer, having managed to yank her jaw back into its socket and tough out the immense pain of that, charged again, but this time the beast reacted much faster. It roared, and a visage of blood and ground organ tissue formed around it like an anima of death and horror. Speaker found himself recoiling in terror. Even Sullen Hoof who’d been about to jam a large and very sharp kitchen knife through a perceived chink in the monster’s armor found himself tumbling backwards and shuffling along the ground to distance himself from this horror beyond sanity.

Red seemed to be the only pony able to face the monster at this point, flaring her anima equally to its greatest extent, the light of her soul revealing itself as a golden bagua on the ground around her, with golden images of various weapons appearing above each bagua symbol. Charging at the monster with her still red-hot edged blade, Red tried to engage the monster – but at this point, to Speakers absolute horror, the monster made its counterattack to Shimmer’s charge.

With one fell flash of its giant blade Shimmer was cut in half – as a tyrant lizard – her giant bisected form spilling gallons of blood everywhere as a shadow limb extended up and grabbed the upper half… swinging it around and smashing it into Red who was struck perfectly, getting knocked out instantly from the immense bulk she was struck with at such speed.

Speaker couldn’t make himself do anything out abject horror, the monster simply dropping the top half of Shimmer which, along with her bottom half, slowly shrank back into normal pony pieces… but leaving behind a huge puddle of blood mixed with bone chips and the odd bit of tyrant lizard organ tissue.

It was when Shimmer, now in a very much bisected pony form, made one final pained and bloodied cough with lungs that could no longer breathe due to having had their bottom parts cut off – along with the rest of her – that Speaker leapt to her side, cradling her head as he cried deeply. This was wrong. It wasn’t…. this shouldn’t end like this. Shimmer had held out for so long. This was just wrong.

Speaker didn’t notice as the monster retrieved a foal and walked past him as if he and Shimmer wasn’t even there, dragging an unconscious foal behind him. Sullen Hoof tried to stop the monster, but with a swing of the giant sword he received a deep cut that nearly liberated his left shoulder and forelimb from his body, it merely hanging on by a few frayed strands of sinew and flesh…

Speaker didn’t look up as Sullen Hoof howled in pain from his injuries, or as the foal the monster had taken just barely managed to regain consciousness for a few terrifying moments as it was rammed down on the spike, the poor thing only managing a weak gasping wail that ended far too quickly before it died, the soulsteel rod claiming its soul.
The monster left quietly – and indeed, it had left no hoofprints.

As Red came to an hour to so later, bruised and aching, she found Sullen Hoof nearly dead from bloodloss, Cash unconscious and bleeding heavily from having been skewered in his left leg by a shattered wooden beam from having crashed into a hut and finally a largely uninjured Speaker cradling the lifeless top half of Shimmer’s body as he sat in a large pool of blood.

> Chapter 19: Dark Shackles of the Mind Burnt By Brightness
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Digging Cash out of the collapsed hut revealed the true extent of his injuries. Red helped Cash hobble over to Speaker, after hacking off most of the splintered wooden beam that had skewered Cash’s left hindleg through his thigh – as well as slapping him quite hard to make him stop whining like a little filly, it only being a flesh-wound after all. Sure, it bled a lot, but to Red it was nothing so she didn’t see any cause for crying like a foal.

Speaker was reluctant to let go of Shimmer’s limp body to tend to Cash’s wound – but after both Red and Cash glared at him angrily Speaker relented, gently putting Shimmer’s upper half down into the by now darkened and thick puddle of Shimmer’s blood he’d been sitting in.

Cash had to admit that Speaker worked with cold professionalism as he ‘fixed’ his leg: A swift touch saw Speaker’s anesthetic charm administered, then the splintered wooden beam was pulled out with similar quiet brutality one might expect from a calmly grieving Lookshyan doctor. With pure essence Speaker manipulated the torn flesh and arteries – ignoring Cash who implored him not to leave any scaring behind, as it might mar his beautiful rump to the best of his ability. Speaker would hear nothing of it: “You’re lucky I don’t use army ants for stitches on you, now shut up”

After Cash had been treated Red dragged a reluctant Speaker over to Sullen Hoof. While Shimmer’s bisection had been swift and surprisingly clean, then Sullen Hoof had been roughly cut into, making for a gruesome injury – with the two of them not even entirely sure if Sullen Hoof was still alive… for he wasn’t moving anymore.

Ultimately Speaker found Sullen Hoof to be alive, as his medical charms simply wouldn’t work on the dead – or so he reasoned.

What followed was a swift and efficient application of essence, pulling Sullen Hoof’s cloven shoulder back together again – and thanks to Speaker’s powerful medical charms then even the shattered shoulder blade should heal over the next few days, a miraculous recovery by any standard.

Sullen Hoof was still unconscious from the bloodloss and trauma he’d experienced when Speaker finished stitching his shoulder back together with the finest strings of white shimmering essence, all illuminated by the pale white-gold light emitted by Speaker due to the rather substantial amounts of essence that he had spent on Cash and Sully at that point. The light was welcome, for at this wee hour of the evening there was no more twilight – only the pitch black darkness of night, with the moon being apparently being in its no-moon phase, denying creation the dim light of the silver chariot.

Red was also starting to feel better, her bruising not slowing her down anymore. This led her to try to do a quick survey of the surroundings – which wasn’t easy when her only sources of light were hers and Speaker’s animas. Doing this she spotted a few more casualties: Three ponies dead in the hut that Cash had crashed into, from the hut collapsing down on them and crushing them under the timbers, and two other unconcious ponies who’d been on patrol for the monster, who had fallen unconscious when the monster pony had arrived. They had been reduced to thin red smears on the ground by Shimmer as she’d stumbled back while in tyrant lizard form. They were collateral damage… and yet Red felt enourmous disappointed, as if she had failed these ponies as a solar.

Red briefly wondered if it wasn’t more prudent to try to hide away the dead villager ponies from the rest – maybe they could just say that the monster pony gobbled them up during the fight, or after it had defeated them? Oh that didn’t sit well her, the thought of having been defeated. She was a solar, a dawn caste! Speaker had told her that the dawn caste were invincible warrior ponies! …but she didn’t feel like one right now.

It was then that some of the rubble of the collapsed hut stirred, prompting Red to rush over to it – maybe there was a survivor! It turned out to be Sunrise Glow, completely unscathed but somewhat annoyed that her sleep had been interrupted, plus the fact that she was trapped under the rubble next to three dead ponies. Red bucked and tugged at the rubble, making for an awful racket, but it wouldn’t budge. Cash hobbled over, despite his leg injury and Speaker angrily shouting at Cash to not exert himself until his leg had healed, and helped Red get Sunrise free.

Out of the ruble, Sunrise Glow surveyed the darkness. Her robes were ripped, from getting caught in the hut, but for once that didn’t seem to worry her too much. First she climbed back into the rubble of the hut and flared her anima as she touched the three ponies inside, reducing them to ash and sending on their souls to reincarnation.

The two ponies who’d been smeared across the ground by the Shimmer-saurus were slightly more difficult to reduce to ash, as it required Red to help scoop their remains into a series of muddy bloody piles. Red expressed no small amount of disgust at doing so, noting that as a merc she rarely had to clean up the messes she’d make: “You know I’m starting to see why Cash wants to get us some servants…”

After Sunrise Glow had finished passing on the souls of the smeared ponies she finally came to Speaker and Shimmer.

“Speaker, I know you cared for her – you love life, but the sooner her soul is released the sooner she can reincarnate. If Luna is willing then her next incarnation will remember you and love you just as much as she did in this life” Sunrise Glow said, giving Shimmer a brief eulogy as she touched Shimmer’s brow and sent her essence of holy fire into Shimmer’s body.
Speaker wept as Shimmer’s body briefly glowed…

It was Red who made the obvious comment a few seconds later: “Uhm… shouldn’t her body have turned to ash by now?”
Speaker looked down. Shimmer’s body was still there.

Ok, this was reasonably weird.

Speaker quickly checked over the top half of Shimmer’s body. No pulse, getting colder, no breath… and yet she wasn’t turning to ash?

“I can only turn dead bodies to ash” Sunrise glow calmly said, sounding just a little annoyed that Shimmer’s body wasn’t cooperating.

Red pulled the rear half of Shimmer’s body over to Speaker. It left a bloody trail on the ground, the pool of blood mixing with the dirt to form a gory quagmire of blood. Speaker found it very uncomfortable to be able to look down into Shimmer’s exposed guts.

Checking over the rear half of the corpse revealed a stark difference. This half of Shimmer’s body was much colder – and what he had thought to be the result of being a pony from the western archipelago on Shimmer’s torso and forelegs, that they weren’t entirely limp, was now very suspect.

“But… you said it yourself, no pulse and no breath – plus she’s been cut in half – no pony can live through that” Red said in disbelief.

Speaker thought long and hard at what he was looking at. Shimmer’s diaphragm had been severed so she wouldn’t have been able to breathe, and with all the bloodloss there wasn’t enough fluid in her veins to maintain a blood pressure or a pulse… but both of these events would always be lethal, right?! What kind of lunar trickery would allow a pony to cheat death itself? 

“Let me patch her up first – then we’ll see if we can find out what’s going on” Speaker suggested, trying to maintain a professional attitude to stave off his continued urge to cry. It hurt knowing that he was getting his hopes up, as the nagging dread that it would all be in vain weighed heavily on him.

Had Shimmer’s front half been alive and… well… not kicking, but at least shown signs of life then Speaker would have been tempted to use an unholy flankload of essence to just regrow everything below her waist. Severed bodyparts can deteriorate fairly quickly depending on the circumstances, so the question was if there was anything salvageable...

First Speaker healed Shimmer’s spinal cord, reconnecting both halves of her body at just that crucial junction. To Red and Cash’s surprise then Shimmer’s rear legs bucked a little when the final connection was restored. Speaker harshly told them to not get their hopes up: “I’ve seen ponies with spinal injuries react the same when you prod at their spinal columns – it’s their bodies reacting, not the pony willing it to happen”

Next up Speaker stitched together most of the damaged organs, placing Shimmer on her back as he fiddled around down in her guts. Cash couldn’t stand looking at the gory sight, as Speaker had blood up to his flank, all of it glistening sickly in the pale golden light from Speaker’s caste mark in the pitch black darkness. Speaker finally managed to reconnect her severed trachea to the bit of it connected to her stomach.

The severed parts of Shimmer’s lungs were difficult to salvage. As she had been bisected the lower ends of her lungs had been severed completely – and Red was having trouble finding the bits of lung in the darkness, as the bloody mud caked around her hooves, making for countless mushy piles of gore that all looked like tiny bits of muddy and bloody organ tissue.
Ultimately Speaker simply closed off the holes in Shimmer’s lungs. The moment he pulled the final essence-strand stitch taught Shimmer’s entire body jerked.

Speaker jerked backwards, his head and forehooves having been fully immersed in Shimmer’s still open abdomen. Shimmer’s body was thrashing around frantically, more of her intestines falling out with each jerky spasm.

Red, Cash and Sunrise were all equally caught by surprise – looking on in horror, except Sunrise Glow who’s hood still obscured her face.

Speaker’s mind ached to make sense of what he was seeing. When he spotted Shimmer’s lips turning blue things started, to a certain extent, to make sense… and he pounced on Shimmer, forcing his anesthetic charm into it: “She’s conscious!!”
As quickly as he could Speaker pried open Shimmer’s mouth and flushed her airways out with essence, re-inflating her lungs. Shimmer made once final powerful twitch and inhaled sharply, followed by a lot of coughing.

Cash fainted, dropping to the ground with a wet splash – him landing in an ever thicker and muddy puddle of blood, ruining his silks once again.

Speaker was beyond himself in joy, his eyes full of tears, calling for Red and Sunrise to get water to wash Shimmer down. With that said he urged Shimmer to stop moving so he could stuff her guts back inside and stitch up the skin around her belly.

As Shimmer slowly got her breath back her eyes opened, which was followed by a deluge of tears – and Speaker found it hard to tell her to remain quiet and immobile while his essence sewed her belly shut.

“Oh don’t… I can do that on my own” Shimmer said with a weak voice, closing her eyes.

Shimmer’s caste mark lit up and every wound she had – both inside and outside – glowed with a bluish white light which faded as flesh and tissue healed in mere seconds.

Speaker shook his head: “But how… how did you survive?”

Shaking her head and gingerly getting up on her hooves, Shimmer took a couple of deep breaths: “I did what I’m good at: Quick thinking”

Shimmer explained that the moment she was cut in half she’d activated two charms she’d never really used in concert before. One was a combat charm that allowed her to ignore otherwise fatal blows that would kill her – for obvious reasons. The other one was a hibernation charm, for while the first charm had let her power through her bisection then her body still needed certain things – like breathing and a steady flow of blood. The hibernation charm was a powerful one that put her in a dreamless slumber, removing her body’s need for breath, blood, food or warmth. Shimmer had been told stories of powerful lunars who’d hidden for centuries in the wyld using that charm.

“…but, would you have slept forever if I hadn’t put you back together?” Speaker wondered.

Shimmer smiled: “The hibernation charm is flexible. When I use it I have to choose a maximum length of time I wish to sleep, plus I made it in such a way that I’d wake up if or when I could breathe again… and you triggered that far earlier”
Speaker wasn’t sure if he wanted to know how long Shimmer had otherwise opted to sleep. Right now he was just elated.
Taking a few careful steps, Shimmer noted that she was still sore all through her insides… which was understandable. Speaker said that it’d be at least a few days – possible a couple of weeks – before her body had fully recovered. In passing he also noted that the same applied to Cash and Sullen Hoof, even though their injuries were much less than that of Shimmer’s.

The sun dawned not long after, and the ponies of the village started coming to – and were greeted with the crusty pools of blood that had stained the middle of the village red. There was some screaming, shouting, even more so when the collapsed hut was taken apart and only ashes were found inside – or the two other missing ponies who’d stood watch’s ashes were found.

While Cash Charmer would have liked to have helped with crowd control this his leg still made it difficult to pose and posture properly – and how would he have been able to speak to the ponies in the village if he couldn't strut or move about properly? Ultimately Sunrise Glow had the whole of the village bowing graciously to the whole circle within the first hour. By noon she was holding mass in honor of Celestia’s sun being at its zenith.

In the afternoon Sunrise Glow presided over her second burial ceremony, having already helped bury the remains of the foals she’d gotten down from the days the previous day.

Sullen Hoof came too during the ceremony, necessitating Speaker using his anaesthetic charm again. With Sully conscious, albeit still woozy, the circle’s warrior’s planned for the next arrival of the monster. Direct confrontation seemed impossible, and fooling the monster with a doll didn’t appear to be possible.

While still weak and without the lunar regeneration charms that Shimmer had used to bring her back to full strength, Sullen Hoof did have a few insightful observations to make:

“When the monster spoke last night – do any of you recall how it spoke?” Sullen Hoof said, his breathing labored underneath his golden mask.

Speaker was honestly less interested in hearing Sullen Hoof’s insightful wisdom, wanting rather to know why Sullen Hoof hadn’t taken his orichalcum helmet off – for it was clearly not helping Sully in his weakened state.

“No, it stays on – maybe I’ll take it off another time – but for now just listen” Sullen Hoof said stubbornly with labored breathing, weakly stomping a hoof down into the still darkened dirt.

Sullen Hoof continued to explain that prior to exalting one of the things he were good at was stalking other ponies and getting a read on them, in order to impersonate them and whatnot, usually so he could get into fine restaurant kitchens… but after exalting he’d found that he could do the same with but a few minutes of observation, instead of having to stalk ponies for days to learn everything about them. The point was that he’d gotten such a read on the monster pony… and depending on what interpretation he used, then this insight could give the circle a great edge for the monster’s next raid.
“Ok, so what’s the problem?” Red said impatiently.

Sullen Hoof sighed: “The monster sounded feral – but it wore armor. That sounds like a demon or some kind of ghost, but it conjured a giant sword and wielded it expertly, no feral monster I know of can do that. Equally, I don’t know anything about demons but if it was snatching foals it’d probably do that for some kind of sacrifice… that’s the only thing that makes sense – but’s not sacrificing them, it just killed the foal on the blunt rod”

Speaker nodded: “So what you’re saying is that the outcome of your analysis depends on how you choose to interpret your observations – and you can’t decide which one to go for, since none of them add up?”

Cash chortled: “You’re forgetting that it talked. There’s definitely a mind inside of it – although I’m not sure if it’s very much”
Sullen Hoof gave Cash a piercing gaze through his mask: “What do you mean?”

“Well it sounded stupid. When it threw me it went ‘ha ha stupid pony crash’, who talks like that? Speaker’s already ruled out that it’s some kind of changeling since it’s not eating the souls of the foals. I think it’s some kind of twisted pony who’s really stupid” Cash said, sounding reasonably sure of himself.

Speaker didn’t buy Cash’s theory: “How do you explain the ghost limbs the beast had? Or its head? That’s not what a pony looks like”

Cash smiled: “True, but did any of you get a look of where its limbs or neck connected to the monster pony’s dark armor?”
Red, Sullen Hoof, Shimmer and even Speaker had to admit that they hadn't really gotten a look at that particular detail.

“I got a good look its shoulder and neck when I tried to aim for its eyes. Shrivelled and dried up wounds. Now ghosts don’t have that, do they? I think it’s some kind of stupid pony who got lured into participating in some dark rituals or something – I mean, I don’t think it’s the monster pony who put up the rods. It has masters, masters with dark powers and connections to the underworld if what Speaker said about the soulsteel is correct” Cash said, nodding to his own words.

Speaker mulled over what Cash said for a moment. It actually made sense in a way: “Ok, so how do we make a trap for a fool we cannot fight directly?”

Shimmer started smiling: “Leave that to me – Speaker, you need to hide all the ponies in the village. I’m sure that the monster pony tracks the foals via scent. Well no, it tracks down ponies via scent, then feels its way around for a small enough pony with the tentacle-leg thing… so we just need to hide the other ponies so the monster can’t smell them, then I’ll be the bait in foal-form again.  For the trap I’m thinking a really deep hole in the ground. You make that with your singing staff right? Red, Sully and Cash you three find something heavy, pointy and hopefully lethal to drop on ugly once he’s in the pit”

Speaker took a deep breath and recalled his singing staff from elsewhere. This was going to be a really deep pit…
Several hours, breakfast and some deep thoughts while drawing up designs in his book later Speaker had made the perfect trap for a monster pony. It didn’t even need what Red, Sully and Cash had found to drop on the monster, although the trees they’d marked to cut down and drop on the monster as pointed tree trunks did ultimately make for a nice addition to the lid Speaker had made.

Shimmer had to admit: Speaker had really outdone himself. With the singing staff and its power to shape stone and earth to whatever tune Speaker played, the twilight caste solar had made a masterful series of constructions – even making a replacement for the hut that had been destroyed.

Speaker had, by moving and shaping earth and stone, built a beautiful stone longhouse as a new village centerpiece to replace the destroyed hut. Next to the longhouse he had excavated an entrance down into an underground stone-tiled hall. The underground hall was clad in smoothed stone of many colors that flowed together as if it was an oil painting, and there was an elaborate built-in venting system connected to a chimney that led out air high up so a monster on ground level wouldn’t be able to track the scents of the air that came out of the place, while the air being sucked in via an air-pump powered by an equally brilliant stone waterwheel system connected to a nearby creek, which kept the underground shelter full of fresh air.

The underground shelter itself was deep below ground, making it an otherwise ideal storage facility for the village for the winter – so it would remain useful after the monster had been taken care of. The amount of earth and stone moved and decorated would have taken months, if not years. Speaker had done it in a few hours with his singing staff and his essence – and it had sounded very beautiful while he had worked.

As for the trap the whole circle agreed: It was impossible to spot at ground level, but if Shimmer in foal-form sat in the right spot she would be sitting on a thin layer of dirt and stone, just thick enough to support a foal, beneath which was a hundred yard deep pit lined with jagged stone protrusions that all pointed downwards, making leaping up a very dangerous task. The only question was whether the beast would jump away when the ground would give away – but Shimmer reassured the circle that she had a way of keeping the monster put.

“Ok, but if you keep it put, how will you avoid fall into the pit with it?” Speaker wondered.

Shimmer sauntered over to Speaker and leapt at him, turning into a flea in the process. If it wasn’t for landing perfectly on one of his eyelashes on his lower right eyelid, and flaring her anima banner so she looked like a black ember surrounded by blue-white flames then Speaker wouldn’t’ have seen her – even if her speak-in-animal-form charm allowed him to hear her: “I’ll turn into a fly on the wall – or something similar – and get out before you close the lid”

The plan seemed clear and Shimmer certain in her role as bait – this time from the very beginning. At nightfall the village ponies huddled together in the deep underground vault that Speaker had excavated with his music. A young filly by the name of Littlepip had been frightened by going into what appeared to be darkness of the vault, but thanks to Speaker’s built in ventilation system then great stone braziers could easily burn and light up the underground hall without smoking up the place, which made the villagers far more at ease.

The circle also readied itself – although Sullen Hoof and Cash had joined the village ponies in the underground vault, as their injures did not allow them to fight just yet. Sullen Hoof especially needed at least another week of absolutely no strenuous activity in order to recover properly – the alternate was Speaker shouting at him for not obeying the good doctor’s orders and Sullen Hoof seemed to respect Speaker too much to disobey him like that.

As darkness fell Red readied herself. Her role for this ambush was more of a backup: If the monster pony didn’t go in the pit the easy way she was there to put the monster in the hole the hard way. Cash had even offered to lend Red his shoes of distant claws, but Speaker was quick to point out that you couldn’t just swap out attunement – a device made of the magical materials had to be removed from its user for a full day and night before a spiritual connection like that would fade, adding that items stored elsewhere were always spiritually close by, since it was by that link that one could always recall them.

Red had hidden herself in a hut where she could see the site of the trap clearly, with Speaker behind her with both Gift and his singing staff at the ready, in case the pit needed to be reinforced once the monster was in the trap.

A key element to the trap was disarming the monster: The grand soulsteel daiklaive that the monster wielded had to be removed. This was both Red and Speaker’s job. Shimmer simply had to remain in one piece this time and lure the monster in. Sunrise Glow had also insisted that she take part in the proceedings, at least as an observer if nothing else.

As darkness finally fell and the monster pony arrived, apparently completely oblivious of the previous night’s events, it instantly closed in on Shimmer who once again was in the form of a unicorn foal. Speaker found the form oddly disturbing – for it even displayed a different cutie mark, one of a sword in front of a mountain, which fit her white coat and horn, as it matched the markings of an earth aspected unicorn.

The monster closed in at a casual pace, making no attempts to be either stealthy or swift in its approach. It left no hoof prints.

As Shimmer felt a familiar semi-solid shadow tentacle wrap around her she used her charms to make hooves extend subtle claws, hooking her onto the thin lid of earth and stone that covered the pit. The monster pulled at her, but she remained put. It walked up to her and revealed its grotesque visage, to which Shimmer let out a very convincing cry for help – her cue for Red and Speaker. Speaker played the very brief notes that made up the ancient dirge of the sprung pit-trap, collapsing the thin lid on top of the pit.

Instantly Shimmer turned into a tiny insect and flew up into the sky while the monster pony roared in confused and flailed its shadow-tentacle limbs. It quickly sank down as the earth gave way – but shadow tentacles shot up with hook-like ends which dug into the ground.

Red quickly ran out and bucked at the shadow-limb hooks, loosening one, but by the time she got to the other the monster pony had pulled itself up! The monster roared and its aura of ground organs and misty blood appeared once again, forcing Red to steel herself and call her harried blade from elsewhere.

The monster pony responded in kind forming its massive daiklaive of edged shadow and sharp pain.

Gift suddenly buzzed through the air at great speed out the door of the hut that Speaker was in, its spinning teeth catching the edge of the dark blade and spinning it away from its cruel wielder. Red responded quickly, catching the blade in her mouth which burnt her lips due to its terrible nature, the sizzling sound from her mouth abating as she quickly shifted to hold the blade only by biting down on it with her teeth.

Now the only issue now was getting ugly down the hole… and it seemed far more interested in getting its giant blade back.
A light suddenly made the monster howl and turn around: Sunrise Glow, her anima at its most potent – revealing the true form of her soul and exaltation, a miniature golden sun rising above her and shining beautiful and bright.

The young would-be mare stepped forth against the monster with an iron will and the sound of ever-resolute determination in her voice: “Creature of darkness. Abomination. I deny you and your being. You will not build your house here – for by mandate of heaven this is my land!”

The monster snarled and approached, but seemed to be in no small amount of discomfort by the glow of her blazing anima. Sunrise didn’t seem intimidated by the approaching monster: “By my brightness, BURN!”

There was a split second pause. Barely enough to blink the eye – and in that moment the looming monster, with its blood red orbs for eyes in its semi-transparent black head, began to emit a bellowing roar of pain. One blink later and the dark beast wholly engulfed in phantasms of white flame that quickly began to eat away at the shadow limbs…

The beast began to twist around and buck, panicking as it tried to throw off the flaming phantasms that assailed it.

Sunrise continued her furious verbal condemnation of the monster pony, seemingly the very sanctity of her words and the force of her essence smiting the beast with each utterance from her mouth. Seeing the sudden turn of events Speaker quickly fiddled a few quick tunes on his singing staff, marking arrows in the dirt for Sunrise to verbally ‘herd’ the burning monster along.

“Demon of the darkest pit! The heavens turn their eyes from you. Your ashes will be left in the mud of the farthest reaches and the very memory of you will be expunged from creation. Now, vile thing for darkness, back to the pit you came from!” the young adolescent firm said, speaking like a true preacher of the highest conviction.

The dark beast stumbled backwards, fires erupting in front and to the sides, herding it to the pit – while small jets and wispy phantasms of holy flame kept the things head distracted, so that it could not turn to look where it was going. With a final booming shout, far louder and more forceful – both verbally and physically – than a small adolescent pony should naturally be able to produce, Sunrise literally pushed the monster pony into the pit: “FALL!”

Speaker quickly played the music on the singing staff that had rolled the heavy stone lid over on the pit and merged that stone with the pit’s foundations. Red instantly felt the magical tug on the dark shadowblade lessen and cease, allowing her to drop the blade safely. Dropping it to the ground the shadowblade turned the tufts of grass it touched to ash… and her lips didn’t feel that different. Hopefully Speaker could fix that later.

One aspect of the pit that Speaker hadn’t been able to ‘fix’ was that with a pit so deep that ground water kept seeping into it. It had filled the bottom eight yards of the hundred yard deep pit. Of course, this would hopefully keep the beast alive… because a quick death-by-impact was far too good for it – plus it would be tired from treading in the water. Sure it might drown… but that was a really nasty way to die, something Speaker had learned well since he’d been trained to both resist and administer water torture as part of his special training when he served Lookshy, so that didn’t bother him at all: He relished in the thought of the beast suffering by his creation.

The circle breathed a collective sigh of relief. The villagers who had been able to restrain themselves from peeking out at the fight, and thus were still conscious, all rushed out and cheered as well – Speaker noticing quite a lot of them cheering “Praise Celestia!”.

From down in the pit, through a small vent that Speaker had ‘played’ into the rock lid, a lot of frantic splashes and loud roaring – and, as Cash had predicted, very simplistic swearing: “Sword! Gimma sword! Don’t like cold wet!”

It was almost pitiful to hear the lamentations of the monster, but when dawn came it had quieted down. A villager was put on guard near the vent to sound the alarm if the splashing ever stopped – because that would have meant the monster would have drowned…

During that day the village held a grand feast – with Sullen Hoof heading up most of the cooking. The plan was to fish the monster up at the end of the party and then execute it as the sun set… but a few hours before that the pony who’d stood watch over the lid-vent came running to the circle: “Uhm… the monster, it wants to talk?”

> Chapter 20: Unlikely Allies
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

While the rest of the village continued their now evening celebrations, the circle tentatively approached the vent in the sealed lid to the ‘monster-pit’. There was little to no sound to be heard from it. No splashing or sound of a monster trying to avoid sinking…

The sun had almost set as Sunrise Glow called out to the monster-pony: “Beast, you wish to speak to us? Know that if you try to trick us we will destroy you”

The voice that came from the pit was the faint echo of a deep rumbling voice, menacing to hear even when quiet as whisper. Cash Charmer and Sullen Hoof both took a few steps unnerved steps back from the vent, while Speaker looked very apprehensive, especially considering what the monster-pony said next: “I wish you to thank you all”

Speaker’s first thought was that this was a trap of some kind. He clearly wasn’t the only pony to have this idea, as Shimmer, Sullen Hoof and Red all had the same look on their face – except Sully because of his mask.

The voices sounded again. It was very different from how the monster-pony had spoken previously, for now it was eloquent and well spoken – but just as monstrous: “I can understand that you would all feel some hesitation to believe me. I can assure you that I am genuinely grateful”

“And why are you so happy? Finally found a worthy opponent?” Red shouted angrily.

There was a moment’s pause, but then a reply came: “No, you separated me from my cursed blade. I was fooled into attuning to it by my now… lets say former master. It took away my ability to think properly, making me the idiot monster you fought last night”

Speaker thought about the statement for a moment. It did usually take a day and a night to break the attunement between an artifact and a pony, for he seen for in Lookshy he had seen unicorns complain that jade weapons they rarely used were bothersome to reattune to – but a blade that robs its user of its mind? That was unheard of, even back in the first age! Who would make such a thing? …maybe the same kind of monster who would send a mindless minion to steal foals and siphon their souls into soulsteel rods?

“I can assure you all: I will not harm any of you should you release me – but I will also not resist should you wish to kill me. I surrender completely to you” the monster-pony rumbled from deep in the pit.

Speaker shrugged. This would make executing the monster so much more easy. He was about to summon Gift when Cash interrupted him: “Oh come on Speaker – we have to know  who it’s masters are, if there are more of its sort that’ll come and finish the job here and what exactly it is. You said yourself that it wouldn’t have been able to make all those soulsteel rods on its own. There no sense in having done all this we leave and another monster-pony comes to replace this one”

With no small amount of reluctance Speaker nodded. Cash then shouted into vent: “Ok monster, but if we are to let you out you will have to submit to us utterly – and swear a magical oath to that effect”

There was a brief sound of splashing noises followed by silence for a few minutes. The silence was suddenly and quite unnervingly broken as the monster spoke. Cash made a startled leap backwards. The source of the monster-pony’s voice was coming from just the other side of the vent: “So agreed”

A very thin shadow tentacle snaked its way up through the vent: “Shake on it?”

Cash looked very unhappy at having to touch the tentacle – but he had to if he was to sanctify the oath. He briefly swiped at the tentacle with his right forehoof, his castemark lighting up. Golden bands of old realm glyphs appeared in the air, spelling out the terms of the oath in the ancient tongue, flowing from Cash’s caste mark down into the vent.

“Ok monster, here are your orders for the time being: You will do as we say. You will not disobey us. You will not harm any of us or these villagers through action or inaction unless permitted by us. Are we clear?” Speaker shouted, surprising Red at just how much he could sound like an ornery drill instructor.

“Of course” the monster-pony said, sounding more like it was saying the same to a pony who had asked whether or not that pony was about to be eaten alive.

Speaker looked at Cash with worried eyes. Cash shrugged: “He swore, I sanctified, so we’re covered – now come on, whip out your music stick and let him out – I promised”

The circle cleared the platform and Speaker recalled his singing staff from elsewhere. As Speaker played the music on the staff that unsealed the lid of the pit a liquid darkness flowed from the crack – the liquid quickly solidified and helped to move the lid over, ultimately allowing a very strange and scary thing to emerge.

The few villager ponies who’d seen the circle talk to the monster now called to alarm. The festivities stopped and an angry mob quickly formed, pitchforks, torches and everything.

Sunrise Glow would have nothing of the mob, turning to face the crowd and shouting at them to calm themselves – adding that they should be ashamed of themselves not to trust the heaven-sent solars and their judgement. The crowd dispersed with some grumbling, the ponies of the village quickly returning to their huts, the longhouse, and some to the shelter.

The monster-pony now stood before the circle at the edge of the pit. With the bonfires from the party still blazing the monster-pony was well-lit for once, revealing its true horrifying nature: Taller than even Speaker’s large and stout physique, its thick limbs were translucent shadow-limbs as was its head.  Its face was like a nightmarish creation of living shadow-flesh with oversized fangs of solid black while its lidless red eye-orbs seemed to be spheres of blood, rippling ever so slightly as the monster looked around. Its voice was unlike anything that even the best storytellers could describe or emulate to scare young foals; throaty and deep, with a raspy ‘beyond the grave’ feel to it: “Ah, thank you. To whom exactly do I owe my gratitude?”

“Why don’t you tell us who  and what you are first?” Red said, still sounding angry, her very worn blade hovering next to her in an attack position, suspended in a golden glow.

The monster bowed its head and formally introduced itself: “I am the Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes. That is my title, for I have no name. I am a deathknight in the service of the deathlord known as the Barbate Arbiter of Unbound Gravitas and Unrelenting Fury, but as of this moment I renounce that service”

Speaker was intrigued. What was a deathlord? What was a deathknight? Were all deathknights like this one? Red seemed less impressed: “Wait, so you’re like the ones who took Thorns?”

Speaker perked up at the mention of Thorns. Last he’d been near that particular realm satrap had been eight years ago, during the final battles of the last realm invasion of the scavenger lands. Lookshy and the rest of the confederation of rivers defeated Thorns there, putting the realm in its place. So what was this about taking Thorns? Speaker inwardly cursed the fact that he’d been out of the loop since his retirement.

The Bodhisattva had a very grim story to tell about Thorns - for apparently three years ago the deathlord known as the Mask of Winters overran the much weakened Thorns, turning it into a giant shadowland and taking every risen ghost as a slave, plus animating the remains of the dead into zombies or skeletan golems. The Bodhisattva did claim that there was still a living population in thorns, but it was shrinking rapidly instead of growing.

Speaker was suddenly a lot less enthusiastic about talking about Thorns.

The bodhisattva digressed: “My master, the Barbate Arbiter, seeks to aid all the other deathlords in any way he can. In my addled state I was working for a necromancer with a lair set in the swamps west of Chung Do to make… things. I never understood what he was making, but now that I can think again I am certain that it will not bode well if his work is finished”
The circle mulled about this grim revelation for a moment. The bodhisattva elaborated that this made the Barbate Arbiter unique among deathlords, for the rest apparently didn’t do much in cooperation, preferring to pursue their own strategies.
“Hold on – just how many of your kind are there?” Shimmer asked.

The bodhisattva shrugged – although it looked more as if his shadow limbs simply wobbled a bit: “Enough that the thirteen deathlords are certain in the inevitability of their success…”

It was at this point that Sullen Hoof made the rest of the circle aware of the angry mob of ponies gathering around them, the ponies of village slowly emerging from their hidey holes with pitchforks and torches again. They wanted the monster that had killed their foals killed, not simply entertained with light conversation – and while Speaker started to worry that the circle at the Bodhisattva would have to run for it, then Cash boldly limped forth and addressed the crowd.

Speaker couldn’t tell what flavors of charms that Speaker was using, but he was sure that there were some in play, for Cash’s caste mark lit up: “Come now good ponies – the beast has surrendered to us! We have won! By taking away the cursed blade that enslaved his mind through foul dark magic, we have ensured that he will never kill another pony in this village again. Now, while we share your thirst for revenge, then I hope you can all understand that we have to know whether other dark creatures will come once we take this one away. Think of your foals! We may have stopped one, but what if another comes when we leave to Chung Do? We have to know where this one is from so we might stop them at the source”
The faces on the angry ponies turned from anger to nods of understanding, some even cheered Cash on as they realized the truth in his words. The crowd withdrew and returned to their previous celebrations, no longer that afraid of the monster in their midst, although most with slightly dampened spirits.

Sunrise Glow suggested that they held the rest of the interrogation elsewhere, out of sight of the village. After a short walk out of the village the Bodhisattva continued his tale, explaining that while he had been told that there were thirteen Deathlords in total, with the Barbate Arbiter and the Mask of Winters being but two of them, then he honestly did not know of others.

“I do” Shimmer noted, looking dour: “In the west, to the north of the archipelago there’s Skullstone, ruled by the Silver Prince – I’ve heard that one of his titles is Deathlord, I just never thought it meant anything. I mean, Skullstone is weird enough already with half its citizens being ghosts and whatnot, but the Silver Prince isn’t aggressive towards any of the other island nations… I just thought that was what you called a pony who lorded over the dead”

The Bodhisattva confirmed that the name sounded familiar, and that the remaining deathlords had holds and secret dominions scattered all over creation.

“And what exactly do they want?” Red asked bluntly. She did not like the answer she was given by the Bodhisattva: “To destroy creation, at the behest of the neverborn – so that they might finally pass on to oblivion”

None in the circle spoke for a moment as the celestial exalts digested that shocking bit of news. Sullen Hoof did ask why the Bodhisattva had said that his former master, the Barbate Arbiter, simply supported the other deathlords – but upon saying that he realized that in supporting them that deathlord still worked to bring about the death of all things…

“How exactly do you ‘destroy’ creation? Kill all ponies? Burn all of the forests of the east?” Cash wondered, thinking about the vast organizational nightmare it would be to coordinate a world-wide destruction scheme.

The Bodhisattva noted that it wasn’t that complicated: “Kill enough ponies and creation will plunge into the wyld” Speaker nodded at this, recalling having told the rest of the circle of the effect of low populations on the stability of the reality of creation. The Bodhisattva continued: “Problem is that there are quite a few who would oppose such a plan – me included”
This last comment surprised the circle. The Bodhisattva explained that he’d originally advocated a more ‘direct’ way of putting the neverborn out of their misery…

“Hold on, Neverborn? What exactly is that?” Sullen Hoof wondered.

Speaker explained that during the primordial war a lot of primordials got killed, mainly be the solars – but it turned out that creation simply hadn’t been built to handle its own creators dying… which was also how shadowlands had formed when the primordials fell through creation – ending up in the then newly created dark mirror version of creation; the underworld. The Bodhisattva nodded and complimented Speaker on his knowledge of such things, to which Speaker noted that with the wealth of knowledge he remembered from the first age and the primordial war then that was nothing.

The Bodhisattva elaborated that he had simply suggested that the deathlords and the deathknights attack the neverborn directly – killing them using spirit-splaying charms of which he personally knew plenty. It would be much faster… but alas his master had refused it for some reason, and when the Bodhisattva had insisted:  “…you saw what I became. I thought the sword was given to me as a gift to placate me enough to do his bidding. Now I will never know the touch of another pony , nor the smell or taste of anything but death”

“So what exactly do you plan on doing now?” Speaker wondered.

“That depends on what you choose to do with me. Considering what I have become then oblivion probably wouldn’t be much worse – but I can also still pursue my original goal. There are parts of the underworld that resists the deathlords. I can gather support and hide there, or scour the wyld for lost primordial slaying devices. I will need more than a blade to force the tombs of neverborn into the abyss” the Bodhisattva mused, looking almost pensive instead of menacing for a moment.

Looking back at the village, then at the Bodhisattva, Cash nodded: “I personally don’t see any problem in you doing that – but we can’t come back empty-hoofed to the village. They will be furious if we just let you go…”

“Oh I think I know a way…” the Bodhisattva noted, requesting that the circle fetch a cart.

It was a curious display that returned to the village not many moments later. To the circle it had also been an enlightening one, for the Bodhisattva had both revealed how to defeat other deathknights with body-parts like his, as well as having provided the circle a suitable trophy to show to the village: He had ‘deactivated’ all of his shadow-limbs except for his head – for to do so would kill him. This had left the Bodhisattva as nothing but a metal cage that held his heart and a tiny amount of shriveled up organ tissue, from which his throat and head of shadow-flesh protruded at one end. The Bodhisattva had explained that he had to supply a constant flow of necrotic essence to each limb, including his head, to maintain them. If the circle disrupted the flow to a part of him it would fade and disappear, including his head. This had prompted the question of how he managed to avoid having that happen while he slept, to which the Bodhisattva noted that once his head was replaced he no longer needed sleep… but being knocked out or otherwise drained of essence would be fatal to any deathknight with such ghoulish desecrations to their bodies.

The ponies in the village were ecstatic when they saw the circle return with but the mutilated chest and head of the monster. The Bodhisattva played along by pretending to be dead – not a difficult feat since he did not need to breathe – and so the circle uprooted the soulsteel rods and whisked them away to elsewhere triumphantly. Leaving the village with the Bodhisattva, they promised to put him to good use, Cash jokingly insinuating that they’d drop him down one of the reservoirs of Chung Do’s communal latrines.

Outside the village the Bodhisattva manifested his limbs again and bid the circle luck, asking to be freed from his oath.
“Hold on – do you know anything about the plague in Chung Do?” Red asked, before even entertaining the idea of freeing the Bodhisattva.

Nodding, the Bodhisattva said that the soulsteel rods he’d been ‘filling’ with foal souls had been for a deathknight artificer who hid in the swamps ten days west of Chung Do. There the Bodhisattva recalled having heard mention of another deathknight called the ‘Ruby and Emerald Mare” who was ‘having fun’ in Chung Do. The Bodhisattva suggested that the circle dealt with both, as they too served the Barbate Arbiter.

“Is this Barbate Arbiter really that bad? I mean, the other deathlords you mention – like the Mask of Winters, they come off as a lot more aggressive” Speaker noted, acknowledging the importance of ‘support, but compared to conquering entire nations then such efforts did look less vital.

“The deathlords aren’t all that competent. They are ghosts and thus bound by their passions. Not all of them see the folly in some of their own actions, some blinded by their rage against all life or foolishly overconfident in their own abilities. The Barbate Arbiter picks up the slack. Without him I’ve been told that at least one or two deathlords might stand to be executed by the neverborn for incompetence…” the Bodhisattva mused, sounding eerily pleased by such an eventuality.

The circle agreed that such a ‘two birds with one stone’ scenario was a tempting one to pursue, so going after the Arbiter’s minions in Chung Do seemed like a perfect way to get started. The Bodhisattva warned them that going after a deathlord wouldn’t just be difficult – but it would be very dangerous. A deathlord is an ancient ghost empowered by a deathless primordial which cannot die: “But take heart, because if I can beat you to it then I will see if even death can die” the Bodhisattva explained, sounding determined and certain in his success.

“Very well. Now, while the oath you took didn’t include any provisions to release you from it, then I now hereby give you free reign to do as you please towards the goals you’ve stated. Also, I ask – not order – that you at least once a year try to send a message to us on what you’re doing and what how far you’ve progressed” Cash solemnly said.

With that said the Bodhisattva departed just as the earliest light of dawn appeared on the sky. Shimmered conjured a cloud and the circle went about visiting the remaining villages, collecting the soulsteel rods and seeing the remains of the impaled foals on them properly buried.

A few days later the circle returned to Chung Do, Shimmer landing her cloud right in the middle of the castle courtyard – much to the initial fright of some of the guards.

Captain Bighoof was at first horrified to hear of the true nature of the monster that had been killing foals in the northern villages – even more so when he learned that the killer had been released to roam free again. Of course, presenting the monster’s dark blade and the haul of soulsteel did make for an impressive prize, even if neither of the two were safe to touch for mortals… Red’s lips were still scarred from when she had held on to the blade, Speaker having also noted some strange dark discolorations on her teeth that he’d had to fix.

The old captain was more intrigued by the intelligence that the circle had gotten from the Bodhisattva: This Emerald and Ruby Mare  -  probably a codename or alias, just like the captain didn’t really believe that the Bodhisattva’s real name was just that. The question was who this mare was, if a mare at all.

“I’ll blend in with the servant staff on the castle and try to spot anything suspicious – then head into town and do the same if I don’t find anything” Sullen Hoof said, using his magical helmet-mask to turn into a very unimposing looking cream-coated stallion with a napkin as a cutie-mark, before sneaking off.

The rest of the circle then had to decide on what to do. The plague was still in full swing, the captain reporting roughly three hundred dead in the days the circle had been gone – almost a hundred a day, and that was just the ones who were reported or found. Many households where every single pony had died wouldn’t be discovered until the smell of rot got strong enough to be noticed outside.

Cash Charmer wanted to parlay with the gang that had taken control of the city’s civilian food supply, while Speaker wanted nothing else but to start work on a cure. Red wasn’t sure where she could be of use, to which Shimmer suggested that the two of them work on trying to find the source of the plague…

“The source?” Red said, sounding confused. She didn’t know much of medicine or healing beyond how to roughly bandage a wound – something she’d done often on herself and others – but finding the source of a disease? She couldn’t even imagine where to start.

Shimmer calmed Red down and explained: “Remember what Speaker told us of plague: This kind of disease usually only flourishes in poor places, where ponies can’t stay clean. We’ll ask around in the poorer parts of town and try to find where it all started, then track it from there”

Red wasn’t sure if doing all of that was worth it. The city was infected – the ponies of Chung Do were spreading the plague to each other now, so why bother finding a source? Shimmer had a rather insightful answer to this: “Chung Do seems to be a rich place, right? Ponies here can afford to bathe often and stay clean. The castle certainly smells of fancy soaps. Why would sickness like this come to a place with fancy soaps? Plus, remember what the Bodhisattva said: This Emerald and Ruby Mare deathknight is here, so she probably started it all. If what’s making ponies here sick is not natural then we can probably save a lot of lives by destroying the source of the plague so that the rest of the city doesn’t get sick”

This Red could agree to. She’d heard of sieges where the corpses of sick ponies had been catapulted over city walls to infect those inside – getting rid of something like that quickly could prevent the spread of disease. This kind of thinking was more akin to what Red could understand.

This left Sunrise Glow, but she said that she’d remain in the castle to begin with, giving counsel and solace to the young Shogun, especially depending on what Red and Shimmer might discover.

The circle dispersed and Red and Shimmer left the castle with Cash Charmer. Red and Shimmer lost sight of Cash as he crossed the giant bridge over the brown river to the western half of the city, while Red and Shimmer began asking around for who had gotten sick first – not an easy thing with the plague having started six months ago.

Red had thought that they would be going to the poorer parts of town, such as the docks where ponies lived and worked as dockhooves, but it quickly turned out from the stories she and Shimmer heard that the first plague victims had turned up not far from the castle, in the nicer part of the eastern half of Chung Do.

Shimmer suggested that they talk to the Sijaneese ponies camped outside of Chung Do. The Sijaneese camp was located just north of the city on the western side of the brown river – far enough away from the city that the large guild wagons they had, which were being filled with the corpses of dead ponies, didn’t pester the city with the smell.

To Red it was a rather disconcerting experience. The Sijaneese ponies all wore black funeral robes embroidered with somber motifs of stylized skeletons and elegant funeral pyres in red thread – and they were all so pale! Red had never liked the Sijaneese – not in any hostile way – but an entire nation of ponies that did nothing but collect dead ponies and intern them in endless underground catacombs? It was well known that all of Sijan was a giant shadowland because of their macabre nation-wide enterprise, but it relieved pretty much all of the threshold of having to deal with hungry ghosts of vengeful dead ponies haunting local burial grounds. Even the realm shipped most of their dead to Sijan.

Shimmer on the other hoof didn’t seem bothered at all. In the west, too far from Sijan for them to be of any service, the dead were either cremated or just tossed into the sea where the sharks would eat them in short order – ghosts were usually swept away by the tide and eaten by changelings. Red found this practice barbaric, to which Shimmer calmly retorted: “You find a better solution then”

The sijaneese ponies were initially not very cooperative, so while Red engaged in futile discussion Shimmer turned into a mouse and snuck the sijaneese ponies’ tents. An hour or so later Shimmer, still in mouse form, yanked Red’s tail – the sign to walk away.

“So… what did you learn?” Red inquired, both eager to hear of what Shimmer had read and thankful that she didn’t have to talk with that creepy mortician pony anymore.

Shimmer took a deep breath: “Well, now I’m sure that the plague didn’t just start from some pony traveler who had it infecting the rest of Chung Do. The morticians’ records match what we learned in the ritzy neighborhoods around the castle, but according to the sijaneese then it only took a few days before the plague showed up all over the city. There’s no pattern and no normal disease spreads that quickly. Whatever is making the ponies in Chung Do sick is something that all ponies in Chung Do is exposed to, and it’s something they’d all come into contact with within a few days of each other, from the richest to the poorest, for it to spread that quickly after it started”

Red could tell that Shimmer was confused. If it wasn’t for having grown up in Chung Do then Red probably wouldn’t have the slightest clue either – but having grown up in Chung Do she knew exactly what they should be looking for! Shimmer didn’t even have time to ask before Red sprung into a gallop, racing back to the city.

Shimmer followed Red as a generic eastern songbird, tracking Red as she entered the city’s western gate, crossed the bridge to the eastern part of town, then ran down to the large square in front of the castle.

The square was marked by two large fountains fed by aqueducts that came out of the castle’s walls. There were at least six dozen ponies with buckets, jugs and bowls there fetching water, chatting, all of them looking worried and a few of them not so well, with those who looked the worst being shunned by the others.

Shimmer landed next to Red who was gazing into the fountains, causing no small amount of commotion from the surrounding ponies, but she ignored them: “So… you think it’s the fountains?”

“It has to be. The whole city uses the castle wells. The castle has its own well inside. The magic of the manse makes the water” Red said, looking intently at the water despite having no clue what to look for.

Shimmer drank of the water, gargling it a bit, then spitting it out on the ground: “I can’t taste it like this – I’ll need to go big bird for that. We should get a bucket; no need to scare the ponies here more than necessary”

Red fetched a bucket from the castle, filled it, and met Shimmer in her monsterpony bird form in the castle courtyard. Some of the guardsponies on the castle walls looked ready to shit themselves, but after seeing Red talk cordially with it they calmed down.

Shimmer took the bucket full of fountain-water and drank it all in a series of big gulps. She then gave Red a weird look with all three of her eyes: “There is something weird in the water – but it’s really subtle. I can’t tell what it is. Get me another bucketful will you?”

Red fetched another bucket of water. Shimmer grabbed the bucket with her talons and drank it all in one huge gulp – and instantly vomited up a large black tar-like mass that spread out slowly on the ground and smelled horribly. The mass quickly began to evaporate while Shimmer tried to quell her violent dry-heaves.

“What in the sweet name of Celestia is that?” Red blurted out.

In between dry heaves Shimmer said that she had no idea, but that Red should fetch Speaker quickly – because she needed what he’d come up with so… because she felt really sick.

To quell her upset stomach Shimmer turned back into pony form, only to elicit a decidedly girly shriek from Red. When Shimmer looked at herself it instantly became clear why: Her body was covered in dark boils, especially around her snout, the scar around her back and belly from her vivisection and – sure enough – under her tail and around her privates. Apparently whatever the water had infected her with had been accelerated by her shapeshifting – or maybe it was her essence? Shimmer had to admit that she was genuinely curious, if it wasn’t for the fact that as an exalted pony she should not be able to get this sick!

Red ran off to find Speaker, screaming bloody murder while Shimmer started vomiting blood.

> Chapter 21: Fools Rush In
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Speaker had spent all his time since the circle had split up earlier that day on setting up a proper workshop and laboratory. With essence he could recall perfectly what equipment he had used back in Lookshy for medical diagnostics and with his first age memories he could recall what wonders of healing he had used in the ancient times. This would be a worthy way to introduce the solars to creation: He would find a cure for the plague and ensure that all ponies across creation would be able to cure it! The end to plague! Sounded like a good plan.

This mainly meant that Speaker had spent the time making lists of equipment he’d need, sending castle servants off to see if any of it might already exist in the castle. For the things that couldn’t be found he instead requisitioned raw materials at the castle quartermare, or so he would have, if not for the fact that that position had been held by one of the two corrupt elders who had escaped. The new quartermare was a young mare who looked very inexperienced. Taking pity on her Speaker rewrote he requisition forms in simpler terms: “One barrel of sand, one bucketful of tin or things made of tin, one bucketful of iron or things made of iron...” – so far he’d gotten the new quartermare to supply him some of the castle smith’s spare iron and to dispatch servants to gather sand.

When Red came running Speaker had been in the process of using his essence to sift through and cleanse the sand, then melt it down and shape it into clear bulbous glass vials, all in one continuous process. Using his essence the sand picked up no dirt in the process so the resulting vials were surprisingly clear. Glass of such quality would usually cost a fortune and require extensive refining, but Speaker was doing it in minutes. Red came barging in and told Speaker of Shimmer’s dire condition in no uncertain terms.

Speaker dropped everything in shock, shattering the current vial he was forming and a glob of molten glass as he ran out to the courtyard with Red to meet a gory sight.

Shimmer was lying on the ground, twitching and convulsing, intermittently puking up blood and making some decidedly unladylike noises.

“Hold her down! I need to purge her system” Speaker shoulder, jumping at Shimmer and trying to pin her down.

With aid from the dawn caste solar Speaker managed to flush Shimmer’s stomach out, getting rid of the last dark goop that had gotten into her. From a pocket Speaker floated out a vial and took a sample of the dark material: “This is not right…”
Shimmer staggered to her hooves, her caste mark showing as she used her essence to fight the last pangs of queasiness: “I’ve been sick with a lot of weird things – that was not natural… I mean, it was so quick, like it was trying to rip out my stomach”

After telling Speaker what had happened Red wondered: “But why didn’t you get sick with the first bucket of water then? Why aren’t every pony who drinks from the fountains getting sick right away?”

Shimmer looked at the gate leading out to the drawbridge and the square: “Did you get the water from the same fountain both times?”

Red shook her head: “No the other one, its closer to the castle…”

“A two-component mixture… how clever” Speaker mused. Red caught on to what Speaker meant a moment later, but she did wonder how that would work… or why it hit Shimmer so hard and suddenly.

Shimmer suggested that the disease might be reacting to her essence. Floating up a wad of the black good and touching it to her tail, then using a shapeshifting trick to turn her otherwise plain and scrawny looking purple tail into a big curly one the black goo suddenly bubbled up explosively, releasing small dark puffs of greenish smoke. Within second the smoke began to sizzle and sparkle in the air, followed by a rush of strong pine scent.

Quickly turning into her monsterpony bird form, Shimmer quickly looked intensely at the dissipating cloud: “Haha! Amazing, I knew this place was good for something!”

Turning back into her pony form again, her boils this time looking even more bloated and pusfilled – much to Speaker’s horror – Shimmer stated: “This manse, the wood essence is blocking the disease from spreading. This is great! We ca-” Looking at Red and Speaker’s horrified looks Shimmer inquired: “What?”

Speaker wasn’t sure whether to berate Shimmer for using essence when it had just been shown to feed on essence-use, or just rush in and treat her. While Speaker was seemingly paralyzed by this question Red was a little more direct: “Shimmer you idiot, you just spread the disease even more on you – look!”

Shimmer paused for a moment and face-hoof’d as she realized her mistake. Looking up she apologized for her rash actions, but excused them with it seeming like a very good idea at the time – plus it paid off: Now they know at least one of the functions of the manse. Sure, it hurt to walk, and talk, and blink, and breathe, but that was nothing that couldn’t be suppressed or ignored with a bit of essence.

Speaker was less impressed, but took notes none the less. Asking Red to burn the rest of the goo on the ground – and to keep all mortal ponies well away from it until the ashes had been soaked in soapy water – Speaker brought Shimmer down to his medical lab to fix her up.

In the lab Shimmer submitted to Speaker’s treatment, complimenting Speaker on what he’d so far made for his laboratory: “This is nice. Back home diseases aren’t that common. Ponies living scattered out on different islands make it difficult for disease to spread, and if a community dies out from it another tribe usually comes into settle it and repopulate fairly quickly”
Having mentioned repopulation Shimmer got a little randy – but looking like a near-death plague victim was, to put it very mildly, very off-putting to Speaker.

“Oh come on, what are a few boils between lovers?” Shimmer joked as she sauntered up to Speaker, boils oozing ever so slightly as she tried to put on a saucy expression. Speaker was impressed that Shimmer wasn’t feeling under the weather at all, but his arousal was not to be found: “Don’t you feel anything from the disease? I mean, I know the infection came very suddenly – but there should be some discomfort from the boils”

Shimmer said that she canceled out anything like that with a little bit of essence. Speaker worried that she might be fueling the disease that way: “You won’t be feeling so hot if I don’t fix this before the diarrhea kicks in”

“What a lovely thing to say to the mare you love” Shimmer mused as she climbed up on Speaker’s surgical table while Speaker brought to bear what little gear he had made so far.

When the guards on the walls announced the nightfall shift change Speaker and Shimmer finally emerged. All the boils had been drained, cut away and Shimmer had been subjected to a rather intimate series of healing essence injections, although none of them had been as fun as she’d hoped. With her regeneration charms she’d healed the boil wounds and was now, effectively, cured. Speaker was proud of his accomplishment, but noted that he couldn’t possibly do the same for every pony in the city. There were thousands of ponies beyond the castle walls and he wouldn’t be able to help more than five or six a day less he deplete his anima of essence – and that stuff took time to come again.

Shimmer admitted that she’d never understood how an exalted pony could ‘run out’ out essence, something her elders had always warned against, especially if one was in a fight – but Speaker explained it like breath: “If you keep a steady and well-paced trot you can go at it all day without feeling too tired. If you gallop you will tire quickly and run out of breath. You can, over time, train yourself to breathe deeper and endure a faster pace – but that takes time. That’s why you meditate to refine your essence, for it enhances your ‘breath’ if you would, so you can use more charms before depleting the essence that your souls and exaltation respires”

Shimmer nodded, looking impressed: “I love it when you talk egghead”

They met Red out in the courtyard, the martial mare overseeing half a dozen servant ponies scrubbing the cobblestones under flickering torchlight. The bubbly soap water that had been poured out was clouded with black ash. More servants were bringing buckets of water to wash the stuff away to the drains spread around the courtyard.

Red was relieved to see Shimmer ok again. Shimmer said it was nothing: “Having been cut in half makes a little bloody vomit and some boils seem a lot less intimidating”

“Indeed. Say Red, have you seen any of the others?” Speaker wondered, having been in his lab most of the day.

Red said that she had seen Sunrise with Onyx up on the keep’s balcony that overlooked the courtyard after she’d started the fire to burn the ‘sickness goo’ away, but she hadn’t seen Sully or Cash.

“That must be some hard negotiations Cash is doing with that gang” Speaker mused.

The circle withdrew to the castle for dinner. During dinner the circle, minus Cash, discussed with the young Shogun how to use what they had learned about the fountains. Shimmer still wanted to investigate how the stuff in the water got into the wells – because she hadn’t seen anything at the fountains themselves that could explain such dark contamination. Onyx seemed mostly in doubt about whether to allow the ponies of Chung Do to use the fountains anymore – but Speaker said that Onyx could just close one Fountain off. Ponies at arms were dispatched post haste. Dinner continued with a young servant mare playing a flute to soothe everybody’s minds, but it was hard to notice her cheerful tunes considering the circumstances.

Shortly after dinner the alarm bells at the gate rang out. These were the signal that something bad was happening, so the whole castle garrison – along with the circle, minus Cash and Sullen Hoof, rushed out to the courtyard.

Bighoof was up on the ramparts while some of the ponies at arms who had been guarding the fountain investigated: A large sack had been left by the square side of the drawbridge, and no pony had noticed it being dropped off…
“A sack… and the guard first noticed it now?” Red said, sounding unimpressed.

Captain Bighoof came down from the castle wall and excused the confusion, noting that with it getting dark it was hard to spot.

Suddenly a guardspony came rushing over the bridge into the courtyard: “There’s a half-dead pony with a blond mane in the sack!”

A more dead than alive Cash Charmer was quickly brought into the courtyard. His blue silks were gone and he had wounds at his hooves, knees, elbows, neck, shoulders, and several around his hips, most of them still bleeding a little. All in all Cash was covered in blood, some half-dried and crusty, some was fresh. His eyes were swollen and his face was heavily bruised, him bleeding from his mouth. Speaker considering Cash lucky that the poor stallion was unconscious.
“Gods. He’s been ragdolled” Red said, looking terrified.

Speaker, Shimmer and Sunrise didn’t know what the term meant. Red explained, poking Cash at each location as she spoke: “I’ve heard some merc outfits doing it to deserters. You cut a pony’s tendons at the hooves, knees, elbows, the muscles around the neck and shoulder, at your tail, around your hips. Cuts loose all your muscles, so you can’t walk or pick up anything. I… gods they even cut under his tongue”

“Right, let’s go kill them all” Speaker plainly suggested, sounding as calm as if nothing had happened. The circle just looked at him.

“What? If these Water Walkers are this cruel it stands to logic that there’s no reasoning with them. I will not let Chung Do starve while I cure them of plague – in fact, I will probably need them well fed for the cure to work anyway. We’ll have to speak to them in their own language, and if they think this how you treat diplomats then let us respond in kind. We have work to do the best for the greatest number of ponies. If wiping out this gang secures the city’s food supply, so be it – and with this done to Cash, I don’t see why we shouldn’t, for our cause is just and our revenge clearly legitimate” Speaker continued, not understanding why the ponies around him looked so surprised.

Shimmer was the first to speak up, despite being quite a bit surprised to hear Speaker suggest killing someone: “I think that’s a great idea. Let’s go teach these thugs a lesson!”

Sunrise was quick to point out that none of them knew where these water walkers had their hideout, plus Speaker should tend to Cash’s wounds first to prevent any permanent crippling.

“We’ll just look around, and Cash won’t die from these wounds. If this gang is the only party selling rice then every pony in Chung Do who doesn’t live at the castle should know where they’re located” Speaker said, reasoning that it wouldn’t be much of a secret where such ponies operated out of.

Sunrise Glow didn’t agree: “Sure, we’ll just ask the first pony we’ll see and ask them to snitch on their only source of food. Then after we’ve gone to them our informants will probably get a lovely visit from their local gang representative who will repay the kindness five folds over to them and their family”

Red nodded: “True. When I was a merc we always said that snitches get stitches – I don’t think we should expect any pony dependent on the water walkers to tell us where they are”

“But… come on – we have to do something!” Speaker pleaded.

Sunrise calmly walked up to Speaker and gestured at Cash: “All you need to do is tend to Cash’s wounds and heal him. Once he’s up again I am certain that he will lead us to the water walkers. What we need to right now is remain calm. These water walkers are probably already gearing up for a confrontation. It would be foolish to walk into a trap. Once Sullen Hoof returns he can scout them out together with Shimmer, then we make a plan of attack”

Speaker took a deep breath. Part of him wanted to apologize for letting his emotions get the better of him, but another part equally felt that such was perfectly justified. A cart was fetched and Cash Charmer was brought down to Speaker’s lab where Speaker began his bloody work of making sure that Cash could walk and talk again once he woke up.

Shimmer met Speaker a couple of hours later in their quarters, Speaker certain that Cash would wake up at some point before noon the next day.
“And what about the ragdoll cuts?” Shimmer wondered. Speaker assured her that his essence had seen those crippling injuries undone, although it would take some time before they would fully heal.

“Now he won’t just limp from that skewered thigh for a week – he’ll be walking funny for at least two weeks. It will probably also take a few days before he can speak again, but he can always write with a floated quill where he went once he comes to” Speaker said, still looking disappointed that they hadn’t rushed out the gates to deal swift justice.

Shimmer found this side of Speaker intriguing. Speaker didn’t consider it that special: “Ponies who do such things… they’re pure evil. When you’re that cruel you do not deserve to partake in the gift of life”

“You know Speaker, for a pony as dedicated as you to preserving life I was worried that you’d not be able to take life… and while it’s never something that any pony should start to enjoy, then trust when me when I say that a century of experience has taught me that some ponies just cannot be reasoned with” Shimmer said, unbuttoning Speaker’s old lookshyan uniform, now covered in blood spatter, dumping it in a basket for the castle maids to clean.

Speaker turned around and looked at Shimmer with horror in his eyes: “I… no. No pony should ever need to be killed by another pony. Gangs like this, ponies who prey who other ponies, they’re symptoms. Limited resources, unequal distribution of those resources. I want to see creation brought back to what it was in the first age, where there was no need or want that went unsatisfied. The source of this inequality as I see it is a general lack of understanding, a lack of wisdom! I’m sure these water walkers feel that what they’re doing is a reasonable if not short-sighted idea, but they probably don’t understand the level of suffering that they’re submitting the ponies of Chung Do to, or they don’t care because they don’t see the big picture. Ideally I would prefer to see them educated, enlightened and put to good use, but given our own limited resources and numbers that’s not an option. The the fastest and most expedient way to get Chung Do back on track is killing enough of these water walkers to break up the gang and free up the city’s food supply. I’ve thought about this a lot while patching up Cash. I’m certain that he tried to defend himself, because some of his wounds are defensive. The water walkers would have realized that he has powers and I’m sure he would have warned them about that as a bargaining chip – they weren’t swayed by his power, so we can’t use it as leverage for peaceful negotiation”

“You seem to think very highly of this gang. You know them?” Shimmer wondered.

Speaker shrugged, stroking his long beard: “No, but it would make sense. A caper like this requires organization. If they've really taken control of all the warehouses and rice-granaries they know what they’re doing. I can’t imagine dumb luck and sick guards is all that allowed for something like this to go unnoticed and unopposed”

Shimmer nodded but pointed out a hole in Speaker’s logic: “Never attribute to happenstance or fools what you can to malice. Remember that the two elders who kept the shogun in the dark weren't exactly on the level. How do you think the elders managed to sneak out of Chung Do? Didn’t Cash say that they’d also drained part of the treasury? They would have had to store that money somewhere that won’t ask questions. That could mean that the guard was instructed to leave that gang alone, giving them room to expand their territory and ultimately pull this heist”

“I don’t know enough about business or laws to be sure, but I have a very big hunch that the leader of this gang is very sure about what they’re doing – although your point is perfectly valid too. It’s probably a combination of both” Speaker said, climbing up in bed.

Shimmer sauntered up next to Speaker in the bed and gave him a tender kiss: “Alright, enough about the gang. Let’s talk cure for the plague, any ideas? I’m all for sexual healing right now…”

The next day Speaker and Shimmer met a very displeased Cash charmer who now had a limp on all four legs in the main castle dining hall. Breakfast was steam veggies and green tea. Few words were said, especially since Shimmer kept elbowing Speaker whenever he tried to ask about the negotiations.

After breakfast Speaker and Shimmer quickly found themselves summoned to the castle library where they found Red, Sunrise and Cash waiting for them. Cash told them everything, slowly, as he had to write it down on paper – him trying to speak sounding as if he has a turnip stuffed in his mouth.

He had found the water walkers’ main rice shop in the doorway of one of the warehouses they had taken over. It wasn’t hard to find, but it was clearly also set up so that they could simply close the door at a moment’s notice if the city guard came. They nearly closed up when Cash approached – apparently they had been monitoring who came and went from the castle, which incidentally meant that only Sullen Hoof’s true appearance was unknown to them, which would make sneaking up on them somewhat difficult.

“I can shapeshift… trust me, that won’t be an issue” Shimmer noted, but Cash then told her that going in solo against them wasn’t really an option.

“I managed to get myself an audience with their leader. A stallion by the name of Paddle Splash, a boatspony before he formed the gang who used to ferry ponies across the river” Cash scribbled down on another piece of paper.

Red wondered why there’d be a need for that kind of services. Cash quickly scribbled that under normal circumstances the bridge is under guard, and all merchants crossing it have to pay a toll. Basically Paddle Splash was a smuggler.

“The problem is that he has friends. You see, when he refused to give up the rice, or even sell it back to us, I tried to threaten him with our power and abilities. Postured a bit, showed him my moves, my claw-shoes. To my surprise he wasn’t impressed. At least the essence-bond prevented them from stealing those shoes from me” Cash continued.

Red mumbled something about what in creation a gang could have that would make them not fear a display a of magical martial arts.

“I know – that’s what I thought. Paddle Splash called in his daughter after negotiations broke down… and she not only did she bring along her ‘friends’, she’s also godblooded” Cash wrote, sighing heavily at the memories of what came next.

It was well known among ponies in creation that a union of gods and mortal ponies would yield supernaturally gifted foals. These rare godblooded ponies were often feared, for they would inherit some of their divine parentage’s powers. What Cash described made it sound as if Paddle Splash had managed to seduce a water elemental or some other river spirit: “From how Paddle Splash described the aptly named Water Hoof, then he hadn’t exactly expected to get a godblooded foal dumped in his lap three seasons after screwing whatever it was he screwed – but he seemed very happy with the results”
“You mentioned that she brought friends? Other godblooded ponies?” Shimmer wondered.

Cash shook his head ever so slightly, as doing so seemed to hurt him a bit: “No, water elementals. Not sure how to describe them though. They were like boulders of water full of silk with bright white eyes that ‘roll’ around on the ground… or charge you and swallow you up – and then it’s not unlike having fallen into stone-filled river rapids while also drowning. Not fun”
Shimmer noted that she was familiar with a lot of different kinds of water elementals back west, but that specific kind of water elementals was new to her. Sunrise said that she had seen that kind of elementals in Great Forks: “The enforcers often have to break up brawls between them. They’re called River Bulls, and are the sort of elementals that gods of rivers use to generate currents in their waterways. Small living tsunamis, with a temper to match, they can move and manipulate water like nothing else”

“Ok ,a gang with command of a bunch of elementals. That explains at least part of how they were able to take control of the rice-granaries. You said you couldn’t buy the rice back?” Red said, appearing to be thinking about how one kills off spirits.
Nodding, Cash wrote that since the gang had been selling rice to the ponies in the city he had offered to buy the lot of it. Sunrise was surprised to hear this, being impressed that Cash would spend that much money willingly.

“You make it sound like I don’t like spending money. I’m a businesspony. You have to spend money to make money – or in this case I’m buying us a very good reputation which I’m betting will pay off later. I offered them most of the gold and jewelry we’d taken from Denansdor, without saying where the goods were from of course. I don’t know what kind of deal Paddle Splash has set up for the rice, but it’s not to sell it back to the ponies here. I heard from some of the lieutenants that they’re busy stealing carts and bribing what few carpenters and coopers that are left in the city to make more carts and barrels. They’re getting ready to transport the rice out of Chung Do” Cash wrote, the floating quill he manipulated jotting down words at a furious pace.

“We have to stop them!” Speaker stated, getting up from the table. His anger was clearly displayed, with his breath quickened and his lips curled in a furious frown.

Sunrise Glow urged for caution and careful planning: “Hold on Speaker. Can we even fight elementals?”

Speaker gave Sunrise a stern look: “I can’t, but we don’t need to in order to hold back wagons full of rice”

“I have some spirit-slaying charms. Can’t do without them in the west, storm mothers and whatnot” Shimmer noted.

Sunrise wasn’t convinced. She advocated caution: “Speaker, you cannot let your emotions take control of you. I don’t like what they did to Cash either, but we need to plan this out – we need to know what we’re up against”

Taking a deep breath, then sighing slowly, Speaker glared at Sunrise: “If the water walkers know that we have powers – and still did this – then they know that we’ll come after them. If they have any ounce of smarts to their name they’ll be shipping out right now. If the city catches wind that its food supply is gone we’ll have riots. Even if we can somehow quell those then ponies here will starve in two or three days, assuming that they even have food right now. I am not ‘just’ furious at what was done to Cash; if we don’t stop this right now this city is dead and I for one will not let that many ponies suffer on my watch”
“Very well – but I still think that we need more time to prepare” Sunrise Glow noted.

Captain Bighoof was shortly thereafter besieged by requests for armor and equipment. The castle armory was raided and the circle mustered in the courtyard an hour later. Cash’s vanity had prevented him from wearing anything larger than a simple chest plate which he could hide under his new green silk shirt courtesy of former shogun’s private wardrobe. Shimmer wasn’t wearing any armor at all – or clothes for that matter – shapeshifting not working very well with armor or barding. Speaker and Red were decked out in the best lamellar barding from the castle armory, while Sunrise had reluctantly been talked into at least putting a chainmail shirt under her robes, although she wasn’t bringing any weapons, saying that she refused to get blood on her hooves.

“Has any of you seen Sully?” Cash wrote, shifting uncomfortably with his chestplate while floating the paper with his statement around for circle to see. None in the circle had. Speaker said that he didn’t expect Sullen Hoof to reveal himself until he had something to report, or was sure that there was nothing to report. Oh the joys of spycraft.

The circle marched out of the castle in full battle regalia, weapons ready. While Cash couldn’t walk very quickly, then he could easily guide the rest of the circle to the warehouse where he had met Paddle Splash via a map he’d drawn. In the square with the fountains outside of the castle Shimmer shifted into her monsterpony bird form, but this time there were differences to how she usually appeared: Instead of covered in feathers she was covered in a black and purple thorny segmented chitinous shell. Her appearance was like a mix of an elemental dragon, a bird with scales for feathers and a very large monstrous insect. Several of the civilian ponies at the one open fountain in the square turned and ran, screaming as if they had seen a demon – which honestly wasn’t that much of a stretch considering what Shimmer looked like.

However, Shimmer wasn’t done. Digging her huge six-inch talons into the cobblestone her body began to ripple and bulge with a slight silvery shimmer. She began to grow… and minute or so later she was the size of a large bull, four times the size of a pony. Kneeling down the rest of the circle was able to climb up on her back, although Cash complained that her spiky carapace was not very comfortable to sit on.

Shimmer unfolded her now very large wings which were replete with thin scales instead of feathers and slowly took off – flying the circle straight to the warehouse that Cash had mapped out.

Enroute Sunrise Glow spoke fervently of never wavering, never doubting in the righteousness of one’s action. She even paraphrased Speaker, saying that it was for the greater that such villainous ponies were struck down by the heavenly hoof of the lawgivers. Her words only reassured the others in their chosen course, but it was nice to hear anyway.

Over the warehouse Speaker gave out the final instructions: “We need to catch this Paddle Splash or some other high ranking gang member – that’ll give us information on their organization and where they’re taking the rice, but our first priority is stopping the rice transports. So block the doors, smash the wheels and take out any pony hauling, pushing or carrying the rice. Sunrise, you make a hole, we follow through”

With that said the circle nodded – Shimmer emitting a bird-of-prey like shriek – and then Sunrise jumped off and plummeted down to the warehouse roof… which she hit, smashing through it. Shimmer dove down to follower her, crashing through the pony-shaped hole in the roof with an almighty explosion of shattered wooden beams and planks while her passengers took cover under her armored wings.

The moment Shimmer landed the rest of circle leapt out, Sunrise extracting herself from the hole in the ground her impact had buried her in, everyone striking an awesome pose with their weapons out, with the battle-shaped Shimmer as their backdrop.

Too bad there was only a single pony in the warehouse, who seemed to have been in the process of hauling a clay jug full of lamp oil from one end of the building to the other. That one pony was already really scared from the sudden collapse of part of the warehouse roof, the pony having dropped the clay jug and begun to run for the exit, the only sounds to heard in the vast empty warehouse being the sound of hooves on wooden floorboards, the one pony going “Shit shit shit!” and occasional bit of broken wood falling from the hole in the ceiling down on the wooden floor.

“Uhm… I think this is the wrong warehouse” Cash wrote and showed to the others, probably looking a bit embarrassed under his helmet.

Shimmer, with her head alone being the size of a pony, scowled at Cash: “Well so much for the element of surpri- hold on”
Turning around a few times, angling her chitin-scaled bird-head in different directions, Shimmer suddenly cried out “They’re down the street – I can feel elementals down there” and charged through the nearest door out of the warehouse.

The circle followed and sure enough, outside the warehouse that they had crashed into, down the road, were two dozen large wagons being loaded up with sacks and barrels of rice. Around the wagons were several dozen ponies with blue headbands, plus a single stallion up on one of the wagons with a bushy grey beard wearing Cash’s blue silk shirt who was barking orders at the rest of the ponies.

Of course, crashing through a large warehouse door wasn’t a subtle way to make an entrance, so the circle was spotted immediately. Paddle Splash shouted for his crony-ponies to hurry up and haul the rice out while two dozen water walkers armed with blades lashed to their hooves – the most common poor pony’s fighting gear – made for a nice wall of ablative flesh between the circle and the rice wagons.

A young made leapt out from behind that wall of armed water walkers: The godblooded mare Water Hoof. Her mane was like flowing muddy water that sprang from her scalp down her neck and her coat was mottled black and brown. Around her hooves was a thick cloudy mist that sheathed her hooves and lower parts of her legs with a thin cover of white.

The armed water walkers, led by the godblooded mare, charged. The circle charged as well, although Shimmer took off and tried to block the rice wagons with her bulk.

At first Speaker, Red and Cash made easy work of the first few water walkers they traded blows with. Gift cut through flesh with endless ease, Red’s blade even more so, while Cash struck with heavenly enhanced might – sending ponies flying with great speed, many of them impacting on building walls which left bloody smears as they slowly slid dow, if not impaled on something and left hanging.

Speaker noticed that the godblooded mare hadn’t joined the fray… she was holding back, gesturing to unseen allies? It was then that Speaker, Red and Cash all found themselves suddenly caught in spheres of water that had flowed up from the gutters! Speaker instantly activated his elemental immunity charm as enchanted water forced itself down into his lungs, but he was unable to break free! Gift sailed through the water, but couldn’t  harm his liquid cage at all! He could only look on in horror as Cash and Red flailed their limbs and weapons around helplessly as they began to drown. Cash even fired a claw from his magic shoes into a nearby warehouse wall, trying to pull himself out of the watery prison, but he didn’t have the strength to counter the water holding him back.

The appearance of the elementals hadn’t gone unnoticed to Shimmer who seconds later came barreling down the street, howling like only an enraged lunar could. Her talons blazed with white silvery light and cut into the spheres of elemental water – but… nothing happened. Shimmer quickly realized that the spheres of water were just that; the elementals controlling the water were elsewhere in hiding. Normally she would simply scan the area with her third eye, looking for the flow of watery essence that controlled the spheres and track that back to the spirits – but Speaker and the circle… what to do!?

Shimmer chose to save the now very unconscious clearly drowning Red and Cash first, snatching them out of the water spheres and throwing them up on the nearest warehouse rooftop. She then turned to get Speaker but was intercepted by the godblooded mare who now seemed to be floating around a magic sledgehammer made of mist. It struck Shimmer’s carapace so hard that it cracked, eliciting a pained shriek from Shimmer.

Twisting around to both grab Speaker and fend off her magical assailant, Shimmer suffered another blow that cracked the carapace around her left forelimb, which severely reduced her ability to fight, since her other forelimb held a sputtering Speaker who was trying to clear his lungs of water. The water might not be drowning him, but it made transitioning to breathing air very bothersome.

Fighting mortals were easy enough, Shimmer had done so many times, but godblooded – especially when you don’t know what their powers are… that’s never easy – not unlike fighting a unicorn for the first time: Did the unicorn know any magical martial arts, sorcery, or was it a freshly exalted unicorn with only a minimum of charms?

Shimmer tried to fly away with Speaker, but the water spheres had moved and were latching on to her legs. Slashing weakly with her broken arm at the water did nothing, and the godblooded was still going at it. Quickly locking her gaze with the godblooded mare Shimmer used a lunar trick to make the mare think that Shimmer about to pull a swift counterattack, a simple illusion, but it made the mare end her onslaught and put up her guard for a moment. This gave Shimmer enough time to free herself from the ensorcelled water binding her legs, letting her lift off and then snatch the onconcious Red and Cash from the rooftop, flying back over the river towards the castle.

“Shimmer!” Speaker suddenly shouted, having finally cleared his airways of water: “…did you see what happened to Sunrise?”
> Chapter 22: Blood is Thicker Than Water Until You Drown
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Landing in the castle courtyard Speaker instantly began to wake Red and Cash up from their unconscious and half-droned state the moment Shimmer released him from her ten inch talons. While doing so Shimmer took off again, shapeshifting into a small songbird with a broken leg and chirped: “I’ll track the rice wagons!”

Speaker looked up at Shimmer while shaking Red: “No you don’t, look for Sunrise! If that gang gets their hooves on her she’s in big trouble!”

Flying down and landing on Speaker’s left shoulder, Shimmer wondered if it wasn’t a better idea to keep track of the rice. Speaker disagreed and pleaded to Shimmer: “Sunrise can’t fight and I doubt the gang will give her pause to use her social charms on them. If they catch her they’ll kill her or worse – find her, please”

Shimmer knew what Speaker meant. A young adolescent mare caught by a gang of wanted criminals that her friends had just tried to kill? Shimmer could easily imagine that if caught then Sunrise would most likely be gang raped first, then killed – or be left in front of the castle again by nightfall in an even worse state. Of course, what is one pony – even if a solar – against all the ponies of a city like Chung Do? Solars reincarnate, but cities just fell. Still, Speaker’s request was all but impossible for Shimmer to deny as her lunar bond to his solar exaltation gave her an overpowering urge to please and protect Speaker; and right now Speaker seemed to fear more for his friend than the city.

After Shimmer had flown off the young shogun Chung Onyx came down into the courtyard. Seeing his seemingly lifeless older sister that he had barely known for a week or two lying on the cobblestone did not sit well with the young colt.

Thinking back to his service in Lookshy as an army medic and surgeon, Speaker had on many occasions been forced to deal with the irate family members of injured ponies. This had been everything from innumerable variations of mothers, sisters, brothers, foals and other forms of close family that simply could or would not stop crying and would cling to their injured relative, making actually saving the patient’s life difficult, to angry officers or furious noble house matriarchs verbally abusing a patient for daring to be injured while there was a need for them on the battlefield or in their family business. Chung Onyx’s reaction to seeing Speaker draw water out of Red’s airways appeared to be a mix of both type of reactions.
Intermittently beating on Red’s armor with impotent anger and frustration, only to stop to cry or sob uncontrollably, Onyx wasn’t in any state to listen to calming voices. Speaker emphasized with the young colt’s pain, but at the same time his professionalism bid him to somehow ‘remove’ Onyx so treatment could continue. If only Sunrise had been here…

“How could you! You have to stay and help! I can’t do this on my own big sister” Onyx cried while Speaker contemplated his options. He had very little time to clear Cash and Red’s airways otherwise they would simply up and die, no matter how tough Red was or how handsome and wellspoken Cash was.

Ultimately a powerful right hoof to the jaw did the trick, knocking Onyx out in one blow – and a flash of essence and a medical diagnostic charm ensured that the young shogun wasn’t hurt in any serious way.

With Onyx out of the way Red and Cash were quickly restored to breathing condition, with Red being at least mildly understanding as to why Speaker had knocked out her little brother.

While Red had recovered from her near-drowning with no detectable injuries then Cash had not been so lucky. Speaker figured it was the prolonged lack of air, while Red was sure that it was a blow to the head from a water walker – either way Cash appeared to have suffered some mild brain damage. Ok maybe not mild…

Later as the sun drew to its zenith, inside castle Chung in Cash’s quarters while watching Cash thrash around weakly, leather restraints holding him to his bed, Red despaired. Cash couldn’t speak, only make out garbled sounds as if trying to speak with half an onion in your mouth, nor could he control his limbs: “You sure there’s even anything left inside of him?”
“Yes I am,  and he’ll recover soon enough – my healing charms has seen to that, but it might be as much as five or six days before it kicks in. In Lookshy soldiers and officers who ended up like this, usually after fighting changelings, would be sent to special homes outside o Lookshy where they would be looked after. I remember seeing loud-mouthed grunts having their mouths and noses, sometimes their entire faces, removed by changeling magic… even if you got to them in time to carve a hole in their neck or where their face was so they could breathe there often wasn’t much to do for them… I feel the same here. We’ve failed Chung Do” Speaker noted, the disappointment he felt in himself for pushing so much to rush ahead with an attack on the water walkers resounding in his voice.

While Speaker sounded as if he had lost all hope Red refused to give up, for her faith in her home was too strong: “Now hold on. There’s no one here blaming you for water walker trickery. So what if we rushed in, we had to or else we’d have lost the rice without even trying to stop it. Shimmer’s off tracking the rice wagons right? …so the three of us will head after them in the morning. Sunrise and Cash’s sacrifice will not be in vain”

“It’s a moot point. The ponies in the city will realize that their food is gone soon enough… there’ll be chaos in the streets” Speaker said, sighing deeply while gazing out a window over the city. It wasn’t hard to imagine it going up in flames on account of this, especially as nine out of ten buildings were built of wood.

Red suddenly bit down and yanked hard on Speaker’s mane-braid. Speaker yelped and turned around: “Hey, what gives?”
What Speaker got was a hoof-slap across the face from an angry Red: “You need to drop that attitude right now. I need you to think up a solution, not brood over the problem. I know the castle has food stores, what if we use that?”

Trotting over to Cash’s desk and flipping through some of the paperwork he had lying there, Speaker floated up a scroll that seemed to be an inventory assessment that Cash had been making: “According to this… maybe if we ration the castle’s food supply and have Shimmer fly out to hunt every day as well… hmm…”

“Well?” Red inquired, relieved that Speaker finally started thinking again instead of moping around.

Speaker wasn’t sure, for it depended a lot on how well the food could be distributed – plus the city would have to be told that the rice was gone, but without rioting, and with both Sunrise and Cash not available to do break the news that part of the plan seemed impossible.

“Just give me a number – how many days or weeks do we have to get the rice back?” Red implored.

“A week maybe? You’ll have to go talk to Onyx and get him to release the food and set up the distribution, maybe get the captain in on it as well to guard against looters” Speaker said, watching Red run off before he was even done talking. When the warrior mare was out of sight Speaker began gingerly rubbing his sore scalp and face – dawn caste’s really hurt...

It wasn’t long before Shimmer returned – and she wasn’t alone, for she was carrying a pony in her claws. Spotting her come flying into the courtyard in her monsterpony form from the window in Cash’s quarters, Speaker ran down to the courtyard to see who it was.

His hopes that it was Sunrise Glow were quickly dashed when Speaker got to the courtyard door. He could hear the shouting and commotion outside… it was a mare, not Shimmer, shouting and cursing in ways that would make even a Nexus sailor blush.

Entering into the courtyard Speaker quickly spotted why Shimmer had brought this pony in as he got close: Aside from her worn rough linen clothing, the mare had a bright blue head-band on. Shimmer had captured a water walker.

“I found her trying to torch the empty rice granaries, probably so the ponies who didn’t know the rice was stolen would think it was just burnt to ash” Shimmer noted, her ’voice’ while in her monsterpony form reverberating inside all the ponies around her’s heads.

The water walker mare was less appreciative of her apprehension, spouting a non-stop stream of colorful language, mostly about Shimmer being a monster, how she was going to kill every pony in the castle because of this – and in what brutal and gory ways she’d kill them all, although all spoken through the blurry lens of a mare who probably didn’t have much of an education and thus not much variation in her vocabulary.

Having grown tired of the foul-mouthed water walker long ago, Shimmer looked at Speaker with relief: “You get to play with her now – I’ve had more than enough”

Speaker looked with some confusion as Shimmer leapt into the air flew off towards the eastern side of the city again, but then she shouted: “I’ll keep looking for Sunrise – they can’t have taken her far”

Red appeared in the courtyard moments later, to the sight of guardsponies restraining the water walker while Speaker looked at the captured mare in an inquisitive fashion.

“Was that Shimmer? Oh she caught a water walker, sweet!” Red said, speaking her mind out loud as she approached.
Speaker nodded and kept his gaze fixed on the by now gagged and squirming water walker mare: “Did Onyx agree to the rationing?”

Red said that it had taken some convincing, but the castle staff was already hauling up bags of rice and other things from the cellar. It was clear from how Red described her talking to her little brother that she wasn’t happy with the situation, but now there was a punching bag to take some of that anger and frustration out on, wasn’t there?

“I won’t let you torture our prisoner Red” Speaker said dourly, shaking his head sternly so his long mustache swayed from side to side.

Red didn’t seem to get Speaker’s message, stepping up to the prisoner and grabbing the brown-coated water walker mare’s dark mane and yanking it back, exposing the mare’s throat to Red: “Speaker, for all we know they’ve killed Sunrise. I want t- no, I need to do this. I’m gonna go all first age on her… spread her out over twin-fountain square like a thin red smear…”

The simmering rage in Red’s voice was unmistakable. Still, Speaker had other plans: “No you won’t. We need answers right now – and if I can get her to tell us where all the other water walkers are hiding, maybe also where the rice is stashed, then you’ll have hundreds of ponies to righteously punish – but killing defenseless prisoners? Not on my watch”

“Oh sure, and she’ll just tell us, wont you?” Red said, slipping the prisoner’s gag down to let the mare speak.

What the water walker started saying didn’t exactly convince Red that the prisoner would cooperate, although she did mentally take note of some of the new flavorful cursewords. Mudsucking scumlicker? Nice.

Speaker gestured for the guardsponies to haul the prisoner down into the castle dungeons and followed after them. Red was still upset, although now she merely suggested that she come along to help yank the mare’s teeth out or whatever Speaker had intended to get the mare to speak as she trailed after Speaker.

“If we take out her teeth she won’t be able to speak properly. Besides, that kind of torture doesn’t work. With regular torture your victim just ends up telling you anything you want to hear, just to make you stop – I’ve seen that a lot in Lookshy. No, what I will do is something that I will do alone and I can guarantee you….” Speaker said, turning around to face Red in front of the reinforced door down to the dungeon: “She will not feel pain, but she will cooperate when I’m done with her”

Red took a few steps back, her face showing no small level of concern. It had been the way that Speaker had the part about not feeling pain, the almost cheerfully malign expression that for a brief moment had flashed across Speaker’s face.
“Don’t do anything stupid alright?” Red said as Speaker stepped down into the dungeon.

Speaker turned his head and sighed: “She will not feel pain, for as I said that kind of torture is barbaric. Nothing I will do cannot be undone, for that will be the bargaining chip I will use to get the information we need, assuming she knows. I will not force her to speak via pain, I will negotiate for the information in exchange for medical services”

Red didn’t like how Speaker was so calm about talking of… medical services. The few torturers she had met in her life as mercenary had either been monsters who liked to hurt other ponies or weird quiet types who never asked questions before pulling at least one hoof off their victims first… and Speaker was beginning to sound like the second sort. Of course, with how he’d healed Shimmer Red knew that Speaker could work miracles when it came to healing… but she wasn’t sure if she wanted to know the details.

The last Red saw of Speaker was his tail just as the door shut behind him. Not long after the three guardsponies that had hauled the water walker in came out quietly with worried expressions behind their helmets, speaking with hushed voices to each other: “Medical torture? That’s new”

Red returned to the castle courtyard, pacing the battlements on the wall as she looked for Shimmer. The vents and barred windows down to the dungeon were in earshot, but there weren’t any screams or shouting. The only kind of interrogation she knew of involved a lot of both, but hey, maybe Speaker knew some weird Lookshyan or first age interrogation techniques?

Shimmer returned several hours later with no new prisoners or ponies this time. It was late and the sun had gone down, leaving the castle courtyard illuminated by torches and braziers full of burning coals. Red filled Shimmer in on the plan regarding the food, now in full swing, as servant ponies were almost done bringing food out to a distribution point set up on the twin-fountain square under the cover of darkness.

“Ok, sounds like a plan – but we still need to spread the word through the whole city so the ponies know where to go for food” Shimmer noted.

Red agreed that this was still an issue, but there weren’t enough healthy criers or heralds left to spread the news the usual way – and the few that were left didn’t seem keen on going in diseased neighborhoods.

Shimmer suddenly perked up, turned away from Red and shouted: “Hey Speaker! Learn anything?”

Red turned and saw that Speaker had emerged from the dungeons, casting long shadows from the lanterns at the thick reinforced dungeon door. His fore-hooves were completely covered in blood and left bloody hoof-prints on the cobblestone, while his face and the front part of his uniform were partially stained in blood as well.

Shimmer leapt from the battlements down to Speaker, a jump that would have killed most mortal ponies – it being a seven yard drop, at which point Speaker quickly gestured for Shimmer to withhold her exuberance.

“I know where Sunrise is and I know where the rice is” Speaker said in a slow, deliberate and somber tone, looking down into the ground. He did not sound happy at all.

Shimmer put a hoof on Speaker’s shoulder and gave him a cheerful smile: “That’s great… but why the glum look?”

Speaker sighed and shook his head slowly: “Just trying to remind myself that we’re the good ponies, right?”

“What are you talking about?” Shimmer said, sounding noticeably more apprehensive.

Speaker looked up at Shimmer. There were tears in his eyes shining in the dim torchlight: “Don’t ask. Just fly over to the river under the great bridge and have a sniff down in the water. Milda… the prisoner said that they tossed Sunrise into the river with rocks tied around her hooves and neck – find her, now! The rice is being sent to a granary near the village of Pebblehoof, we’ll go after that once you’re back with Sunrise”

Shimmer nodded fervently and launched herself up into the air, turning into her seagull form and flying off. Red came down from the battlements later, Speaker briefing her on the information he had obtained.

“And how do you know she told you the truth?” Red said, her concern over the truthfulness of the information clear for all to see.

Speaker shrugged apologetically: “Milda, that’s her name by the way, wants it to be true. When I was done with her she had very little motivation to lie, but quite a lot to tell me the truth”

“Is that so…” Red said cautiously, still not entirely interested in getting the exact details of Speaker’s interrogation techniques: “But why did they steal the rice then?”

This Speaker knew the answer to: According to Milda then someone had contacted Paddle Splash a few months ago, after the water walkers had taken over the city’s food supply. The original plan had simply been to profiteer from the monopoly, but the plan changed after this stranger had approached Paddle Splash. It had taken time, with Cash’s appearance having forced Paddle Splash to further speed up the execution of the plan to avoid failure – but apparently some rich pony was willing to pay a fortune for all the city’s rice.

“Who would do something like that? Whoever this buyer is she’d know that it would mean the doom of Chung Do” Red exclaimed.

Speaker didn’t have a clue as to who the buyer might be, but noted that it could just as well be one of the rebel nobles, as it could be a scrupulous guild factor who’d then try to sell the rice back to Chung Do for an even higher price: “The hundred kingdoms – got to love how things work here” Speaker said sarcastically.

The two solars walked up to the battlements on the wall and gazed out at the great bridge. In the darkness of the night it wasn’t possible to see Shimmer, but suddenly there was a great golden light in the river under the bridge – and moments later Shimmer, in her monsterpony form, burst through the water with a brilliantly glowing Sunrise Glow in her claws.

It looked like a tiny sun was being flown over the city in the claws of a giant bird which landed in the castle courtyard. Speaker and Red rushed down to the two. Sunrise was soaked and still had thick robes tightly bound around her legs, with rocks in burlap sacks tied to the ropes, but seemed surprisingly ok beyond that…

“You’re alright! That’s amazing!” Red shouted, tears in her eyes.

Sunrise wasn’t having any of it, acting as if nothing had happened: “Oh quiet you, this is no time to lose your composure. Speaker, Shimmer said that you’d learnt where the rice was?”

“Yes… but how did you survive being chucked in the river? You don’t have any elemental immunity charms like I do” Speaker wondered, amazed that the adolescent mare wasn’t hurt in any noticeable way at all.

Sunrise plainly stated that she had simply held her breath to begin with, then found a sunken ship down on the river-bottom that still had some air-pockets left. Then she had simply crawled into one such air-pocket and put herself into a meditative trance, only breathing once an hour to converse air. Her plan had been to let her ropes soak and become loose, so she could slip them off and resurface.

Shimmer added that she’d tracked Sunrise’s scent underwater to the shipwreck, then knocked on the shipwreck after which Sunrise had flared her anima to make finding her much easier.

“Wait, if you could walk around on the bottom of the river, why not just walk up from the river?” Red wondered.

Sunrise tried to lift a hoof, but the heavy pony-head-sized rocks didn’t allow for much room to move: “Going upwards was not an option, and the river is surprisingly deep under the bridge – there were quite a few wrecks down there”

Shimmer nodded, stating that it was at least a hundred and twenty fathoms. This had also meant that even if Sunrise had flared her anime while on the bottom the rest of the circle wouldn’t have been able to see it on the surface.

“Alright – then we can go after the rice now!” Red exclaimed, stomping triumphantly on the ground.

“No we can’t – we need to plan and scout ahead” Sunrise said like an angry mother reproving a foal, killing Red’s buzz very effectively.

This time Speaker was a lot more inclined to agree with Sunrise to err on the side of caution. Shimmer could fly out and find the granary, then scout it out and report back. In the meantime Speaker wanted to spend some time figuring out how he could help fight against the elementals that the water walkers controlled, for there was no sense in charging in only to have Red almost drown again. Speaker equally figured that neither Cash nor Sunrise should come along for that raid, as Cash couldn’t defend himself well enough and Sunrise seemed to already be aware that she couldn’t talk the water walkers down.

Red reluctantly agreed that some more planning might be a sound idea, especially now since the castle food supplies should last for the rest of the week. With that subject brought up Speaker quickly noted that Sunrise would do well to help the food distribution if Shimmer flew her around town so Sunrise could use her speaking charms to inform the city of the food distribution set up in twin-fountain square: “And you’re right – we need to teach Cash some defensive charms or how to toughen up if he’s to be any help”

After removing the ropes from Sunrise that held the rocks to her she and Shimmer left to spread the news.
Speaker retired for the evening – he needed to wash off… badly.

Red too felt that it had been a long day, but morbid curiosity bid her to take a peek into the dungeon first. It was pitch black, so Red willed her caste mark to light up.

What she saw had the stout dawn caste vomiting in seconds: Strapped to a stone table, surrounded by barrels full of bloody-red water, was what was left of this ‘Milda’ pony, the water walker that Shimmer had brought in.

To say that the state of the mare was terrible was an injustice, but it certainly clarified what those guardsponies had meant by ‘medical torture’: The mare was lying on her back on the table, with leather straps over her throat and midriff keeping her place, with Speaker having removed… nearly everything else. The mare had no legs, no tail and large patches of her skin had been removed as well. There were but exposed patches of moist flesh, severed sinew and unattached muscle glistening in the dim light of Red’s caste mark.

It was curious that she did not bleed in any way, indeed Red saw that deliberate care had been taken to connect severed veins and to staunch any and all bleeding, if the pile of bloody rags on the floor was any indication. It was when Red saw what was in the barrels that she vomited, for in the salty water were the limbs, pieces of skin, the one eyeball, nose, and a lot of other smaller pieces of flesh…

It was right after vomiting that Red noticed that Milda was actually moving a little. Milda’s chest moved ever so slightly as the mutilated pony breathed. With her one tearful eye she gazed at Red what was most likely meant to be a panicked expression – but it was hard to tell, for so much of her face was missing. For a moment it looked to Red as if the mare was trying to speak, as she slowly opened her mouth to reveal a full set of teeth in surprisingly good condition, but she closed her mouth again quickly as if the exertion of simply opening her mouth was too much. A sick thought reared itself in the dawn caste mare’s head: Had Speaker done dental work on Milda just to spite Red?

Red quickly left the dungeon, telling herself over and over both that this mare was a vicious criminal and that Speaker had promised that he could undo everything he had done to the mare… she was a vicious criminal and the damage could be undo, yes, a vicious criminal and the damage could be undone.

She now understood why Speaker had questioned whether they were still the good ponies in this conflict.

Red did not sleep well that night, dreaming of herself falling apart over and over again – with Speaker in the form of a terrible bloated corpse with a white ragged mane and beard haphazardly piecing her together again, only for the cycle to repeat, all the while hearing Speaker’s voice saying the same thing over and over: “We have work to do the best for the greatest number of ponies“

> Chapter 23: Divine Retribution
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The week that followed saw an uneasy calm settle over Chung Do. The castle’s stores quickly shrank, and Chung Onyx as well as the castle staff and guards weren't that keen on the humble size of their rations. All the while Speaker set to work recalling how he had slain demons and primordial-sympathizing gods during the primordial war, also checking up on Cash’s recovery from his drowning-induced brain damage. Red and Sunrise helped with crowd control for the food distribution, Red marvelling at how Sunrise with words alone instilled the hungry massed with a sense moral discipline that ensured that the food distribution proceeded as if by clockwork. Sunrise spoke to the hungry and the sick of how whole city had to live, and that each of them would get their piece in time.

Shimmer also aided in the food distribution by supplementing the castle’s food stores via hunting. Being able to fly out Shimmer could easily bypass the roadblocks, and by the fourth time she returned the ponies of Chung Do on the twin-fountain square were cheering on as Shimmer landed in her monsterpony form, carrying four large boars – one for each talon-filled foot, even more so when she would withdrawn dozen more from elsewhere.

All during this Sullen Hoof remained missing and unseen. The circle agreed that this was becoming worrysome: Shimmer couldn’t imagine that Sully would shy away from joining the fight against the water walkers: “Hell, if he’d helped out by infiltrating the gang we might have learned of their plans a lot sooner…”

After the week had passed Cash finally woke up one morning, fully aware and in control of his facilities, with no signs of brain damage. The first thing he called for was a bath, with the rest of the circle quickly gathering in his quarters to celebrate his recovery. Of course, Cash was – to put it very mildly – disappointed when he learned of the rationing: “…and you knew where the water walkers have been hiding the rice all this time? What have you been waiting for?” 

Speaker explained Cash the plan they had come up with and how they had come up with it: Shimmer had scouted out the granary and counted over eight dozen water walkers at the compound and helped Speaker draw up a detailed map of the place, apparently using a charm that allowed her to see through the local wildlife near the granary to constantly check up on the place. The granary itself was simple enough, with several large wooden barns for dry storage of the rice and a waterwheel that powered a mill for grinding rice-flour, as well as a barrack for the laborers that usually worked in the surrounding rice paddies – the owners of the granary and the laborers appeared to have been evicted.

With a map of the compound and the sentry patrol routes Speaker had originally devised a plan whereby the circle would sneak into the compound via the stream, but Shimmer had via her essence sight spotted the gang’s water elementals lounging in the stream. This had complicated things, as there weren’t any other ways in that offered good cover for stealthy approaches.

Because of this Speaker together with Red had come up with a different plan: Red and Shimmer would do a frontal assault, drawing out and engaging as many water walkers as possible, while Speaker would hang back and keep an eye out for the water elementals. If and when the godblooded mare would join the fight Red would engage her directly, while Shimmer would handle all of the water walkers – something Shimmer assured Cash that she was more than capable of.

This left Cash wondering exactly how he fit into the plan, since clearly the circle had been waiting for him to recover. To his disappointment the circle unanimously insisted that Cash stay out of the fighting. Red put it bluntly as only she could: “Until you learn some defensive charms or ox-body techniques you’re too frail for combat”

“Oh please, I’m as sturdy as the next pony” Cash boasted, stretching slowly and painfully as he stood up for the first time in a week.

Red wasn’t impressed: “That’s the problem Cash. You’re ‘only’ as sturdy as a mortal pony. That just doesn’t cut when up against elementals, godblooded ponies or other exalted. If Speaker had been just a few minutes late in getting you breathing again you would’ve drowned. All of us know ox-body techniques or defensive charms, or both. Sure, you’re not that bad with your claw-shoes against mortal opponents, but you were knocked out in seconds by that magic water”

Cash reluctantly conceded that he wasn’t as battle-hardened as Red or Speaker, but still wondered if he had any roll at all to play in the recovery of the rice. He had. Speaker explained that Cash and Sunrise were to hold back and stay out of sight until the fighting was over, then come in and talk whatever surviving water walkers down into orderly submission – assuming they hadn’t fled at that point.

There was also one other thing to do before Shimmer was to fly the circle out to the granary: Sunrise had been asking around to find out where the water walkers might have gotten hold of their water elementals. Such spirits of nature were usually under control of local gods, and sure enough the ponies of Chung Do mentioned a goddess by the name of Gudaa, the god of the brown river – the river that ran through Chung Do. Basically what Sunrise wanted to do was to meet this god and try to get the elementals recalled.

“…and how exactly do you plan on summoning a god?” Cash wondered.

Shimmer chuckled: “Oh come on Cash, every foal should know that… you just pray hard enough”

“And my essence sees to that my prayers are always heard. What I need you for is to help ascertain if the god is being truthful” Sunrise solemnly stated.

After Cash had cleaned up and gotten dressed the circle went down to the docks where a shrine to Gudaa had been made countless generations ago. The shrine itself was but a statue carved of granite in such a way that it looked like a mare with a mane of water-plants and limbs that all flowed into a single wave of wave of water. It was customary that all who sailed the brown river to give a token offering in the large bowl at the base of the shrine, which contained strange shards of blue glass that gave off ice-cold flames that consumed all the offerings chucked in the bowl.

Sunrise moved up in front of the shrine with the rest of the circle apart from the missing Sullen Hoof standing behind the adolescent mare.

Sunrise drew a deep breath and proceeded to sing a most beautiful song. Speaker had to wonder when Sunrise had come up with the song, for it was a wonderful ode to the calm waters of the brown river, its steady flow and its life-giving bounties all of which of course were thanks to the goddess Gudaa. Aside from the singing sounding hauntingly beautiful Speaker couldn’t help but develop a strange sense of curiosity while hearing the song. This only made him ponder the question of when and how Sunrise had come up with such a perfect song for the occasion even harder.

After a few minutes of singing the waters under the pier that the circle was standing on began to bubble and churn. At first the circle was startled, but then a most curious sight emerged from the waters next to the pier – well, to a native of Great Forks it probably wasn’t that impressive, but still: A being roughly in the shape of a pony, with limbs of the murky water of the river and a body clad in a flowing dress of the red, blue and purple flowers that grew along the banks of the river and a head that looked as if somehow hewn from a solid chunk of living ice that constantly melted yet never shrank, giving off a beautiful flowing mane of clear water that perfectly accentuated the goddesses eye’s of spherical sapphires.

There was a moment of silence where only the background noise of the city, which was much quieter than usual due to the plague greatly reducing the amount of business going on, and the sound of flowing water under Gudaa could be heard, as she stood on a pedestal of her river’s water.

The goddess seemed most curious: “Oh… what interesting guests I have… and such pretty singing. Who do I have to thank for that” she spoke, her voice deep and overbearing, like a joyous grandmother visited for the first time by a darling granddaughter.

“Greetings Gudaa, Goddess of the brown river – I am Sunrise Glow, of the solar zenith caste. I have humbly prayed for an audience with you on the matter of a gang of criminals from Chung Do which me and my associates here have seen in command of a number of water elementals. We wish to know if you are aware of any of your or other local elemental courts having a problem with rogue elementals aiding and abetting in mortal criminal activity” Sunrise rapidly stated in a monotone voice.

The goddess seemed a bit taken aback at how direct Sunrise was, Sunrise not starting off with polite conversation or a lengthier personal introduction, but the goddess none the less mulled over the question: “Hmm… no, I know of no elemental courts in my domain that would do something like that. Have they caused trouble?”

Sunrise explained that with the power of the elementals backing up them up one gang, called the Water Walkers, had stolen all the rice in Chung Do – and that it would be much easier to recover the rice if the elementals weren’t there to be enforcers for the gang.

“What a terrible debacle. But truthfully, I know of no rogue water elementals in my domain. All of my minions are, to my knowledge, at their posts as dictated by me – either performing their given duties or serving me in my court when I deign to reside there” Gudaa gracefully stated.

Sunrise remained silent for a moment to give her circle-mates time to add anything, an opportunity that Cash used to ask about Water Hoof, the godblooded mare. Gudaa’s response to this was a mirthful one: “Should I even be caught disgracing myself with a mortal I can assure all of you that I would keep such an offspring in my court as a servant or simply kill it off to avoid the embarrassment. Whatever spirit that bore this godblooded pony is disgracing itself by allowing this Water Hoof to commit these criminal acts you speak of”

“Very well oh goddess of the brown river. We graciously thank you for your information. We shall deal with these water walkers on our soon enough, and then we can put all of this behind us” Sunrise said, nodding.

Satisfied with Gudaa’s answers Sunrise Glow thanked Gudaa for her time, bowing gracefully. Gudaa bowed her head in kind, stating that it had been far too long since she had entertained solars: “Sunrise Glow, you are more than welcome to visit me in my spirit court should you wish – merely pray for guidance and I shall send a servant spirit to show you the way”

With this said Gudaa sank into the river, disappearing from sight without leaving even a single ripple on the surface of the water.

“Well that was interesting” Cash noted, looking intrigued.

Speaker looked quizzically at Cash. Cash chuckled: “Well she’s certainly a river goddess, because you don’t get any more slippery than that”

“What do you mean?” Red wondered.

Cash explained that while it was perfectly plausible that Gudaa was speaking the truth, but she none the less dodged most of Sunrise Glow’s questions, while Sunrise also never asked directly whether Water Hoof had directly lent or stationed the elementals with the water walkers: “What if the ‘proper’ duty station of those water elementals were with the water walkers? And while she said that whatever spirit had born this godblood has disgraced itself, then that didn’t answer if she knew who it was – or if it was herself”

Sunrise defended her choice of words by arguing that insulting gods is never wise: “The mere insinuation would have offended her. It would be most unwise to upset the god government the city’s main source of wealth”
“Sunrise, darling, there’s being polite – and then there’s failing to get any useful information by being a slave to etiquette. You have to admit that we’re none the wiser after this brief little audience with Gudaa”
With a huff Sunrise turned and began to walk back towards the castle: “Cash Charmer, if you are not satisfied with my inquiries then feel free to summon the next divinity we need speak to yourself”

Back at the castle the circle armed themselves once more. Meeting in the courtyard Speaker couldn’t help but notice that Red hadn’t put on her lamellar barding yet, indeed she didn’t seem to have brought any out at all –but Red said that she was saving her energy for the fight: “Weighing ourselves down prematurely will just lead to us wasting essence and energy”
Sunrise commended Red on her prudence. Cash noted that he wasn’t entirely pleased with not having to fight, but was curious about how they were going to handle the water elementals. Speaker was happy to inform Cash that he’d solved that issue: “I’ll be on elemental overwatch. If they appear I’ll be able to see them, even if dematerialized – and I’ll have a nasty surprise waiting for them if they do”

Shimmer conjured her cloud and the circle was off at great speed. While in-flight Speaker explained that while meditating on his first age memories to find a way to fight spirits he’d recalled a basic technique that allowed solars to see, hear and otherwise sense spirits, ghosts and demons of all kinds while they were invisible: “It requires some basic knowledge on how spirits work to perform, but I think you will all have to agree that learning this charm will be useful for all of you”
Red agreed, reminding the circle that once the gang had been dealt with there still was the deathknight in the swamps that the Bodhisattva had warned against – and that might mean encountering similarly immaterial soul-eating hungry ghosts. Cash agreed, noting that it’d make any future diplomatic work with gods and spirits a lot easier. Sunrise said that she already knew it, but agreed that Red, Cash and even Sullen Hoof would stand to benefit from learning this charm. Of course, Red and Cash weren’t in any way learned about the ways of spirits, ghosts and demons – so while Shimmer began to lower the cloud to the ground Speaker used his harmonious academic methodology to impart wisdom into the minds of Red and Cash.

After they had landed Shimmer explained that they were about three miles south of the granary. Retrieving a map from elsewhere, Shimmer showed how the stream that fed the water-wheel powering the rice-mill at the granary came via a hill that they were on the other side of. She had landed there to avoid the water walker patrols that surrounded the place from spotting her cloud.

“Of couse, at this point subletly isn’t a concern – so I’ll just be over here…” Shimmer said, smiling as she sauntered away from the circle.

Speaker was about to ask what she meant when Shimmer began to shapeshift – and grow – and grow – and she just kept on growing…

Previously for the warehouse raid Shimmer had grown to the size of a large bull, three times the size of a pony – but this was much much bigger. Equally, Shimmer’s shapeshifting usually only lasted a few seconds – but this one took several minutes… and when done she was in her monsterpony form, standing over ten yards tall and at least a twenty yards long, each of her feathers this time morphed into a chitinous feather-shaped scale half an inch thick in some places. Now Speaker understood why Shimmer had insisted that she could take over several hundred waters walkers with ease – her talons alone were over three feet long, like big silvery scythes!

“Behold, the emperor ox expansion! Now let’s get stompy!" Shimmer roared.

Looking at the rest of the circle and the puddle of piss growing underneath Cash, Speaker wondered whether they would even have to fight?

Bolstered by Shimmer’s grand display of protean might the circle marched on the water walkers. Just before reaching the crest of the hill Cash called for the others to stop. He explained that with Shimmer looking like a beast of legend, a compliment Shimmer was quite happy to hear, then he would like another go at talking the water walkers down…  acknowledging that if he failed he would retreat post haste and let the others do the fighting. The circle agreed, and so Cash climbed up on Shimmer, sitting on over her giant head-sized third eye.

As the circle appeared over the top of the hill, with Shimmer’s giant monsterpony form well lit by the noon-day sun, it only took a few seconds before the water walkers were scrambling to muster their forces. Hundreds of water walkers poured out of the barracks to confront the massive two-story monster that approached, with a strangely familiar pony riding on top.

Watching as the water walkers lined up at the fence that circled the granary, Cash smiled. When he saw the young godblooded Water Hoof stomp around and shout orders, trying to keep the water walkers from fleeing in terror he was even more amused: “Greetings Water Hoof – we meet again. Shall we talk about you surrendering the rice to us?”

Water Hoof sneered up at Cash and formed her magic sledgehammer from the mist around her hooves: “You come and get it”

“Oh come now, don’t make Shimmer here sit on you – you won’t like that, she farts” Cash mirthfully threatened.
The giant monsterpony chuckled and nodded, Cash somehow miracously not falling off as her head shook: “It’s true – my rear is more deadly than my front”

It was clear that Water Hoof was used to intimidating ponies of less power than her. Cash could see her resolve wavering; the godblooded thug wasn’t sure what to do…

“Again, the rice – or I’ll pour your blood back into the brown river for mommy to have a sniff at” Cash ominously threatened, gesturing forcefully with a hoof – all three claws on his magic shoe fully extended.

While Water Hoof had appeared perturbed by the situation so far, this direct threat on her life – plus the allusion to her supernatural mother and the brown river – seemed to do exactly what Cash wanted: It provoked a response. Water Hoof snarled, looked back at the rest of the water walkers, then bellowed “Kill them!” before she leapt on a jet of water up at Cash.

Red, who had been hiding behind Shimmer’s large feather-scaled ears jumped forth, intercepting the crushing blow – engaging the godblooded mare with her blade while at the same time retrieving her  bright red lamellar armor and donning it instantly in a single elegant aegis-assuming gesture: “Oh no you don’t!”

Shimmer, seeing the hundreds of water walkers swarm towards her, roared and lashed out with her claws – killing dozens with each blow. Her swings equally revealed Speaker who had been riding along on her talons behind her legs, as he leapt down and took pot-shots at the water walkers with Gift, working out some of the anger he had built up against himself for having to mutilate the water walker Milda; oh how he hated the water walkers for having led to him resorting to such a vile act, oh how he regretted having done it.

In between slinging Gift back and forth to lob off another head Speaker wondered if Cash’s power over words could possibly rid Milda of any lasting psychological trauma associated with her ordeal? Maybe Cash could even talk her out of being a criminal, which would be nice.

Speaker didn’t get much time to contemplate Milda’s recovery before he spotted the translucent forms of the water elementals converging on Shimmer. Running away from the frontline where Shimmer was turning the gate into the compound into a meat grinder full of dead water walkers, Speaker circled around to the side, making it appear as if he was trying to flank the mortal water walkers. What Speaker was really doing was trying to get closer to the approaching water elementals by running straight at them.

Flinging gift with all his might at the first elemental in range, Speaker bellowed a mighty battlecry as the primordial disk sailed through the air and cut through the ethereal essence in an invisible display of essence carnage. It actually looked quite amusing, as the disk zipped through a seemingly empty bit of a air on the hillsize, only for it to suddenly look as if Gift had cut a hole in an invisible barrel of water – as the water elementals life-fluids gushed out, the elemental deflating and fading into nothing.

Speaker knew quite well that his attack had only dissolved the spirit – not killed it. The elemental would reincarnate in a month or so at its master’s court, possibly Gudaa, but this was more than enough to neutralize the elemental for the time being. Seeing one of their kin be ‘slain’ so swiftly and without warning shocked the surrounding elementals, and Speaker saw them alter their course and converge on him.

Back at the meat grinder Shimmer had routed the water walkers after Red, in a terrible and mighty display of martial proves, had – even after her sword had smashed by Water Hoof’s magic sledgehammer – beaten up Water Hoof to such an extent that the godblooded pony was lying unconscious and bleeding down on the ground, having slipped off Shimmer’s blood-spattered and slippery feather-scales.

Speaker made surprisingly short work of the other elementals around him, which really didn’t surprise him: The spirit-cutting attack he had relearned from his first age memories was one developed to slay the mightiest of demons and primordials – so lesser elementals like this was hardly a challenge, as the charm made Gift cut not just the ethereal ‘flesh’ of the elementals, but also what passed for their spirit-souls, literally cutting their minds apart.

The elementals on the other side of Shimmer had long since spotted what Speaker had been doing and had chosen wisely to flee, especially after Water Hoof had been reduced to what looked like a leaky pony-shaped sack of whimpering blood and guts.

With the battle seemingly won Shimmer advanced into the courtyard of the granary and began shifting herself back to her normal pony form, the various blades and knives that had been jammed between her feather-scales popping out like acupuncture-needles as she shrank. Red, Cash, Sunrise and Speaker joined around her, congratulating themselves on a well-fought battle.

Speaker, with the help of Shimmer, began to sift through the carnage that Shimmer had left behind at the gate. The water walkers who were only wounded, of what few there were, were tended to so that they might live to stand trial or be re-educated, all the while Cash and Red discussed how to get the rice back to Chung Do.  Sunrise paced around the compound, shouting for what water walkers that might be hiding to come forth and surrender, assuring them that no harm would come to them if they surrender peacefully. None came forth.

It was while he was hoof-deep in a by now heavily anesthetized and dying water walker’s guts that Speaker heard Red shouting for the circle to come over. Literally wrapping up the water walker so that she might live and staunching the last few bleeds, Speaker ran back to see a triumphant Red hauling out a very annoyed-looking old stallion: Red had caught Paddle Splash. The gang leader had been hiding in the miller’s office, something Sunrise had informed them of after discovering a large number of foals in the barracks.

“Hold on, why would there be foals here?” Speaker wondered.

Shimmer quickly clued him in on the grim truth: After the water walkers had taken control of the food supply, a lot of families in Chung Do that couldn’t afford to buy food had instead opted to simply join the gang. It was obvious that a lot of ponies in Chung Do had seen the actions of the water walkers as reprehensible, but at the same time the gang seemed to be the only way out of a city riddled with plague and soon to be under siege from the rebelling nobles. This also answered a question that had been bothering Red for a while now: How the water walkers had been able to keep fighting for so long against Shimmer in her emperor ox sized monsterpony form – for they had been fighting not just for the gang, but for the survival of their families… which led to the rather uncomfortable realization that a lot of the foals that Sunrise had discovered were probably orphans at this point, with the circle being the killers of their parents.

This was confirmed when Sunrise came out of the barracks with them, all in all about sixty foals, many of which quickly found their dead parents among the bloody remains at the gate to the compound. They reacted as one might expect…

“Well this certainly makes you feel like a god damn hero, doesn’t it?” Cash quipped, gesturing for Shimmer and Sunrise to ‘do something’ about the inconsolable foals and the cacophony of their high-pitched crying.

The grim realization that many of the water walkers they had slain were parents fighting to defend their foals almost made the circle forget about Paddle Splash, but Cash noticed the old stallion trying to sneak away and ‘caught’ him by firing a shoe-claw so it landed in front of him.

Not wanting the gang leader to be left out of the misery Cash led Paddle Splash up to the gates among his dead gang members and their bawling foals, to show him the gruesome sight that was the remains of Water Hoof.

To Cash’s surprise the godblooded pony was still alive, even if only barely, but Paddle Splash was horrified to see his daughter in such a state none the less. Of course, Cash hadn’t led Paddle Splash up to his daughter for hugs and tea: “Water Hoof, for the crime of knowingly inflicting bodily harm on a solar… I sentence you to death”

Paddle Splash barely had time to react before Cash leveled a hoof against Water Hoof’s head and fired a shoe-claw into her head, killing her instantly. Cash gave Paddle Splash a smug grin, the old stallion merely giving Cash a grim frown in return without saying a word.

“Speaker, Red, I believe you two have grievances with this pony?” Cash called out.

Approaching Cash and Paddle Splash it was clear that the old gang leader had accepted his defeat and wasn’t trying to fight back, but while Red was quick to suggest that the stallion should simply be executed as well Speaker wanted to question Paddle Splash first: “Who were you selling the rice to?

“Screw you” Paddle Splash replied defiantly, spitting on the blood-soaked ground in front of Speaker.

Cash extended a shoe-claw and held it at the old stallion’s tail: “I don’t like your tone old man, now answer”

Paddle Splash broke into laughter: “Ha! As if any of you could hurt me – I’ve got divine protection”

“I don’t see much of anything for you here aside from us. Your gang is gone and you have no enforcers left to protect you” Red noted, surveying the bloody battlefield.

“No it means he has a deal with someone – or something. Gudaa am I right?” Cash inquired, poking Paddle Splash a bit further in the nose with his one extended shoe-claw, drawing a tiny trickle of blood.

Paddle Splash smiled and nodded slowly, seemingly ignoring the sharp claw being jammed into his nose: “Why yes – so you’re all still dead if you touch me. Heck, killing Water Hoof will probably be enough for that, so hurting me will only make it worse… say, how about all the rice paddies around Chung Do flooding and ruining what crops that are left to feed the city?”
“In case you didn’t notice, then Speaker over here terminated three elementals just outside the gates – I’m reasonably sure that he could do something similar to Gudaa if she doesn’t call off her elementals should they come after us – so trust me, you are in no position to intimidate us” Cash noted. Speaker nodded.

Again Paddle Splash laughed, although not nearly as much as before: “Right, and Gudaa will just sit idly by while you kill members of her court? You’re all dead – she’ll drown you all slow-like…”

“Right, I’ve heard enough of this scum” Red said, stepping up to Paddle Splash with a hoof raised, it wreathed in a bright golden cutting edge of essence.

Speaker put a hoof to Red’s raised hoof: “Hold on, I still want to know who he was selling the rice to”

“And why would I? I don’t talk to dead po-” Paddle Splash began, only to be cut short by Red striking him hard on his shoulder, just under his neck: “I’m tired of you giving us lip. Tell us or we’ll take you back to the castle give you the same treatment we gave Milda!”

Hearing Red threaten the gang leader with the same medical horror that Speaker had subjected Milda to sent shivers down Speaker’s spine: “Oh no – I’m not doing that again, ever!”

While still holding quite firmly on to Paddle Splash, Red briefly glanced at Speaker and nodded with a fleeting smile. Hearing that Speaker never wanted to hurt another pony like that gave her a profound sense of relief – of course, this still begged the question of how to ferret information out of Paddle Splash.

This issue might have been resolved back at the castle, but the circle never got a chance to do so as suddenly the stream around the water-wheel erupted as if a geyser had just gone off. Paddle Splash began laughing again: “What took you so long!”

The reply to Paddle Splash’s question was a swift jet of high pressure water that tore off the old stallion’s head, it skidding along the pools of water walker blood before coming to rest. As the mist from the geyser settled and the explosion of water rained down over the granary the circle found themselves facing Gudaa.

Cash stepped forward, partially drenched like the rest of the circle, looking neither pleased nor surprised yet he still spoke with a cocky tone informed by his confidence: “Come to wrap up any loose ends? Kill any incriminating witnesses? I’m sorry to say that Paddle Splash already ratted you out Gudaa, said you had a lovely little deal with him. You’re in so much trouble now”

Gudaa, floating above the water wheel on a column of standing water, was three times as big as when she had appeared at the Chung Do docks: “Silence! I came as soon as I had interrogated my own minions as to what was going on with these ‘water walkers’ after we spoke at the docks in Chung Do– I’m here to retrieve my servants before they do any more damage”
Explaining herself, Gudaa told the circle that many years ago she had discovered that one of her elementals had fallen in love with a boatspony and smuggler at Chung Do due to his skills at navigating the waterways. This had resulted in a godblooded foal being born, which deeply embarrassed Gudaa as such offspring were considered a sign that Gudaa’s underlings were literally screwing around while on the job – which in turn didn’t reflect well on Gudaa’s management skills. To solve the issue Gudaa thought she had hushed up the event by delivering the foal to the father and ensuring his silence by assigning a few water elementals to be the foal’s bodyguards as a gift in order to keep him quiet. This had clearly backfired, as was evident from how this godblooded mare had abused her guardians and turned herself and them into thuggish enforcers. Gudaa claimed that she had arrived just now after having extracted all of this information from the ‘mother’ elemental, who was not at pleased of how criminal her daughter was, who had remained silent about the situation for years out of embarrassment. As Gudaa retold the story and surveyed the slaughter that her corrupt minions’ actions had ultimately led to she became increasingly furious and frustrated, her waters swelling and roiling with fury at how such deceit could have taken place without her noticing it.

Cash nodded. Gudaa seemed genuinely upset at the turn of events and the goddess commended the circle on having fought of the water walkers and somehow even besting her admittedly rogue elementals. Sunrise and Shimmer both agreed that this sounded surprisingly reasonable, as such subterfuge by lesser spirits wasn’t that uncommon in other parts of creation. Gudaa added that Paddle Splash had been appeasing her via regular offerings and sacrifices as ‘thanks’ for having been granted a daughter with such powers, which in hindsight were probably funded via stolen goods – or were simply stolen property being sacrificed.

“Well you will have to forgive my initial and erroneous presumption then Gudaa – I can assure you that we will go quietly with these facts, provided that you can show better oversight of your elemental underlings. But ultimately, it is all water under the bridge now. We will return the rice to Chung Do and you can return to your heavenly duties” Cash curiously stated, bowing his head, Gudaa similarly making a polite gesture in return.

Shimmer turned to Speaker while Cash proceeded to entertain Gudaa with polite banter: “You know; it’s nice to deal with gods that are at least somewhat reasonable for once. In the west I’d often have to engage entire spirit courts in battle in order to get them to stop misbehaving… why are you looking like that?”

Speaker was staring intently at Gudaa, who’s form had reduced itself to a more pony-sized one, as she followed Cash around. Shimmer gave Speaker a poke.

After the fourth poke Speaker finally turned to give Shimmer an annoyed glare: “Would you stop that – I’m trying to remember something”

“Remember what?” Shimmer wondered, looking at Speaker then at Cash and Gudaa. Behind them Sunrise had miraculously calmed down the roughly 60 orphan foals and was leading them back into the barracks, away from the carnage, but not before going over to the stream by the waterwheel to wash all the blood off the foals.

Speaker took a deep breath, paused for a moment then sighed: “Gudaa is lying. I know she is. I’ve been thinking all week ever since I took that poor water walker apart that there had to be a better way to get to get the truth out of prisoners… it wasn’t until Gudaa started talking here that I finally remembered it… a charm that lets me know if what I’m hearing is true or false”

Shimmer had to admit that such an ability sounded very nice – and obscenely useful! This of course led to the question of what exactly Gudaa had been lying about. Speaker explained that according to his lie-detector charm then Paddle Splash definitely had some kind of deal going on with Gudaa, that much she confirmed herself by mentioning the appeasement sacrifices – and the part about him and an elemental having a godblooded foal together… but the sacrifices that Paddle Splash made to Gudaa? That wasn’t to appease her, nor had Water Hoof and her elemental bodyguards’ criminal activities been a problem at all – no, Gudaa had clearly known about that in advance and was ok with it.

“Then go tell Cash – what are you waiting for?!” Shimmer said, gesturing energetically for Speaker to get moving. It was clear to Shimmer that Cash had been more curious about investigating the immediate uses and functionality of his lie-detection charm instead of acting on the information. She had seen this countless times with freshly exalted lunars who wanted to frolic and play around with their various animal forms and shapeshifting charms.

“Hey, hold up!” Speaker shouted. Cash and Gudaa turned to see Speaker galloping towards them.

Speaker stopped next to Cash: “Gudaa is lying. She knew what Water Hoof and her elemental bodyguards were doing with Paddle Splash – she didn’t come here to retrieve her minions, she came here to cover up her dealings with the water walkers!”

“Well Speaker, as always you have the social graces of a sack of cabbage” Cash said in return, throwing a smile at Gudaa who put on a forced smile, but as Speaker looked as if he wasn’t going away any time soon Cash decided to hear him out… and Cash couldn’t help noticing that Gudaa seemed to become a bit annoyed as Speaker talked about this first age truth-telling charm he’d finally remembered how worked, Speaker calling it the “Judge’s Ear Technique”.

Gudaa was, as Cash had noticed, less than pleased with Speaker not just implying that she might not be telling the truth – but calling her a liar by accusing her directly. Of course, the conversation had equally revealed to Gudaa that Speaker was a solar as well… which made things a little more tricky – still, Gudaa had to at least try to save face: “How can we be certain that you have properly understood the workings of this first age charm?”

Cash conceded that a quick test might be in order, to which end he asked Speaker to judge whether his following statement was a lie or not. Cash cleared his throat and boldly stated, with a grand smile on his face: “When I got my cutie mark my father treated me to a trip to a nearby brothel. I screwed the whore I picked for hours – it was one of the best days of my life!”

Had Speaker heard the statement without his lie-detector charm he would have accepted the statement – as it fit quite well with how Cash usually acted, plus a newly  cutie marked colt could easily have enough vigor to pull off a feat like that – but the charm… said that the hours part and the best day of his life part were both lies. The implications were obvious, but Speaker simply said: “No it was not one of the best days of your life and you did not last for hours”

Cash nodded: “True, she barely touched me before I finished – it was one of my greatest embarrassments – but…” he said, turning to Gudaa: “…not as big as yours, for now I believe Speaker in that you’ve been lying to us all along. What do you have to say for yourself?”

Gudaa huffed and floated backwards, the pillar of water she stood on swelling with self-rightous indignation: “I do not have to answer to you! No solar holds domain over my waters and my minions – I can do with them as I see fit!”

“So you knew that Paddle Splash and Water Hoof were using your minions to commit crimes… I’m guessing that the ‘deal’ Paddle Splash had with you was a share of the loot being sacrificed to you in exchanged for getting those elemental enforcers?” Cash boldly stated, his smile turning into a malign grin as he relished in the sudden turn of events and future prospects of being able to blackmail a god.

The godess’ form swelled once again, becoming three times the size of a normal pony. In her towering form Gudaa bellowed: “Puny solars – you speak as if your words still carry consequence. I am a god, you are but a circle of fools with delusions of unwarranted self-importance!”

“We could report you to Yu-Shan for corruption, murder and dereliction of duty – you wouldn’t want that?” Cash teased with stern by sly eyes, unphased by the display of godly power by virtue of his own confidence.

“Fools! You think that the celestial bureaucracy cares for the petty grievances of mortals? Dereliction of duty? Oh you make me laugh! The brown river still flows, and thus my duty is upheld. You have no power over me” Gudaa said with a cruel laughter, twirling around herself as her water column continued to grow, water elementals from the stream feeding the water wheel floating up into the air to join with her.

Speaker was quickly growing tired of this arrogant goddess thinking herself above the plight of those her actions made suffer. Gift whirred to life and zipped out of his saddle bags, attaching itself to his right hoof as he reared up with a loud whinny, assuming the strong stance that followed the Thousand Wounds Gear Style form of martial arts. Gudaa responded to this by summoning up a shield of water elementals in front of her: “You dare raise arms against me? If you want any hopes of returning the stolen rice to Chung Do you will put down your weapons and swear that you will never trouble me for my actions or complicity in the actions of the water walkers!”

Now it was Cash’s turn to laugh: “Oh really? You should have seen how quickly Spealer dispatched your other elementals here… you think holding up half a dozen of them in front of you will be any different? Face it: You’re ours now. If we tell the ponies of Chung Do what you did they’ll tear down your shrine and spread the word to encourage every other city and village on the banks of the brown river to do to the same.  We own you”

With a divine gesture from Gudaa the large wooden barns and granary structures holding the rice burst – scores of previously hidden water elementals appearing to tear the outer structure apart, revealing the countless sacks of rice within as the elementals now held the wall-less structures together, clearly awaiting orders rip the buildings apart completely: “If you harm me or my minions I shall have all the rice churned into the mud so thoroughly that the only food you can return to Chung Do with will be mud pies” Gudaa states, her voice harsh like a fast stream full of sharp rocks.

Speaker and Cash both quickly looked around to see what happened. The barracks had also been partially demolished, with the sound of terrified foals shrieking coming from inside.

“Can you tell how many elementals are holding each barn up? Can you take them out before they ruin the rice if we attack them?” Cash quickly asked Speaker. Speaker simply shook his head: “Not possible. There are too many”

Shimmer turned into her monsterpony form, hissing like an angry bird at the water elementals while brandishing her great silver talons at them. Gudaa wasn’t impressed: “A lunar too? Good grief, is this a whole circle of anathema? Oh this is too rich… and you’re all powerless to stop me. I should see you all killed simply for daring to interfere with my business with the water walkers! Do you have any idea how many valuables they sacrified to me in return for the power I gave them?”

The elementals that had been assembling in the column of water under Gudaa surged out, surrounding Cash and Speaker, Shimmer, and flowing into the barracks only to shortly thereafter come out with Sunrise and all the foals under guard.

“Killing you all and delivering the bodies to the bronze faction should see me promoted to goddess of all rivers of the east!” Gudaa gloated, slowly advancing towards Cash and Speaker – like water slowly rising to drown them all.

Suddenly a large hedgehog struck Gudaa in the back of her ice-sculpted head, its spines digging into the goddess’ head of ice. Gudaa howled as she tore the animal off her head and threw it on the ground, the circle turning to look at where the animal had come from.

A mare covered in a bright yellow hood on the roof of the water-wheel house, standing next to a sack full of squirming hedgehogs, with a  very ornate metal bow floating in the air next to her was waving at the circle: “I think you could use some help”

Gudaa shrieked and called all of her water elementals to her, the hundreds of elementals that were holding up the barns swarming to her like a tsunami. The barns fell over piece by piece as the elementals let go of the structure they had been holding up after knocking the outer walls and superstructure apart to reveal themselves.

Amidst the loud crashing noise, the sound of timbers snapping and wooden planks breaking as everything collapsed the mystery mare leapt down to Speaker and Cash, turning to face Gudaa: “I have been authorized to use terminal sanction. You will cease and desist all activities not related to your purview of managing the brown river this instant. Comply or I will mine you for starmetal myself!”

“Curse you!” Gudaa shrieked as her mighty form flowed over to the water-mill, crashing through it as she dived into the water and disappeared. The hooded mare effortlessly leapted to the side, landing near Cash and Speaker.

Sunrise and the foals came running out of the barracks, finding the rest of the circle staring at the strange hooded mare who had joined the circle down on the ground.

As the dust settled on the collapsed water-wheel the circle became very curious as to who this strange hooded mare-do-well was… 

> Chapter 24: Initial Encounter Repeated
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As the circle assembled in front of the yellow-hooded mare the question was – for fairly obvious reasons – who was this mare who had frightened off Gudaa, who could use hedgehogs as arrows?

The mare stepped forth and drew back her hood, revealing herself to be a pony with strikingly green eyes, a dark-brown coat and a strange green squiggly glyph glowing on her forehead – almost like a castemark, but it certainly wasn’t a solar or lunar caste mark. It took Speaker a moment to recognize the sign of Jupiter, one of the five gods of fate who’s divine purview is that of secrets, those kept, those told and the uncovered. This was a sidereal exalted, chosen of the mare of secrets.

“Can’t be – all sidereals disappeared along with the solars. My elders haven’t seen a single one since the usurpation” Shimmer quickly pointed out, her millennia old elders having kept vigil for their lost celestial oracles, yet never finding anything.

The sidereal mare sighed: “I can explain both the solar and the sidereal disappearance in good time – right now all you need to know is that I only intervened because my superiors would be upset if I let a circle of solars die on their turf”

While the sidereal’s statement raised more questions than it answered, Cash was more interested in current matters: “Why are you here to begin with? You certainly didn’t come here to fight our battles, because then you could have intervened a lot sooner”

“True. I was sent here to investigate the Chung Do plague when I spotted you lot flying out of town. Sapphire circle sorcery is not that common anymore in creation, so I trailed you and listened in. Now, considering how much effort you all appear to be putting into saving Chung Do I’m going to assume that you’re not the ones who started the plague?” the sidereal mare said, looking at both the circle and the destruction around them.

Red nodded: “You damn right, but what’s the big idea? Speaker said that all the sidereals were gone and now you show up?”

The sidereal sighed: “As I said I’ll explain that another time. I just need to know what you’ve learned about the plague right now – please”

Speaker looked at Shimmer, wanting to see if she was ok with him telling this impossible stranger what they knew of the strange tainting of the two fountains in Chung Do, but Shimmer was looking very agitated…

“Oh no, you’re going to explain yourself right now! The lunars have suffered millennia of wyld hunts and have had their good name vilified and demonized across creation. If the sidereals weren’t wiped out in the usurpation I want to know where you’ve been and I want to know right now!” Shimmer shouted, the knowledge that nearly half her prior incarnations since the usurpation had died at the hooves of wyld hunts,  mortal ponies who’d poisoned her or other assailants who all acted because lunars were denounced as moon-mad anathema by the immaculate dogma of the dragonblooded unicorns – all because there had been nothing to prevent the unicorns from doing so.

Shaking her head the sidereal sighed, then stared intently at Speaker: "Please tell me what you have learned of the plague – I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what you know”

Speaker wasn’t sure if this stranger was trustworthy, but considering how the mare had just saved them from what would no doubt have been a costly battle then he felt that he owed this stranger at least that much: “All we’ve found so far is that the two fountains fed by the castle manse have been tainted. If you combine the waters and drink it you will get sick, and essence use rapidly speeds up the infection – even essence use aimed at resisting the infection. I haven’t had time to test it any further”

The sidereal nodded: “Very well. You keep working on that: I’m sure you’ll find a cure soon enough – makes my job easier”
“Hold on? Your job? Your superiors? It sounds an awful lot like you sidereals have a lot of organization… which you shouldn't have if you disappeared along with the solars during the usurpation” Cash said, trotting closer to the sidereal.

“Oh would you look at the time, got to go!” the sidereal suddenly said, releasing a smoke bomb that veiled her escape perfectly. As the smoke began to clear a few seconds later the mare was gone without a trace, not even Shimmer’s heightened senses could detect that there had been another pony.

The circle looked around between themselves in confusion. As the smoke cleared a piece of the watermill collapsed, making for an awful racket.

Looking around at the remains of the granary for a moment, bags of rice mixed with broken planks of wood and timber rafters spilling out of the debris, Red said: “We’ll we certainly showed Gudaa”

“No we didn’t – Gudaa probably just figured that fighting us head on, even if she had more elementals, would cost her more than she was willing to sacrifice to kill us” Speaker noted. Shimmer nodded, adding that Gudaa probably knew that the whole circle would be targeting her primarily in the event of a fight, which the god really didn’t seem that keen on.

Cash didn’t seem to be bothered by Speaker or Shimmer’s analysis: “Oh please, we won this all on our own, and we’ll deal Gudaa before all this is over – but that’s for later. Now, how about getting this rice back to Chung Do?”

“Ya come on Speaker, don’t belittle that we just faced down a god – not bad for a young circle where only two of us can really hit spirits” Red said, looking very pleased with herself.

Shimmer chuckled: “Oh please, I’ve faced down dozens of gods and spirits back west on my own, but let’s get to work”

It took several hours and quite a lot of digging through rubble, broken timber and collapsed barns to retrieve the rice, with every member of the circle doing their part to speed up the process. Sunrise somehow talked all the ants in the area into retrieving grains of rice from the collapsed buildings and depositing them in empty sacks out in the open, while Shimmer shifted into her monsterpony form and flew around, using her protean essence to mold large portions of the collapsed buildings into wood-textured blobs of clay and tossing the blobs aside to clear up access to the rice. Red took a more direct approach, going back and forth hauling heavy sacks of rice out of the rubble as Shimmer opened up for her. Speaker recalled his singing staff from elsewhere and used its powers to first segment the collapsed buildings, flowing plates of stone over the collapsed sections containing sacks of rice, and then sending waves of dirt coursing over the rest to clear the ruble in one fell swoop. All in all it took the circle the rest of the day to recover all the rice. When done Shimmer conjuring a cloud where all of it was lifted up on, flying the circle, the rice, and the surviving wounded Water Walkers back to Chung Do.

As the circle landed in twin-fountain square, the sun having set on their way back, the dozen guards keeping watch over what little food that was left at the dispensary greeted the circle with loud cheers once they realized what the circle was returning with.  The prisoners were taken to the dungeon under Speaker’s tender care – him dreading having to face Milda again now that he had to piece the poor mare back together again.

In the morning the circle was saluted by the young shogun who wanted to hear all about what had happened. Cash indulged the shogun, telling of the riveting adventure of divine deceit, daring battle and the horrid trickery of the water walkers. Chung Onyx mourned the loss but was happy that the rice and at least some of the newly recruited but misguided water walkers, along with all the foals, had been brought back.

Walking through the grand hall of the castle, the young Onyx lamented to Red and Sunrise: “I saw mom and dad hold court many times, them judging a lot of criminal and stuff – but… I’ve never done it myself. I’m not sure what we should do with the water walkers you brought back”

Red was a bit torn on the subject as well. She wanted to punish the water walkers – but at the same time she recognized the ruse both she and they had been subjected to, which ended up with a lot of foals getting orphaned for all the wrong reasons. Sunrise urged for caution and suggested that they spend more time deliberating: “If any of the survivors were among the new recruits of the gang we should consider more lenient sentences, if any at all, provided that Cash can assure that they will not engage in criminal activity again”

“I guess the only pony we could really blame was Paddle Splash” Chung Onyx said, his young voice revealing the pent up frustration within him as they walked the halls of the castle.

Speaker emerged later that evening and sought out Cash Charmer, hesitantly seeking his aid: “I need you to use your talking-charms on a… patient… of mine. She won’t wake up  until sometime tomorrow, but when she does I’ve arranged for a servant to come and find you, then I need you to talk her into… well…”

“Well what? Come on, I’ve got a city to run to here” Cash said with a bemused look as his head emerged from behind the mountain of ledgers and scrolls his desk was full of.

“I need her to not hate me – I need her to consent to me treating her” Speaker said, hating that he even had to ask for such a favor, but at the same time he didn’t want to have to keep her sedated any more than necessary until Milda fully regenerated.

Cash gave Speaker a bemused look: “Are we talking about the prisoner that told us where to find the rice?”

Speaker nodded. Cash cheerfully agreed to come and help out, the two quickly walking down to the dungeons.

As the they exited the castle into the courtyard Cash noticed half a dozen servant ponies pushing and pulling sealed barrels out of the dungeon. At first he was curious what was in the barrels, but when he caught a whiff of the smell of the liquid oozing out of one of them… a powerful and pungent stench of rot… he suddenly didn’t want to know – but Speaker none the less took his disgusted look as one of curiosity: “Remember when Red threatened Paddle Splash with doing to him what had been done to this prisoner? Those barrels contained her amputated limbs”

“I hope you didn’t try to stitch any of that back on this prisoner of yours…” Cash said, holding his nose shut with a hoof.

Speaker said that he hadn’t, adding that he was still at a loss at how he could ever have thought doing something so extreme could in any way be justifiable, but also noted that he had magically treated the embalming fluids that the limbs and bits had been stored in so they wouldn’t rot. Basically this shouldn’t have been possible: “But you know what’s the weirdest? When I checked on all them yesterday before we took off for the rice, they were all good. Things just don’t rot that quickly – It’s not natural!”

As they walked into the dungeon Cash reminded Speaker of one instance where things truly had decayed that quickly: The guild caravan! This obviously raised the uncomfortable question of whether the true source of the destruction of the caravan was in and around the castle, but that discussion was briefly put on hold as Speaker displayed his patient to Cash.

With all of the removed parts of Milda having mysteriously gone bad, Speaker would be forced to use his healing charms to regrow everything instead. This wasn’t much of a problem, although it did mean that it would take at least a week or two for all the limbs, skin and that one eye to grow back once Speaker got to work. However, for that to be possible Milda would have to cooperate with Speaker… mostly to help by her telling whether everything Speaker regrew worked properly – but doing that with a hostile prisoner wasn’t really an option, and Speaker reminded Cash of how Milda had acted when she had first been brought into the dungeon.

Cash didn’t seem particularly daunted by the challenge: “I will her turned into a loyal subject of Chung in no time  - don’t you worry”

“Hold on – I don’t want you to use any mind control charms on her. She won’t be of any use if she just nods or says yes to everything I do. She has to be able to critically judge if I’m putting her back together right” Speaker explained, looking at the sedated and mutilated pony with great concern.

Patting Speaker on the back Cash stated with an utmost certainty in his voice that it would be no problem at all. “Speaker, use that bright head of yours. A pony like this mare probably didn’t join the water walkers because that was the only thing in life she aspired to. Now, the power and money the gang had acquired at its peak here would have been very tempting for many, probably her as well, so I simply have to redirect her likes and understandings so she considers loyalty and service to us the to be the quickest way for her to reach wealth and power – which really isn’t that unrealistic come to think of it. Honestly, it’s won’t be that difficult” Cash said, retrieving an exquisitely detailed jeweled gold ear-ring from elsewhere, part of the loot from Denansdor.

Speaker slowly nodded and had to admit that Cash seemed to know what he was talking about – even if Speaker wasn’t sure that Cash could pull it off without using mind-altering charms.

Walking back out of the dungeon, Speaker and Cash passed by other smaller cells in the dungeon where the wounded remnants of the water walkers were resting. Cash could see that Speaker had also tended to their wounds – most of them were of a far lesser scope than that of Milda’s – although a few were sprouting nubs where new limbs where in the process of growing back.

“Say Speaker, what’s the plan with these ones? Can I have some of them? I could use some help around the office, not that many healthy clerks left around” Cash cheerfully stated, looking at them like a costumer eyeballing merchandize in a storefront.

Speaker wasn’t sure what to say. Red and Sunrise hadn’t gotten back to him regarding Chung Onyx’s word on the matter, and personally then Speaker would prefer that they all simply be sworn to never knowingly engage in criminal activities again and then be let loose – seeing as they weren’t much of a threat anymore.

Cash wasn’t happy to hear that he would have to wait to get a few personal servants, so instead he wondered if Speaker knew of any other prisoners down in the dungeon he could have instead.

“Cash, we’re not slavers – we’ve talked about this” Speaker said, sounding a lot more tired than he was physically.

Still, Cash persisted, pointing out that he wouldn’t be enslaving any ponies under his command: “Consider it an alternative to prison. I swear them to absolute fealty for the remainder of their sentence, give them a decent wage during the period, come on; That’s a far better deal than what they’re getting here”

Quickly walking up to a cell at the far end of the dungeon, Cash pointed at a rather miserable looking pony inside of it. The prisoner’s face was a melty blur of old burn scars – probably hot water or oil from what Speaker could tell. The pony’s mane was similarly not really there anymore due to the burn scars, while the pony’s tail appeared to have been shaven off completely and docked, leaving but a tiny stump behind.

“Hey you, how would you like to work off your sentence helping me in an office up in the castle?” Cash called out to the brown and grey-coated pony.

The prisoner didn’t answer, since he appeared to be asleep. Speaker was quick to point this out, but Cash would have none of it.

Calling out the jailor, Cash inquired about the melty-faced pony. Speaker objected to the prisoner being called something like that, but the jailor noted that they didn’t really know the name of the pony – it had simply been caught attempting to steal from the food dispensary and hadn’t really been that cooperative after that.

Cash appeared to find this amusing, but none the less insisted that the jailor send word to Cash once the prisoner woke up.

Walking out of the dungeon Cash couldn’t help notice that Speaker had a strange look on his face. Inquiring into this, Speaker first revealed that while they had been talking about Milda he had been using his lie-detector charm to tell if Cash was planning to use any mind control charms or not on her for what Speaker wanted done.

“Well I hope that the charm told you that I don’t plan using any mind control” Cash said, smiling gleefully and confidently.

Speaker sighed and said that Cash was right, but then added: “But the jailor… the charm was still on at that point – and when you called out for the jailor, then asked if the jailor was the jailor… the jailor was lying”

Cash stopped right in his tracks: “Anything else that pony was lying about?”

“The melty-, the prisoner with the burn scars wasn’t caught for stealing food – but he hadn’t been cooperative, that was true… although the in the context of how this jailor pony said that, it could simply mean that the prisoner hadn’t been cooperative with the fake jailor” Speaker said, slowly mulling over the possible meaning of this strange turn of events.

Cash was much quicker to act, returning to the dungeon with Speaker right behind him. Cash demanded to see the prisoner log. Speaker found it very difficult not to sneak accusatory looks at the jailor who seemed quite confused as to what was going on.

Quickly flipping through the pages of the prison log, Cash turned to Speaker and asked: “Is it still on?”

Speaker gave Cash a confused look, then realized that Cash meant the lie detection charm: “It is now”

Cash then turned to the jailor:  “It says here that your nameless prisoner was caught for theft a week ago. Is this true? Is it true that you don’t know his name?”

The jailor shrugged apologetically, shifting uncomfortably in his guard armor: “Ok, so what if that’s not exactly why he’s down here? Your lordships shouldn’t worry about what happens to scum like that. There are other ponies here who do sentencing and carry out punishments”

“You didn’t answer my question” Cash calmly stated, looking the jailor right in the eyes.

Suddenly Cash fell over backwards, gasping in surprise and shock. Speaker quickly helped him back up: “What was that?”

“The eyes…”Cash gasped, catching his breath as if he had galloped a hundred yard dash.

Speaker wasn’t sure what he meant, but looking back for the jailor revealed that the jailor was gone…

Cash quickly explained as he brushed off his silks that the jailors eyes were… wrong: “You remember what the Bodhisattva said about the deathknight operating in Chung Do? The Ruby and Emerald Mare”

“That jailor was a stallion” Speaker said, sounding conserned but at the same time not convinced of what Cash was hinting at.

Running to the cell with the no-name prisoner, Cash shouted at the prisoner to wake him up. Speaker was still skeptical: “Hold on, shouldn’t we be going after the jailor?”

“What pony did we last see a little over a week ago, has a brown and grey mottled coat, and never showed us his true face?” Cash asked poignantly.

Speaker willed forth Gift as quickly as he could while Cash ran back the jailor’s station to confirm that the fake jailor had run off with all the cell door keys. Gift made short work of the lock, after which Speaker rushed in and flipped the not sleeping but clearly unconscious Sullen Hoof up on his back, rushing him out of the dungeon to his medical lab.

Cash gathered the rest of the circle, the lot of them arriving to find Speaker tending to a severely weakened Sullen Hoof… who evidently had quite a lot of trouble explaining what had happened – chiefly because whoever had put him in that cell had also cut off his tongue.. no, bitten it off.

Unlike mortal ponies then exalted ponies recover from injuries much faster. This is a well-known fact among all ponies in creation thanks to the widespread prevalence of the dragonblooded unicorns. For Sullen Hoof this meant that Speaker’s medical charms were able to grow back his tongue fairly quickly – but in his emaciated and weakened state he still needed quite a lot of rest and essence-fueled nutrition-infusions courtesy of Speaker before he would be up and walking again, let alone talk in any coherent manner.

The next morning Speaker walked Sullen Hoof to the dining table in the castle, the rest of the circle eagerly awaiting the return of their night caste solar.

The first thing Sullen Hoof said as they had all sat down and each been served a dish of steamed vegetables and rice was: “Who is the hooded mare over by the fireplace?”

None at the table knew who it was it.
> Chapter 25: Out of Mind, Out of Sight
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Ah, good to see you all together again” the hooded mare said in a strangely satisfied tone, addressing the ponies at the dining table.

Given the circumstances of Sullen Hoof’s recent discovery the circle was not particularly pleased with the sudden appearance of an unannounced guest. Indeed, in a blur of furious motion – as only a solar of the dawn caste could – Red had leapt up from the table at the hooded stranger and drew her blade from elsewhere mid-leap, pinning the hooded mare against the stone brick wall at sword-point.

“Ok, I can see this isn’t going to work out” the hooded mare managed to squeak, her throat pushed upon by the cutting edge of the blade. She closed her eyes and suddenly…

The circle sat that the dining table, with Sullen Hoof gazing at the fireplace. He sighed deeply.

“So, Sully – good to see you survived. Any clue what happened to you?” Cash asked as the rest of the circle began to eat the steamed veggies and rice that had been served to them.

Sullen Hoof looked at Cash. With the heavy burn scars it wasn’t easy to look directly at Sullen Hoof, but Cash seemed to keep a straight face as Sully mournfully replied: “I… I don’t know. I don’t remember. I don’t even really remember the jailor you told me about. I’m sorry, I failed you all”

“No you didn’t – I think you actually succeeded” Cash said, smiling. Cash suspected that Sully had actually found the Ruby and Emerald Mare, but that he’d been caught by her and had his memories altered while captured.

Shimmer agreed that his theory wasn’t that unlikely given the situation, but wondered why Sully hadn’t tried to escape any sooner. Sullen Hoof said that the few things he remembered from his week of captivity was that he’d been drained of essence all the time, so much that he’d fainted from it almost all the time. Speaker was curious about how the essence had been drained, or how that would have caused Sully to be knocked unconscious, but there hadn’t been any marks or other telltale signs to reveal how this happened on Sully.

Ultimately the circle agreed that the hunt for the Ruby and Emerald Mare continued and that it was simply good to have Sullen Hoof back. This also raised the question of what the next step was.

Speaker said that he wanted to finally spend some proper time looking for a cure to the plague, perhaps with the help of Sully to manufacture the medicine while the rest of the circle looked for the deathknight. Cash said he needed some more clerks to run the city efficiently, for the number of city officials that weren’t sick was falling steadily, him presenting his prisoner-work program again. Red was cautious about using water walkers as city clerks, seeing as how they had already once attempted to run the city more or less, but Cash assured the circle that he could bind them via magic oaths so that they would be severely punished if they tried to exploit whatever power given to them as his underlings. Sunrise wanted to continue preaching to the ponies of the Chung Do, saying that with the food distribution, defeating the water walkers and the recovery of the rice that the circle was becoming very popular in Chung Do, so a lot of ponies were very open to building a temple for Celestia in return, plus she wasn’t much of a detective or a warrior, so flushing out a hiding deathknight wasn’t something she could be that helpful with.

“I can help draw up plans for a temple – but my priority right now is the plague” Speaker noted. Sunrise agreed.

Red said that she’d lead the hunt for the deathknight, Shimmer adding that she’d love to help out with that.

Sullen Hoof as the last pony in the circle to declare his intentions said that he wouldn’t mind helping Speaker, but wasn’t sure about making medicine.

“Can you make tea?” Speaker asked jokingly.

Sullen Hoof gave Speaker a mildly indignant look.

“Then you can make medicine” Speaker said, sounding reassuring in the same way a grandfather might encourage a grandson in some field of endeavor.

As the circle split up after the meal Speaker led Sullen Hoof down to the medical lab. The laboratory itself was located in the castle basement, in what had been a large storage room.

Sullen Hoof marveled at the devices that Speaker had managed to create, with everything from exquisitely delicate glass distillation devices to fine measuring tools – all apparently made by Speaker himself. Speaker on the other hoof was more curious as to Sullen Hoof’s wellbeing and positions, namely his burn scars and his missing magic mask: “How did you get those scars?”

First Sullen Hoof gave Speaker a piercing glare, then he drew a deep breath: “I told you I exalted while working in a kitchen in Nexus, in a cult to the god of fine cuisine. I had just had a culinary epiphany when the doors were battered in, immaculate monks flooding the place and I was shining with a bright golden light while tasting the best sauce I’d ever made. The head pastry chef in the kitchen was a pony named Doughnut Joe… and he threw a put full of boiling oil at me. It’s that simple, hurt like hell too”

“I can fix all that damage if you want” Speaker almost absentmindedly offered while going over some of his equipment.
Sully’s face soured, followed by a very resolute “No”

Speaker was taken aback by his offer being turned down. He couldn’t see why not, but Sully insisted that Speaker had already done so much for him! By having taught him how to read and write Sullen Hoof had finally been able to read cook books, expanding his understanding of the culinary crafts in ways he had never imagined! “So while I thank you for your generous offer, then I cannot accept. I already owe you too much for having opened up a whole new world to me”
“That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard” Speaker bluntly replied. 

Sullen Hoof looked at Speaker with a mix of incredulous confusion and indignity, having just bared his great respect and feeling of debt to Speaker.

“You were there on the cloud when I gave you, Red and Cash a quick lesson how spirits worked. I required noting in return – and I don’t require any now or for past lessons” Speaker said.

Stepping up to Sullen Hoof and carefully examining the burns, Speaker taking his time to appraise how difficult it would be fix to the damages, Speaker finally spoke: “I can fix your face over a few weeks of multiple surgeries and get your mane growing properly again. Shimmer can help grow your mane out quickly as well if you want. I don’t want anything for it, I just want to help you and honestly –turning down the probably best surgeon that currently exists in creation when he wants to help you out for free is just plain stupid”

Sullen Hoof stood silent for a moment, then Speaker noticed tears in Sully’s eyes. Sullen Hoof shook his head: “Stupid… ya I guess so. It’s just… in Nexus giving anything away for free is illegal. It’s hard to stop thinking like that when you’ve lived with it all your life. I just… I guess I don’t have a good reason to refuse you. I’m Sorry”

Speaker smiled: “It’s ok. Now, about your mask? The Ruby and Emerald Mare probably has that… any idea how to get it back? I mean, a magical mask that lets our enemy disguise herself as well as you did – it won’t make it easy to find her”
“I should speak to Sunrise about that. She needs to send a prayer to Shalrina, the goddess of faces and identities. I got the mask from her while I hid and recovered in her shop in Nexus after the cooking cult got busted and I had been chased by immaculate monks. She said that she was the only one who could see through the mask’s illusion at all time, something about her always knowing when it was in use and what face I was wearing. So we just ask her what face the mask-bearer is wearing, get a description, find that pony and get my mask back” Sullen Hoof explained.

Speaker nodded slowly. He hadn’t realized that the mask had been one from the very goddess of faces and identities, although he also wondered why such a powerful celestial god had a shop in Nexus: “Fair enough, but you should run back and find Sunrise about that prayer before we do anything else here. I’ll start setting up for some preliminary experiments on the fountain water”

An hour later Speaker was up to his ears in strange looking essence-fueled medical experiments when Sullen Hoof returned, looking disappointed as he stood in the doorway into the lab. Sullen Hoof explained that him and Sunrise, after praying to Shalrina and in that prayer telling her that Sully had been robbed of the mask, had been visited briefly by a servant spirit of the goddess who noted that the helmet had ‘returned’ to Shalrina. She had detected that a foul essence had attempted to take control of the mask – so it was back in Nexus, waiting for Sullen Hoof to come apologize and retrieve it. This was a mixed blessing to Sullen Hoof, but now they at least knew where the mask was and didn’t have to worry about some other pony using it.

“So… you want to get your face fixed in the mean time?” Speaker inquired.

Sullen Hoof shook his head slowly, but smiled: “I would be very grateful to get my face back, but can it wait until I get the mask back? Shalrina might not give it to me if I have a normal face when I come to collect” 

“Very well, now you at least have a proper excuse, now come – I’ll show you what I need help with” Speaker said, ushering Sullen Hoof inside the lab.

Over the next several days Speaker and Sullen Hoof worked hard to find not just a cure to the plague – for it turned out that Speaker could easily cure a single pony at a time simply by the power of his essence and his medical charms – but to make a cure that could be distributed to the whole city one had to work a bit harder. This requirement of distribution required that the cure, in whatever form it ended up in, could keep for at least a few days after being made so it could be distributed; Speaker’s medical charms didn’t allow for the creation of storable medicine – it was powers that had to be used right then and there.

To Speaker’s great joy then Sullen Hoof came up with a brilliant idea after Speaker had explained how diseases themselves were essentially alive and grew inside ponies, leeching essence and nutrients from their bodies, all the while polluting those very same essence flows. Sully’s idea was to make the cure work in the same way that you would tire a dinner guest of a certain kind of food: give them a bad and watered down version of it, so it wouldn’t impress the dinner guest very much. This led to Speaker and Sullen Hoof experimenting in how to ‘water down’ the potency of the plague so that those still healthy could get a weakened version of it that their bodies could thwart easily, thus immunize them to the real plague. One thing they couldn’t agree on was what to name this new strange way of curing a disease. Pre-infection? Dilution-treatment?

“I have to say… this is really impressive. You’ve taken the dead castle alchemist’s stores and made it into a cure for a disease that for a couple month ago I would have sworn there isn’t a cure for” Sullen Hoof said, shaking his head in disbelief. In front of him a big iron cauldron filled with luke-warn brown liquid bubbled, a large wooden spoon enveloped by a golden glow at the end slowly going around in a figure-eight pattern.

Speaker was gazing intently at glass alembic that had a dark grey cloudy fluid inside. Every other second the fluid would bubble and release a dark smoke as the bubbles burst against the inside of the alembic. A pitch black fluid was dripping down into a small cup at the end of the alembic: “Well yes… but we still have to make it stay alive. It was fun experimenting with the first four batches that failed, but this is getting frustrating”

Sullen Hoof walked over to Speaker and looked at the alembic with amazement. The potential for concentrating flavors and distilling alcohol still had him thinking up new dishes and drinks all the time: “Don’t worry. I put in the green jade powder in just like you asked. But say, maybe it’s that we’re trying to manipulate the disease while inside a manse that prevents the spread of disease?”

“No, I tested that myself earlier. The manse prevents spread of disease, but it doesn’t cover the basement and dungeon for that. That’s why it doesn’t smell like pine down here… smell, oh god the cauldron!” Speaker shouted, a rancid smell suddenly spreading through the laboratory.

The two ran over to the cauldron where Sullen Hoof floated the big wooden spoon up from the broth. The previously calm brown liquid was as black as the stuff in the alembic, and the liquid was thick and sticking to the great spoon like tar.

“How? We did this perfectly, watched every step of the process like hawkes” Speaker said with great anguish and bewilderment. Sullen Hoof scratched his head.

At dinner the two presented their problem to the rest of the circle. Cash wasn’t impressed: “So yesterday you two failed six times, and now its four failed batches today? How many dozen times have you two failed at this? Some might take that as a hint that what you’re trying to do won’t work”

“No it should work – and the way the brews fail is really weird. They clot, thicken or turn black – rarely the same thing twice. If this was a problem with what we were doing we’d see the same failure over and over, but each time it’s something different” Speaker lamented.

Sunrise’s ears perked up under her hood: “So it’s not a fault in your procedure. Sabotage?”

“I can’t see any other answer. But I don’t see how…” Speaker lamented. Sullen Hoof agreed that sabotage was the only answer that made sense. However, he had no clue how the Emerald and Ruby Mare was doing it, and she was the only one the circle could think of who’d want to prevent a cure from being made: “I’ve used so much essence sharpening my senses to pierce any illusions she might be hiding behind – if whatever dark charms she’s using to stay out of sight works in any way like mine then I should have seen her”

Cash found the implication that Sullen Hoof could turn invisible quite interesting: “Wait, you can disappear from sight?”

Sullen Hoof nodded once, then winked out of sight, appearing again in the same position he had vanished in a few seconds later: “It’s not difficult – but only works when I stand perfectly still, so it is only good for hiding, not sneaking around in a laboratory and ruining our brews by adding stuff that ruins it”

“Who’s to say that she’s not found a way to do that anyway” Red wondered, arguing that such a limitation would merely be there to be overcome. Sullen Hoof had to agree that this was a possibility…

“But we tried to set up traps for an invisible pony walking around, including salt wards to prevent ghosts coming into the lab. We set up strings of yarn with little bells on them and spread rice-flour on the floor to track movement and hoof-prints… but nothing. I set it all up so only me and Speaker could walk around without setting anything off” Sullen Hoof complained, slamming a hoof into the large wooden dining table. All the porcelain rattled, the sound quickly fading again as the circle mulled over this impossible act of sabotage.

Cash cleared his throat and plainly stated: “While this is disconcerting then I think you two are going at this in the wrong way”
Looking around at table, Cash found all the eyes of the circle locked on him, wordlessly asking for him to explain himself: “Saving Sully was undeniably a good thing, but simply continuing what we all did before the whole water walker incident clearly isn’t working. We need to focus on rooting out and killing this deathknight in our midst if we’re to make any progress here”

“And how exactly would we do that?” Red wondered, her voice betraying her frustration of a foe that could not be seen or fought directly.

Cash was clear that he didn’t know the answer to that question, but said that everything else the circle was doing should be put on hold until the deathknight was taken care of. He also expertly pointed out what the first step should be: “Ok, so we know that she’s hiding from us somehow, which would explain why Red and Shimmer hasn’t found her yet – and that she’s quite good at disguising herself, right? We simply need to find out how she is doing it. Sully, if you’re right then she can’t be using invisibility charms – unless they work differently from yours, which is still an option. Equally, then I would like to go over the traps and whatnot that you and Speaker put up down in the lab, just to see how they work – maybe I can come up with a few ideas there?”

The discussion continued, Shimmer saying that she had set up a kind of ‘web’ through the castle to detect anything empowered by necrotic essence, which had always worked perfectly to detect the elemental essence of unicorns back east when it was attuned to detect that kind of essence instead. It evidently hadn’t worked, but even then it wouldn’t tell her where the deathknight was, but the idea with it was to narrow down exactly where the deathknight was: “…but I’m not getting any response from it. The manse isn’t interfering it, I tested that, but if she can hide from my charms then I’m getting scared of how well she can hide her activities”

Red remained quiet during the brainstorm, nodding to the various suggestions but being unable to come with any of her own. Instead, her face merely soured into a more dour and determined scowl.

The meals long eaten, the circle adjourned for the time being and Speaker, Sullen Hoof and Cash went down to the lab to investigate the warning system they had put up. They returned shortly thereafter to the dining hall, appearing confused as they walked in on Sunrise talking to the young Shogun: “Do not worry your highness, we shall find this dark fiend and put an end to her wicked ways, so please, take heart and rest assured that we will find her”

Turning to see the confused looks on her three circle-mates’ faces, Sunrise inquired into any discoveries. Sullen Hoof explained the strange nature of what they had found: “The strings with bells… had been pulled from the walls several times”
Sunrise couldn’t really see the problem in the statement, but Sully elaborated, saying that this meant that the strings and bells had been tripped several times – the only problem was that Speaker and Sullen Hoof had both been present constantly while the strings and bells had been up, and they had taken them down before leaving the lab.

“So they could only have been yanked from the walls while you had been there, but you didn’t see or hear it?” the young shogun said with bewilderment, his young mind baffled at how something like that could have worked.

Suddenly Sunrise slammed a hoof into the stone-tiled floor: “So that’s how she’s doing it!”

Cash, Speaker, Sullen Hoof and the young shogun were all curious as to Sunrise’s revelation, but instead she called for Red and Shimmer and the others to meet her in the courtyard as quickly as possible.

A few minutes later in the courtyard Sunrise gave Shimmer strict instructions to summon a cloud only big enough and powerful enough to support the six of them – one that would fail and disintegrate should more weight be added. Shimmer complied and the circle got up on the very tiny cloud, Sunrise then instructing Shimmer to take them far from the castle as quickly as possible.

A few miles away from the castle, high up in the lowest of the clouds in the sky, Sunrise told Shimmer to stop.

“Ok, now please tell us what you know” Speaker insisted.

Sunrise drew a deep breath and bid the circle remember their exit from Sullen Hoof’s old ruined manse down south: “When we left we were spotted by on the roof of the manse, but I used a charm to make them not perceive us – altering the way they remembered what they were seeing”

Waiting for the circle to see her logic, the faces of all the ponies present quickly switched to shock, horror and despair. Cash was quick to ask how one could fight a charm like that, but Sunrise had little aid to offer in that department: “I only know that the compulsions I can give can be resisted if the target becomes aware of what they’re being compelled to do”
“So it’s a bit like the hypnotic tongue technique?” Cash wondered.

Sunrise shook her head: “No, it works differently: the memory-reweaving discipline doesn’t compel you to do anything like you can with hypnosis. It outright changes how you perceive the world and remember it. I used it sparingly in Great Forks, but to great effect, when warding off the last of my would-be kidnapers after I exalted – putting the idea in their heads that I was no longer desirable for their pleasure cults. It completely overwrote any idea they had that I was beautiful or attractive, as they justified the new notion to themselves”

“Ok, but then what have we been cursed with here?” Red said, looking a little confused as to what exactly she was under the influence of.

Cash arched his back for a moment and peered up into the cloud they were in. It wasn’t possible to see for more than a few feet since they were inside the cloud. “It’s obvious. We’ve been charmed to not notice or remember the deathknight or any of her actions, which is why Sullen Hoof can’t remember who or how he was captured. It’s quite ingenious really now that you think about it. Speaker, Sully, you two didn’t hear or see her walking around your lab because of this. Hmm… I do wonder what else we haven’t noticed her doing”

Sullen Hoof was quick to point out that his capture had gone unnoticed until Cash and Speaker stumbled across him, so that had perhaps also been part of the compulsion – but Speaker pointed out that this had only happened because no pony in Chung Do or the circle had known what Sullen Hoof really looked like, so the prison guards hadn’t known to free him.

“But we could see the jailor – and if Cash is sure that it was the deathknight in disguise…” Sullen Hoof rebutted, fishing for some kind of justification to why he hadn’t been found sooner.

Sunrise pointed out that Sullen Hoof had answered his own question: “The deathknight was in disguise. We’re probably only compelled to ignore her when she’s in the appearance she was in when she first put the idea in our heads”

“Excellent! Now that we know that we can fight the compulsion, right?” Red hopefully asked, looking eager to dish out some violent justice and revenge for having her head messed with.

Cash shook his head: “Sorry Red – but this is a well thought out of charm we’re under. We’d need to know exactly what we’re not meant to notice before we can try to counter the effect… and that’s not possible when we can’t see her”

“We can ask the other ponies in the castle help us! They must still see her” Red suggested, but Cash pointed out that if this was the deathknight that had started the plague then she had been in Chung Do for over six months now, long before the circle showed up – so there probably wasn’t a pony left in the city that wasn’t under her spell.

“Damnit!” Red shouted, stomping on the cloud so hard that her hoof plunged through it. She recovered quickly from the half-stumble, but the sudden shock of almost falling from the sky, the quick reaction to counter it and the impotent fury over the situation wasn’t doing much for her mood.

The question now was what to do? It was clear that the deathknight was sabotaging all attempts at creating a cure – and couldn’t really be stopped. Adding to the situation was the uncomfortable truth that the season of fire was coming to an end: Calibation was in a few days – and after those five days of starless and moonless skies the season of air would come… winter, and come the spring thaw the rebel nobles would undoubtedly invade. The uncomfortable truth of their dire situation weighed heavily on the circle as they each thought of a way to remedy the calamity.

“If we can’t attack her directly, then let’s attack her allies! The Bodhisattva told us that those foal-soul-spikes were being made and delivered somewhere west of Chung Do in the swamps. If we can’t find this deathknight here, we might be able to flush her out by attacking her allies” Red suggested eagerly.

The rest of the circle was quick to agree that a change in strategy wasn’t a bad idea – and taking the offensive for once sounded a lot more appealing than waiting around for a foe you couldn’t detect to attack you.

“Hold on – do we go back to the castle first? If the Emerald and Ruby Mare is down there waiting for us, she might warn her friends that we’re coming” Shimmer wondered.

Red wanted to raid the castle armory for equipment, and Cash wanted to wrap up some paperwork, but Speaker and Sunrise both advised against it. Speaker said that he could make whatever gear they needed on the fly, and Sunrise was adamant that they really shouldn’t return to Chung Do at all until they had found a way to purge their minds.

Red wasn’t sure about not returning to Chung Do until then – but the circle agreed that the choice of whether to return or not was one that could wait until after they had attacked the deathknight’s allies to the west.

Shimmer flew the cloud to the west at a brisk pace, quickly covering hundreds of miles and nearing the edge of Chung territory. The swamplands that made up the borders to the neighboring territories were difficult to travel through, so sending large armies through them to invade was next to impossible, making the swamps a natural border. The only road through the swamp to the west was the western trade road which linked the Chung lands to the rest of the hundred kingdoms to the west, and it was guarded by a toll station that could easily send a runner to Chung Do to warn of incoming invasions.
It was on this road that the circle spotted a sijaneese corpse caravan.

The large guild wagons full of dead plague victims from Chung Do had evidently been allowed to pass through the road blocks, but now they stood still on the road for some unknown reason.

As the cloud descended the circle realized that the caravan had stopped for a good reason: The giant furry yeddim that had pulled the great multi-storied wagons full of corpses was dead… its hulking corpse collapsed in the middle of the road. It was then that the wind shifted and the circle on the circle found itself barraged by an unbearable stench of rot and death…

“Oh fuck my nose – I didn’t know that corpse caravans smelled this bad” Red exclaimed, desperately trying to cover her nose somehow.

Cash vomited off the side of the cloud, while Speaker noted that corpse caravan’s usually didn’t smell – they were warded in such a way that their cargo didn’t rot before they reached Sijan.

Landing the cloud, Shimmer quickly noticed that the ground was strangely darkened. Picking up a lump of dirt and licking it, then quickly spiting and swearing she shouted: “It’s just like the guild caravan we came with - this whole thing has been struck by the same rot spell – look –the yeddim!”

At close range it was clear that the yeddim was in a very advanced stage of decay. However, unlike the guild caravan that the circle had traveled with, then there were no corpses of caravan guardsponies strewn around the place… instead Speaker found strange tracks in the ground, which had been darkened by an eerily even cover of blood at some point in the recent past. Also the wagons, their timber frames rotten to the point that touching them almost made them collapse, were empty… and there were a lot of hoof prints leading away from them.

“I think we can all agree that the sijaneese wouldn’t give up their cargo without a fight… but honestly… it looks like all the sijanese ponies were killed and then they and their cargo were raised from the dead” Speaker said, noting liking his own frightful conclusion one bit.

Red withdrew her armor and blade from elsewhere: “At least now we have an excuse to go investigating the swamp. Lets follow the hoof prints and see where the dead went and make sure they stay dead this time”

The circle followed the tracks of hundreds of hoof prints into the swamp. It wasn’t that difficult to track such a large number of ponies moving through the swamp, for while the muddy waters might make it almost impossible to follow a single pony in the swamp, then hundreds of shambling dead kicked up enough mud and knocked over enough small plants and bushes that one simply had to follow that instead. 

What the circle found was… disconcerting, to say the least.

After having slogged through the swamp for a few hours, during which Shimmer had flown overhead in her seagull form to scout ahead, Shimmer returned and told of a strange and worrisome sight. She led the circle slightly to the east, to the edge of the swamp, where the ground quickly began to dry up.

“Don’t step out of the puddles! This is some kind of freaky shadowland – I’ve ever seen anything like it before” Shimmer warned, perched on Speaker’s right shoulder still in her seagull form.

Sullen Hoof smiled at her warning but carelessly stepped into blackened dirt beyond the wet swamp puddles, following behind Sunrise, but he quickly regretted doing so: “My hooves!”

Sullen Hoof leapt back into the swampy puddles, landing in an awkward angle and falling to his side in a splash all the while waving his front hooves around as if they were on fire. Speaker rushed to Sullen Hoof to see what was wrong, to his horror discovering that Sully’s hooves looked pale and falling apart, as if they were the hooves of a two hundred year old mummified pony – like some of the old embalmed unicorn bodies kept on display in Lookshy’s museum of ancient heroes.
“Told you…” Shimmer said, adding that she’d gotten the same when she had landed in the blackened dirt.

While Speaker used his healing charms on Sullen Hoof’s hooves, Cash and Red wondered why Sunrise could walk around out in the blackened dirt without her hooves withering.

“I am too holy for this land to touch me” Sunrise said resolutely, looking further afield.

Cash and Red looked at each and shrugged. Cash then wondered why the ground was so black: “It’s not the same shade as the old bloodsoaked dirt at the caravan…”

Floating a patch of dirt up next to him, Sullen Hoof – all the while Speaker worked on his hooves – gave the dirt a close look, then carefully he licked it ever so slightly: “Its ash… and it looks like the dirt itself is harmless once you take it out of the ground, seeing as my tongue didn’t wither”

“This isn’t right. Shadowlands cause living things to fall into the underworld if you stay  overnight – and very few things can grow in it – but I’ve never seen a shadowland that withers flesh and bone like this” Shimmer said in bewilderment, flying out to Sunrise.

Having done all he could – wrapping Sullen Hoof’s hooves in tight bandages so nothing else could fall off and cleaning the wound thoroughly so the hooves could heal over time – Speaker looked in at the shadowland. The swamp petered out at the edge of a hill, so their view was blocked by the crest of the hill: “Shimmer, what’s up ahead?”

Shimmer flew up into the sky, but suddenly a dark beam of necrotic essence hurtled like lightning from beyond the crest of the hill and struck Shimmer in her seagul form with a powerful and loud concussive blast – the bird being blasted back into to the ground not far from the circle, a nasty sizzling sound coming from the little form as it began to wither…

“Shimmer!” Speaker cried out, galloping into the shadowland, insulating his hooves with a little bit of essence without even thinking about it. He quickly picked up Shimmer’s unconscious bird form – which proved very difficult as she began to shift back into pony form the moment Speaker’s floating glow touched her.

Straining to keep Shimmer from touching the ground, Speaker quickly moved her back into the swampy puddles, putting her down on her good side while he checked the side she’s been withered on… and Cash threw up again at the sight of the damage revealed.

Shimmer’s entire left side had been withered to dust. Probably nothing that she couldn’t regenerate once she came to, but she was unconscious so that wasn’t an option right then and there. Instead Speaker cleaned the dirt and ash away from her crumbling ribs, the skin on her entire left side, from most of her face, her left shoulder to her left flank all having been withered away into dusty flakes that peeled off if you even looked at them.

To Speaker’s elation he quickly concluded that while the damage was gruesome to behold, then it wasn’t actually life threatening in any way. After hitting Shimmer with his painkiller charm she came to fair quickly and she was really pissed at having been hit so suddenly without having been able to dodge. To the amazement of the rest of the circle she regenerated the withered skin and ribs in seconds: “Damn that hurt… that thing is going down!”

“So… did you see something before you were hit?” Cash wondered, looking fairly hesitant at the prospect of stepping over the ridge to be the target of some unseen foe.

Shimmer nodded and began to shift into her monsterpony form, her hooves turning into clawed hands with long silvery talons, her face growing a beak and her forehead opening up to a third eye as chitinous feather-scales covered her body: “A manse – big crystal on top, that’s what shot me – but that won’t be a problem again”

> Chapter 26: Illusions of Immortality
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Steadying himself, Sullen Hoof began floating lumps of ashen dirt up to himself, spreading it out over him. In no time at all had the scared pony completely covered himself and his fine silken chef garbs in dirt. Sullen Hoof also directed Speaker to finder a way to let the circle walk on the withering grounds, Speaker testing a number of readily available materials before settling on using his singing staff to summon up stones in the swamp to reshape them into horse-shoes – for the stone could not wither, since it was not alive.

Outfitted with stone shoes and camouflaged using the ashen dirt, Sullen Hoof peeked over the crest of the hill. This time there was no dark essence lightning, allowing Sullen Hoof to survey the landscape beyond.

What Sullen Hoof described sounded very weird to Speaker. The shadowland seemed to be centered on a large three-tiered ziggurat that had a huge purple crystal hovering above it.

While Sullen Hoof scouted ahead, slowly moving down the hill, Speaker outfitted the rest of the circle with stone shoes – except for Cash who had his magic shoes, and Sunrise and himself who seemed to be able to resist the withering touch of the land by force their essence alone.

Red wasn’t particularly keen on the stone shoes: “They’re brittle! They’ll break if I buck or punch anything”

“Then we’ll have to get to safe ground before we start fighting anything. The ground around the ziggurat is covered in stone tiles – that might be safe to walk on without protection” Sullen Hoof said, having returned to the circle without being noticed.

Startled by Sullen Hoof’s sudden reappearance Red gave a start, but quickly regained her composure while giving the decidedly dirty Sullen Hoof a mean glare. Sullen Hoof just smirked under his equally dirty hat.

Sullen Hoof had spotted some trees a bit further into the shadowland – strange dead trees of iridescent white wood. He figured that they would give sufficient cover to sneak up on the ziggurat. Shimmer had a slightly different idea…

Having shifted into her monsterpony form in full combat ‘regalia’ – the scale feathers, the insect-like chitinous armor growths – Shimmer wanted to walk through the dark lighting straight to the ziggurat.

Sullen Hoof wasn’t much for this very much not subtle approach, but Red supported the idea of a full on assault: “It’s faster, come on!”

Moments later the circle strode confidently down the ashen hill towards the ziggurat. The dark lightning intermittently pulsed from the giant dark purple crystal hovering above the manse. It had dark cloudy shapes writhing inside it –and Speaker didn’t like the look of it one bit: This a mockery of what a true manse was meant to be!

The lightning itself hit Shimmer over and over, this time as an unending stream of death, but with her powerful shapeshifted armor it barely even left scorch marks. Behind her the rest of the circle took cover as the lightning scattered and broke on her seemingly impenetrable bony body-armor.

From what Speaker could see when peeking out behind Shimmer then the fortress they were approaching was of a very old design… in fact, it reminded him specifically of certain early first age strongholds: The ziggurat was a giant three-tiered stepped pyramid, with a wide ground level with at least ten yards to the roof of the first level. On top of that was another level, equally tall, with walls as vertical as the ground level’s, but only took up a small amount of the roof of the ground level. 

On top of that was an even smaller level, just as tall, and above that… a giant purple crystal around which dark lightning twisted and crackled. It was clearly some kind of manse, but Speaker had seen the maps of the area: There weren’t any known demesnes in the area – let alone any strong enough to power kind of manse defenses – heck, even the strange forest of iridescent white trees was a new feature, and forests don’t just appear out of nowhere… at least not outside of wyld-zones.

As the circle got close enough to step up on the rough cobble-stone that covered the ground around the manse the circle made a grim discovery:

“Oh gods…” Sullen Hoof suddenly said, catching his breath. While the rest of the circle had been looking up at the death-ray they were now in cover of, Sullen Hoof had been looking down… and he had noticed a very grim feature of the cobble they now stood on: “It’s tomb-stones! I think we’re standing on graves!”

The rest of the circle quickly looked down. It was true – hundreds, if not thousands of gravestones, some simple, some beautifully detailed, lined the ground around the manse. Sunrise was quick to point out why this was a really bad thing, her ears twisting about under her wide hood: “I can hear ghosts nearby”

Speaker quickly facehoofed at his own folly: He should have known better than to not walk into a shadowland without his spirit detection charm on. Willing the occult patterns of essence into existence within his ears, eyes and hooves Speaker instantly caught on to the quiet groans and rattle of strange ethereal voices… but they were coming from above the circle?
“They’re above us. I think the ghosts patrol the first roof level – not down here” Speaker said with a whisper.

Shimmer reached up towards the roof of the ground level with a taloned forelimb – it stretched unnaturally all the way ten yards up to the edge… but suddenly a skeletal pony leg and hoof poked out of the stone wall and tried to grab the extended leg.

Quickly retracting her limb, Shimmer peered intently at the limb with her third eye: “Speaker, the walls… this isn’t rock…”

Putting a stone-shod hoof up against the manse wall Speaker began to nod. The sound of his shoe against the wall was not one of stone against stone… instead the ashen surface crumbled ever so slightly, for on the surface it was as dry and nearly as hard as stone, but it certainly wasn’t stone: It was dry and tough ashen flesh interspersed with plates of rune-carved bone. This whole manse… it wasn’t alive, but it certainly wasn’t entirely dead either: “This place is an abomination”

“All the more reason to destroy it” Shimmer said as she zipped up to the first floor roof, being pulled up by her extended arm after again snaking it up, this time taking care to dodge any blood-soaked skeletal limbs that would poke out of the wall to grab her.

Peeking over the edge to the Roof level Shimmer suddenly pulled herself up on the roof with a fierce warcry, the rest of the circle only getting to see her disappear over the edge, followed by the sounds of fighting.

The ponies down on the ground scrambled to find a way to get up to Shimmer. Cash aimed a hoof up at the edge and tried to fire a claw to pull himself up – but he missed. Red sighed and aimed for him, the claw this time embedding itself deep into the ash-covered flesh wall. Cash was able to pull himself and Red up.

Speaker gestured for Sunrise to over to him while he retrieved Gift from his saddlebags. Attaching Gift to his right fore-hoof, Speaker gazed intently at the disk as it spun up with a humming buzz and a puff of steam. It then slowed down the circulation of the blades, and rearranged them so that they cut in a serrated pattern. Around each of the blades an extra large cutting edge of pure glowing essence extended…

Grabbing Sunrise with his left hoof, Speaker thrust Gift forcefully into the ashen flesh. The ashen flesh wall was dry and tough, which suited Speaker perfectly, as the bladed disk spun up and dug in. The essence-based blade extensions quickly faded, but they did their job: With the momentary addition to cutting power Gift managed to embed itself several inches into the wall of flesh – it then began to pull Speaker and Sunrise up, as Gift’s rotating blades chewed through the surface of the dry flesh without being able to dig further in because it was attached to Speaker’s hoof as if it was a gear running along the length of a machine, leaving behind a bleeding trail of torn flesh and splintered bone plates.

Like a gear going along an indented steel row Speaker quickly ascended, him and Sunrise quickly reaching the roof level. Red and Cash were both weaving and dodging from ghosts they could not see – but Speaker could… and it wasn’t pretty: War-ghosts, the spirits of fallen warriors who had died without being put to rest, able to attack with the weapons they died with without materializing…

Shimmer was having a far better time, her silvery talons trailing blue light as they cut through the swarming ghosts with ease, their vaporous and semi-transparent forms dissolving into puddles of ectoplasm that hungry skeletal limbs protruding from the roof scooped up and funneled into sphincters in the slabs of flesh…

Speaker joined the fight as quickly as he could, flinging Gift at the war-ghosts that were attacking Red. It was a testament to Red’s incredible fighting skills that she was to successfully duck, weave and parry attacks from foes she literally could not sense – and yet the only times they managed to hit her their ghostly blades only scraped along her lamellar armor, or left her tiny inconsequential superficial cuts.

Cash couldn’t hear the shrieks of the ghosts as Gift tore through their ethereal essence, enhanced by Speaker’s god killing charm that had previously made swift work of several water elementals. The ghosts that Shimmer tore through didn’t fare much better as she felled dozens with each slash of her claws, but it seemed as if hundreds of ghosts were pouring down from the upper levels – or just coming out through the walls – to join the attack… It was a strange silent battlefield against enemies that mortal eyes could not see.

Sunrise Glow stepped into the fray. Speaker shouted for her to get behind him, but she did not listen. By the might of her dedication and stubborn will none of the war-ghosts could touch her, for lo she was holy and she shined with a bright light and she was protected by a seemingly invincible ego shield, her desire to ignore these feeble ghosts made manifest through the might of her essence.

To Cash it just looked like the ghosts weren’t attacking her, while the rest of the circle was under constant attack – to Speaker, it appeared as if the ghosts could not hit Sunrise, despite Sunrise not even trying to dodge.

Clearing her throat, Sunrise suddenly began to sing a single long tone. To Cash and Red nothing really seemed to happen, although Red subsequently quickly noticed that the attacks she were fending off were losing coherence and coordination very quickly.

Speaker laughed, sending Gift flying once again. Sunrise was using the same strange charm she had used on the Bodhisatva – for the dozens of war-ghosts surrounding them were fleeing, as Sunrise’s simple act of singing somehow burnt every ghost in earshot as if struck with holy fire. Shimmer ran around in a frenzy as the ghosts fled, her long silvery talons ripping ghosts asunder left and right with an ease that Speaker had to admit was quite impressive – and equally intimidating.
Moments later the ghosts had scattered or sought refuge where they couldn’t hear Sunrise’s burning voice, and Speaker realized that the adolescent mare had maintained that single high note for almost a minute: “I think you can stop now… and maybe breathe?”

Sullen Hoof appeared, having apparently stayed out of sight somehow – and said that there was nothing on this level of the ziggurat of interest. He also noted that down on the ground on the opposite side there was a gate, but it was locked and bared – and evidently made of the same evil metal that the bodhisattva had used to trap foal-souls: soulmetal – so the gate was virtually indestructible.

“You’ve been busy” Red commented, giving Sullen Hoof a firm nod of approval.

Sullen Hoof shrugged: “Ponies always look at the fighting – not at the ones sneaking around behind them not fighting”
With the gate not much of an option, Shimmer did her limb-extending trick again – taking care to dodge the skeletal limbs that tried to grab at her - and checked on the second level roof for a way into the manse. This time there was plenty to see: “Walking skeletons, zombie-ponies and big stacks of flesh and bone slabs. They’re repairing the roof – there was a big hole. It looked like something had forced its way out from inside the manse”

The circle quickly moved up, Red and Sunrise coming up with Shimmer this time, while Speaker hauled Cash up with Gift embedded in the wall again.

Cash found this new use of Gift quite creative: “…and the new blade extension on the disc looks positively lethal, when did you come up with that?”

“I just remembered that I could. It’s part of a technique to enhance the cutting power of Gift, but this way it also digs into the flesh-wall and pulls us up – I’ll have to experiment with this later” Speaker said with a strained voice, finding Cash just that much heavier to hold on to.

On the second level Speaker arrived to find Red and Shimmer having cut down everything that moved. There were skeletal remains of ponies scattered everywhere, along with large slabs of dried meat etched with strange glyphs and similarly sized slabs of bone that Speaker had no idea where came from: “…bone doesn’t grow into building blocks. How did they make these?”

“Ya its weird – but it looks like they were repairing this hole here” Shimmer said, pointing a talon towards a large hole in the roof. 

Red was about to push the remains of a zombie pony down to the first floor roof when Sunrise touched the corpse and reduced it to Ash: “Hey!”

“Be respectful of the dead – they are not toys” Sunrise said in a calm but scathing tone.

Red rolled her eyes and walked over to peek down the hole.

Speaker, Shimmer, Sully and Cash joined the warrior mare.

“It’s dark down there” Red bluntly stated, sounding disappointed that there wasn’t anything to hit.

Sullen Hoof sighed and leaned in over the hole: “To you, maybe – but not with my vision enhancement charms: I’m seeing… tables? Big ones, down on the ground level – there’s no first floor. I don’t see any movement”

Speaker mulled over the description for a few moments when suddenly a blur of motion shot up from the hole, striking Sullen Hoof so hard that the Night Caste pony tumbled over backwards, knocked out cold with blood pouring from his mouth, with what Speaker suspected was a broken jaw.

The brief moment spent considering Sullen Hoof’s wounds allowed the attacker to land behind Speaker and buck him into the hole. If not for the perfect balance charm Sullen Hoof had taught Speaker, he would have fallen – but this did leave Speaker balancing precariously on an exposed bone plate jutting out from the torn roof panels of flesh.

From behind him Speaker could hear Shimmer and Red charging this guardian of the manse, but by the time Speaker managed to find something to stand on, so he could turn around and step away from the hole, he found the fight to have taken a terrible turn for the worse:

Red was wriggling helplessly up in the air, held tightly by rusty chains that jutted out of the back of… celestia’s mercy – a dark warrior pony, not entirely unlike the Bodhisattva, but at least this time with no apparent sacrificed limbs replaced by ghostly gifts of the neverborn. Still, this pony stood firmly in sleek articulated soulsteel plate armor, wearing a helmet made to give the appearance of a smug grin, while a very nasty looking soulsteel glaive floated above him, ready to strike, swipe, chop or parry any incoming attack.

Shimmer was doing all of the attacking, but despite swiping furiously, or darting around and trying to catch the dark armored pony from a different angle, she was batted forcefully away each time by the shaft of the glaive.

Cash was curled up next to Sunrise, cowering in fear, while Sunrise seemed to be holding her mouth… and bleeding from it.
Quickly rushing over to Sunrise to help her, Speaker hurriedly asked what was wrong. She gave a muffled answer under her hood, pointing a bloody hoof over at the manse guardian. When Speaker turned to look he saw tiny letters of white light floating in the air forming around his field of vision: “One of the hooks on the end of the chains from the monster’s back. It cut my tongue, so I cannot talk”

Speaker quickly turned back to Sunrise: “Your tongue – let me see”

It wasn’t pretty. Sunrise’s tongue had almost been torn off – and when that hadn’t worked the hook that had caught it had simply cut its way around. It was a rough and jagged cut, very ugly: “I can’t fix this right now – just stay low”

There was a howling shriek from the fight behind Speaker, and upon turning to see Speaker saw to his terror the dark guardian twirl its glaive with lightning speed as it flickered with many shadows, slashing at Shimmer multiple times – the glaive leaving dark vapor trails as it coursed through the air, along with multiple trails of blood. Shimmer dropped to the ground, emitting a strange and very un-ponylike whine, more akin to that of a wounded bird of prey.

It wasn’t because that the scene was eerily familiar, indeed at least this time Shimmer hadn’t been cut in half – but Speaker still roared in a mix of fury, despair and anger, Gift zipping off at the dark warrior. The dark armored pony seemed to have expected incoherent rage and had held his guard appropriately for that, but it did not seem to expect the cold rage that Speaker exhibited: Gift swerved and flew around the glaive, not even trying to hit the dark pony, instead it zoomed past… right into the rusty chains, cutting into them with great force.

The dark pony twisted in attempt to dodge, but Speaker had flung Gift with a martial skill not seen in Creation for millennia, and Gift severed one of the chains holding Red. The part of the chain no longer connected to the dark pony’s back dissolved into a splattering of blood, allowing Red to wrestle the two remaining chains and free herself.

The dark pony remained still, the glaive twirling around to swipe at Red – cutting a deep gouge through Red’s armor into her left rear leg just as she was about to land, causing her to land hard on her side as her left rear failed to right itself.

“Wha- Who are you? Why are you doing this? Are you the guardian of this manse?” Speaker shouted, Gift having zipped back to his right forehoof.

Red staggered to her legs, but her left rear leg hung limply. Shimmer emitted a pained whine as she shapeshifted from her monsterpony form to her true form, that of a western mare the size of a filly.

The dark pony shifted its stance, the half length of chain jutting out of its back dissolving into blood. Its armor shifted to cover the tiny hole where the chain had come out from, and the pony began laughing from under its grinning mask: “Oh oh course – how rude to kill you before I tell you”

“I am He who Kills and Fears Nothing, the unkillable warrior of the night and I will now kill you all… not because I am to defend this place, but simply because I can” The dark pony said, pulling a hoof up to remove the front of his helmet…
Red groaned at the grim sight under the helmet: “Great, your face is cut off? We’ll we’ll see about killing you alright… I mean, someone’s already been chopping bits off of you”

Speaker shook his head – he couldn’t see what Red had seen, but it was obvious to him what they were facing: “You’re another deathknight, aren’t you? Like the Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes”

“True, but enough talk. I’m not one to stall to live a few moments longer… for unlike me, you’re about to die” The fearless killer said, reattaching his mask in a swift motion, only to launch himself at Speaker.

Speaker braced himself and brought Gift up to parry the incoming blows, but Red leapt in the way, parrying Killer’s soulsteel glaive with her bare hooves – which where all sheathed in bright light. Speaker recognized it as the effects of using the Hooves of Iron technique as part of the Hoof of the Daystar style of martial arts. Truly, one had to respect the simpler techniques.

With this reprieve given by Red, Speaker noticed her limp leg. To Speaker’s trained physician eyes the damage was clear – and it made him marvel at Red’s ability to stay fighting, for it appeared that the leg had been severed at the hip bone, meaning that only skin and what little unsevered muscle that was left was holding the leg in place… which it was barely even managing to do.

Speaker quickly joined the fight again, flinging Gift at the merciless killer who kept shouting taunts at Red and Speaker while expertly dodging Gift and Red’s floating blade – which was quickly cut into pieces by Killer’s soulsteel glaive.

Seeing her blade destroyed did something to Red. Speaker, standing behind the warrior mare, could hear her cry of anguish as she dropped into a terrible martial trance – but he could also feel the air around her tense as her anima flared to its full terrifying totemic glory: A golden fountain of light erupted around Red, revealing that telltale circle of glowing symbols – a full bagua – and above each symbol hovered different weapons of pure light… and what happened next took only a few scant seconds.

First Red gestured at the short sword, sending it flying at the killer – who brushed it aside with the sturdy shaft of his glaive. Next Red sent the glowing katana at the Killer, then the maul, the axe, the spear and even flinging the bladed horseshoes at the deathknight – who quickly had to use actual effort to avoid getting hit. Finally Red drew the glowing bow and fired a single arrow of furious white light …. And another, and another – all so quickly that one would easily mistake Red to have only fired one arrow – but Red wasn’t done. Upon leaving the bow of pure essence each arrow split into three more, peppering the oh so fearless killer with armor piercing target arrows that each blazed with the righteous fire of Red’s martial passion and fury. This entire barrage of attacks had taken but a scant few seconds.

Speechless – probably due to the arrow that had punched through his armor and lodged itself in his throat – the otherwise fearless killer made a gurgling sound and only after floating the arrow stuck in his throat out did the killer laugh mockingly and madly at Red, clearly banking on her being too weak to finish him off… despite her having just pinned him to the wall of the third level of the ziggurat.

Red, all her weapons having faded, dropped to her three good legs – trembling. Speaker could figure as much that Red had probably just spent every last mote of essence she had in her… but the killer wasn’t dead yet and Speaker could feel the murder in Red’s eyes even behind her.

Hobbling forward toward the Killer, who was still pinned to the wall, Red began to feebly pummel the deathknight. Her own wounds too great, and the deathknight’s soulsteel armor too thick, Red could do little to finish off her foe except shatter her stone shoes against the soulsteel plate armor – and even if he was all but defeated, every limb of the deathknight pinned and blood leaking profusely from his armor, then the dawn caste solar could not let this insult to her weapon and the offensive of hurting her friends go unpunished… especially since the bastard was still mocking her, even in defeat!

Speaker looked on with some measure of disgust as first Red ripped off the killer’s face-mask, revealing the grim visage of a pony’s head cut in half – with the face half missing entirely. The back end of the eye sockets had black pits of teeth that seemed to work as the killer’s neverborn-gifted eyes, while the entirety of its lower jaw was gone – making Speaker wonder how the monster had been able to talk. Above the blood-eyes was exposed grey matter, the brain of the deathknight…
"Let’s see how unkillable you really are!” Red shouted, her voice ragged.

Red began to punch the killer directly in the brain, causing the killer to spasm pitifully as its pinned limbs began to jerk around to each blow. After the sixth blow – nearly having caved in the killer’s skull completely - the limbs stopped jerking, the killer’s entire body going limp. A part of Speaker objected to this brutal execution, but it was easily ignored.

Approaching Red to treat her wounds, Speaker barely caught Red as her martial trance faded, reminding Red painfully that her leg was all but severed from her body. Speaker quickly hit her with his anesthetic charm before the pain set in, then putting her down on the ground and rushing over to Shimmer…

“Come on – be alive!” Speaker urged, checking for a pulse on Shimmer’s small body. To Speaker’s great relief she was alive, and her wounds weren’t that deep… but she was also conscious: “Why haven’t you used your regeneration charm?”
Shimmer groaned again, looking up at Speaker with tearful eyes: “He cut… he cut me”

Speaker had decades of experience with patients who were unable to verbalize their own injuries: He knew how to coax such information out of them – and with his exaltation he could with but a glance diagnose even the most well hidden of injury, however… here he only saw the flesh-wounds, the lacerations to Shimmer’s belly, sides and shoulder. Administering his anesthetic charm Shimmer sighed deeply and shook her head, beginning to cry. Speaker didn’t see the problem – Shimmer had shrugged off and regenerated far greater injury not an hour earlier when she had landed on her side and had her flesh withered by the corrosive essence sufficing the ground around the manse.

Sunrise came over to Speaker, along with Cash who was dragging the unconscious Sullen Hoof. Closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, Speaker looked between Sunrise, Sullen Hoof and Red – then began to patch Red’s leg back together again, all the while wondering what was wrong with Shimmer.

After restoring Red’s leg to the point that she could at least put some weight on it – mainly via heavy use of essence-formed sutures and fast acting bone-adhesives – as well as stitching up Red’s flesh-wounds in the same way, Cash came over to Speaker: “I think I figured out what ‘s wrong with Shimmer”

Speaker was all ears as he began to work on Sullen Hoof’s thankfully not broken but dislocated jaw. Cash wasn’t sure how to word it, but he’d drawn a frightfully simple conclusion based on Shimmer’s apparent inability to use her own regeneration charm: “I think that Killer freak cut her in more than one way – not just her body – but her soul… cut away her ability to use charms”

Considering the suggestion, Speaker tried once again to talk to Shimmer – and indeed, Shimmer concurred that she was feeling a most horrifying void within her – her body drained of essence completely… but what was worse was that none of it was coming back. Cursing that he didn’t have essence sight like Shimmer had with her monsterpony form, Speaker closed his eyes and simply tried to feel the essence around Shimmer. There was hardly any…

“Wait, none? But… your soul, it breathes essence – if it’s all gone and not coming back, you should be dead” Speaker quickly pointed out.

Shimmer shook her head, speaking quietly: “A tiny bit… hardly any left. It’s so cold”

Feeling a pat on his shoulder, Speaker turned to see Sullen Hoof having regained consciousness. Sully gestured for Speaker to walk away from Shimmer for a moment: “I think I have an idea of what’s going on”

“We’ve figured that out already – The killer damaged Shimmer’s soul, so now she doesn’t have any essence left” Speaker said coldly, trying to mask his anger behind a façade of professionalism.

Sullen Hoof shook his head: “No no – I mean, why she’s reacting like this. Remember, she’s over a hundred years  old… she’s been a lunar for a really long time – so this is probably the first time a very long time that she’s been this powerless, almost as if she’s a mortal again. If she’s been used to wielding essence for that long…”

“Let’s hope it’s not permanent” Speaker said, going back to Shimmer to patch up her wounds.

After having fixed Shimmer up to the best of his ability, and re-attaching Shimmer’s torn tongue so she could – to a very limited extent – speak, the question was what to do…

Red didn’t have much fight left in her, Shimmer had none, and Speaker was deeply worried.

Sunrise would have nothing of such pitiful behavior. Using a charm to cause her voice to magically come from around her, allowing her speak without using her mouth, Sunrise scolded Speaker for wanting to give up on assaulting the manse: “Come Speaker, you, me, Cash and Sullen Hoof are all ready and able – and if this dead deathknight and those ghosts were the only defenders of this horrible place, then we have won already. All we need to do is venture into manse and check for straglers – if there were more defenders, do you not think that they would have come to their ally’s aid during the fight?”
Speaker slowly nodded. Without Shimmer being able to use sorcery the circle was stuck halfway up the ziggurat anyway… so securing the location wouldn’t be that bad of an idea anyway. 

A sudden clatter startled the circle, as the killer’s corpse suddenly fell to the ground – Red’s arrows of light having faded. However, upon hitting the roof four black tentacles of what looked like tar-smeared flesh shot up from the hole in the roof and snatched the body, dragging it down into the darkness.

“Looks like there’s still something down there… with tentacles” Sullen Hoof grimly pointed out, retrieving a pair of cleavers from elsewhere.
> Chapter 27: Dark Dreams Broken
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Taking a peek down the hole in the roof, Sullen Hoof quickly noted that he could no longer see tables down on the ground level. Indeed, he couldn’t see the ground level at all…

“Then what can you see – come on, give us something useful” Cash bemoaned.

Sullen Hoof shot Cash a dirty look: “Teeth. Lots of teeth. I think someone parked a monster with an open mouth under the hole... it looks hungry”

“Wouldn’t we have heard something growling down there if that was the case?” Cash quipped.

Sullen Hoof trotted over to the pile of ashen flesh slabs and hauled one back to the hole, then tossed it in. There was a moment of silence, then from the hole sounded a very quick snap – not entirely unbefitting that of a giant maw closing shut very quickly… then chewing... then swallowing... and then crapping out the remains onto a stone floor.

“Ok, so… now what? We can’t go down into that – we’ll be eaten”  Cash said, looking very much like he was ready to go back to Chung Do.

Sunrise walked up the hole, peeking down. In the darkness normal eyesight revealed nothing to her, but none the less she drew a deep breath and sang a single high pitched note. From the pit erupted flashes of white, yellow and golden light, as the circle could hear that Sunrise’s strange musical assault was smiting any number of dark things down in the manse. It was a howling geyser fueled by the burning flesh of the monster in the dark... it slowly dying down.

Sullen Hoof quickly peeked down again once nothing more was spurting out the hole in the roof: “Awesome! The maw is gone and the ground is clear under the hole – Speaker, can you make a rope or something out of the building materials here?”

Looking around at the slabs of bone and flesh, Speaker frowned. It wasn’t exactly idea materials to make rope – but the flesh slabs could probably be made into something. Red called out that she’d found a barrel full of brass spikes among the construction equipment. With the spikes Speaker instantly began to use his essence to melt the spikes down to fashion a long pole that he extended down into the manse, but it turned out that there wasn’t enough metal for that. To supplement the brass Speaker used Gift to cut some of the bone slabs into long rods that he built into the brass pole. It took a surprisingly short amount of time, especially considering that Speaker didn’t have any forge or smelting equipment, instead using only his essence to work the materials. Sullen Hoof was particularly intrigued, to which Speaker simply pointed out: “A good solar craftspony needs no tools beyond his own essence”

The pole was lowered down into the manse until it rested on the floor, after which Sullen Hoof and Speaker had a look to check for ghosts or anything else that might be waiting for them at the end of the pole. They saw nothing, so they all quickly slid down, with Red and Shimmer coming down last.

Finally inside the manse, the circle quickly surveyed their surroundings – which turned out to be a lot more difficult and daunting than one might have expected. Sunrise flared her anima to the point that she appeared wreathed in golden flames of pure sunlight – yet the light from her anima barely extended more than half a dozen yards around her before simply terminating in an almost palpable darkness.

Of what very little the circle could see was indeed a very large table made of a single huge slab of stone – and that was all they could see. Speaker identified the stone as something not native to the Chung lands – for it was dark like flint, but had a weird texture: “I’m not even sure this is native to creation…”

It was then that Red shouted: “Look, the hole!” and pointed upwards. The hole in the ceiling was being covered… now their only source of light was that of their own souls.

“Everyone flare up – we have to find who’s controlling this manse, but stay in sight ok?” Speaker said. Shimmer and Red gave him apologetic looks as neither had the power left in them to do so, so Speaker told them to stay with Sunrise.
Peering into the darkness Sullen Hoof shook his head: “Can’t see a thing. I think this place eats light...”
“Moot point. Sunrise, give them a serenade. A requiem to send them all to lethe!” Speaker said, like an officer ordering archers to fire a volley.

Sunrise drew in breath but what came out as she was about to speak was a brief shout as dark fleshy tentacles, just like the ones that had taken the fearless killer’s body, suddenly yanked Sunrise into the darkness and away from the circle…
Her surprisingly calm shouting and insistent “Put me down you fiend or feel my wrath!” ended very quickly with the sound of a splash, followed by a loud thump and several brief metal on metal striking sounds – then there was silence.
“I want to go home” Cash said meekly.

Ignoring the impulse to agree with him, Speaker brought Gift to bear and reared up into a martial stance – ready to cut any more tentacles he might spot… then his vision began to fail and he began hearing things.

Turning to look at the rest of the circle, it was clear that they too were suffering the same strange effect. It was as if white noise tainted everyone’s hearing and eye-sight, followed by a high pitched gravelly voice suddenly speaking as if from all around the circle. The voice spoke slowly, as if the speaker savored every second it could hear itself: “Now now… why leave? I have such sights to show you… and you won’t even need eyes to see them”

Taking a step backwards to brace himself, Speaker felt his hind-hooves become wet. Quickly glancing down he could barely make out that the floor was now awash in a thin layer of blood: “Everyone, stay alert!”

For a few moments nothing happened – but the static continued. From the darkness a faint outline of a pony slowly emerged and Speaker focused as much essence as he could to guide Gift to striking it as he launched it –in desperation not even thinking whether it was the source of the static poisoning his senses or not.

Gift emitted a quick puff of steam as it revved and zipped off, leaving a golden vapor trail behind it. There was a sound of grinding metal on metal, Gift stringing something, a split second later Gift returning to Speaker – but the faint silhouette of the figure remained still.

The menacing voice spoke again, this time just as high pitched but slightly less gravelly – as it sounded positively delighted: “Oh, still some fight left in you – that’ll make this fun!”

The static intensified to the point that Speaker couldn’t see his own hooves or hear his own voice as he shouted for Sullen Hoof to come help him.

It was then that he saw – just barely – that the silhouette had moved closer, just barely revealing that it was a pony wearing black hoof-length robes and a pale mask of skin cut to make a bloody smile over its head that was nearing him – but he hadn’t seen the figure move, it had just appeared there when he had looked up…

The cognitive dissonance between something appearing out of nowhere, the almost complete loss of his ability to sense his surroundings and the overpowering fear for his own life made Speaker throw Gift again as hard as he could, pouring as much essence into guiding the device as possible.

Gift flew true and impacted the figure head on – and a split second later two cleavers dug into the pony as well… then the static spiked for a moment and suddenly the pony was gone – but the static returned. Gift zipped back, covered in some kind of thick black pitch or tar…

The mirthful and menacing voice returned, the auditory static momentarily decreasing just enough that the voice could be heard as it laughed: “Oh this is too much fun. I should do this more often”

“Reveal yourself you monster!” Speaker shouted, desperately turning to face whatever hints of movement the visual static fooled him into seeing.

Turning again Speaker was startled to the point that he screamed as suddenly the dark masked pony was right in front of him. The visual static increased to the point that now Speaker was truly blind, seeing only a mess of white and black undulating specks in his field of vision. Slashing with Gift, Speaker felt as Gift cut into the pony – but it didn’t feel right... Gift bogged down halfway through the cut, stuck in the tar-like goo that the pony was full of – and Speaker’s medical experience very quickly pointed out to him that the pony body he was attacking was far too limp to be anything but dead. This was a ruse, a trap!

Yanking hard to free Gift while willing the primordial device to retract its stuck blades, Speaker fell over backwards into the blood-covered stone floor – which somehow lessened the visual and auditory static for a moment: “Don’t attack it Sully, it’s a dummy! It’s a corpse!”

Speaker got up and looked around now that he could see again, quickly spotting the black tentacles that seemed to hold the corpse dummy in front of him. Some quick estimates on where the puppeteer could be later and Gift flew off into the darkness…

Suddenly the visual and auditory static faded completely – instead the circle heard an anguished and high pitched howl of pain just as Gift zipped back to Speaker, its blades covered in proper blood for once – even if it was a bit too dark… and cold.

“You weren’t supposed to do that! Why didn’t you attack the corpse!?” the voice screamed, no longer sounding gravelly at all – just high pitched and somewhat nasal.

The corpse puppet dropped to the ground with a wet splash onto the blood-covered floor and Sullen Hoof was over on it in an instant, tugging at his cleavers which he quickly threw at the same spot that Speaker had aimed Gift as soon as they were out. There was a clatter of metal on stone as they struck nothing, but it was clear that Speaker had managed to wound the dark lord of the manse.

With the static gone Cash also got into the fight, firing his shoe-claws into the darkness – but instead of retracting them when he didn’t hit anything he left them out and began to swing them around so the claws or the chains they were attacked to would hit any pony skulking around in the darkness.

Looking at Sullen Hoof Speaker realized that Sully was using a charm to enhance his hearing, so he could track the foul corpse-puppeteer in the darkness, since Sullen Hoof was pulling out all kinds of kitchen tools – from big wooden spoons, various knives and rolling pins out of elsewhere and then flinging them into the darkness – and quite often they did not return a clattering of wood or iron hitting a stone floor, but instead the sound of such things hitting a pony… occasionally even eliciting a yelp of pain.

Cash quickly joined in on this, firing his claws in the same rough direction as Sullen Hoof was chucking things.

Speaker chose to hold back, not throwing Gift blindly into the darkness – instead using the points where he could hear Sullen Hoof hit the target and how much they were apart to judge the puppeteer's speed, then leading the target by just the right amount, dropping back into the proper form, revving Gift with essence, and throwing it with all his might. Sure, he couldn't hear the puppeteer's movements in the dark, but he could track the more audible sounds of impact.

A shrill howl went out through the manse as Speaker could hear the puppeteer fall over and shamble up again. This was followed by a wet and slick sound of flesh and meat being chucked around, a ripping sound, some grunts and then nothing. A thought struck Speaker: Why wasn’t this puppeteer giving off any sounds of hoof beats against the stone floor? Only Sullen Hoof, with his sensory enhancement charms, could track this unseen foe.

Having tracked the puppeteer halfway around the periphery of the inside of the evidently hollow manse Sullen Hoof suddenly professed that he was out of things to throw.

“But you can still track him, right?” Speaker called out, peering intently into the darkness – not wanting to lose track of the puppeteer.

Sullen Hoof said that of course he could still hear the puppeteer – to which Speaker cut him off and said “Then throw me!”
Giving Speaker a bit of an odd look, which was understandable seeing as Sullen Hoof was almost half a head taller than Sullen Hoof and twice as muscular, but Speaker simply nodded fervently. Sullen Hoof shrugged and said “Alright, hold on!” as he ran up to Speaker while powering up a charm that made white lightning crackle all around him. Straining for a brief moment to lift the twilight caste solar up in his forehooves, Sullen Hoof spun around with Speaker and launched Speaker in all his glowing glory at where Sully could hear the puppeteer was at the moment…

Speaker flew through the air, surprised at the sudden strength that Sullen Hoof had been able to muster to lift Speaker up into the air and then throw him with such force. As he flew through the air Speaker positioned himself so he would land properly no matter if he hit the ground or the puppeteer first, a feat made easy by his balancing charm. 

Flaring his anima mid-flight, Speaker shined golden light into the darkness – and sure enough: Sullen Hoof’s charm-enhanced hearing had heard right, as Speaker came to a good tumbled landing, getting up quickly to see the puppeteer moving away from him with an eerily silent gallop.

Running after the puppeteer proved easy enough, as Speaker found himself gaining on his quarry quickly - evidently the puppeteer wasn't that physically fit. The puppeteer looked exactly like the corpse dummy used to distract Speaker and the others, and the hunt ended at the main gate of the manse that began to open as the puppeteer neared it.

Just as the door had opened enough for the puppeteer to slip through, which the puppeteer quickly did, the door began to close. Speaker shouted angrily and threw Gift with all his might – but hit the soulsteel gate instead, Gift simply bouncing off it in a shower of sparks and returning to Speaker’s right hoof.

The thick soulsteel gate was now too closed for Speaker to follow the puppeteer and wouldn’t budge, but then the gate suddenly stopped closing… and became surprisingly light and easy to move. Throwing the door open Speaker found the puppeteer lying on the ground next to a pony wearing a green hooded robe. The puppeteer was wearing dark robes and a disgusting mask of pale sickly skin cut to feature no eyes but a disturbingly large and bloody grin.

“Whoever you are, thank you” Speaker said, catching his breath, stepping into the dim light outside.

The hooded mare standing over the puppeteer nodded and threw back her hood: “No problem, it was my pleasure”
Drawing the flesh-mask back from the puppeteer’s head, Speaker’s face soured in disgust. The pony that was the puppeteer had no face – just like the killer the circle had fought up on the manse. One could see straight into grey matter, as well as the edge of the puppeteer’s skull and pale skin as it ended so abruptly.  Sighing at the disgusting and thoroughly unnatural sight, Speaker thought out loud: “Do all Deathknights get their faces removed?”

“Beats me – the few I’ve heard of supposedly look quite normal” the hooded mare state, peeking down at the puppeteer while furiously taking notes on a scroll with an elegant silver brush that floated with a green glow.

Seeing the green glow, Speaker took a step back – then noticed that the mare had no horn. There was only one possibility: “Sidereal!”

“Oh you remember me?” the mare said, smiling as she floated the brush and scroll into a pocket of her robes that seemed far too small to fit such things – but they went in quite easily.

Speaker looked at the sidereal with guarded caution, not sure whether he should gird himself for combat or relax his stance: “No… should I?”

The mare sighed and asked for Speaker to gather the rest of his circle, assuring him that she was there to help – and that she would stand guard over the deathknight in the meanwhile.

Like the two times before Speaker thought furiously about the implications of the sidereals existing as he called out for the others, and like before he couldn't remember ever having met the hooded mystery mare. The rest of the circle emerged shortly from the manse. Like before there was the usual confusion about who the strange dark-brown coated mare with the very green eyes was – but this time Shimmer didn’t have the strength to enrage herself over the revelation over the existence of the sidereals, and Red didn’t have the power to do much of anything either, so the sidereal was actually able to introduce herself fully:

“My name is Heath Rose, or just Rose, chosen of the mare of secrets. Yes this means that you all have a lot of questions to ask – but before that I have to know, do you lot have full control of this manse?” the sidereal asked, her voice young and strong, yet tempered with a strange hint of wisdom that only Cash picked up on.

Poking the unconscious deathknight with a hoof, Sullen Hoof shook his head: “No, this joker seemed to be in control of the manse’s internal defences – we killed the other deathknight”

“Really? What’s in there then? What does the manse do?” Rose inquired, peering into the darkness beyond the manse’s soulsteel gates with hungry eyes.

The circle couldn’t tell Rose, only inform her of the magical shroud of darkness that permeated the insides of the manse. Sullen Hoof was quick to point out the obvious: “If we want to be able to search the place we’ll have to get faceless wonder here to deactivate those internal defences – they mess with your sight and hearing”

Shimmer groaned. It was clear that she was furious at the appearance of the sidereal – just like before – but Rose was quick to exploit the wait until the deathknight awoke, explaining her plight. She first made it very clear that this wasn’t the first time she had explained herself under strange circumstances, in fact it was apparently very normal for her to have 'multiple first encounters' with ponies she met, and it was common for tempers to flare at such repeat encounters due to confusion.
Rose also subtly hinted of a begrudging acceptance of this most certainly not be the last encounter of this nature that she would have to face.

“It all relates to the usurpation. We feared that the millions of unicorns would turn on heaven after we saw what they did to the solars. We tipped off the lunars that they were being tracked via astrological divinations, which wouldn't work on ponies hiding in the wyld and then we hid ourselves, using special sidereal astrology… a little too well unfortunately. We broke a few stars to hide in their shadows, but it went too far – now no pony in creation can remember us after we’re out of sight - even you lot” Rose explained.

Looking  at an angry but also spiritually tired looking Shimmer, Rose nodded: “I know what you’re going to say, you’ve said it twice before – but again, none of you would remember us. I’m fairly sure that sidereals meet lunars a lot more often than you think. And again, knowing what you’re going to say, the only reason that your elders remember us is that personal memories of us made before we broke the constellation of the mask didn’t go away, otherwise we’d have forgotten ourselves too”
Shimmer looked immensely disappointed.

Rose took a deep breath and shrugged in silent apology.

“So… what do you want with us?” Cash wondered.

Rose smiled. It was the sort of trained smile one might see a diplomat or courtier display with frightening ease – although Speaker didn’t pick up on this, but Cash certainly did: “To be honest? Heaven is in trouble, sort of. Like with the lunars we had to make do without the solars, which meant a lot of dirty deals and bribery of various gods, just to keep things workings. Now you’re back and some sidereals don’t like that, they want to keep supporting the realm to hold things together – I’m with a faction of sidereals who’re in opposition to that policy: We want to welcome the solars and offer them our council and assistance”

Cash leaned over to Speaker and whispered: “You have your truth-telling charm, right?”

Speaker inwardly cursed himself for not having that up verify the sidereal’s claims: “I do now”

Rose continued: “Basically I have standing orders to bring any solars I find to my superiors – once I’ve verified that you’re not hostile”

“What about ugly?” Sullen Hoof said, shoving the puppeteer hard enough to flip the unconscious no-faced pony over. 
Speaker was about to suggest that they wait around for the freak to wake up and then interrogate him about the manse first, then decide on his fate, when Speaker noticed that there was something very strange about the pony’s legs as the  puppeteer flipped over: “Hold on…”

Lifting up in the puppeteer’s robe’s Speaker revealed a sight arguably more grotesque than the puppeteer’s lack of face: The deathknight had no legs – but while the Bodhisattva had ghostly limbs of dark shadow, then this deathknight had for each limb three or four pale fleshy tentacles grafted to his body, each covered in a tar-like black and thick oil. The puppeteer’s long and thick black robes had completely obscured this fact, but Sullen Hoof quickly added that this explained why the puppeteer hadn’t made any hoof beats while inside the manse.

“Why would he do something like that to himself?” Cash wondered.

Shrugging, Red reminded the circle that the Bodhisattva had been tricked into doing so – so perhaps this deathknight hadn’t been in his right mind either when it had been done?

The deathknight groaned, then spoke in a strained but high pitched and nasal voice: “You labor under the illusion that I had legs when I was given my second breath”

Aware that the deathknight had awoken, Sullen Hoof quickly brought his cleavers to bare, but the deathknight was quick to acquiesce to his capture, displaying a remarkably well-read vocabulary.

Despite her heavily injured leg, Red somehow managed to pull the puppeteer up and shook him about a bit: “Name, rank and what the hell are you doing here in this gods-forsaken place!”

It was in no small ways disturbing to see the faceless pony rattle about like a ragdoll under Red’s forceful grasp, for with no face it was difficult to gauge how the deathknight was reacting to being shook about.

“I’m the Unhaloved Coveter of Limbs Great and Small… please don’t hurt me” the high-pitched voiced deathknight meekly stated, the creepy and confident tone he had used back when fighting circle completely gone.

Sullen Hoof stepped up to the missing face of the Coveter: “That depends on how unharmed Sunrise is – what did you do with her? Is she still alife!?”

“Who?” the Coveter said, sounding as if he spoke in equal parts jest and ignorance. Red flipped the Coveter upside down and shook him some more, bashing his head into the ground a few times. This didn't have much of a result for some odd reason, although again the inability to see facial expressions on the deathknight made it nearly impossible to see if he was in pain.

With a control of his cleaver unmatched by any but the most expert of master chefs Sullen Hoof led his cleaver over one of the Coveter’s tentacles, filleting one side of it down to the bone in a single swift stroke. The Coveter twisted to look up at his dangling tentacles and groaned, not in pain, but whined: “Do you mind? Those things take time to put together properly”
“Just tell us what you did to her and where you put her!” Sullen Hoof angrily shouted, floating his cleavers to the Coveter’s face.

It was impossible to read the Coveter’s non-existent face, but the threat of additional damage to his limbs, along with having a cleaver poked into his exposed brain, made the Coveter ever so slightly more cooperative. The Coveter deactivated the internal shroud of darkness inside the manse, revealing everything inside…

The circle, Rose and Coveter ventured inside the manse where the Coveter showed where he had ‘stored’ Sunrise. 

Sunrise had been dunked in a large barrel of fetid blood – and the lid had been nailed shut. The Coveter was a bit surprised when Sunrise was let out and she merely requested that Speaker clean her robes.

“Oh she’s held her breath for longer than that” Cash laughed.

It turned out that the Coveter had been operating a very large necro-surgical workshop. Speaker found the idea of crafting things out of the dead to be disgusting – specifically since it involved all those dead Chung ponies who’d been reanimated to walk straight to the shadowland to the manse – but he couldn’t deny that the creation’s weren’t at the very least impressive… but also very disgusting and clearly abominations that should be destroyed at once:

The Coveter proudly revealed his creations: Giant warstriders wrought of flesh, bone, sinew and brass spikes. Thosuands of pony corpses, flayed, gutted, drawn, quartered, disassembled and then stitched together anew into what looked like giant flesh golems shaped like ponies, but six times the size of normal ponies: “I was commissioned to produce fifty of these bonestriders, but sadly someone compromised my fuel rod production so most of these are inoperable…”

The circle had a fairly good idea about how that had happened, but they didn't tell.

Guiding his captors near one of the grotesque bonestriders, the Coveter explained some of the intricacies of his creations: “Normally a pony would mount up in a control harness inside a fuselage inside a warstrider, but with ablative flesh armor a hatch wasn’t an option. So I came up with a simple solution for material pilots… most of these are meant to operated by war ghost”

The Coveter floated a long wooden pole up from the floor which he used to poke the inside of the mouth of the bonestrider. A long flesh-carpet made to look a bit like a pale and ragged tongue flopped down to the ground with a brief but wet splat.
“You see, all you have to do is step up on the tongue…” the Coveter barely managed to say, his high pitched voice barely hiding the glee he held inside, before the tongue suddenly wrapped around the Coveter and yanked the deathknight into the rotten maw of the bonestrider – swallowing the deathknight whole.

“Did he mean to do that?” Cash wondered, looking queasy.

Speaker nodded slowly, sighing: “He probably did – but I think he forgot something to, unless these bonestriders are fundamentally different from regular metal warstrider power-armor: They take a hooffull of minutes to power up, even if you can suit up faster than that”

Sullen Hoof laughed: “Well then, lets unwrap him before he can activate it”

“Don’t bother” Rose said, launching herself at the warstrider. Mid-air Rose performed a set of strange katas which culminated in her twisting midair as a long strip of paper flew out around her, glowing with old realm glyphs. Just before impacting the bonestrider Rose disappeared, dissolving into shining strands of essence that slammed into the bonestrider… which then reared up and began to rip its own head off in a gory shower of stinking blood, torn sinew and the odd brass rod or spike that clattered to the ground.

The circle leapt back to avoid getting hit as the bonestrider tore itself apart. When it had removed its head and right fore-limb at shoulder its remaining forelimb began to hammer on the shell of armored ribs that comprised the bonestrider’s pilot fuselage. After a few moments the bonestrider quivered and literally shat out of the Coveter, the deathknight falling clumsily down to the ground along with a lot of blood and guts that didn’t seem to be his own.

“What the shit!?” the Coveter shouted, looking up at the bonestrider. A second later the bonestrider shuddered and collapsed, dropping to the ground in a limp pile of flesh and bone-struts, with Rose materializing next to it in a triumphant pose.

The Coveter wasn’t allowed to ask too many questions before Sullen Hoof leapt in and tied up the deathknight, using a technique not unlike that of sewing together a stuffed bird when he stitched together the Coveter’s flesh-tentacles, after wrapping up the deathknight’s mutilated head tightly in a broad strip of the Coveter’s own robes which seemed to muffle his voice quite well - despite not really having a mouth to begin with.

“How did you do that? You possessed the bonestrider!?” Red wondered out loud, sounding completely at a loss of how such a feat was done.

Rose made with a hop, skip and a jump as she daintily maneuvered out of the piles of gore and flesh from the collapsed bonestrider, landing in front of Red so close that their noses touched: “Prismatic Arrangement of Creation Style, God ways – always fun”

Hobbling backwards, Red looked at Speaker with just as much confusion as before: “Speaker, translate!?”
“It’s a sidereal martial art – way above what we can do right now” Speaker said, looking at the destruction before him with rapt awe.

The question now that the Coveter had proved to be a less than cooperative prisoner became the same as before when the Coveter had been unconscious: What now? Rose had explained of her desire to take the circle to her superiors, but now that the purpose of the manse had been revealed, at least partially, then it also had to be dealt with. Rose had a simple suggestion: “There are a lot of sidereal’s who’re quite keen on learning more about deathknights – We can give them the Coveter and let them study this manse to learn its secrets, because this place is freaky… there’s no essence flows in the area powerful enough to support it, and yet it works”

“Oh hell no – this fucker is coming back to Chung Do for public execution, and I’m going to wreck this place once my leg is good again” Red resolutely stated, not wanting such a blight to exit in the Chung lands.

“Let’s talk that over once you meet my elders – in Yu-Shan” Rose said with a smile on her face.

> Chapter 28: Heavenly Gifts Given Too Freely
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The circle watched in rapt anticipation as Rose, outside the necro-aspected manse, with the Coveter securely tied up, began to shape a green sphere of sorcerous essence into existence. Her anima flared up briefly in the form of a green nimbus of crystalline refractions of green light which then abruptly faded away as the sphere of light punched a hole in reality, revealing a tiny hoof-sized door of gleaming metal with a crystal door-knob.

Opening the door, Rose revealed a space behind it which had not been there before. Inside it was the end of a glittering rope which Rose gave a yank, triggering unseen chimes to ring. Moments later a torii gate made of all the magical materials in beautiful harmony appeared on the side of the ashen flesh walls of the manse. Within the mouth of gate was a strange watery event horizon made of dim white light.

“If you would all step through please” Rose said, smiling.

Red was still too shaking from the sidereal’s possession of the bonestrider, Shimmer too weak to protest and Speaker was too curious at what hid beyond the heavenly torii gate. Sunrise nodded, for to her it was only proper that heaven supported her clearly righteous cause - and she wasn't shy of letting Rose know this. Cash was more than curious as well, chiefly because of the myriad of ways that an alliance with heaven might speed up his own dreams of power and prosperity.

Stepping through the gate didn’t feel weird. It was but another step for hooves that had walked many miles already, stepping off the tombstones that lined the ground around the necrotic manse and on to the golden bricks of a plaza that stretched on into the horizon, full of colorful and strange spirits going to and fro.

The circle noticed little of this, as on the other side of the gate, right as they came through, stood a three and a half yard tall solid orichalcum statue of a lion – which growled at them – and in a voice deep enough to make the ground tremble: "State the purpose of your visit or face my wrath" 

Coming through last, Rose quickly skipped over to and up on the celestial lion, giving it a pat on the head: “They’re with me, the normal looking group by request of Ayesha Ura and the tied up one by  the convention of deathlords. Tea time and a prisoner to deposit”

The lion frowned, revealing fangs that, under better circumstances, would have given Shimmer a wingboner - assuming that she would be in a form that had wings that moment: “You may pass Heath Rose, but ensure that your guests do not cause any trouble or you’ll be back in Shinning Barrator’s office again faster than you can pray for forgiveness”

“Sure thing, now can you hail us a cloud? Master Lupo need’s to get stinky here over to a secure location” Rose said, gesturing at the Coveter who’d been tossed through the gate.

The lion made an arcane gesture towards the dark star-lit skies of heaven and an air elemental appeared moments later. Of its body it formed a platform of solid cloud, not unlike the sort that Shimmer would conjure, only this time the cloud was sentient and in the shape of a giant turtle with a hollow and flat shell that others could stand or sit on.

Without Rose even saying where to the elemental took off once the circle, Rose and the Coveter had gotten on board, zipping off into the sky above Yu-Shan, leaving most of its creation-born passengers stunned and speechless of the sight that met them.

Yu-Shan, to mortal ponies simply known as ‘heaven’, the home originally built by the primordials, displayed a sense of architecture and aesthetics most alien to ponies. It's strange and almost organic-looking crystal spires, gold-cobbled pathways and endless multi-storied pagoda mansions of solid jade were unmatched by anything the mortal world had ever been able to produce – perhaps except during the high first age. Cash couldn’t stop drooling and gawking.

The elemental transport moved at a pace far greater than Shimmer’s, a necessary trait as Yu-Shan spanned tens of thousands of miles of nearly non-stop bureaucratic temples of celestial management and oversight of all the things in creation. 

Arriving surprisingly quickly in a part of Yu-Shan that seemed to be predominantly rolling green hills separated by rivers of molten gold and silver, the circle was met with another marvelous sight: On each hill was a palatial manse, one more lavish and resplendent than the other. Speaker marveled at the architecture – and couldn’t help but notice that Cash’s throat had run dry from all the drooling.

The elemental landed on a platform on the roof of one of the celestial palaces and simply faded from sight, leaving its passengers standing on the platform. A spirit servant who looked like an artistic arrangement of green and yellow squares of gemstones came out of an ornately decorated thick wooden door, introducing itself simply as 'the butler'. Rose requested that they all be taken to one “Master Lupo” to which the butler somehow nodded with its strange form and led the group of ponies down into the palace.

Through corridors floored with exotic woods that were unusually soft to the hooves, walls bedecked with trophies, busts and paintings of things that might only have existed thousands of years ago and strange yet decorative arrangements of dancing lights hovering around glowing crystals which lit up the palace with a warm and inviting glow. It all happened too fast for anyone in the circle to stop and look, and soon they found themselves outside a dojo lined with paper walls upon which exquisite paintings had been drawn of ponies engaged in stylized martial arts duels.

From inside the dojo could the circle hear the unmistakable sounds of two ponies having sex – loudly – and roughly, judging from the occasional sounds of a pony being slammed into a floor-mat. Heath Rose’s face turned a shade of crimson that Speaker had only seen on ponies stricken with eastern blood fever as she realized that they were about to walk in on her elder mid-coitus...

The butler, having no real face outside of its roughly pony-shaped appearance of slowly swirling yellow and green square gemstones, appeared exceedingly unphased as it loudly announced “Heath Rose, five quests and one prisoner” outside the dojo.

There was a brief sound of two ponies collapsing on top of each other, followed by a swirl of motion and then a blur as a pretty young mare with a dark coat, amber eyes and a lush and curly black mane galloped out of the dojo with but a semi-transparent silk shawl hastily tossed around herself.

“Well at least this Lupo fellow has good taste in mares” Cash commented, looking as the young mare’s most appetizing flanks disappeared around a corner down the hallway.

Master Lupo, as Rose had referred to him, emerged from the dojo shortly thereafter, dressed in a loose white training outfit of indeterminable material. He appeared as a very strong stallion, not bulging with muscle, but wiry and lean – not unlike Red’s physique – he even matched Red’s black mane, although his was cut short: “So, Rose, you’ve brought guests?”

Rose nodded fervently and deeply: “Yes master, but I’m here because I have a deathknight captive to hand over. The Unhallowed Coveter of Limbs Great and Small here was caught by this circle of solars. I’ve convinced them to hand over the prisoner to me – oh, and he might try to escape, so don’t untie him just yet”

Looking at the deathknight prisoner Lupo’s brows furled: “Well I be… we’ll have to find somewhere fun to hide him then. Thank you Rose, this will go a long way to appease the deathlords”

“What? We didn’t come all the way here to hand this freak back to his masters!?” Red bellowed, a blade of white-hot essence forming around her, poised to strike…

…but then the sword fizzled into nothing. Lupo nodded at Rose, then looked at Red: “Forgive me, it is sometimes easy to forget that non-sidereal ponies occasionally come to Yu-Shan, now probably even more than ever. I was referring to the Convention of Deathlords, which I’m second chair in. This is the name of a group of sidereals devoted to combating the deathlords”

Red looked at her very much not-there blade in absolute confusion, speechless from seeing her own solar essence somehow fail.

“Now, this Coveter fellow, what deathlord is he under? You were sent to the north-eastern parts of the hundred kingdoms last I checked, so is it one from the Walker, or the Mask of Winters? The Lover?” Lupo asked Rose.

Rose looked at Speaker with quizzical eyes. Speaker perked up: “I don’t know who the Walker is, and I’ve only heard little about this Mask of Winters recently – but the Coveter here, if we’re right, works for a deathlord called the Barbate Arbiter of Unbound Gravitas and Unrelenting Fury”

Lupo and Rose looked at each other for a moment, then Lupo sighed while Rose looked apologetic. Lupo shook his head: “Rose, please don’t tell me you’ve just found another deathlord…”

“She didn’t, we did. We heard of the Barbate Arbiter about a month ago when we fought another of his deathknights” Cash said demonstratively.

Lupo groaned. Rose quickly explained: “We currently know of six deathlords for sure, maybe seven. Getting information from the underworld is tricky and until recently we honestly just thought that they were powerful and ancient ghosts of little consequence. It wasn’t until the Mask of Winters rolled over Thorns and turned that entire part of creation into a giant shadowland that we discovered that the deathlords have an agenda too”

“Ya we know. The first deathknight we fought told us, after we freed him from the cursed grand daiklaive he’d been given by the Barbate Arbiter. Told us all kinds of fun things really” Cash remarked, smiling.

Rose looked impressed: “Well then, looks like we're all staying here a bit longer for a proper debriefing. Do you have room Master Lupo?”

Lupo turned Rose down, saying that he’d not be able to house a circle of solars without attracting attention, not this close to calibration. Speaker quickly added that Red and Shimmer needed time to recover from their injuries as well, and that he would prefer that any debriefing took place after they had done so.

“Also, now that we’re at it: If you want the information we have, then we want something in return” Cash boldly stated.
Lupo groaned again, giving Rose a tired look. Rose gave her master an apologetic look: “I’ll get them somewhere safe where they can figure out what they want. I’ll try to keep it manageable”

Rose quickly spirited the circle away, leaving the Coveter in Lupo’s tender care. Up on the landing platform Rose floated a gilded coin around at the sky – moments later a rickshaw of shining crystal and silver pulled by what looked like a pony made of vermilion vapors appeared.

The ponies got up in the rickshaw – which somehow managed to seat all six of them despite clearly being made to seat only two – and after Rose had said “Take me home” the vaporous pony spirit reared up and launched the rickshaw into the air. It didn’t remain up there, but instead came down to a gold-brick road next to the mansion, where it raced off at a speed less than that of the air elemental, but greater than that of Shimmer’s usual cloud… but unlike both of those the rickshaw didn’t protect its passengers from the air rushing in their face at well over several hundred miles per hour.

Speaker and Shimmer huddled together, Red withdrew a lamellar helmet from elsewhere, Sunrise pulled her hood down even further. Cash was the only one along with Heath Rose who sat with open eyes, enjoying the ride. Indeed, Cash really enjoyed the ride, Rose having to repeatedly hush him as Cash would howl in joy from the rush of the speed.

“Quiet down – making too much noise, even out here in a residential district, will get you arrested!” Rose admonished.
The rickshaw traveled along gold brick roads past pagodas of crystal, palaces of exquisite architecture, and other marvels such as bathhouses where the waters stood as solid pillars reaching hundreds of yards up – never falling or flowing, with hundreds of frolicking spirits and gods swimming up and down.

When the rickshaw came to a stop it was outside a mansion much smaller than Lupo’s – indeed, it didn’t even feel like much of a manse either. Rose invited the circle inside: “I’ll have servants ready rooms for you all – just tell them when you’re ready for the debriefing. Oh, and if you meet my room-mate don’t talk too much to her, she’ll just find some way to embarrass you”

“Oh come on, that’s no fun” a mare spoke with a regal realm accent, coming from the mansion. It came from an exceedingly pretty mare dressed in a green embroidered semi-transparent silk gown with jewelry befit of royalty. Indeed, with how beautifully her black mane was coifed, and how her curves were just perfect in all the right places it would be easy to mistake the sidereal for some princess of a far-away country you hadn’t heard of, but would be quick to acknowledge existed.

Rose frowned: “And that would be May Blossom, formerly of the noble realm house of Nellens. Her interpretation of being a chosen of secrets is to uncover as much gossip as possible and then spread it so as to embarrass as many rich and influential ponies as possible. Seriously, don’t talk to her”

“And who might your guests be? It’s a little early to pick up guests for the carnival of meetings isn't it?” May Blossom laughed, ignoring the criticism Rose flung at her. 

Rose trotted up to May Blossom and gave her a mock punch to the shoulder – one forceful enough to knock May Blossom’s tiara to the ground: “Don’t fuck me over on this. I swear, I will remake your first kiss to have been from a one-eyed drunk rapist if you screw this up for me”

The two continued to bicker while Cash inquired to Speaker: “Carnival of meetings? That sounds like something I should know what is”

Speaker tried to recall what he knew of the event from the first age: “Some gods would kidnap a few dozen hapless ponies from creation and party with them for a day or so during calibration. Usually a bit annoying if they snatched someone important to running your country…”

"Isn't that how the Spinner of Gloriuos Tales became a god, but being whisked away to that and impressing enough gods to be made one himself?" Cash noted. Speaker nodded. Cash smiled, a lot.

The circle settled into the mansion which made the Chung castle manse look like a dirt hovel. Speaker marveled at the cavernous library – even though he wasn’t allowed to read nearly anything in it, Rose apologizing that it contained a lot of personal diaries and reports from her past incarnations, as well as classified work-related content. Of the few books Speaker was allowed to read the more interesting ones were a few first age encyclopedias.

While disappointing, Speaker found himself happily occupied by tending to Red and Shimmer – as well as teaching Sullen Hoof the aptly-named crafting charm “craftspony needs to tools” to Sullen Hoof, after Sullen Hoof discovered that the mansion’s kitchen was helmed by a team of spirits that could literally conjure up any ingredient requested. Sullen Hoof relished in cooking in a proper heavenly kitchen, greatly impressing the head chef spirit.

Red recovered slowly but surely, the full use of her leg returning after three days, while Shimmer’s soul healed steadily every day, allowing more and more of her essence to return. By the first day of calibration Shimmer was halfway to full recovery. During the wait Cash had used his time to speak at length with Heath Rose when she was home, as well as May Blossom when Rose wasn’t home, trying to figure out what he could secure for the circle in exchange for the deathlord-intel they had promised.

“Speaker, I’ve been chatting with Rose. I think the best offer we can get in exchange for what we know about the Barbate Arbiter to secure some meeting arrangements…” Cash said, looking serious.

Speaker looked up from the book on geomancy he was reading: “Meeting arrangements? I’m surprised you didn’t ask for more”

“Officially we haven’t asked for anything yet – but I’ve checked what we can get. Look, we still have all that jade from Denansdor and the jewelry from there as well, so asking for money would be pointless. Plus, from what May Blossom has told then we might just be in a lot more danger here than I thought…”

Speaker put the book down: “You have my attention”

Cash explained that from what he’d been able to weasel out of May Blossom then the sidereals were somewhat divided on the subject of Solars: “I got the impression that it’s a bit like how Shimmer described the silver pact of lunars: A lot of lunars made do without solars, and now not all of them are not interested in seeing centuries of work be wasted just because we’re back… the sidereals similar made a lot of tenuous alliances here in heaven to keep things going after we disappeared. us regaining power in creation upsets these aliiances, the result being that a lot of these sidereals want us dead to retain the status quo. So if we start making big demands then the ‘gold faction’ simply won’t be able to keep our presence hidden here – and I for one don’t want my fate to be re-written to have me wake up one morning and be a tea-pot”

“They  can’t really do that – but… if you’re right, then I guess it might be wiser to patch things up in Chung Do first. How did Sunrise take this?” Speaker wondered.

Cash sat down and rolled his eyes: “She really wants us to get the sidereals to arrange a visit to the gods who oversee the prayers that come in to Celestia – but that’s where I got my idea”

Cash explained that while the ‘gold faction’, the faction of sidereals in support of the solars, weren’t that hot on openly doing the bidding of solars in Yu-Shan, then they could arrange meetings: “They won’t stop us from running around here ourselves – we just have to get the proper meetings arranged so the celestial lions don’t arrest us for loitering, and the gold faction is willing to set up those meetings in exchange for the information we’ve promised .Sunrise wants to visit the head of the ‘Glorious Sun-Prayer Processing Agency’, and Sully wants to visit some kind of godly kitchen, then I just needed to check if you had any requests?”

Looking around at the library while taking a deep breath, Speaker beheld the wall to wall, floor to ceiling rows of ancient books. Were there not mortals in creation who needed his help he would love to just spend a few years reading everything there was in this library – and May Blossom had titillated him about a place in Yu-Shan known as the Forbidding Manse of Ivy were records of everything ever recorded… and now Speaker had to choose what tiny favor he’d like? It hardly seemed worth the effort if he couldn’t get full access to all the lost secrets of the first age.

“Speaker, come on – Rose wants an answer before she takes us sight-seeing” Cash said, urging Speaker on to make a decision.

Closing his eyes for a moment and willing Gift to appear from elsewhere, Speaker floated the primordial device around for a moment before banishing it back to elsewhere: “There is one I’d like to meet: Lytek, the god of exaltation”

“There’s a god for that? I guess I shouldn’t be surprised… but ok, I’ll go tell Rose” Cash said, sauntering off.

A short while later the mansion’s butler appeared in the library, a spirit in the form of a pony made purely of cream-colored feathers, requesting that Speaker come to the front gate.

Going through the halls of the mansion, over floors of mirror-polished stone, past walls decorated with paintings of ponies, cities and landscapes from the first age, Speaker emerged to find the circle up in another rickshaw, the sky dark and star-lit with an unmistakable blue hue. Rose had said that Celestia, Luna and the mares of destiny decided how of Yu-Shan appeared, meaning that it didn’t follow the sky of creation and that it could change on a whim - no matter what time of day it was.

As the spirit-drawn rickshaw set off it quickly became apparent that this time the trip wasn’t that long, taking the circle to a large open park several miles wide not far from Rose’s mansion. It was surprisingly vacant, but Rose explained that with this being the first day of calibration the bureau of seasons held a grand celebration at the plaza where the circle had come through to Yu-Shan, the party lasting all throughout calibration as the gods of seasons were off-duty for the five days between the years.

Rose wanted to show the circle around a little bit in heaven before taking them to the debriefing, and with most of the gods at the calibration festival it was easier to show a circle of solars around without any nosy gods asking questions. Speaker noted that Rose hadn't really asked if the circle was ready for debriefing, but he didn't object, seeing as both Red and Shimmer had healed sufficiently to function properly - even if Shimmer would need a couple more days for her soul to recover fully.

At the park two rivers flowed, one with liquid gold and another with liquid silver – neither were hot to be next to, so Speaker doubted that it was actual molten metal in the rivers, especially since the shores of the rives didn’t have any coatings of cooling metal. On the silver river Rose had arranged a boat in the shape of a giant purple-scaled dragon with a huge orange mustache. It ferried the circle up river at speeds not even Cash had words to describe, as the landscape simply seemed to blur and fade into lines of light, only to suddenly coalesce into solid shapes again as the boat came to a sudden stop that made nearly every pony in the circle tumble off their lush cushioned seats.

At this the first stop, the dragon boat had arrived at the foot of two enormous alabaster and jade towers. The tops of the towers were wrapped in clouds, around which Sullen Hoof could tell that there were what looked like floating platforms of glass with gods and spirits on them. Rose said that this was the bureau of weather’s headquarters. It was a magnificent sight to behold: The towers were just under three miles high, and around the towers at the ground grew trees of blue jade that were well over half a mile high. All around the towers flew various elementals and weather spirits and most curiously of all: between the two towers floated a gigantic blue bee-hive looking structure, made of infinitely regressing hexagonal tubes that linked together.

Rose looked at the circle with great anticipation, as if waiting for the solars and lunar to say something.

“Speaker, didn’t you say earlier that in the first age the solar deliberative controlled weather in creation via the Pegasus ponies?” Cash idly thought out loud. 

Speaker nodded: “True, back then the bureau of weather just did as it was told by us – I can’t imagine how it fared having to suddenly manage on their own…”

“Not that well in the beginning honestly, but they figured it out eventually” Rose said.

After ooh’ing and ahh’ing a bit more Rose asked where the circle wanted to go. Speaker, while impressed, wanted to get to the meetings set up so they could return to creation, him not feeling well with leaving the young shogun and the ponies of Chung Do sicken any more than necessary.

“We can’t go back Speaker, we haven’t found a way to fix ‘the problem’ yet” Red admonished upon Speaker, trying and failing to whisper her message.

Rose raised an eyebrow at Red and Speaker: “What problem?”

The circle shared a few concerned glances to and fro before Sunrise plainly stated: “We had left Chung Do to raid the Coveter’s manse when we realized that another deathknight within castle Chung had put subtle mental blocks in us all – and all other ponies in the castle. They appear to prevent us from seeing the deathknight and any evidence of the deathknight’s presence. We originally planned to assault the Coveter’s manse to draw this deathknight out. You would have gotten this information at the debriefing”

The spirit helming the dragon boat was about to ask for where to pilot the boat to next, but Rose gave the aqueous spirit a silencing gesture: “You’re all under the influence of a deathknight and you’re not sure what you’re not seeing and you didn’t tell me?”

“Yes” Sunrise stated, using a stately tone as if inquired about her presence at a meeting.

Heath Rose swallowed audibly: “Well, at least you didn’t say this while May Blossom was around… right?”

Rose instructed the spirit helming the dragonboat to take the boat to the "Commission on abstract matters and celestial concerns". When asked what this place was she simply answered: “It’s the bureau of heaven, for Sunrise and Speaker’s meetings” with a straightforward and far more serious voice than the previously lighthearted tone she had been using.

Enroute Rose made the circle promise not to tell of their mental influence problem during the debriefing they had consented to undergoing later, adding that she’d have to re-check with the sidereals and spirits scheduled to handle the interviews, to ensure that this matter didn’t go on the record: “Let’s just say that if it becomes a matter of celestial record that you lot are under the influence of a deathknight the bronze faction will have all the reason they need to see you all dead in an instant – they won’t even have to do anything themselves beyond inform Shining Barator’s office that there are security threats loose in Yu-Shan and you’ll all be celestial lion-chow in no time”

"Shining who?" Cash whispered to Speaker.

Whispering in return: "The god of the celestial lions, heaven's chief of police"

“I wasn’t under the impression that this bronze factions wants us dead… I got that our return inconvenienced their schemes, but why kill us?” Sunrise inquired, sounding utterly unphased at hearing that a good deal of the sidereal host wanted them dead.

Rose sighed: “It wasn’t easy running creation after the solars disappeared. The weave of fate had to be reworked quite a lot in most places to handle the sudden change – your return will mean just as much upheaval, plus a lot of the gods that those sidereals allied themselves with aren’t keen on coming under the hoof of creation-based solars again”

“There are lunars who’re just as likely to try kill any solars who wanders into their territories and tries to take over the people they lord over – but seriously, are solars that unpopular here? I thought Celestia and Luna still ran Yu-Shan” Shimmer wondered. She might not be back to her full strength yet, but she was more than strong enough to engage in conversation.
Rose shook her head and looked in the direction the dragon boat was going, away from the circle: “Sorry, but those two and the mares of destiny have been… busy… for quite a while. They let the bureau heads run their parts of heaven, rarely getting involved with much of anything anymore, it’s part of why it’s been so hard for us sidereals to keep thing running”

“I refuse to believe that Celestia would ever abandon her duties. She is the shining paragon of all virtues, most importantly temperance and conviction. Being the most high she would cannot succumb to sloth, temptation or be able to shirk her duties” Sunrise Glow stubbornly stated, her faith in Celestia unwavering.

Cash Charmer sighed: “May Blossom told me about this. Sorry to break it to you, but Celestia, Luna and all five mares of destiny are all – according to May Blossom – addicted to these here games of divinity”

Sunrise tried to stand as tall as was physically possible for her, an act that didn’t accomplish much as she was a head shorter than every other pony in the circle: “Lies. Celestia is incorruptible, she is unconquered”

“Sunrise, you wanted to visit the Glorious Sun-Prayer Processing Agency because they aren’t doing their job of handling all the prayers that go to Celestia properly – not answering prayers properly or not at all, do you think that Celestia would ever have allowed that kind of mismanagement to take place on her watch?” Cash argued, not sounding as if he was entirely pleased with the implications of his statement, but none the less sure in them.

Sunrise couldn't find words to gainsay Cash - his logic was infallible. It wasn't a pleasant realization that there was something fundamentally wrong with the god you had been empowered by, especially since Celestia was meant to be incorruptible...

The spirit helming the dragon boat announced that they had arrived at the Hall of Celestial Stability.

The circle, uneasy both with the realization that there were forces at work in heaven aiming at killing them, along with the discord sown following Sunrise giving everyone the silent treatment after being unable to convince anyone that Celestia wasn’t imperfect, moved ashore the shimmering boarding ‘surface’ of light that extended from the dragon boat. Rose led them inside the massive and oddly squat building complex made of solid ivory. The surfaces of the walls were replete with orichalcum, moonsilver and rainbow-shimmering starmetal marbling, detailing endless rows of heavenly deeds and virtuous acts of celestial government. In the lobby Rose split up the circle: Speaker would seek out Lytek’s office within the department of abstract matters, while the rest of the circle could go to the Glorious Sun-Prayer Processing Agency.

“Why do we have to split up for this? I want to go with Speaker” Shimmer complained, wrapping a leg that was just a little too long to appear natural around her solar mate.

Rose shrugged as she tugged at a bracer which instantly changed her garbs into what looked like a very officious suit of green and blue silk: “It’s not easy getting into Lytek’s office these days. Lots of security. You only get in if you have an appointment”

“As if they’ll find me” Shimmer said, leaping into Speaker’s ear – transforming into a flea.

Rose shook her head: “It’ll be your grave – not mine” as she walked off with Red, Sunrise and Cash.

Speaker looked around in the cavernous lobby. Rose hadn’t given him any real directions, and there wasn’t that much traffic of gods going around – probably because of that festival going on. A bored spirit, looking like a jellyfish made of paper origami, behind a front desk that was just a little too tall for an adult pony to look over, gave Speaker a thoroughly disinterested glare as Speaker reared up and leaned up against the desk to get eye contact: “Can I help you?”

Speaker took a deep breath. It had been a while since he’d had to tangle with obstinate requisitions officers back in Lookshy, but Speaker recognized a bored and understimulated desk-jokey when he saw one: “I have an appointment with the right hoof of power, Lytek, God of exaltation” 

The administrative jellyfish god pulled out several binders of papers, riffling through them with its origami tentacles: “Ok, so why are you here and not there?”

“I need directions” Speaker said.

The jellyfish bobbed up and down, floating mid-air for a moment in silence: “Where to?”

Speaker sighed: this was not going to be easy…

A while later Speaker had  found his way into the basement of the vast complex. It was surprisingly light and roomy, with broad but slightly opaque crystal tiles in the roof letting down what felt like sunlight, even thought the sky outside when Speaker had entered the place was one of a starlit sky. There were no maps of the place, or signs, so finding out where to go was pretty much impossible.

Shimmer advised Speaker in what direction to go, using special sensory charms to detect in what directions there were gods. This worked well for the most part, Speaker finding the odd god willing to look up from their piles of gold-inked scrolls at their desks to offer directions -  although most just ignored the solar pony as he peeked into their offices.

The search went on until Speaker came across a non-descript office in which two gods sat, one behind a desk taking notes, another sitting in a lounge chair that looked supernaturally comfortable describing what sounded like soul-wrecking bowel-movements.

“Excuse me, I’m looking for help – I hope I’m not disrupting anything?” Speaker said, trying to be polite.

The god buried behind the desk in a mountain of scrolls looked up with tears in its six malachite eyes. It silently shook its head.

The god on the lounge chair leapt up. It was dressed in an exceedingly colorful kaftan, yet its pony form was betrayed by how its limbs appeared to buckle and ‘drip’ as it stood on the intricately patterned ivory floor. Its voice was bombastic and yet had a eerie slur to it, as if the god's mouth was half full of food: “Oh I was foretold I would be met with a seeker! Maidens be praised!”

As the colorfully dressed god, who’s physical features seemed oddly lumpy – it otherwise looking like a normal brown-coated pony with a strange but plain androgynous appearance – approached Speaker with swift steps Speaker backed out of the office. The god followed: “Oh yes, I shall give you all you desire! My aid, my blessings, my everything… my love”

“Just how much celestial cocaine is this guy on?” Shimmer whispered into Speaker’s ear. 

The god strode right to up Speaker at which point the god’s odor assaulted Speaker’s nose like a swift buck to the groin… for the god reeked of the most fetid rot Speaker had ever born witness to. Shimmer silently wished herself lucky that as a flea such smell didn’t actually come off as that bad. Speaker had to fortify himself with essence to avoid retching.

“Oh! I know that our love can never be, but I will none the less aid you and bless you with all my heart!” the god professed, melodramatically gesturing and fawning at the confused solar.

Having no clue in regards to what the amorous god was going on about, and with Shimmer chuckling in his ear, Speaker professed that he simply needed to know where Lytek’s office was.

With great exuberance the god flailed its limbs about as it told Speaker where to go – ending its tirade with a blessing that, while to Speaker it wasn’t exactly heartfelt, then it could certainly be felt, somewhere deep in his body: “Now go forth my lovely, go forth before my heart breaks and let all know that I, Resplendent Buttflow, The Giver of Gifts, Lord of the Opening and God of Diarrhea is as generous and bountiful as Venus herself!”

Speaker bowed politely with a very strained smile, trying not to breathe while this close to the stench of the god, then ran off as quickly as possible using the directions given.

Going down twisting hallways Speaker began groaning as he felt his stomach churn. Shimmer picked up on this remarkably quickly: “You ok dear?”

“Nope, don’t feel good” Speaker said through clenched teeth, his entire body tense.

What few words Shimmer was able to get out of Speaker merely confirmed that a blessing from the god of diarrhea wasn’t one that warded a pony against the condition… quite the opposite as Speaker’s condition quickly became apparent – and the lack of signs on the doors meant that finding a place that one might relieve oneself wasn’t exactly easy to find, indeed the question was whether gods even had toilets or needed to use them – to Speaker it was a bit of a moot point: He could feel that he only had seconds to go…

> Chapter 29: Out Of the Fire and Into the Kitchen
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

His body reeling with the dubious blessing of Resplendent Buttflow, the titular ‘Giver of Gifts’ and ‘Lord of the Opening’ – who also happened to be god of diarrhea – Speaker ran through the halls of the palace of Celestial Stability, the very heart of the Bureau of Heaven in Yu-Shan. The seamless ivory walls, marbled with the most exquisite of magical materials, bore no signs or maps to give directions – and indeed, the seemingly endless halls had no signs of a toilet either.

His brows furrowed and his face grim, Speaker took a deep breath and girded as well as clenched his loins for the furious smiting they were no doubt about to suffer – and he looked at the four doors within reach, for he felt his flanks failing him…
One door was oddly plain, considering where Speaker was, of flat planks of wood lashed together with what looked like black string. The second was of dark rock, polished to a mirror shine. The third was of a weird metallic crystal, while the fourth looked… promising? It was a 'door' made of leaves, hanging down in the doorway in a thin but thick layer via dangling vines.

Speaker moved through the leaf-door with much trepidation. He didn’t want celestial law enforcers coming after him for having desecrated some random god’s office – but right now the blessing of the Lord of the Opening was bidding his opening to open and, well… give of its gifts.

Sneaking into the office as best he could, with his breath held and his hooves gently touching the surface of the oddly dark office, Speaker entered, looking around for any signs of activity. The room was fairly small, hardly a few yards across with carpeting of real grass and a tree-trunk set in the middle – weird, but not inconceivable for whatever strange god might work there. Speaker found a corner furthest from the door where he released the floodgates.

Shimmer couldn’t see what was going on, being in the form of a flea in Speaker's left ear, but she felt Speaker tremble and heard his cries of pain. Ancient slave songs of misery and toil, the mournful weeping of widows and orphans of war, the impotent fury of yozis locked away within their king turned inside out – none of it could match the soul-wracking horror that Speaker felt as the bounty and generosity of Resplendent Buttflow worked its way out of his rear with a most heavenly fury. Also it quickly started to smell badly as Speaker deposited five times his own weight in viscous fecal matter.

Reeling from the roughly ten minutes of rectal torture, Speaker weakly staggered towards the door of leaves. He had endured torture-resistance training as part of being in the Lookshyan special forces, the first field force, but this? This was divine torture, beyond that of vengeful unicorn drillmasters. It was then, to Speaker’s horror, that the darkened room lit up, revealing that the tree-trunk in the middle of the room extended up into a green bough that held a desk, a chair, blue glowing fruit and a god that appeared to be a pony made of burlap and gardening tools instead of hooves and eyes – a visage that mortal ponies could easily use to frighten foals into fits of terror.

In his weakened state Speaker didn’t have the strength to panic, only to look up and await the smiting he was about to receive – for he had left the entire grassy floor of the office a mess without equal.

“Wonderful! It was about time. I put in for manure for my floor six years ago!” the scarecrow-looking god exclaimed cheerfully.

Speaker, up to his fetlocks in shit and feeling utterly rectum-ravaged, looked up in tired and pained confusion.

The scarecrow-god gave Speaker a second look: “Hold on, you don’t look like you’re from the Fecal Requisition Department?”

It turned out that the god was the god of garden implements, specifically celestial garden implements. This chiefly meant supplying the various gods of landscaping that maintained the grounds around the untold hundreds of thousands of celestial estates with properly crafted gardening tools with the proper blessings – and apparently it had been a while since the supply division had bothered to send up ‘refreshments’ to this god’s office: “So truly my little mortal, I must thank you for your generosity. Tell you what, take this writ of requisition. Just write or sketch whatever gardening tool you need and call my name while holding it. The tool you desire shall appear before you in no time at all”

Speaker looked at the scroll of woven green jade floating before him. It was first when Shimmer ‘yelled’ at him in his ear to grab it that he did and bowed just a little too deeply, getting shit on his nose, then leaving post haste.

Out in the hallway Speaker cleansed himself with essence, as well as disinfecting himself and applying his anesthetic charm to himself – for his rear truly did hurt from having deposited five times Speaker’s bodyweight of resplendent buttflow - hopefully the supernatural healing conferred by exaltation would stem the bleeding soon enough.

Finding his way back to where the diarrhea god’s directions guided him, Speaker quickly found his way to Lytek’s office – or rather, the outer entrance to Lytek’s office.

As with the rest of the offices there wasn’t much in the way of signs indicating who’s office it was, but it was the thirty-second door down the hall with the amber lighting, as the shit god had said… so Speaker gave it a go.

Knocking on the door yielded nothing. Slowly opening the door and stepping inside resulted in Speaker finding himself grabbed by no less than seven limbs of various shapes, colors and lengths of claws – some golden, some of varying shades of jade, a few looking like ordinary but huge talons.

Inside the room of naked ivory walls Speaker suddenly found himself he found there to be a very large number of guards… a lot more than what Speaker recalled Lytek having in the first age. There were three celestial lions, each standing almost four yards tall and nearly as wide, two lesser elemental dragons – their mile-long scaled bodies coiling upwards into the seemingly infinitely tall room. There were also a number of other lesser martial spirits, the common thread for all of them was the very suspicious eyes they each gave Speaker.

One of the elemental dragons, earth-aspected if its white stony scales of jade were any indications, growled at Speaker and rumbled: “What is your purpose here pony?”

“I have a meeting with Lytek?” Speaker meekly answered. Faced with a fully sized lesser elemental dragon Speaker really didn’t want to say or do anything that could anger the thing.

The dragon snorted a cloud of thick gray dust at Speaker. When the cloud of dust had settled the dragon appeared before Speaker in a pony-sized form, still clearly draconic, but now standing on two legs with two arms and pony-sized head – instead of having a head the size of three dozen ponies. It held what looked like a guest list: “Name?”

“Bright Machine Speaker” Speaker said, sighing in relief.

The entire mob of guardian spirits and lesser gods roared – in an instant Speaker found himself pinned against the wall. The pony-sized dragon sneered: “There’s no pony by that name on the list! Now give us a good reason not to rip off your ears and stuff ‘em up our nose”

Speaker thought furiously. What else could Heath Rose had signed him up as for the meeting with Lytek? If it was a question of security it must have been as something that opposing sidereals couldn’t duplicate to avoid any of them sneaking into Lytek’s office in Speaker’s stead… oh of course!

Flashing his caste mark, Speaker quickly felt the guard’s release him. The pony-sized dragon quickly apologized: “Oh, but why didn’t you say you are the solar we're been waiting for?”

The guards all shuffled around briefly, making a passage to a small door at the other end of the guard room – a door which supposedly led to Lytek’s actual office.

Speaker happily trotted towards the door, when he was suddenly grabbed by another guardian spirit – one that appeared to be made up of an aesthetically pleasing arrangement of bladed metal. Using two of its blades as pincers in a blur of speed it snatched Shimmer out of Speaker’s ear: “Is this one with you?”

Nodding quickly, the blade-spirit stuffed the lunar-flea back into Speaker’s ear - inadvertently trimming Speaker's ear-hair in the process.

“Rose warned you…” Speaker said as he opened the door. Shimmer didn’t answer, but Speaker could hear her groan. 
Inside the office Speaker couldn’t help but smile. This was truly the office he remembered from the first age: Cluttered, full of tomes and books – each detailing the various charms that the various exalts had come up with. Behind a worn desk of stone stood a being of pure light. It wasn’t blinding to look at, but it was impossible to see any distinct features of the being – for it was Lytek, god made of Autochton, the right hoof of power and god of exaltation! Had Speaker been able to see any actual details he’d be aware that Lytek was wearing robes of light made in very stylish, if not exceedingly antiquated, first age fashion.

Lytek instantly leapt at Speaker: “Bright Machine Speaker! Well I never… I thought the meeting was just another infiltration attempt. I hope my guards weren’t too rough”

Speaker smiled and shook his head: “Nothing I couldn’t survive old friend”

Shimmer marveled as the solar and the god regaled about the first age. Speaker thanked Lytek profusely for having fulfilled some kind of promise – something that seemed to have something to with Speaker’s ability to recall nearly everything he had experienced in the first age.

Lytek in return was extremely touchy-feely with Speaker, poking, proding and examining the solar like a carpenter inspecting a wagon for a yearly service check – with little care to intimacy or personal limits. In most other parts of heaven, perhaps not counting the headquarters for the Bureau of Destiny’s Serenity division, or the heavenly Baths of Venus, the spa of the gods, such rampant fondling would warrant arrest and censure, but to Lytek the exalted were but carriers of his work – the celestial exaltations – and it was his charge to inspect them whenever possible to ensure proper function. It didn’t hurt that Speaker and Lytek had clearly been friends in the first age, their shared friendship with Autochton having granted them a shared interest a bit beyond what many solars had toyed around with at that time.

While the two brosephs talked Shimmer mainly napped, as the two waxed nostalgic over Autochton and their merry times together – both in battle and in more peaceful situations. Apparently Autochton made some really good steam-based tea. It was just as Shimmer was about to doze off as Lytek suddenly changed the subject: “Right, but Speaker – listen, of all the solars I know, you I trust the most, ok?”

Speaker nodded, not sure what Lytek was getting at.

Lytek sighed. The bright silhouette of the god dimmed slightly for a moment, revealing that Lytek did have the form of a pony – and had a really massive beard – before the glow intensified again, making it impossible to see any exact details of the god: “I… hold on, you’ll have to leave your lunar outside for this”

Surprised that Lytek had detected her, Shimmer jumped out of Speaker’s ear and landed on the ground in the form of her usual pony self: “Hi, Last Shimmer, great to meet a friend of Speaker”

“Friend? Oh yes -  but you’ll have to leave now. Here, go have fun with this” Lytek said, a small blue metallic crystal floating out from one of many cupboards in office. Shimmer grabbed the crystal in her mouth, turning wide-eyed and stupefied as she touched it – Lytek floating her out into the guard room: “Just let her sit in a corner until Speaker comes out”

Back in the office Lytek turned to Speaker, something that wasn’t easy to tell due to Lytek’s glowing nature: “Ok, Speaker, there is something I have to discuss with you”

All ears, Speaker sat and listened as Lytek quizzed the solar on some of his “Divine Apparatae of Periapt Surgery”, the tools with which he ‘polishes’ the exaltations of solars, lunars and sidereals before sending them back into creation for reincarnation, removing unnecessary memories and whatnot from the exaltations so only the important things are carried over – things like the memory of death, or other random day-to-day memories of no importance imprinted on the exaltation shards. Speaker nodded that he knew them well, despite the irony that these devices had specifically not been used on his exaltation before his current incarnation – at Speaker’s own request back in the first age.

“Right, well… the auraclast is missing” Lytek finally said, sounding decidedly uncomfortable with even speaking the fact out loud.

Had Speaker not been thoroughly vented of bowel content thanks to Resplendent Buttflow’s blessing, Speaker would have shit himself at the sound of this dire news. The auraclast was one of Lytek’s strange tools of soul and essence manipulation, specifically one that would crush and annihilate the soul that an exaltation was attached to – used during the primordial war to recover the exaltation shards of exalts who’s souls had been twisted and destroyed beyond salvation, but not destroyed enough to release the shard, for such was the terrible nature of primordial battle.

“Any celestial exalt struck by it will be instantly killed – I can’t begin to tell you how perplexed I am at the theft of this device, for its wards and locks even kept curious solars away in the first age, but the news of these here deathlords in the underworld… I’ve heard that they aim to end all of creation, and the auraclast is probably one of the best weapons they could wish for to hold off the exalted host while they work towards this” Lytek lamented.

Speaker inquired who Lytek had told this, to which Lytek simply shook his head: “There are no gods or ponies in heaven I trust with this information. If this became known I would be subject to endless censure, and the sidereals who oppose your return will have even more reason to try to put me under guard again”

“Hold on – again?” Speaker said, not being aware of any prior altercations between Lytek and the sidereals.

Lytek told the terrible tale of how, thousands of years ago, sidereals had captured him and held him prisoner while Solar shards had poured into his cabinets, then transferred the shards into a container of jade and malfean porcelain: “You might have heard of this event? It’s commonly referred to as the Usurpation”

Had any other god, pony, demon or other being told Speaker of such a preposterous tale Speaker would have called them liars – and poor ones at that – but hearing it from Lytek… Speaker trembled. He couldn't tell if Lytek was being sarcastic or just his usual inquisitive self, but the implications of his  statement were just immense! Had there been sidereals behind the usurpation? Speaker clearly remembered being chased by legions of dragonblooded unicorns, hiding in fear… but sidereals? Lytek presented Speaker with a memory crystal of the few memories that the first age Speaker had requested be removed for his next incarnation… the memories were of a very specific fight, between Speaker and a sidereal. The sidereal had used its strange martial arts to somehow ‘wound’ Speaker’s soul with a disease that would slowly kill him, something that Speaker couldn’t heal… at least not without access to a medical laboratory that had been destroyed already.
“Why?” was all Speaker could muster.

Lytek couldn’t give him an answer. He had theories, but said that for definitive answers he’d have to speak with the sidereals: “The gold faction, the sidereals who’re in support of your return – you can trust them. Ask their leader, Ayesha Ura, she’ll be able to explain the past properly to you”

“This is a lot to take in… but it explains a few things. But you can count on me to keep an eye out for your auraclast – me and my circle, we’re currently hunting a deathknight in the hundred kingdoms. She's being directed by a deathlord called the Barbate Arbiter. Considering what this deathlord has ordered its other deathknights to do, then it has all sorts of crimes to answer for – that’ll be our approach to explore the underworld and take on this monster. We’ll find your auraclast, even if we have to ask the other deathlords for it” Speaker said, speaking frankly and confidently to his friend.

Lytek smiled – not that Speaker could really tell – but it was the sort of smile that showed that Lytek hadn’t told Speaker everything, for the missing auraclast wasn’t the only problem, but Speaker only saw a glowing god, not a concerned smile.

Speaker bowed to Lytek: “If there’s nothing else then I would bid my goodbyes. I’m sure my circle is looking for me”

Hesitating for a moment, then moving to speak – but then choosing not to, Lytek hovered from a moment as he thought of what to say in passing: “Seek out The Raven King in the Violet Bier of Sorrows, he’ll help you against the deathlords”

Speaker nodded and thanked his old friend for the meeting then entered into the guard room where Shimmer trying – and failing – at getting chatty with the guardian spirits.

Shimmer instantly perked up and followed Speaker out as he emerged, not missing a moment before she started inquiring about Lytek had talked to Speaker in private about: “Deathlords. Lytek gave us a lead to another god who should be willing to help us”

“That’s awesome!” Shimmer said as she bounced along Speaker.

It turned out that finding their way out of the ivory office complex’s basement was a lot easier and faster than finding a specific office within the place. In no time at all did the solar an lunar emerge back into the lobby of the vast structure.

Waiting for them was the rest of the circle, along with a very new and strange sight: Sunrise was smiling underneath the hood of her hood. Cash told the story of their adventures in bureaucracy while Rose led the circle outside to a new dragon boat:

“Oh it was glorious! I’ve never seen Sunrise so fired up before. The gods at the agency whined and moaned that they were overburdened, but I pointed out that in the first age they would have been processing several orders of magnitude more prayers daily all ponies back then worshiped Celestia. Sunrise accepted no excuses. The gods threatened with reporting us to the lions, but I dug out a hoof-full of Sunrise’s prayers to Celestia made after she exalted… un-processed and unanswered prayers! Do you know what the punishment those gods could face would be if they were caught not answering a solar’s prayer to Celestia?”

Cash retrieved a gilded scroll tube, un-corked it, and showed Speaker Sunrise’s original prayers. The agency now just had copies – but the prayers apparently simply appeared in the agency’s many in-boxes, dated, with the name of the pony who prayer and with the content of the prayer – so now the circle had all the blackmail material they needed to keep the agency running.

“…and they didn’t report you for blackmail, theft of official celestial paperwork and threats, why?” Shimmer wondered.

Sunrise cleared her throat, loudly: “Because for those puny and decidedly unworthy gods to report us, solars, for kicking their flanks and forcing them to do their jobs would require going straight to Celestia… to tell her that they weren’t doing their job in the first place”

“I’m finding it hard to believe that they just obeyed you like that, even with the blackmail and little recourse to take – they could just process Sunrise’s prayers couldn’t they?” Speaker inquired, not entirely convinced of Sunrise and Cash’s story.

Cash smiled. In fact, he grinned – menacingly so – then chuckled ever so slightly: “My dear Speaker, of course that wasn’t all we did. I wrangled up their department’s official charter and magically swore all the gods and spirits working in the agency to actually uphold it, making them promise to do their job. They weren’t all happy about it, but Rose here was more than willing to accept their resignations and deal out… what did you call it again?”

“Terminal Sanction. Fun little charm: It’s what sidereals use to mine gods for starmetal as a means of execution” Rose noted.
Cash gleefully suppressed a giggle at Speaker: “Turns out that resigning from your job in heaven is… not really an option – and abandoning your duties punished, severely”

“I guess that explains the god’s original motivation for rebelling against the primordials – because what you’re describing sounds a lot like slavery” Speaker said, looking if not concerned, then a bit worried.

Having actually seen the agency and the state it was in, Cash didn’t share Speaker’s worries: “You didn’t see how they had neglected their work. Some of the prayer-handlers hadn’t worked on their in-box for centuries – and of course works piles up when you do that. Look, that department was big enough to handle all the prayers that came in to Celestia at the peak of the first age and it’s never been downsized. If they just catch up on their backlog of work they’ll have it easy and I can assure you that I made them aware of this, so it’s not all bad”

Nodding, Speaker looked up at the sky of Yu-Shan now that the circle had exited the Hall of Celestial Stability. The sky was still dark and starlit, but now it had a huge moon shining a clear light down on Yu-Shan.

“Hmm, Luna is ahead in the games. That’s been a while” Rose absentmindedly commented.

Looking around at the quay as other dragon boats zoomed by almost faster than it was possible for pony eyes to perceive, Sullen Hoof wondered where their boat was. Rose looked concerned: “”This isn’t right, the boats are usually always on time”
“Maybe it’s the festival?” Speaker idly suggested.

Rose nodded: “True, that’s actually fairly likely. Hey, did you get to your meeting with Lytek by the way?”

“I did, it was very nice to see an old friend – although I also ran into this weird god on the way, Resplendent Buttflow – that was less pleasant…” Speaker said, his face showing the mix of experiences as he recalled both the good and the very bad parts of his little adventure.

It came to Speaker as a bit of a surprise as Rose began to laugh: “Oh you didn’t? Ouch, well… at least you’re still walking, that’s more than most of the ponies who meet him can boast”

Rose explained that the god of diarrhea, like so many other gods, had his personality shaped by the concept they governed – and diarrhea by its nature was a fairly ‘giving’ condition to be afflicted with. It was also a condition that liked to spread itself around: “Still, it does make the poor thing a social pariah. Nobody invites him to parties, so he’s deluded himself into thinking that he receives love-letters from secret admirers”

“That’s just sad” Speaker said, now feeling pity for the self-deluded god.

The sidereal mare shrugged: “That’s Yu-Shan. Not all gods can have popular domains”

Around the quay were exceedingly comfortable benches, and due to the somewhat unpredictable lighting conditions of heaven there were also plenty of street lambs built in the form of tall plants that each held powerfully luminous flowers. As the circle settled down to wait Cash inspected the form that Speaker had been given by the god of gardening tools. He was very impressed: “Wow… this thing is amazing. You could ask for anything with this, as long as it’s in the shape of a hoe or some other gardening thing… a solid diamond rake?” 

Suddenly an ill and powerful wind suddenly blew through the area, Cash dropping the woven green jade requisition form and scrambling to pick it up again.

“What’s going on?” Shimmer said, perking up and sniffing at the air with deep nasal breaths.

Not sure if there was any cause for alarm with Heath Rose as their guardian, Speaker hesitated to acknowledge his lunar mate’s gut reaction. Moments later all the light-flowers around the quay fell over, their stalks having been cut in half by unseen forces.

Rose, Red and Sullen Hoof all three came to the same conclusion in an instead, shouting in unintended unison: “Ambush!”
Speaker began to tug at Gift in elsewhere with his mind – but only Rose, Red and Sullen Hoof were able to arm themselves in an instant, along with Shimmer who leapt into the air and shifted into her beastpony form with a fierce howl. Red also rattled about a little as her trademark suit of bright scarlet lamellar armor appeared from elsewhere, circling about her as each piece quickly adhered to her body, the barding reassembling itself around the warrior mare as guided by her martial essence.

“Quiet, we don’t need to be cited for disturbing the peace!” Rose called out, not shouting, but speaking in raised voice.
Looking at Rose in disbelief as multiple odd-looking gods and spirits materialized around the circle, Speaker despaired: “Is she serious?”

“Of course! Even if you’re fighting for your life you’re not allowed to inconvenience the other gods here, heaven forbid someone might spill their tea…” Cash noted as he reared up, brining his shoe-claws to bear.

The gods and spirits that had appeared all looked... wrong. Some had clearly defined forms, such as a body of cinnabar stone, or a vaporous body of purple smoke, but nearly all of them had deformities of some kind: Parts of their bodies would sag unnaturally, look concave, or even appear to drip as if they were bleeding the very their body was made of. Speaker had absolutely no idea what they – for they looked so misshapen and downright wrong, for to his knowledge there was only one god of deformities in heaven, and she actually looked deceptively normal, at least back in the first age.

“I am Heath Rose, Chosen of Secrets – these ponies are under my protection! If you aggress I will perform terminal sanction on you – mommy needs a new pair of starmetal hoof socks!” Rose sternly stated, her caste mark glowing brightly with its green glyph of Jupiter, her trying to glare menacingly at all of the spirits present.

The spirits didn’t seem all that frightened – indeed, on closer inspection they didn’t all seem that intelligent, many of them having expressions more akin to predators than sage gods.

“Don’t attack any of them – if we deal the first blow they’ll be perfectly justified at tearing us apart, just defend yourselves” Rose shouted.

Speaker inwardly cursed that he couldn’t’ retrieve Gift any quicker. He really needed to learn how to do whatever it was Sullen Hoof did to pull those cleavers out of elsewhere so quickly.

Suddenly a hurricane force wind blew from one of the gods, knocking Cash, Sullen Hoof and Sunrise over while Red stood firm as her armor gave her enough weight, Speaker had his elemental immunity charm and Red just… wasn’t there – and then the wind stopped just as quickly as it had begun, with Rose appearing where an elemental looking spirit had stood moments earlier, holding what looked like a shiny new starmetal and blue jade coin, something Speaker later figured out to be a windslave disk – a device that lightened the weight of anything it was attached to.

“I told you, terminal sanction – now off with you or I’ll turn in the rest of you to the supply division as trinkets as well!” Rose called out, sounding noticeably agitated.

The other gods and spirits didn’t react well to this, leaping, flying, flowing or otherwise launching themselves at the circle and Rose in a seemingly blind fury. Speaker tried to defend himself as best he could, his spirit cutting technique working just fine when used bare-hoofed, while Shimmer and Rose equally tore spirits and gods apart left and right in a gory mess of glowing divine ichors and other quasi-ethereal bodily fluids. In moments the quay was awash in a rainbow of different shades of blood, while Red, Sully and Cash all tried to defend themselves to the best of their efforts – lacking the charms needed to inflict serious harm to the bodies of these rabid gods.

It didn’t take long for the first dozen of godlings to fall to the circle, Rose cutting through them with strangely sharpened hooves and a coat that suddenly had a distinctly golden shine to it that warded off all blows that struck it, while Shimmer bit and slashed with her great beak and talons, all of them glowing eerily in the moonlight. Gift finally appeared for Speaker to use, but as he was about to throw it a swarm of new foes spilled out of the dark alleyways between the towering palatial structures that surrounded the quay. The circle and Rose might have held their own against the first dozen assailants, but against hundreds? In the few seconds before the fighting began anew the circle considered their options:

“What are they? Where are they coming from?” Red shouted, understandably confused about why so many gods would suddenly attack them.

Rose face was clenched in bitterness and starting to show signs of exertion as her breath was already ragged: “Those bastards! They’re gods without purveys. When the great contagion wiped out nine tenths of creation a lot of gods were out of jobs. For a god to lose what they were meant to manage or govern… its very dangerous for them: they might go mad or go feral – like these ones. They’re usually held in uninhabited parts of Yu-Shan, ancient refugee camps – but someone’s herded a whole block worth in our direction. Those bronze bastards must really want us dead!”

“We need to get out here!” Cash called out, defending himself to the best of his ability against the spirits snapping at his haunches. By mortal pony standards Cash’s fighting was far beyond what any pony could ever expect to achieve, but against ‘homeless’ gods of war of countries that no longer existed he was finding his silks, which were already dirty with ash, putrid blood stains, and war ghost echoplasma and glowing spirit blood, increasingly torn – along with himself suffering painful lacerations from the blade-limbs of whatever mad god of war was currently trying to make him into a trophy.

It was Sullen Hoof who called out for the others to follow him in a fighting retreat, as he had apparently picked the lock of a service entrance to an exceedingly classy office building. The circle quickly barricaded the door as they got in, but there wasn’t much room and the door – despite being made of some kind of odd fragrant metal, clearly wouldn’t hold for long.

“What’s the plan Sully?!” Red shouted, holding up against the surprisingly flimsy door as the horde of mad gods outside clawed, bit and blasted away at it.

Sullen Hoof appeared to be looking for something, very intently so. Shimmer, who had been force to return to her usual pony form to enter through the door, tried to look around as well in the kitchen they appeared to be barricaded in – but she didn’t really know what she was looking for… but suddenly Sullen Hoof cried out: “Yes! Everyone, get in here – we’ll be safe here!”
Holding a hatch open to something that looked deceptively much like an oven, Sullen Hoof gestured frantically for the circle and Rose to get in. At first there was some hesitation, for while hiding in the ovens of the kitchen might just work back in creation… then in heaven that probably wouldn’t work, especially not when trying to hide from gods.

“It’s a portal, not an oven! Now get in!” Sullen Hoof insisted, Red groaning as a pair of red hot claws pierced through the door, through her armor and into her left shoulder.

Rose instantly leapt into the oven, to which Sully slammed the hatch shut. There was a flash of light, and Sullen Hoof pulled the hatch open: Rose was gone. 

“Wha-?” Cash almost managed to say, as his own fear of the ravenous gods outside moved him inside the oven along side Sunrise without him even being fully aware of it.

Speaker and sunrise followed next, then rose, then Sully and Red as the last.

After the flash Speaker and Shimmer found themselves quickly being pulled out by a small stocky spirit who looked exceedingly pissed: “More? Damn you ponies! The ambrosia delivery system is not for personal transport!”
Outside the oven and down on the ground, Speaker got up to see the rest of the circle around him, with Red and Sullen Hoof climbing out of the ‘oven’ as well.

“That was brilliant! I didn’t know that the ambrosia network could transport living ponies” Rose said, sounding exceedingly relieved and very pleasantly surprised.

Sullen Hoof shrugged as he brushed himself off and reached into elsewhere for his celestial chef’s uniform: “Speaker, correct me if I am wrong, but a lot of primordials enjoyed live meals?”

Speaker nodded absentmindedly as he looked around. The circle was in a giant kitchen that bustled with activity and tantalizing odors. Several dozen other spirits in uniforms oddly similar to Sullen Hoof’s stood around them, some working, and some looking at the circle.

The circle collectively thanked Sullen Hoof for coming up with an escape plan, while Rose fumed that such crude means of assassination had been employed against them. The discussion didn’t last long as the proprietor, owner and lord god of the establishment that the circle had intruded into burst into the kitchen, demanding to know what the holdup was on the dish washing was.

Looking at the circle, Sullen Hoof cracked his neck left to right – producing a few ungodly pops and snaps – he then approached the otherwise exceedingly well dressed and quite dashing god.

“Robed in Splendor, I am Sullen Hoof – we met earlier in Nexus…”

> Chapter 30: Food Fight of Celestial Portion and Second Helpings
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The god of fine cuisine, Robed in Splendor, a very dashing and charismatic god in the form of a mighty stallion who was as beautiful and fun to be around as the good food he held domain over, lit up with a smile and a heavenly glow that was both soothing and strangely appetizing as he recognized Sullen Hoof.

The night caste solar and the god rushed towards each other, Robed in Splendor’s exquisitely embroidered velvet cape flowing like the finest wine as he ran towards his most esteemed of guests and embraced Sullen Hoof in a most righteous hug – like a father reunited with a long lost son.

Sullen Hoof introduced the rest of the circle to his friend, and Robed in Splendor in turn welcomed the circle to the Jade Kitchen – the finest temple and workshop of the culinary crafts in all of existence, the place in which nearly all food in heaven is cooked and distributed from.

The food-god was understandably shaken to hear of the rabid gods that had been set on the circle, and Rose spared no time conjuring up a messenger spirit to report the horde of mad gods to the proper authorities. In the mean time the circle was shown to their seats in the main restaurant part of the establishment with instructions that this round was on the house. It was a bit awkward sitting down in what was arguably the classiest restaurant in all of heaven, especially since the circle was still stained with rabid god gore and Cash, Speaker, Shimmer and Red all had cuts and injuries from the fight earlier.
A spirit floated by and gave the circle some exceedingly exhaustive menus and for each of the ponies a single glass with a strange pale semi-transparent orange liquid, something that looked a bit like cider. It wasn’t cider. After a single tiny sip Rose burst out “Wow!” then downed the rest quickly, sloshing it around in her mouth for well over a minute before swallowing: “It’s celestial wine – you lot have to try this. You usually have to order this stuff centuries in advance!”

The circle sampled the heavenly drink and quickly discovered that it had the strange but handy side-effect of healing all of their injuries – the circle also unanimously agreed that it was the best tasting liquid that any of them had ever tasted, although Sunrise took a tiny sip and passed off the rest of her glass to Cash who eagerly accepted it. Sullen Hoof insisted that he could probably cook up something just as tasty, if not better, but for now it was time to order: “Let’s have a look at the menu shall we?” 

Speaker couldn’t read most of it, for the menu – a scroll of thick and bacon-perfumed velum – was so tightly packed with the names and descriptions of quite literally every dish ever made, that it looked as if someone had just dunked the menu in a tub of ink. Rose noted that a lot of Yu-Shan paperwork looked like that, as most gods could easily perceive the multiple layers of writing, or they would have servitor spirits who could. 

With some trying and some powerful perception-enhancing charms Shimmer was able to help Speaker ferret out a spicy southern dish from the menu, while Sullen Hoof helped the rest of the circle order as he seemed to know it by heart. Sunrise ordered a bowl of plain rise, Sullen Hoof looking quite offended but he didn’t object.

“Hey Sully, how do they get fresh pork up here in heaven? I mean, I don’t see any pig farms around here…” Red wondered as the circle slowly ate and savored the absolutely divine meals they had been given.

Rose answered before Speaker could finish chewing on his chili-infused bacon: “Prayers sent to heaven solidify and pool into quintessence. Gods can shape that into anything, be it housing, clothing, jade, or in this case food. It is quite literally what the gods both live off and live in. Sidereals use it to manufacture gear for work in Creation”

“So I’m eating prayers? Mmmm…. Tasty prayers” Cash mused.

Later as the circle was about to order desserts a loud sound of thick wood splintering came from the front door of the establishment. A servitor spirit flew across the room and crashed into the circle’s table. Everyone except Sullen Hoof tumbled backwards, Sullen Hoof leaping up and perching himself on a broken table leg as he looked to the door: “I think we’ve got trouble”

A pony assassin veiled in tight black silks and armed with twin hook-swords leapt towards the circle, but was intercepted by Robed in Splendor who made the assassin freeze mid-air, it just floating helplessly: “In my house? You dare intrude and assault my servants?!”

The assassin paid little heed to the god who had caught it mid-air, for despite floating seemingly helplessly in the air a few yards from the enraged god it performed a kick that still managed to hit the god with such force that Robed in Splendor slammed into the ground – the assassin dropping down to the ground as well, quickly leaping again at the circle.

With the few seconds given by the god’s brief intervention Red had conjured her blade of golden essence and stood ready to intercept the assassin as it came hurtling – but Red intercepted the assassin with her hooves having somehow morphed into metallic prongs that snatched the assassin’s blades and yanked them away: “No you don’t!”

The assassin leapt back while throwing some rather nasty looking black glass darts back at Rose and Red who effortlessly parried them.

“Hold on, I’ve got this” Sullen Hoof said, stepping up in front of Red and Rose.

Rose didn’t seem pleased with Sullen Hoof’s proposal: “That is a sidereal assassin for sure, he’ll kill you!”

Sullen Hoof ignored Rose’s warning, instead turning to Robed in Splendor: “Please, form the arena”

“Well this wasn’t how I had expect to see the first kitchen battle done here since the first age, but very well” Robed in Splendor said, erupting with a flash of light as the heavenly restaurant suddenly changed and became something… else.

Speaker felt the ground beneath him shift as broken chairs and tables faded – but counters, sinks and cupboards appeared instead. The restaurant had turned into a kind of amphi-theatre, but there was not a stage in the middle… there was a really big and very well stocked kitchen, and Sullen Hoof stood in the middle of it, while the assassin stood at the edge of it, with the circle and Robed in Splendor standing up by the audience seats.

“You dare assault the orichalcum chef in the jade kitchen? I accept your challenge” Sullen Hoof said in a stern and feisty tone, his eyes aflame with culinary passion and his cleavers keen.

Robed in Splendor loudly announced: “Allez Cuisine!” and ate a bell pepper.

The assassin, fully encased in black silk wrappings – even the assassin’s head, with no apparent slits for eyes – said nothing in return, but made with a brief shout and slammed his hooves into the ground– and suddenly Sullen Hoof was bombarded with a rain of black glass shards from out of nowhere, but Sullen Hoof deftly dodged and weaved through the rain as his essence floated up multiple pots and pans which almost instantly began to radiate great heat – one of which quickly flipped itself at the assassin who shattered like glass…

Sullen Hoof frowned, while spinning around to avoid the last of the shards and floated up three dozen big amphorae of various oils and many more different strange looking powders and spices, each in grand amounts, spreading them among the pots and pans he had floating around himself – then he dropped flat to the ground to dodge the assassin who reformed from shards of broken reality as the assassin bucked at Sullen Hoof, but missed.

Rolling over to the side and somehow impossibly leaping backwards several yards – straight from lying flat on the ground – Sullen Hoof continued to ignore the assassin as he threw his hooves into the air and flared his anima, enacting the most powerful technique of his culinary martial art… for every single ingredient and kitchen implement around him seemed to awaken into some quasi-semblance of life, hurtling themselves against each other: Knives cut vegetables, cleavers finely diced meat, grates flew around cheeses and spices crushed themselves against each other to form exotic and colorful blends.

Dodging and parrying this whirlwind of exceedingly sharp cooking implements and heavy cast iron cookware that seemed ever so intent on striking the assassin, the silk-wrapped pony appeared to always stand at the right spot or in the right pose to never be struck properly - until a flying cleaver finally did – sort of – for again the assassin fractured into many pieces, but this time the assassin reappeared as three dozen identical assassin! By the sheer volume of their numbers they drowned out the whirlwind of cooking implements, ingredients and knives, and they all quickly descended upon Sullen Hoof like a swarm, but the solar flickered and faded into seven shadows that each leapt in a different direction, reforming at a dizzying twenty-four yards above the assassin at the crest of a supernaturally powerfully vertical jump… most of the still swirling cooking implements quickly rising into the air to join him.

As Sullen Hoof arched his fall and hurtled down towards the multitude of assassins he had his essence fling the now boiling oil from many of the glowing cherry-red pans all over the throng of would-be killers below him. The many duplicates screamed as they were doused in oils of temperatures far beyond what was possible for ponies to live through, or for glass to not warp and melt under – and they all shattered into a mess of half-molten black shards of glass – but the assassin reformed on their remains and launched himself at Sullen Hoof who was hurtling down at him.

The two nearly impacted hoof against hoof, but Sullen Hoof flipped and twisted mid-air, ‘landing’ on one of his whirling and now empty pots, zipping away and out of reach from the assassin.

“Damn you! Stop cooking and fight properly!” The assassin shouted as he landed with a crunch on the shards of his destroyed, the gruff and deep voice of the assassin revealing that the assassin indeed was a stallion.

Sullen Hoof leapt down from his orbiting pots and still chopping, dicing and stirring utensils and ingredients – which followed suit: “Why not fight my guardian or my other circlemates and leave me to cook?”

The assassin chuckled and threw five broad throwing knives past Sullen Hoof. It was clear to Sullen Hoof that they were not to aimed to hit him, but as he saw them collectively pass him he saw the reflections of his circle-mates and Rose… and they were screaming and shouting, but he couldn’t hear of them. He turned to look up at the audience stand, but they were not there, not even Rose. Sullen Hoof did not shout or get angry, for a true orichalcum chef was always in a state of culinary fury and concentration, but he understood the grave nature of the situation.

“You will fight me properly now you damned anathema!” the assassin shouted, his breath ragged. The strange fighting charms he had been using were clearly wearing on the assassin, while Sullen Hoof didn’t even appear to have broken a sweat.

Sullen Hoof ignored the assassin and sampled a floating spoon that held a few drops from a saucepan that had just flown near him. He smiled and turned to the assassin: “No”

The assassin roared and fractured into half a dozen seemingly identical reflections of himself, each leaping to attack Sullen Hoof simultaneously and with a level of coordination that was as beautiful as it was deadly. Barbs of essence formed around each assassin’s fore-hooves mid-jump as they each were poised to deal a killing blow.

Sullen Hoof sighed and leapt up some twenty yards once again, disappointed that this assassin – clearly skilled in some very strange martial art that he wasn’t really sure how worked – was so unimaginative with those skills. He quickly took that back as the assassins below each grabbed at silver spoon, obsidian knife, polished bronze casserole or some other kitchen implement and struck them – for it was not the things that the assassins held in their hooves that were struck, but Sullen Hoof’s reflection and through that Sullen Hoof himself. Sullen Hoof tried to twist and weave mid-air as he began to fall, but his reflections all focused on him, and so he could not move out of the way of them – as the spoons and knives bent and casseroles were dented from being struck those damages formed on Sullen Hoof. It looked as if his skin cracked and bled all over his body as if he was a shattered mirror. 

Landing surprisingly well considering his multiple injuries, Sullen Hoof looked up at the multiple reflections of the single assassin. He finally addressed the assassin: “Very well, I will fight you”

The remains of the whirlwind of cooking implements banked and steered itself towards the assassins, pummeling the assassin and his solid reflections with high speed potatoes, forks and heavy cast iron pans. The reflections all shattered and reformed, but some reformed right in front of other things flying at them, so three of the reflections were shattered as they were struck head on by cast iron pots or in one case a carrot drilled its way into one reflections’ forehead at a clearly lethal speed.

The assassin leapt at Sullen Hoof, but he deftly sidestepped, ducking to avoid another. Two other reflections shattered as the kitchen whirlwind continued to hound them, even as they assaulted Sullen Hoof – for the kitchen implements never struck the solar, moving out of the way and occasionally leaving a spoon with a sample for him to taste behind.

With two reflections left along with himself as the original, one of the three reached for another polished bronze pot. Seeing this Sullen Hoof began to notice a pattern in the assassin’s use of reflective choices, but as he beheld the reflect Sullen Hoof saw himself: The assassin had not made another reflection of the assassin, but one of Sullen Hoof! …and in a single swift motion of an essence-fanged hoof did the assassin cut the throat of the reflection while the two other assassin-reflections held it tight, Sullen Hoof feeling his own throat first tighten and then open up as the reflection of himself faded into shattered glass.

The assassin’s remaining reflections crumbling into shattered glass as well as the assassin strode over to the dying Sullen Hoof: “Pitiful. I expected an honest fight here, not to have my targets lined up with you fooling around and trying to serve yourself a last meal before I kill you. Let’s hope that your next incarnation learns to show proper respect to his betters”

Sullen Hoof smiled up at the assassin. He didn’t speak, for his throat was supposed to be slit and he supposed to be dying. No. He had learnt well in Nexus when to play dead to end beatings from thugs and the cruel mercenaries that functioned as the city’s questionable form of law enforcement – and he wasn't done yet.

As the assassin stood over Sullen Hoof and sighed, watching as the last of his blood spilt forth from his slit throat, Sullen Hoof suddenly flickered into many shadows again and reappeared in front of the assassin with a sauce pan floating next to him.

“What? Impossibl-“ the assassin almost managed to say, as Sullen Hoof tossed the contents of the saucepan over the assassin. The assassin, while surprised enough to end his own word mid-pronunciation smirked at the silly sauce attack and laughed. The clear sauce dotted with tiny grains of many flavors sailed through the air and splattered all over the assassin – some even getting into the assassin’s mouth as he was laughing.

Sullen Hoof took a step back and removed the throat prosthetic he had been wearing, including the red-ink pump and thin tubes of colored starch as veins that he had created back at Rose Heath’s mantion as a way to test his new crafting charm taught by Speaker, after having eaves-dropped on May Blossom and Rose having whispered together, them having clearly talked about some unnamed threat that wanted to kill the circle – quite possibly via throat-slitting in the night. The ingenious prosthetic looked like a natural part of his throat, but was not, for it even came with a thin metallic lining that ran flush with Sullen Hoof’s throat that had protected him from certain death.

The assassin finished laughing and gave Sullen Hoof an appreciative nod: “Ok, that is impressive. I should have suspected something when you didn’t bleed that much from your wound… but now I will ensure that you die properly”

Sullen Hoof shook his head and frowned, as if speaking to a foal: “No”

“Oh don’t give me that again. At least have the decency to fight back properly when I kill you” the assassin said, rearing up into a strange martial stance. Sullen Hoof wondered if the assassin, with his eyes covered by strips of black silk, could even see properly? Oh well, that wouldn’t matter much now…

It started with the assassin smacking his lips. He then nodded: “Well that certainly is tasty…”

“Isn’t it good? Don’t you want more?” Sullen Hoof offered.

The assassin found himself nodding as he dropped down to sit and sniff at himself smelling so good with that sauce all over himself… he sniffed at his hooves and then gazed – through the silk wrappings covering his eyes – up at Sullen Hoof in terror: “What did you, what- what did you do to me!?”

Sullen Hoof smirked but didn’t answer, only floating more pots and pans over to the assassin, using his essence to whirl the air with the scent of the food in them towards the assassin – then Sullen Hoof floated the food out of each pot and pan, using his essence to mush it together and strain it into more clear liquid…. Which he unceremoniously splashed down on the assassin.

The assassin began to quiver noticeably, with jerky and erratic movements holding up things on the floor next to him that had sauce on it and licking at it – even if it was some of the shards of black glass that his own charms had form. With a tongue that was quickly being reduced to a shredded and bloody mess the assassin wept: “What did you do to me!?”
Sullen Hoof said nothing, but simply looked on as the assassin cried while hungrily crunching his way through bizarrely delicious shards of glass without being able to stop himself – but there weren’t many of those shards… very quickly the only thing left with the sauce was on was the assassin himself.

It wasn’t pretty, and even Sullen Hoof had to steel himself as he watched the assassin bite into his own hooves and flesh, screaming in pain between moaning in ecstatic pleasure from the heavenly taste. It didn’t take long for the assassin to have cut enough flesh from himself to eat that he bled to death, but it was a gory and unholy sight to behold. Now his circle was avenged.

Sullen Hoof said nothing – but he did smile quite a bit as his friends suddenly all called out in a cacophony of confusion, only to stop again quickly as they all seemed to realize that they were back in reality. They each told the same story: They had seen a flash, the reflected image of the assassin and then they had been unable to see anyone else. Heath Rose had an idea of what had happened, something she confirmed as she unwrapped the assassin.

It was disgusting to look at the remains of the assassin – and Robed in Splendor was quite keen on knowing who it was as well, for his kitchen stadium was in ruins! Sadly there wasn’t much left of the assassin to identify: Not only had the sauce made the assassin eat his own lips and chef his own forehooves off, but he had sliced most of his skin off as well with the nearest kitchen knives he had been able to reach (floating them around, since he had no forehooves left…) so there wasn’t even a cutie-mark to identify. Still, Heath Rose could only say one thing as the assassin’s head was properly unwrapped, revealing a strip of paper that appeared glued over the assassin’s eyes, with a little bit of blood seeping out from under it: “He was a sidereal"

Sullen Hoof was just about to remark that this explained why the assassin had wrapped his head up entirely without leaving holes to see through, but Rose said that the strip gave supernatural fate-based sight, giving the user a slight measure of foresight into the future – or at least into fate – so one could see where your opponent was fated to move next, allowing for attacks to aim for where you would be in the future.

“That’s crazy… how does that work?” Cash wondered while Robed in Splendor shouted for servitor spirits to come and clean things up.

Rose drew a deep breath: “It works quite well – but only sidereals can do that – and only sidereal elders can master Obsidian Shards of Infinity style… so I don’t know who this is, but he definitely was a sidereal elder which narrows the field a bit”

The circle mused on this fact for a moment as Red inquired into the exact nature of this strange ‘style’ of martial arts – for she wasn’t even sure what the sidereal had done could be called martial arts.

“Oh it’s a real style alright, but it works very differently from more conventional magical styles. Obsidian shards of creation style holds up a mirror to creation… and breaks it. That’s how he could attack you through your own reflections, or pull your reflection out into the real world and wound you through it – or pull each of us into a separate mirror world where we were isolated. We would have been stuck in there forever if you hadn’t killed him Sullen Hoof, I owe you my life” Rose said, shuddering at the thought of forever being trapped in a mirror’s image of creation, unable to be seen or heard or felt by the world around her.

“That is a terrible power” Shimmer said, shaking her head at the dead sidereal, then turning at Sullen Hoof: “But you… what exactly did you do to him? I mean, you made him eat himself!?”

Sullen Hoof shrugged: “Orichalcum Chef Style works best in a kitchen and this is the best there is. It doesn’t focus on fighting foes physically, although it teaches that too – but its greatest power is how it assaults the senses and the mind. Your nose and tongue hold powerful senses rarely used in battle. I used that against him, covering him in a sauce that contains nearly every flavor that heaven has to offer, so powerful that it is both maddening and addictive – it is but one part of what could become a banquet for the gods”

Having heard this Cash had to stopped from sampling the sauce repeatedly.

Rose nodded: “Got to say, that was really impressive. For now I think it would be wise to leave this place. I don’t know how the bronze faction has held off celestial lions from storming the place yet, but I don’t think they’ll wait forever – let’s get out here before they come”

The circle bid there farewells to Robed in Splendor, but not before Sullen Hoof presented a spoon of the heavenly sauce to the god – who in turn gave Sullen Hoof his highest of blessings, as well as extracting a promise from Sullen Hoof to return and cook for the god again someday. Sullen Hoof gladly gave that oath and was rewarded with another sip of celestial wine causing his mirror-shattered flesh to heal as if it had never been hurt at all. 

As they left the Jade Kitchen the sun stood high in the sky, something Rose didn’t seem that surprised of. She hastily summoned an aerial rickshaw and as the circle flew off they could see celestial lions entering the jade kitchen.

“Sullen Hoof, when did you master Orichalcum Chef Style?” Rose asked, as the rickshaw. Sullen Hoof explained that he had done so in the first age… in this life he had simply slowly re-mastered it by remembering how it had been done in the past, just like how Speaker was re-mastering his fighting style.

“Ah yes. Solar exaltations were always best at retaining practical past life memories, or maybe it’s just Lytek favoring you guys, who knows. Either way I’m taking the lot of you to a gate back to creation” Rose said, instructing the spirit pulling the rickshaw to go to a ‘portal sixteen’.

Once again zooming through the broad gold-paved boulevards of Yu-Shan, the aerial rickshaw floatied above the ground while the this time dozen-legged spirit ran at a frightening pace pulled the circle and Heath Rose along effortlessly.

The trip took remarkably little time and Speaker was sure that Rose was using strange sidereal journey charms to connect them from where they had to left to where they were going much faster than what would be normal. Rose merely nodded and said that it was either that or spending three weeks in traffic: “You don’t want that, trust me.

Arriving at a surprisingly nondescript plaza in the eastern end of Yu-Shan, the plaza being surrounded by an oddly teal colored forest on one side and some very blocky buildings covered in mirrors on the rest, the circle lined up in front of the large torii gate that dominated the square.

Gods, lesser spirits and countless ethereal messengers were going in and out of the gate’s event horizon, making for a lively and trafficked but none the less easily accessible gateway into creation.

Stepping through, the circle found itself on the shores of a river surrounded by thick jungle. The sun was low in the sky but rising, which was strange since it had seemed to be noon up in heaven. Up the river it was possible to glimpse part of a port with ships and large sails, while a barge floated past the circle down the river with some very wide-eyed sailors on board. They seemed quite shocked in fact.

Rose explained that the sailors the circle and her just appeared out of thin air, so their confusion was understandable. The sidereal mare then threw a large chestnut into the water which somehow unfolded into a boat: “Come on, we have to cross the river to get the debriefing”

“Why don’t I just whip us up a cloud?” Shimmer suggested.

Rose shrugged and floated the boat up from the water, it turning back into a large chestnut again.

The ponies on the barge looked on and all agreed that their last ration of rice-wine must have been bad as they saw the circle of ponies fly off on a cloud.

Guided by the sidereal Shimmer made the cloud fly down the river, which turned out to be the Maruto river. When they reached fork where the river merged with the Meander river to form the yellow river Red guided the circle down to a temple that was built into the rocky promontory outcropping where the two rivers merged. It had some very pretty blue glass windows and some very tall spires, by creations at least, for to ponies who had just been to heaven it really wasn’t that impressive.

Landing in front of the temple, Rose welcomed the circle to the river temple of Anisatsis.

“And what flavor of god is that?” Cash wondered.

Sunrise knew that: “Fertility goddess”

Cash smiled, a lot: “I think I just found religion then!”

Rose laughed as they approached the temple gates: “No pleasure cults here, sorry – but they do have experienced midwives, plus it’s the secret headquarters of the convention of Wood, as well as the gold faction”

The circle and Rose were met by a priest who seemed to recognize Rose: “Welcome Heath Rose. It is good to see a pilgrim return again. Will you be needing to converse with the divinities?”

“Yes, in fact I’ve brought new acolytes” Rose said, nodding towards the circle.

After being led inside, the circle and Rose were guided down the halls of the temple past niches with clearly pregnant mares and their families who were praying for healthy foals, to an empty niche. Rose led the circle inside then pulled on a torch sconce. A hidden door opened and Rose trotted inside, calling for the circle to follow.

Inside the hidden part of the temple it was clear that a celestial bureau operated: Spirits and godlings, many of which clearly had absolutely nothing to do with fertility, flittered about doing paperwork or discussing matters related to fate and other heavenly minutia.

Red led the circle to a large and well lit meeting room where an oddly familiar mare with a black curly mane, pretty amber eyes and some tasteful golden earrings sat at the end of a big table.

Speaker instantly pointed out to the rest of the circle: “Hey, isn’t that the concubine we saw run off at Lupo’s place?” 

The rest of the circle collectively facehoofed. Rose turned a shade of red that was even more fierce than when she had originally seen her faction leader, Ayesha Ura, run half naked out of her master Lupo’s dojo.

Ayesha Ura, the sidereal leader of the gold faction, gave Rose a bemused but also condesening smirk: “Interesting choice of friends you have there Rose”

Rose stammered: “yes I… these are the solars and the lunar I have written to you about. Friends, this is Ayesha Ura, Chosen of Journeys, leader of the faction and chair of the convention of wood” She then very quickly walked over to a chair at the table and sat down, sweating profusely.

Speaker sensed that he might have done something wrong.

Leaning in to whisper into Speaker’s right ear, Cash quietly said: “Didn’t I say something about you not opening your mouth in public?”

What followed was an awkward but ultimately very enlightening meeting between the circle and the head of the gold faction. Other spirits joined the meeting temporarily on a few occasions, either to bring in refreshments, maps, new scrolls to take notes on or other things, although some of the time it was animated clockwork servitors that came in instead. Indeed, through the meeting and by seeing the different ‘things’ that the gold faction seemed to employ or use as part of their organization it appeared that the gold faction was very open and resourceful about what they used to get the job done. Ayesha made a point of this, arguing that it freed up resources for the gold faction ponies to pursue other goals: “Goals such as helping solars and preventing bronze faction assassins from getting to them”

“How do you explain the mess in the jade kitchen then?” Sunrise wondered.

Ayesha pointed out that as chair of the convention of wood she only had near-absolute heavenly authority over the east, not heaven.

The meeting lasted until nightfall, the circle explaining everything they knew about the ‘new’ deathlord they had learned off, as well as what they knew of the deathknights they had encountered. Ayesha Ura was extremely thankful for the information and several dozen scrolls were filled out with the information.

As per Rose’s instructions they didn’t mention the mind control issue with the Ruby and Emerald mare, but at the end of the meeting Rose herself brought up the subject. Ayesha Ura appeared to have been let in on the secret prior to the meeting, and she explained that this was why the debriefing was held in creation: “Rose was right to advice you all to secrecy on this matter. The bronze faction would have leaked it immedeatly to the celestial lions had they known. Now, in the mean time we’ve looked for a solution…”

Ayesha explained that removing magical compulsions who’s exact nature were unknown was more or less impossible to do directly. If a pony was consciously aware of such a compulsion it was just a matter of being aware of when it was trying to influence you and then consciously reject it – doing so would over time erode and remove the compulsion completely, but if you didn’t know what you were being compelled to do…

“This isn’t to say that we don’t have a solution. In fact we’re a little surprised that between the five of you none of you thought of it” Ayesha stated.

The sidereal elder proceeded to explain that in the first age among solars there was a technique, a part of the Hoof of the Daystar style of martial arts, which could do what the circle needed done: “Like most charms and techniques of this style it deals with striking. Striking evil down, striking true, and in this case striking at the bonds and illusions of the mind”
Looking at Speaker Ayesha asked if this sounded familiar. Speaker sadly couldn’t remember anything that fit that description, neither could Red or Cash who both practiced the style.

Furrowing her brows, the deceptively young looking Ayesha nodded towards Rose: “Fair enough, then you’ll have to go to someone who knows the technique and learn it. Rose, take them to the bull and try to make friends”

Hearth Rose looked like she just shat herself.

> Chapter 31: A Bull Shattering Frozen Clouds
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Staying the night in the exceedingly humble pilgrim dormitory of the temple, the circle departed the next day for the north.

Rose still seemed shocked at the order she had been given. The circle didn’t quite understand, but as they flew towards the north-west Rose tried to explain: “Has any of you heard of a barbarian warlord known as the Bull of North?”

“Isn’t that the barbarian who led some ice-walkers tribes against the realm’s vermilion legion and whipped them out?” Cash suggested, having heard of the story some years ago while still working as a traveling merchant.

Rose nodded, adding that the bull was a dawn caste solar who exalted so far north that no wyld hunt caught wind of him in time to stop him from raising an army.

“So wait, this bull is a solar? Hmmm… well that actually makes a lot of sense come to think of it” Red noted, recalling the stories she’d heard among other mercenaries of the battle four years ago. An entire realm legion, over six thousand ponies-at-arms, along with all the magical weapons a realm legion usually brought to bear: Essence artillery, jade warstriders, magical armor for the unicorns… all of it defeated by a single Solar and a horde of barbarian ponies armed with nothing but their hooves or weapons made of mammoth bones?

“Sounds legit” Shimmer said, nodding. The story certainly fit the legends she had been told by her elders of solar battlemasters in the first age.

Rose sighed: “Less than three hundred realm soldiers survived the battle of futile blood, but that wasn’t all of it. The bronze faction had, at the time, made a convention of the Bull in order to stop the Bull. All three members, all elders like the one Sullen Hoof faced today, were slain by the bull… and unlike our assassin today they weren’t trying to be subtle about it and the bull still took them all down”

“I don’t see the problem. He’s a kickass Solar and your boss says that he knows this mind fixing charm” Red said, feeling a strange kind of kinship with this Bull pony Rose was describing.

Hanging her head low, Rose sighed again then looked up at Red: “It’s not you I’m worried about. It’s me. I don’t want him to kill me, and so far the bulls only known interactions with sidereals have been of the killing sort”

“Well if you’re with us I’m sure it’ll be all good” Red said with a smile, genuinely looking forward to meeting this warlord.
After several hours of flight the question of exactly where the Bull was located came up. Rose said that the gold faction had put astrological blockades in place on the Bull so scrying for his location wouldn’t work – to prevent bronze faction assassins finding the Bull that way – but this also meant that the circle would now have to ask around to find the warlord the old fashioned way.

“Can’t be too hard. Considering the rampage they pulled off there should be a trail of destruction to find” Cash noted.
“It’s been a few years since they were active – we can probably just ask around at a trading post. There should be merchants who’ll know where they are” Shimmer noted, asking Sully to look around under the cloud for a trading post or merchant town.

As Sullen Hoof looked for a good spot to gather information Shimmer flew her cloud along the Avarice river. Speaker found the sight of the river strange, as his old home – the hunting lodge – wasn’t that far from the river. As the cloud passed over the Bien lands Speaker sighed and tried to spot the village he had lived near, but by the time they flew by that it was getting too dark to see the ground properly.

Further west, near the point where the Avarice river merged with the river of tears, Sullen Hoof noticed a vast canyon opening up to the south of the Avarice river. In the canyon were a series of natural stone pillars, with houses built on top of them – and the faint flickering of torches and lamps revealed that there were bridges connecting the pillars. What had really caught Sully’s charm-enhanced eyes was the number of ships docked on piers built on the south shore of the river, the docks again being connected via bridges to the houses on the canyon pillars: “Trading post!”

Shimmer made the cloud descend, landing on the shore to the great surprise of the few drunken sailors out and about at the late hour.

“We should find a place to sleep here. Anyone who knows anything is probably asleep by now” Shimmer noted.

On one of the canyon pillars which had quite wide mesas as it turned out, the circle found an inn with room for all of them. The next morning the circle split up, looking for information. The plan was to meet back at the inn at noon.

Speaker and Shimmer cased out the local craftsponies, the town of Felubic having a lot of small ship-maintenance workshops to service merchant shipping that came down from the north via the river of tears. Speaker figured that the craftsponies would know what new ships had just arrived from the north. After some decidedly suggestive flirting from Shimmer the two exalted ponies got all the information they needed from an apprentice who apparently was quite lonely.

Heading to the docks Speaker and Shimmer found Cash and Red already there, talking to the captain of a merchant ship. Well, Cash talked to the captain. Red was having fun hoof-wrestling with the burly sailors and beating them effortlessly – and it wasn’t even noon yet.

Seeing the sailors cheering for Red and her current opponent, a bulky and gruff looking mare, Shimmer perked an eyebrow: “Well that’s a new thing”

“What is?” Speaker said, looking around in the inn. There were musicians playing flutes over in a corner, lively banter and lots of drinking and singing all over the place, combined with a hoffful of servants trying to skirt around the many costumers trying to serve food and ale.

Shimmer pointed at the sailor mare that Red was hoof-wrestling with: “In the west mares aren’t allowed to be sailors. Heck, most places don’t even let us on ships…”

“Wha- why would they do that? Fishing and shipping is nine tenths of everything you can do in the west, so why would you limit yourself to only half of all ponies to work on your boats?” Speaker wondered, trying to wrap his head around the logistical headache that such a misogynist gender policy would entail.

Smiling, Shimmer calmed Speaker: “It’s the storm mothers of the west. They are the gods of the storms we have back home. They’re very ugly, jealous and will wreck any ship they come across that has a mare on it prettier than them… which is all of them. The cultural misogyny came naturally with that, since mares can’t work on boats out of fear of losing the ship”

Speaker wasn’t really sure what to say to this revelation, but he was certain that if he ever met a storm mother he’d have words with her. Shimmer just kept on smiling, shrugged and approached Cash.

It turned out that the merchant that Cash had been buying drinks and flirting with, a haughty looking stallion in very a very utilitarian captain’s uniform, had passed a trading post on his way down the river of tears manned by the Bull’s underlings. With this information the circle left on a new cloud heading north, following the river of tears.

The weather quickly became noticeably colder as the circle flew north. Around evening it was so cold that the circle had to find somewhere to quickly purchase warmer clothes. Luckily the circle was able to reach the trading post that the captain had mentioned before the last rays of light disappeared, although as the circle barged into the large riverside house that was the trading post they did look quite frosty. In the common room they had entered sat a dozen or so other ponies, all dressed in warm furs and other forms of thick northern clothing, all of them minding their own business.

“Careful, northern ponies are well known for being hostile to strangers” Rose warned the circle.

Behind a counter of thick wood, bathed in the flickering glow of a big roaring open fireplace in the middle of the trading post and tavern, an inn-keeper gave off a hearty and cruel grin as he spoke to the circle in a notable northern accent: “Ah, southings – can you hold the heat?”

Looking around while shivering, it quickly became clear to the circle that this ‘trading post’ was as much riverside inn and tavern as it was a trading post. The inn-keeper, a tall stallion wearing a very nice looking fur coat, gave the circle a pensive look: “If you want room and board I need coin first, no farting around”

“Wow, such northern hospitality” Shimmer quipped, speaking in old-realm to avoid the inn-keeper understanding her. 

Through his charms Cash instantly knew that the inn-keeper was weary of the circle because they were all strangers to him – foreigners who could not be trusted to do honest business. With a tiny whiff of essence and a smile on his lips, no small feat considering how cold Cash was, the silk-dressed pony approached the inn-keeper: “Come now, we’re just staying for the night. How about you heat up something for us to eat get us something to drink, then we’ll part on good terms in the morning”

As if by magic the inn-keeper smiled and nodded at Cash, accepting the few coins of silver Cash flung at him, quickly bringing out some steamy broth and very nice honey-mead to the circle at their table.

“Well that was a nice change of heart, what did you do to him Cash?” Sullen Hoof wondered as he breathed in the warm vapors of the bowl of broth in front of him.

Cash smiled: “Made him think I’m a local. Rose was right; ponies from the north don’t like strangers, more so than most other places – but they’re very open to the ponies they do trust. Now, warm yourselves while I try to find out if anyone here is selling furs… Speaker, you can make us something with some furs right?”

“If you get us enough, sure” Speaker said absentmindedly, being busy with slurping up the warm meaty bread broth in front of him.

Cash quickly wolfed down his meal and cased the establishment, then sat down at another table. A short while later he returned having apparently acquired three dozen bear and wolf pelts… for free.

“Wait, for free?” Sunrise said in disbelief.

Cash explained that for the gracious ‘gift’ he had in turn informed the merchant  he had talked to about the village further down the river that Cash and Speaker had saved from slavers a few months ago, who on Speaker’s instructions had begun to collect and sell the herbal ingredients to maiden tea: “I told him of the business opportunity he might find there – in return he gave me the furs as a gift, plus he’d need the room on his boat for the tea herbs”

“From complete stranger to trusted business advisor in just a few minutes. Impressive” Shimmer said, nodding at Cash.
“With my charms? I’d expect nothing less” Cash said, smiling greatly. 

Speaker worked the furs over the night, producing six sets of warm and oddly stylish fur coats the circle. Cash wasn’t sure about the exact style that Speaker had made them in, since Speaker had made them in the first age style that he remembered well… problem was just that that style had gone out of fashion so many times over the last several thousand years that Shimmer wasn’t even sure that it had ever been in style, despite Speaker’s reassurances that it had been… once.

Clad in dubiously stylish but undeniably warm clothing, the circle inquired with the locals to where the Bull was located. This turned out to be slightly more tricky as the inn-keeper had at least been used to strangers even if he hadn’t been friendly to begin with, but again Cash’s social charms proved invaluable as he was able to find a pair of hunters who, after some essence-based smooth-talking, bragged about how much the Bull’s quartermasters had paid for the meat they had sold them a few weeks ago. With this information also followed the rough location of the Bull and his forces, and so the circle sped off – with Speaker napping as Shimmer flew the cloud, him having worked all night on the warm fur coats.

Around noon Sullen Hoof announced that he could see a large army camp out on the tundra down on the ground. It was a huge tent city, with Speaker guessing that there was at least capacity for some two or three thousand ponies down there, although it wasn’t that easy to see due to the snowfall that was blanketing the camp.

At the cloud’s cruising altitude there wasn’t much bad weather, but it was quite cold. As Shimmer made the cloud descend towards the camp the circle found themselves flying down into a mild snowstorm. The visibility quickly deteriorated to the point that Shimmer had to rely on Sullen Hoof and his sensory-enhancement charms to safely guide the cloud.

The issue of guiding the cloud quickly became a moot point, as suddenly two nets shot up through the cloud and caught Sunrise and Cash, yanking them down through the cloud with great force. Seconds later, just as Red and Sullen Hoof had brought their arms to bear to defend themselves, two other nets shot up from under them. One caught Shimmer and pulled her through the cloud – the cloud quickly dissolving… leaving Red, Speaker and Sullen Hoof to fall from the sky. The other net missed.

“Shimmer!” Speaker shouted. He couldn’t see a thing and he was falling to his death. This was not how he had thought meeting the Bull would go…

Suddenly a net came from bellow and entangled Speaker. It pulled him down much faster than he had been falling, the ground soon becoming visible as it came closer and closer uncomfortably quickly. It also became clear that the net was being reeled in via a thick rope attached to the net.

The net was suddenly swung around, translating the downwards motion to intense horizontal motion, but it also began to slow down and after a few rotations around whatever had been reeling him in. Fairly dizzy, Speaker was dropped to the ground where the net released him unceremoniously into a pile of cold snow.

Speaker quickly found himself being shouted at by northern ponies in a language he didn’t understand at all, the northern icetongue, while quite a lot of crude spears were also being leveled at him. As the world around him stopped spinning Speaker saw that the rest of the circle was being detained similarly, several dozen spear-wielding and fur-clad pony-looking beings having surrounded each of them, although it was difficult to tell from the poor visibility given by the snowy weather and the cold wind.

Cash shouted something in icetongue, and half a second later there was the sound of a pony being clubbed over the head followed by Cash yelling out in pain. Speaker sighed and reminded himself that Cash really needed to learn a defensive charm or two…

Suddenly Red roared and with a twisting motion swiped away the spears around her so hard that all the spear-tips bent. The large amounts of essence needed for such a powerful and precise blow caused Red’s anima to flare, the golden light piercing the heavy snowfall surprisingly clearly and with a forcefulness that for a brief moment cleared away all the snow.

Speaker instantly heard all the spears drop in Red’s direction, followed by more shouting in icetongue. Of course! If this was a camp lead by a solar warlord the soldiers would obviously respond positively to other solars!

“Everyone, flare your animas!” Speaker shouted, hoping that the others would hear it, as he willed his anima to ignite and wreathe himself in harmless but exceedingly shiny golden flames.

Around Speaker he could see the dim outlines of more golden animas flaring, plus a silver-blue anima. This elicited even more shouting in icetongue, but this time some of it was by Cash. The shouting quickly stopped after that, the circle gathering together.

“So… what did you say to them?” Sullen Hoof asked Cash, not having understood a single word that had been said.
Cash shrugged: “That we’re solars and that we’re here to see the bull, at least that’s what I think I said”

“Since when could you talk icetongue anyway?” Red wondered.

Cash smiled, patting Red on the shoulder: “Linguistic charms my friend – learn a language in ten seconds flat. Used it back when I talked to those hunters in case you didn’t notice”

A pony mare clad in crude but thick furs strapped to her approached the circle. It was difficult to see her face, and her voice was muffled by the furs tied around her to keep her warm, but she motioned for the circle to follow.

The circle was led into a large circular tent-hut made of mammoth bones and covered in multiple thick fuzzy pelts and hides. Inside the yurt a small fire burned, around with dozens of exquisite swords, shields, suits of armor and other strange but expensive looking trinkets, and in the middle was a throne wrought of ornately carved mammoth tusks and the skulls of various many-eyed monsters plus a half-dozen pony skulls lying at its base…

On the throne sat a dark-grey coated pony stallion bigger than Speaker, with thick legs and hooves, a shaggy coat and a long grey mane tied into multiple braids. The stallion’s face was grim with a thick grey beard that grew into his mane, and he bore the marks of having fought many things with many fangs and claws, and on his head he bore a – by the standards of the hundred kingdoms – plain golden coronet with a sunburst icon on the front. It was the Bull of the north, and while it was clear this solar exalt was physically old then his body was taught with bulging muscles and strong-looking if not worn hooves and wild unshorn fetlocks.

“Speaker, this is how I’ve always imagined a solar warlord” Shimmer said quietly, blushing at the sight before her.

Cash was about to bow and introduce himself and the circle to the bull, but the Bull interrupted him as he began to bow his head, speaking in a strange northern dialect of OId-Realm: “If you are solar you bow to no-one but Celestia”

“Very well. My name is Cash Charmer, exalted of the solar eclipse caste” Cash said in old realm, standing tall and resplendent.

The Bull let out a brief chuckle: “A wordsmith, good – I have need of one like you”

“Let us not get ahead of ourselves – we are not here to join forces” Sunrise quickly pointed out, her old-realm having a very formal pronunciation.

The Bull gave Sunrise a derisive snort, the breath of the solar puffing out of his nostrils like a thick fog.

Speaking again in icetongue, Cash introduced the Bull to the circle, each showing their cast mark as Cash gestured at them. The Bull seemed impressed to finally see a full circle and he was quite curious at Shimmer, for he had never seen a lunar before.

“I can’t imagine that the silver pact hasn’t tried to make contact with you” Shimmer said, her old realm having an odd western pronunciation to it. 

The Bull couldn’t answer, instead turning his attention to Heath Rose: “And what of this one? You fear me… you have been silent since you stepped into my yurt”

Rose didn’t say a word, instead trying to inch herself behind Speaker to hide from the Bull’s gaze.

“A mortal follower perhaps? One awed by your powers and now awed by mine as well?” the Bull quipped with an oddly mirthful grin.

Cash yanked Heath Rose up next to him, right up front of the Bull: “Not at all. She is a sidereal and has been quite useful to us. She’s simply afraid that you’ll mistake her for sidereals like the ones who previously tried to kill you at Futile Blood. We’ve had such an assassin come after us as well, but apparently the sidereals are divided on whether they want us solars to return… so not all of them are hostile”

The Bull got down from his throne and stood nose to nose with Rose: “Futile Blood, yes, I fought three strange ponies there who were not unicorns. After all his fancy magic fighting I ripped his legs off and hoisted him up on a pole to freeze to death, took three days. Fed his remains to bears, then I ate the bears. Were they sidereals as this one?”

Rose was visibly shivering, beads of sweat rolling down her forehead.

“I assure you, Rose is on our side. She even arranged a meeting with the gold faction Sidereal leader, and I’m certain that she could do the same for you if you’re interested. The bronze faction Sidereals are simply too caught up in trying to make creation work without solars to want to abandon their old schemes and plans”

Nodding ever so slightly, the Bull returned to his throne and called for a servant in icetongue. A young colt appeared in the tent moments later, hauling a big clay jug full of mead. Drinks were offered to all present and there was a brief moment of quiet.

“So, solars of the river province, why did you come to me?” the Bull inquired.

Red wanted to tell the Bull, but she understood neither icetongue nor old realm, and for once Speaker held his tongue. Sunrise explained their plight, how the gold faction Sidereals were certain that the Bull knew of a martial arts technique that could strike the magical lies and compulsions out of the circle’s minds.

The Bull found this quite amusing, both that the circle had found themselves victim to such underhoofed trickery, but also that these Sidereals with their strange magic fighting as he called it couldn’t fix the circle on their own: “Still, I will gladly help fellow Solars”

Having spoken, the Bull asked whether the circle wanted to have him simply use the technique on the circle, or whether he should teach one of them the technique, to which Red asked Cash to tell the Bull that she wanted to learn the technique – assuming that it was possible for her to learn it at all.

The Bull noted that such would take time, time that he honestly didn’t have that much of – for after his bought with the vermillion legion those years ago he’d been spending his time consolidating and simply maintaining control over the lands he’d conquered. He simply didn’t have the time needed to train Red…

“I think I can help with that” Rose meekly noted.

Rose explained that she knew a sidereal technique which could allow her to copy skills and charms very quickly. It was something used as part of Sidereal education to speed things up. The Bull wasn’t sure, but again Cash vouched for her. The process was surprisingly quick and quite shiny. The Bull sat opposite of Red, with Rose standing next to them with a hoof on each of their foreheads. Rose’s green caste mark flared and glowing bands of green essence coursed between the two Solars. An hour later Red knew a knew martial arts technique, having learned it purely via memory transfer.

“Well, what are you waiting for? Use it on us!” Cash urged.

Red shrugged and reared up as if to stomp Cash, but instead she lunged out with a lightning-quick and surprisingly gently hoof that barely touched Cash’s forehead. Cash then keeled over screaming, as snakes of golden fire erupted from his mouth and eyes as the lies within him were burnt away…

“Who’s next?” Red said, looking at the rest of the circle who, looking at Cash wiggling around on the pelts covering the floor of the Bull’s yurt, didn’t look that interested in going through with the mind-purge anymore.

Taking a deep breath and willfully choosing to ignore the feeling of fright, Speaker stepped forward. He didn’t even manage to say that he would be next before Red had gently struck his forehead. Searing pain from within erupted in Speaker and he too dropped to the floor, writhing in agony.

As Speaker came to he saw the rest of the circle undergoing or recovering from the technique, although Sunrise had apparently been sensible enough to sit down first so she fallen over. He felt… the same as before. He had expected to feel different. He had expected to see things that hadn’t been there before – but there weren’t anything on his circlemates that he hadn’t noticed before. Looking at Shimmer as she got up, the last fading vapors of golden fire trailing out of her mouth and eyes, Speaker saw nothing he hadn’t seen before: It was the same purple dreadlocked mane, the same beautiful blue eyes, the same cute face, the same two puncture marks on her throat, the sa-

Hold on.

Looking around at the rest of the circle, then feeling his own throat and wincing in pain as he felt two puncture marks as well, Speaker quickly concluded that he had somehow not noticed that they all had identical neck wounds. As this fact dawned on the rest of the circle, and as the brief panic that ensued died down after they had all checked that there wasn’t anything else they hadn’t noticed about themselves, the question was what these marks meant.

The Bull, looking quizzically at Rose, inquired if this explained why the circle hadn’t responded to his questions previously.
“Wait, what questions?” Speaker said, looking up from his examination of Shimmer’s puncture wounds.

The Bull said that he had asked about the wounds before asking why the circle had come to him, but none of them had answered. Rose added that similar questions back in Yu-Shan had also been ignored, with Rose having chosen not to push the subject after her initial inquiries.

“Hold on, you never asked said about that” Cash quickly pointed out.

Rose shook her head and jingled a large bit of jewelry that hung around her neck, well hidden in her fur coat: “I did. I can prove it if you want” 

It slowly dawned on the circle that the wounds were part of what the Emerald and Ruby mare had hidden from them via her mind control. Speaker quickly finished examining the puncture marks: “They don’t make sense… they’re not near any veins and I never noticed any of us having any symptoms of being hurt”

Shimmer peered intently at the wounds on the solars around her, then she turned into her monster-pony form, the yurt bulging as all the ponies inside were showed up against the thick pelts that made up the yurt’s walls. Somehow maneuvering Speaker’s neck up in front of her face, Shimmer gazed at her solar mate’s wounds with her third eye while everyone else groaned and showed and called for Shimmer to shift into a more manageable size.

After few moments Shimmer shifted back into her usual pony form and declared: “Its essence!”

A short explanation later, the circle understood Shimmer’s revelation: The puncture marks were placed to tap into each of their inner essence flows, as evident by the wounds placement relative to their chakras.

“So… this deathknight has been what, draining us of essence? Wouldn’t we have noticed ourselves having no power to use our charms?” Cash wondered.

Speaker shrugged: “Maybe she used an anesthetic charm like mine and drained us in our sleep? Plus, we were under the compulsion never to notice or pay her any attention right?”

The Bull noted that he’d heard of similar injuries from those of his agents who occasionally clash with the Lovers forces. Rose seemed surprised at the mention of this ‘Lover’, while the rest of the circle wasn’t really sure what they were talking about, but Rose quickly explained that it was another Deathlord with a stronghold in a shadowland several thousand miles north of where they were right now. 

“Either way, now we should all be fully equipped to return to Chung Do and confront this deathknight” Heath Rose declared, sounding quite pleased at the thought of getting away from the Bull.

The Bull smiled, revealing worn teeth: “Not so fast.  I have given you all something quite valuable and powerful – I will expect to repaid that favor at some point”

“Of course, but honestly – what could you possible need? You’ve conquered vast tracts of land, you have your own army of icewalker ponies, all the loot from defeating a realm legion – what could we possibly offer?” Cash inquired, his icetongue having improved remarkably quickly.

The Bull groaned: “I am dawn caste, I am the greatest military leader I could ever imagine – but I am no bureaucrat and such talents are rare to find among the barbarian tribes I rule over, and of the conquered ponies it has been impossible to find one that doesn’t turn to corruption or sedition when given a chance. I need help consolidating my holds: That’s what I’ve spent the last several years since defeating the vermillion legion doing, going from rebellion to rebellion, fending off idiotic invasions and wyld hunt incursions from Cherak”

“So, you need help with peacetime management. Fair enough, you’re a warlord – not a clerk, but we have our own trouble down in the hundred kingdoms: Rebel nobles, a plague spread by a deathknight. It’ll take time to wrap those things up” Cash pointed out.

Ultimately the circle agreed that for the time being they would simply owe the Bull a big favor, but the Bull did point out that as a more immediate issue the circle could help out with once they had the time would be up in Plenilune: “Some of the first conquests I made when I began to march out of the snow with my icewalkers was the Salt-spire League, but they renounced their oaths of fealty the moment my army moved on. I’ve sent Raneth, a twilight caste solar who came to me three years ago, to govern the league, but he’s effectively under siege from the slew of assassins sent after him by the nobles and kings of the salt spire cities that refuse to bow to him. Securing control of the Salt-spire League would gain me a steady source of income from trade in salt with the guild, and I need those funds to set up a proper government. Tribal ponies who only answer to their chiefs do not make good regional overseers and it’s difficult to motivate more educated ponies to work for nothing”

Impressed by the Bull’s knowledge of how to run a good government, and equally impressed by his admitting that he couldn’t actually do it himself, Rose stated that the gold faction would gladly lend advisors to the Bull, as well as oversee the training of the Bull’s minions with regards to proper managerial techniques”

“Just teach them to read and write first, that’ll make my life so much easier…” the Bull groaned.

Speaker perked up at the mentioning of such a desire for basic education: “That is something I think I can help with right here and right now”

The circle adjusted their fur coats and ventured outside, where the Bull somehow managed to call the entire army together with a single loud shout. The weather had settled ever so slightly, so the visibility was better, but it still wasn’t perfect. The Bull then shouted at the heavens: “And you wind spirits, knock it off or I’ll come beat you asses again!”

The weather cleared in an instant. The Bull commented that he had an ‘understanding’ with the local windigoes that they were to clear the skies on occasion for him, or else… 

With clear visibility in the frosty landscape, the circle could see the full extent of the Bull’s encampment: It was massive. Well over a thousand tents of various shapes and sizes, although all in the same style as the Bull’s yurt. Next to the camp the entire army had assembled in an orderly rank and file formation so perfect that it brought tears to Speaker’s eyes. Stepping up in front of the mass of tribal ponies, all of which looked gruff, with wild manes and not a single shorn fetlock in sight, the Bull announced that a new Solar he had just met were about to give them all a brief magically enhanced lesson that he was certain they would all benefit from.

With the help of Cash writing the icetongue alphabet on a scroll and translating, and Sunrise projecting the letters up into the air using her ability to project essence-fueled illusions – a simple but visually stunning charm she had apparently only ever used as part of her sermons – Speaker was able to use his educational charm to teach three or so thousand tribal icewalker ponies how to read and write in a language he couldn’t even speak – all in just an hour or so. The Bull was quite impressed.

After explaining that the lesson would first properly sink in after a week or so, requiring an hour of daily meditation, the Bull thanked Speaker and said that he could only hope that Raneth would become as willing to help others once the Solar once again ruled all of creation. Speaker wasn’t entirely sure of what the Bull meant, but took it as a good thing.

Bidding the Bull goodbye the circle left towards Chung Do and warmer climates.

> Chapter 32: Nobody Expects The Solar Medical Inquisition
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

On their way back to Chung Do the circle and Rose discussed what to do next. It was clear that there would most likely be things they would see which they hadn't noticed before – but this wouldn't necessarily mean that the deathknight would be easy to spot.

Rose suggested that as a means to defend against future mind control from the deathknight she could use a sidereal charm on the circle, one that would cement her status as heavenly advisor to the circle and ward the circle against outside magical influences. She also quickly added that it wouldn’t impair or otherwise hinder the circle in any way – so there were no strings attached: It was purely beneficial, or so Rose claimed.

“Makes sense. I remember sidereals acting as advisors and viziers to the solar deliberative all the time back in the first age” Speaker noted.

The ritual was a simple martial demonstration, where Shimmer ‘parked’ the cloud up in the sky so that she could pay full attention to Rose along with the rest of the circle. With Rose’s mastery of what she claimed to be an entry level sidereal martial art, one that not just emulated but reshaped the essence flows of creation around her, Rose was able to demonstrate feats of skill far beyond the imagination of the circle, but that wasn’t the point of the lesson: The profound truth was that the greatest weapons in creation are not of steel or essence, but that of ponies themselves. Through cooperation and acts of giving or receiving help impressive results, that were greater than the sum of the effort put into them, could be achieved. While Speaker, Shimmer, Sully and Red didn’t learn much with regards to actual martial proves then Cash and Sunrise of all ponies seemed surprised at the insight Rose had into martial arts. Sunrise in particular, who had never displayed any skills at hoof to hoof combat, even appeared to have learned some rudimentary combat techniques from what Rose had demonstrated.

“I’m glad to have piqued your interest, but the true boon of this demonstration is the essence link I’ve made to all of you. Any deathknight or other power that wants to control your minds will now have to contend with a heavenly oracle holding a hoof over your mind to shield you from negative influences” Rose proudly stated.

Red inquired into this particular style of combat that relied on such a strange indirect approach. As Shimmer made the cloud resume its flight back to Chung Do Rose explained to Red the basics of Throne Shadow style, the ancient and odd style that sidereals used which quite literally worked best through others.

It took the circle almost two full days to reach Chung Do via cloud, but they managed to return to the castle on the evening of the first true day of fall, the first day of season of air, of the month of Ascending Air. It was a somber reminder that in two months the winter spirits could come from the north and bring snow across creation – well, they’d bring cooling rain to the south, but the rest of creation would be blanketed in snow for a few months… and come the thaw the nobles would no doubt invade.

Considering how close the circle felt that they were to finally catching the disease-spreading deathknight and ending the plague another point of discussion arose as they neared Chung Do: If they managed to catch or kill the deathknight quickly enough and cure the plague in short order the nobles might just attack Chung Do before winter… not after. While Red was certain that she could fend off any mortal army on her own – a feat that the rest of the circle honestly didn't doubt – then Speaker pointed out a grim fact related to the inherently unstable nature of the hundred kingdoms: If Red simply defeated the nobles and scattered their army a neighboring kingdom might just come and besiege both Chung Do as well as the holds of the nobles since both would then be without an army. It could lead to a never-ending circle of strife: “And if word spreads that the plague is over and Chung Do is ‘only’ defended by a bunch of anathema we might run into the same problem the Bull spoke of with the saltspire league: Endless waves of assassins instead of outright invasions. I would prefer to avoid all of that if possible”

Rose suggested that the circle somehow simply prevent the news of the city being cured from being spread once they got that far – and noted that there was no guarantee that the circle could cure the city before the onset of winter.

“Oh we can cure the plague – me and Speaker have made a cure, but the deathknight kept ruining our attempts at making large batches of the stuff. I’m sure we can have the city healthy again in a few weeks if we can just catch the deathknight” Sullen Hoof optimistically stated

Rose mockingly and cheerfully admonished herself for ever doubting that solars couldn’t do such feats: “Should have expected that”

“Perhaps, but we’re out of ingredients to make the cure. The castle alchemist had a store of these weird blue mushrooms and his notes said that he’d usually pay foals to forage for them in the great forest north-east of the city” Speaker noted.

Red was oddly horrified at learning of this: “The Spider-Tree forest? Stain-beard sent foals into the… good grief”

Speaker didn’t see the problem, but Red explained that she remembered the Spider-Tree forest being haunted by evil spirits – spirits known for killing mortals that strayed into their territory, so sending foals to pick mushrooms in the forest was a very cruel thing to do.

“Well his notes did say that only half of the ponies he sent out returned… damn…” Speaker said, realizing the high price of the alchemical reagents he’d used up.

Shimmer interrupted Speaker’s musing as she made the circle aware that they were in sight of Chung Do: “Where should I land? What’s our plan? Do we go in armed and ready or do we play it cool?”

The circle agreed that they should pretend nothing had happened and case out the castle to find anything out of the ordinary.

As the circle landed to the relieved cheers of the ever dwindling number of guards manning the castle battlements – the circle having been gone for almost a week – the circle quickly scattered and returned what would be their usual duties: Sunrise, along with a remarkably unremarkable-looking Heath Rose, headed straight to the Shogun, Speaker checked up on his water walker patient in the dungeons, Red checked in with the captain of the guard, Shimmer turned into a seagul and retreated to a nest up on one of the castle towers as all the cloud-conjuration had drained her quite a lot, even with Speaker giving her of his own strength. Sullen Hoof took control of the castle kitchen after a shouting match with the castle chef, and Cash returned to his castle office and the impossible pile of paperwork that was awaiting him there.

Down in the dungeon Speaker found the water walker mare almost fully recovered. She was even up and about, but luckily the guard posted outside the makeshift surgical bay had kept her inside – as well as seen to her being fed while Speaker had been gone.

Speaker was now faced with the uncomfortable question of what to do with this water walker. He was quite sure what Red and Cash would suggest: Execution for crimes against Chung Do, while Sunrise would probably just see her locked down with powerful mind control charms and turned into an acolyte. Personally Speaker would prefer that Milda was set free under a magical oath never to willingly break the law again. Milda seemed less cooperative, the mare apparently feeling more vindictive than cooperative seeing as she had completely wrecked the surgery room she had been kept in.

Not wanting to disturb the rest of the circle Speaker instead entered the room with the pony at arms stationed outside of it, the two restraining Milda upon which Speaker gave the water walker a hard dose of truth: He told of how the rest of her gang was either dead or under lock and key in the rest of the dungeon, how their secret divine patron had been busted and was pending judgement from the circle, how Speaker himself had slain multiple of the water elemental enforcers the gang had received from the river goddess Gudaa.

It was a little heartbreaking to see how Milda’s world shattered around her as Speaker told her of these most uncomfortable truths, but Speaker didn’t feel that much pitty seeing as she was unabashedly a criminal who not minutes earlier had been shouting at the top of her lungs that she would kill, gut, burn and through other creative means see to Speaker’s deaths and that of his loved ones.

“So, Milda, I’m going to give you two choices. Either you swear an oath to never on purpose break the law again.  A friend of mine will magically bind you to that, or I will deliver you to another friend of mine, the older sister of the Shogun, who will most likely execute you in short order out on twin-fountain square. For your sake I honestly hope that you choose to live, but considering the number of ponies your actions aided in hurting and how utterly unrepentant you seem to be, then I will not shed tears for you if you choose death” Speaker said, satisfied that he was giving such a criminal a chance of, if not redemption, than at least life.

The guardspony loosened the gag he’d been forced to put on Milda since she wouldn’t stop screaming obscenities at the two of them – and to the guardspony’s relief Milda didn’t just start shouting profanities again as the gag came off.

There was uncomfortable silence as Milda clearly pondered long and hard over her two choices. Ultimately, to Speaker’s great joy, Milda chose to take the oath.

Speaker sent for Cash who arrived a few minutes later. Swearing in Milda was a relatively quick process and Cash noted that he’d been thinking of the exact wording of such an oath for quite a while, chiefly for the other water walker prisoners, so it was nice to have one to test it on.

“Do you swear to do to your utmost to uphold the law of Chung Do, or whatever other place you choose to stay, until such a time that I or Bright Machine Speaker here releases you from your oath?” Cash officially inquired.

Milda begrudgingly nodded: “I do – can I go now?”

“Sure, I’ll walk you to the gate…” Cash offered.

Speaker sighed deeply as he saw Cash walk out of the dungeon with Milda. Again Speaker despaired at the question of why he ever thought it right or justifiable to dismember Milda to gain her cooperation. Cash returned ten minutes later.

“Cash, I am a bad pony for what I did to her?” Speaker said, cleaning up the broken furniture and equipment that Milda had left behind.

Cash smiled and gave off a strangely cheerful bit of laughter: “The information you gathered from her saved the city. You’re a hero and a solar – none have the right to think less of you for what you did. And even if she talks about what you did then I’ve already spread rumors in advance about how it was information given to us by a water walker traitor who told us everything under threat of torture – so nobody is going to believe her”

Giving Cash a very disbelieving look, Speaker wasn’t sure if he even wanted to know how Cash could be sure that spreading such a lie would make the ponies of Chung Do doubt Milda. After a moment of thought the answer hit him: “Of course… still, that’s really mean. Now the ponies here will think that she’s both a traitor the city and a traitor to the water walkers. Nobody is going to trust her with anything”

“Speaker, under any other jurisdiction she would have been executed in the cruelest ways imaginable, we’re talking milk and honey level punishment. You chose to spare her, despite what she and her organization did to Chung Do. That makes you the better pony no matter which way you look at it – and it leaves her in a far better position to start a new life than she could have gotten anywhere else” Cash said with a confident glint in his eyes.

Nodding, Speaker felt far more at ease and more confident in his own sense of justice: “You’re right. And this city has suffered enough death: There’s no reason to kill any more ponies if it can be avoided”

“Good, now – I actually came down here to talk about trying to find… you know who” Cash quietly stated after quickly looking around.

Speaker nodded and motioned for Cash to follow him. The two left the dungeon for Speaker’s laboratory where Speaker barred the door and carefully examined the room to check that they were alone: “I knew it…”

“What?” Cash wondered, looking away from the strange assortment of liquids and powders that Speaker had set up.

Speaker demonstrated how the hoofprints in the dusty floor didn’t add up. There were Speaker’s large prints, Sullen Hoof’s smaller prints, and now Cash’s as well – but there was also a fourth set… one that shouldn’t be there. This had to be the hoofprints of the Ruby and Emerald mare. Speaker began to take measurements and make a mold of the hoof prints, but Cash stopped him: “Don’t bother – I’ve got it”

Cash pulled out a small jeweled bauble the size of a small onion and floated it around the hoofprints in question.
Smiling, Speaker recognized the device as a Recorder of Everlasting Glories – a holographic essence projector and recorder, devices made in the first age to immortalize the heroic deeds of the solars in their battles against the primordials: “That’s what you asked for from the sidereals, wasn’t it?”

“That and they’re tailoring me a blue silken Tang-zhuang style jacket out of essence spider silk – finally some indestructible silks fit for one such as me to wear” Cash said with no small amount of pride and relief.

Speaker looked up from the recorder and gave Cash a more serious look: “Right, but about finding out mystery deathknight – you came down to me because you had some ideas?”

Cash said that he didn’t have an idea as much as he had news. Shimmer had apparently snuck around the castle and noticed things, as had Cash while going over the castle finances: “Shimmer found several blood stains on the walls and floor in various parts of the castle, and I noticed that someone has been withdrawing money quite regularly from the castle treasury without the records showing who it was dispensed to. The last withdrawal was during calibration while we were gone, so I’m pretty sure our deathknight is still here”

His face souring, Speaker furrowed his grows into a troubled grimace at the thought of their enemy had been running around right under their noses. The problem would be to find a way to ferret out the deathknight without the deathknight noticing and galloping off.

“Ya that won’t be easy. By the way, thinking ahead, I remember you and Sully talking about having run out of ingredients for your cure? You said that we could get more in some nearby forest?”

Speaker perked up at the mention of the cure: “Yes, we’ll have to look into that once we’ve dealt with the deathknight, shouldn’t take long. By the way, you just gave me an idea: A health check against the plague! We’ll announce that every pony working in the castle has to come in for a health check to see if they’re infected with the plague or not. The deathknight might be hiding in plain view, but not showing up for the checkup would be suspicious and could disrupt whatever illusion she put up around herself – and if she comes in for the checkup – we’ll be able to nab her… that’s the plan at least”

“That’s not a bad idea – but how will you be able to tell that it’s the deathknight?” Cash asked, not sure if Speaker’s plan would work that well.

Silently pondering the question for a moment, Speaker suddenly leapt into action, mixing a series of powders and liquids together and asking Cash to fetch him a bucket full of water taken from both fountains.

“You want water from both fountains? But that makes it infected” Cash said, apprehensive of getting near the source of plague.

Speaker reassured Cash that he knew what he was doing, sort of, reminding Cash that he simply shouldn’t drink the mixed water.

A short while later Cash returned with a bucket of water floating in front of his head. Speaker quickly took a sample of water and via his essence and isolated a few small grains of dark dust from the water – the disease itself. Through a series of purification processes that Cash didn’t understand at all – only that it looked expensive – Speaker produced a black tar-like substance and proudly showed it to Cash from all the sickness that had been in the water that Cash had brought.

“Wow, you made black goo” Cash said in a disinterested tone, unimpressed on account of his ignorance.

Speaker chuckled: “This stuff should react to necrotic essence, the essence of deathknights. Beyond that I’ts harmless. I just put some on a rag and touch every pony in the castle with it as they come through the checkup – if it reacts we’ll know that we have our deathknight”

“React… how?” Cash asked.

Shrugging, Speaker said that he wasn’t entire sure. The stuff might catch on fire, or adhere like strong glue – all he could tell was that it should react very clearly with a necrotic anima.

“Well ok – I for one don’t mind setting the deathknight on fire to begin with. I’ll set up a room in the castle for the health checks and make it look legit” Cash said, quickly leaving. Speaker began packing up gear to bring up as well, for he reasoned that he might as well actually check the ponies working in the castle for signs of the plague.

The next day, shortly after dawn, the checkups began. First the entire castle guard – the two dozen ponies at arms left – were processed. Most of them were found to have bite-marks on their necks, but like the circle before having their minds freed then none of the guards noticed anything – and Speaker didn’t inquire about them so as to avoid revealing that his mind was uncompromised.

In the room Cash had set up – a meeting room previously used to entertain foreign dignitaries and other important visitors to the Shogun’s court – there was a low but sturdy table set up for examination, an empty bookshelf where Speaker had placed his gear as well as a small setup of glass vials and bulbs for testing the samples taken from the various ponies being checked.

As the day progressed and a hoofful of the ponies working in the castle, three guards and a dozen or so maids were found to have early symptoms of the plague. It wasn’t nice news to bring, and Cash and Sunrise had to console many a pony who broke down crying upon being diagnosed with the illness – but Speaker was also quick to point out to the ponies that they had developed a cure, so they would all live through it. Cash also made them all promise not to spread this news, as the castle might otherwise be overrun by the sick ponies in the city. With Speaker having his truth-telling charm on Cash didn’t have to sanctify these promises, as the few ponies who were found unwilling to honestly withhold the information were quickly identified and given a stern talking to. The ponies who were infected were told that they could not leave the castle until cured, for the castle manse prevented the spread of disease, so they were in essence under quarantine as long as they stayed. The common pattern for all of the ponies infected was that part of their castle duties had them go into the city from time to time, as they mostly drank from the castle well, not the plaza wells.

As the afternoon rolled around Red found herself immensely bored watching pony after pony being checked and sent on their way. She and three other guards stood outside the room in which Speaker and Shimmer did the checkups, while Cash and Sunrise managed the line of castle employees, which in Red’s opinion was exceedingly boring, but then again guard duty was always boring.

This changed when a meek-looking musician was sent in from the line.

She looked quite unassuming with her short-cropped black made and brown coat. A bit pale perhaps, plus she had the bite marks on her neck, but otherwise dressed in a neat and well-maintained green castle uniform, with a very nice dizi flute held in a leather sheath hanging by her side.

Red ushered her into the examination room where Speaker and Shimmer greeted her. Shimmer asked her to lie down on the low table, after which she floated over a small bit of cloth with the black substance that Speaker had prepared. A quick swab over the back of her neck with the cloth produced no reaction… at first. It was when Shimmer put the cloth down in a bowl with other similarly soaked bits of cloth that she noticed the difference: The tiny bit of cloth was ‘glowing darkly’ – eating the light around it, as if emitting a black light.

Following a script that the circle had agreed on in advance, in case the deathknight was detected via the swab, Shimmer sighed: “I’m sorry, it looks like she’s positive”

Speaker was surprised at the news, but played it off as if this meant that the mare in front of him was infected with the plague: “That’s… damn, another one” – despite never having had any acting lessons it was easy for Speaker to fake the sorrow of a positive plague diagnosis, as up until this point he had ‘enjoyed’ plenty of actually plague victims to practice on, so the sorrow was quite genuine.

The routine the circle had agreed on for the ponies that actually had plague was much different, mainly because it required Speaker to do use his diagnostic charm. Speaker approached to use that charm, his essence instantly letting him know that something was very wrong with the pony in front of him – chiefly because it told him that the mare was actually dead, which clearly didn’t make sense.

Looking at Shimmer, Speaker nodded and gestured for Shimmer to do what was planned to happen next.

Shimmer walked up in front of the mare, who looked quite surprised and sad. Donning a purposely obviously forced smile, Shimmer told the mare that she wasn’t to worry, because Speaker had developed a cure that would soon be handed out – so it would be ok, but that since she was sick she’d have to go into quarantine.

While Shimmer spoke to the mare, Speaker poked his head out and calmly told Red that they had one for quarantine. None of the infected ponies had been given this treatment: This was the line Speaker was to say to spring the trap on the deathknight.

Red and the guards entered the room, finding the mare softly crying and Shimmer trying her best to pretend that she was consoling the mare. It was a convincing crying act Speaker would later admit, but the moment Red stepped into the room and blocked the door the mare burst into tears: “No! You can’t lock me away!”

Speaker, standing between the mare and Red, felt a great wave of shame overcome him. Had he made a mistake? Had his necrotic essence-detetion solution come up with a false positive? Maybe Shimmer had caused it to react for some reason?

Distracted by guilt and shame Speaker didn’t even notice as he reared up and struck the mare with all of his might right upside the head with an essence-empowered hoof.

The mare tumbled backwards, bleeding from her nose and the corner of her mouth, looking at Speaker with a pair of quite horrified eyes.

Speaker glared at his own hooves with disbelief.

“Well that is one way to make her stop crying, but come on, that’s cold – especially by your standards” Red commented.
Speaker didn’t know what to say, but suddenly Heath Rose stepped into reality right next to Speaker with a comforting hoof on his left shoulder: “Don’t worry – you did nothing wrong: This mare is the deathknight you’re looking for”

The mare stopped crying in an instant, instead giving off an unnerving hiss followed by a stern demand for Red to step aside from the doorway: “Out of my way or you’re dead!”

Red scoffed at the mare’s demand, but the scoff turned into a bloody cough as Red dropped to the ground clutching her chest. The mare leapt out of the room in a single great bound before anyone could stop her.

“Stop her, it’s the deathknight!” Rose shouted, quickly turning to pursue the deathknight. Speaker and Shimmer followed suit, Red gesturing for them to go instead of staying to help her.

Outside the examination room Speaker saw Cash joining the chase, but quickly stopping again as the deathknight again shouted: “Stop chasing me!”

Defying the call for cessation of pursuit, Cash toppled over as blood burst from his hooves and his nose and his eyes, leaping him in a bloody mess on the smooth stone tiles that lines the castle’s hallways. Speaker too felt his chest contract painfully as he kept running, followed by the telltale warm coppery taste of blood in his mouth, but beyond that he was surprisingly unhurt. What kind of dark power was this deathknight wielding when her mere words could injure those who refused to obey her?

Looking back at Shimmer and Rose Speaker realized that Shimmer had used a shapeshifting trick to extend a leg and a hoof all the way up to the deathknight, Shimmer being in the process of retracting her leg as Speaker looked. The blood on the floor as he ran past it revealed that Shimmer had managed to at the very least graze the deathknight, and beyond that Shimmer and Rose looked surprisingly unaffected.

Rose, Shimmer and Speaker chased the deathknight around the many hallways of the castle. Speaker found it quite revealing and also incredibly frustrating that the castle guardsponies didn’t come and help – but this simply revealed that they had all been put under the deathknight’s influence. Gift finally appeared in front of Speaker as the three celestial exalted ponies chased the Ruby and Emerald Mare into one of the castle’s large banquit halls, when Sullen Hoof suddenly leapt out of hiding and tackled the deathknight.

Sullen Hoof and Ruby and Emerald Mare tumbled into the large wooden banquit table, smashing chairs and knocking over candlesticks that luckily weren’t with lit candles.

The deathknight quickly freed herself from Sully’s crasp and shot horrid chains of blood from her back up into the ceiling, pulling her out of melee range – but Speaker was quick to throw Gift to sever one of the three chains erupted into rust-stained blood.

Rose, Speaker, Shimmer and Sullen Hoof stood down on the floor looking up at the deathknight. Sully threw his cleavers at the mare on the ceiling but she evaded them by swinging around on her blood chains. Speaker had just as much luck hitting the deathknight, but suddenly Cash and Red appeared in the doorway that the Speaker and the others had come into the banquet hall via. They were both bleeding, although Cash looked far more worse for wear.

“Remember what I showed you, get her down!” Red said, Cash raising his forehooves at the mare and launching his shoe-claws.

Between dodging another barrage of cleavers and Speaker’s Gift the mare simply didn’t have any more wiggle room to avoid being struck by Cash’s essence-guided claws. Sullen Hoof quickly leapt over and helped pull on the chains that now led from Cash’s shoes to the twice-impaled deathknight and helped yank her down.

The Ruby and Emerald mare crashed down into a couple of wooden chairs, followed by some brickwork from the ceiling falling down on her as well as her blood chains ripped loose. The deathknight rose and snarled at the circle, revealing her true visage: A mare with a pale and almost porcelain-like artificial face-mask with – true to her name – a large ruby and emerald, both with a perfect brilliant cut, in her otherwise empty eye sockets.

At this point guards began rushing into the banquet hall to see what the noise was.

“Don’t touch me!” the deathknight shrieked loudly, flaring her anima…

The sight that followed was not meant for mortal eyes. For the circle their eyes simply averted the sight, as if their minds attempted to shield themselves from the blasphemy of essence that was the manifestation of the Ruby and Emerald Mare’s soul: An infinitely regressing pit of darkness opening around her, with pulsating organs that continually ground against each other and fell into the pit as wet, slick and shiny chunks of them fell apart from the necrotic forces acted on them. The mare was wrapped in a misty haze of blood as a gaping wound opened the mare’s forehead and the mortal guardsponies that had rushed into the banquit hall screamed in that particular way that only adult ponies who had genuinely lost their shit could scream.

Some of the guardsponies ran in fright. They were the lucky or just sensible ones. The unlucky ones simply dropped to the ground in silent and abject terror – some of those they drew whatever arms they had and stabbed or gouged at their eyes so that their minds might never again be tormented by such an unholy corruption of sights.

Speaker flew into a rage at the sight of the deathknight’s effect on the mortal ponies in the hall – but as he charged the mare she turned and flung open the door out to the large castle balcony overlooking the courtyard. Running through the open door, staining the nice green drapes with a mix of blood and small bits of ground random organs, the circle attempted to follow suit – but as they reached the door the Ruby and Emerald Mare stood ready to greet them: “I don’t know how you broke my hold over you, but you’ve ruined my fun and now you will face the consequences!”

Just as Rose and Sullen Hoof charged the deathknight did the charnel mare turn and again scream at them to stay away.

Before either of the two could reach the deathknight she leapt like none other high up and far away from the castle with a force so great, as she set off, that the balcony groaned and the stone brickwork began to crack, as Sullen Hoof collapsed clutching his chest, striken down by the deathknight’s dark word magic.

Seeing their quarry getting away, Shimmer instantly leapt into the air in pursuit and shifted into her monsterpony form – but the deathknight floated out and crushed an egg-shell filled with 8-scream devil powder, trailing the stuff behind her for a brief moment. The powder was aptly named and well known as an expensive alchemical crowd-control weapon, for when Shimmer flew into the stuff it clung to her like a hungry demon and seeped into her flesh, causing an intense burning pain. 

Shimmer dropped from the sky screaming in pain as her wings felt as if ablaze with hellish fury.

From the now decidedly unsafe to stand on balcony, the rest of the circle looked on in despair as the Ruby and Emerald Mare seemed to be getting away.

In a split second of desperation and not knowing what else to do, Speaker quickly called out: “Throw me!”

Not even bothering to question Speaker’s logic – or the seeming lack thereof – A wounded Sullen Hoof and Red quickly positioned themselves on either side of Speaker and gave him an almighty essence-enhanced toss. Speaker quickly found himself flying through the air, in an arch that was undeniably peaking far too quickly, meaning that Speaker was about to go from flying to falling.

To remedy the situation Speaker threw Gift down relative to himself, it quickly returning to him – but while Speaker continually willed Gift to recall to his right forehoof he used his perfect balancing charm to catch Gift on right rear hoof – effectively standing on Gift. As Gift kept trying to move itself to his right forehoof, while the balancing charm meant that Speaker weighed nothing as far as Gift was concerned, Speaker was able to extend his aerial travel quite a bit – at a speed so great that by the time the Ruby and Emerald Mare’s trajectory put her over the river Speaker was in range to Gift, although maintaining balance on a device that actively wanted to slip up to his forehoof was by no means easy.

Having followed the deathknight in this admittedly strange and difficult fashion, Speaker quickly realized where the mare was going: She was aiming to land on the south-western bridge pylon! Quickly twisting around so that Gift finally reached his right forehoof Speaker threw Gift with all of his martial precision…

The Ruby and Emerald Mare had both seen and heard Speaker approaching, but she had only counted on the lunar giving chase through the air. As she saw Speaker throwing Gift at her directly she tried to maneuver out of the way – a tricky thing to do mid-leap, as one wrong move could send you spiraling off course into a painful, if not lethal, crash landing.

With what the deathknight thought was luck she dodged Gift, but it swerved and circled around to attack the deathknight from above – and succeeded quite well, the rotating blades that encircled gift chewing a deep gouge down the deathknight’s back, throwing her dangerous off balance.

So hit, the deathknight began to spin out of control. As Speaker dropped harmlessly into the river, he just barely managed to see the Ruby and Emerald Mare smash into the side of the south-western stone pylon with a resoundingly dull and bone-snapping cracking sound. Moments later the shattered remains of the deathknight joined Speaker down in the water, where he hauled the corpse to shore, stuffed it into elsewhere and returned to the castle – two big gemstones, a nice ruby and emerald, stuffed into his pockets.
> Chapter 33: Sickness Of the Mind and Body
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The circle gathered in the castle courtyard as it was announced that Speaker had returned. Sullen Hoof had seen, via his sensory enhancement charms, that Speaker had dropped harmlessly into the river, so the circle hadn't started thinking that he had died in his pursuit – but they were surprised that Speaker had recovered the deathknight’s corpse.

“Well now we’ll have something to hoist up on a stick and parade around town!” Red said in a morbidly cheerful fashion.
Sunrise probably gave Red a chastising look from under her hood: “You’re not serious, are you?”

“Oh she’s serious” Cash chimed in, adding that it would do wonders for the morale of the ponies in the city to see the one responsible for the plague having been brought to justice.

Sunrise didn’t approve. She also informed Speaker that Rose had departed for Yu-Shan to report the death and supposed resolution of the Chung Do plague, adding that Rose had promised to come visit once the plague had been cured.

“Ok. As for the parade I say go for it. Tell the good ponies of Chung Do that the fiend who spread the plague is now dead and that we’ll have a cure in circulation in a week! – although I’d love to first examine the body first really. I want to know what makes these deathknights tick!” Speaker said, looking at the Ruby and Emerald Mare’s decidedly lifeless and mangled body with absolute contempt.

Despite the consensus on the deathknight autopsy, the first thing that Speaker did was tend to the circle’s injuries. How the deathknight had injured them via her words alone was a mystery to the circle, with Rose, and Shimmer being the only ones who had somehow avoided getting hurt. Cash had suffered strange wounds around his hooves, Red had apparently nearly had a heart attack and Shimmer found Speaker to have lacerations in his mouth and throat. Sunrise had avoided harm by virtue of not having been part of the fight at all, instead having spent the time of the examinations and the subsequent fight keeping the young Shogun out of harms way. 

Once the circle had been treated Speaker also spent a few hours fixing up the guards that had seen the deathknight’s gory anima. The ones who had ripped or cut their eyes out had their eyes regenerated, but to Speaker’s great chagrin he found that a few of the guards who had simply frozen in catatonic terror were beyond his current ability to help…

Later, with a heavy heart, Speaker and Shimmer performed an autopsy on the deathknight corpse: Shimmer used a rather grizzly but exceedingly efficient charm that conjured up moonsilver maggots which ‘re-inflated’ the corpse, even hooking together and stiffening in liu of broken bones and collapsed organs, giving the corpse a subtle semblance of life. Speaker found this charm deeply disturbing, although quite handy, and Shimmer noted that it was quite handy if you wanted to make sure that nobody noticed a few dead guards at whatever place you were sneaking in.

Initially Speaker concluded that the deathknight had been in a very strange state of body: Incredibly old wounds mared her form, including several stab wounds around her neck which had been covered up via a mix of makeup, her clothes and what looked like necro-surgery on her quite dead flesh: “Like a mortician preparing a corpse for a final viewing… it’s like she was embalmed while still alive”

“And here I thought she just had a strange choice in perfume” Shimmer joked.

In the end the two exalts agreed that the deathknight had been kept alive via necrotic essence, as her body had been dead or almost so all the time. Speaker wondered if it hurt being like that, while Shimmer mainly took down notes of everything Speaker discovered: “Would it be ok if I send a copy of this to my elders back home? I’m positive that they’d love some intel on the deathknights that roam their seas – plus a recipe for that necro-essence goop you made?”
“You have deathknights in the west?!” Speaker said in surprise, his voice worried.

Shimmer shrugged: “There’s probably deathknight’s all over creation, solars as well if we’re lucky. In the west there’s a nation called Skullstone where the living and dead live… no, co-exist together. Strange place, my elders say to keep away from it, but I understand that they have deathknights like this one too – but I haven’t heard of any of them pulling stunts like this – most I’ve heard is that they act like diplomats and army champions”

Speaker frowned and shook his head, he then began to close up the deathknight corpse and wash it down with essence – making it somewhat presentable, while Shimmer left her essence-maggots in place, to make it easier to prop up the corpse for display.

The next day the city was replete with fanfare, as a small but glorious procession departed from the castle courtyard: Sunrise up in front, magical music and singing appearing around her, with golden phantasms of essence forming up around her in the guise of a whole parade of glowing ponies that sang and danced to the honor of the mighty Solar saviors. Red and Speaker proudly trotted along in the center of this with a long pole held between them, the corpse of the Emerald and Ruby Mare tied to it for all to see and throw stuff at. Cash trotted along the edge of the parade, proudly telling the good news to all who would hear.

Many of the ponies of Chung Do came out on the street, wondering where the choir or marching orchestra was – marveling as they saw Sunrise and the magical singing phantasms conjured by her essence. Following that they were all told that the evil pony that had spread the plague that still ravaged the city had been brought to justice – and better yet that a cure would be distributed in short order. 

Between the triumphant fanfares that Sunrise willed into existence, Cash’s loud and supernaturally catchy proclamations and the elation of the citizens to finally have a target to vent their anger and sorrow at, half of what was left of the city was soon trailing the four solars, giving cheers and accolades to their saviors. The spirit of city was lifted in such a way that it was almost palpable. More ponies were coming out of their homes to fetch fresh water, no longer fearing infection and death as much – and those already sick finally had hope, renewing their will to cling on to life.

In the evening the circle met up back in the castle, which turned out to have fixed itself from the damages that the fight had caused, the wood aspected manse apparently having regenerative abilities. Sullen Hoof had prepared a feast – and while the food was lovely then Sullen Hoof seemed strangely unpleased with what he had made. One of the things that Sullen Hoof had made was a very delicious soup based on wine, but Sullen Hoof was not pleased: “It’s still not good enough”

“Oh come on Sully, this stuff is great” Cash said, relishing in the meal.

It turned out that Sullen Hoof had been haunted by the memory of the celestial wine he had sampled at the Jade Kitchen Stadium in Yu-Shan ever since they had left. In his attempt to replicate the sublime flavor of the heavenly wine by refining local wine via his essence, resulting in the soup they were now enjoying– but it just wasn’t the same.

“The wine you used for this, it’s made on grapes right?” Speaker wondered. Sullen Hoof nodded. Speaker pointed out that the celestial wine was made on peaches grown locally in Yu-Shan, plus if he recalled correctly from the first age, then that heaven-made wine was aged for almost half a millennia.

“Peaches? Hm… I’ll have to experiment with that then ” Sullen Hoof said, nodding pensively, then asking Red if there were any peach orchards around Chung Do.

Thinking for a moment, Red sighed: “There is, a few days east, but that’s beyond the blockades. Say, now that we’ve dealt with the deathknight, how do you lot think about doing some blockade raids to open up the city?”

“We need to cure the plague first. If anything then we should ‘raid’ the nearby Spider-Tree forest for those blue mushrooms I need to cook up a new batch of plague medicine – and we’ll need a lot for the whole city” Speaker pointed out.

Shimmer agreed that fixing up the cure first would be a good idea: Striking out at the nobles too early would only bring about an actual siege to the city prematurely. This brought up a different but related problem: If the cure was created and spread ‘too soon’ the nobles might not wait until after winter to attack. 

Speaker was quick to explain the problem: “If they attack before winter we won’t have time to rebuild and mount any kind of real defense. Sure, if Red goes off and has a go at the attacking army she might just beat them back – but we need a solution to this that doesn’t require that we have to sit and babysit Chung Do forever. We need a permanent solution”
“So… instead of just beat them back, then kill all the rebel nobles and install some loyal ones, have Cash swear them to fealty?” Red suggested.

While Speaker ideally wanted a less murderous resolution to the situation, then he did agree that this would probably require some ponies dying before peace could return to the Chung lands.

“Speaker, this is the hundred kingdoms – there is no peace here, you know this, you said as much yourself. Once this rebellion is over, no matter the victor, I’m sure that there’ll be some neighboring country or nearby warlord who’ll love to try their luck here thinking the Chung lands weakened by the rebellion and the plague” Cash quickly pointed out, rehashing a point Speaker had made a few days previously.

Sullen Hoof gave Cash a dour look: “Wait, you’re saying that all of this is just a waste of time?”

Cash smiled: “No, I’m saying that we as solars should be playing the long game: Think the conquest or pacification of all of the hundred kingdoms. Think of how many lives and resources that are thrown away every year on petty squabbles and internecine warfare here in the east”

Sullen Hoof had to admit that in that context taking control of the hundred kingdoms made an awful lot of sense. With that kind of power it’d be a lot easier to force through the various social agendas that the circle had in mind. Speaker found this idea appealing as well.

Cash then unveiled his grand plan: First fix up Chung Do and issue a call for immigrants and general amnesty to outlaws to repopulate the city. According to the numbers he’d been getting from the Sijaneese then almost two thirds of Chung Do was dead or dying, so that would be very necessary. The circle’s social charms would ensure that all immigrants would play nice.

Secondly, the army of the rebel nobles shouldn’t be defeated – it should be suborned. With control of that army Chung Do would instantly have a defence force and via Cash and Sunrise’s social charms they could quickly make those soldier ponies quite friendly to the city if need be. Next Speaker would spend the winter using his educational charms on the ponies of Chung Do so that come spring Shimmer could use her cloud to start transporting ponies down to Denansdor, ponies that would have been sufficiently trained via Speaker’s educational charms to operate the first age factories there, then crank out enough first age military hardware to take over the hundred kingdoms.

“I like this plan!” Red explaimed enthusiastically, the promise of such grand conquest sounding quite irresistible to her martial heart.

Waving his head from side to side as he thought of the plan, Speaker ultimately frowned and sighed: “I can’t teach what I don’t know. Making or operating that kind of first age machinery is beyond me… I mean, I remember once having done it all, but I don’t remember how I did it”

“Didn’t you also say that you’d need the most powerful form of countermagic there is to terminate the miasma around Denansdor?” Shimmer noted. Speaker nodded: “True, adamant circle countermagic – and you’re our best sorcerer here, so correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t you need a teacher to be initiated into sorcery and for every sorcerous circle ascension?”

Shimmer concurred, the horrible implication of what Speaker had said dawning on the lunar pony: “Gods… does that mean that adamant circle sorcery is lost? I mean, if all solars were wiped out in the usurpation so there’s none left to train others up to that level?”

“Hold on, isn’t sorcery just like using charms? Can’t you just sit down on your rump and meditate and figure that stuff out on your own?” Cash wondered.

While Speaker and Sunrise tried to explain to Cash why he was so very much wrong Shimmer simply sat and despaired, muttering something about how this might explain why someone named Rakshi had gone mad in her quest to learn how to cast adamant circle sorcery…

“…ok, so let me get this straight. We’re not really supposed to work sorcery at all, but we can, but you need a teacher – and not even in the first could anypony agree on who the first sorcerer was? Damn this shit is complicated” Cash moaned.
“Look, the point is that to pull off your plan – which I like, was it possible – then we’d need to find someone who’s actually initiated into the adamant circle of sorcery, and as far as we can see that’s just not possible anymore” Speaker noted.

Shimmer suddenly got a sly look on her face: “Wait, Speaker – back in Yu-Shan, Lytek gave that memory crystal. Maybe he has memory crystals from other solars that shows us to initiate ourselves to the adamant circle ourselves?”

“Shimmer I could kiss you!” Speaker said, smiling gleefully. Cash, seeing that there once again was hope for his plan, first smirked at Speaker and then leapt at Shimmer and kissed her instead, stating: “Speaker, you’re not supposed to just say that when she already likes you, you dummy, you’re supposed to do it”

Shimmer didn’t seem to object, although Speaker did look a bit miffed.

“What about the deathknights and the deathlords?” Sullen Hoof said, reminding the circle that there was more to do that simply regain control and dominance over creation – it had to be saved from those who wished to see it end.
Cash nodded: “True, we’ll have to deal with them as well – but that doesn’t have to change the plan: If we retake Denansdor I’m sure we’ll be able to cook up something sufficient to end the deathlords, or simply find enough weapons and equipment to do so waiting for us in the Denansdor manse vaults”

Ultimately the circle agreed that Cash’s plan, as ambitious and hinging on seemingly impossible or unavailable things as it was, was a worthwhile plan to pursue, even if it’s ambitious time plan would probably have to be moved up a bit.
First up would be the curing the plague.

Speaker led the circle to the Spider Tree forest. It turned out to be quite aptly named, as it didn’t take long before the circle came across a small meadow in the forest where blue mushrooms grew – and where there grew trees in shape of ponies.

“Ok that can’t be natural…” Cash very quickly pointed out.

Sunrise stepped up to one of the pony-trees and brushed a hoof against the smooth bark: “They aren’t. They’re ponies who’ve been killed by Wood Spider venom, it turns you into a tree, so watch your step”

“Sunrise, spiders are just icky, and last I heard they don’t do to ponies – don’t spiders just eat flies and stuff?” Red said, scanning the treeline for motion out of fear of an ambush.

Speaker explained that wood spiders were a kind of predatory wood elementals, as big as a pony: “In the first age it was even theorized that they were the inspiration for the changeling meme that became the timber wolves, since they look so alike, aside from being in the guise of different animals”

Sunrise asked the circle to cut down all the pony-trees – the dead needing to be laid to rest, all the while Speaker and Shimmer collected mushrooms. Red quickly formed a hulking grand daiklaive out of her essence and was about to cut into a pony-tree when a hissing voice from up in the boughs called out in old realm: “Stop! It must not harm the forest!”
Thinking quickly, Sullen Hoof guided Cash’s aim, resulting in a shoe-claw being fired at where the hissing voice had come from. As the claw shot up into the mixed boughs of the treeline around the meadow there was a monstrous shriek, not particularly loud, but decidedly un-pony-like. As Cash and Sullen Hoof pulled back on the chain connecting Cash’s shoe to his launched claw a pony-sized tangle of vines and sticks was yanked out down onto the ground… and aside from the large mess of vines that made up its abdomen it had six branches poking out of its mossy thorax, three on each side of a large head-sized lump of moss that had four knobs of polished wood poking out, probably the thing’s eyes…
As the wood spider struggled to get back on its feet it wailed: “It hurts us! Why does it hurt us!”

“Because you’ve killed a lot of ponies here, that’s why!” Red bellowed, disgusted by the pathetic nature of the elemental.
Cash quickly struck a bargain with the elemental, allowing the spirit to live in exchange for a very large amount of the blue mushrooms that Speaker needed – not that the circle had any effective means of permanently killing the elemental, but after revealing that they were solars Cash found that the spider thought that they could, and chose to capitalize on that fear. The meadow was cleared of pony-trees which were all burnt in a large pyre.

That night Speaker, Shimmer and Sullen Hoof cooked up several large batches of the plague cure that Speaker and Sullen Hoof had previously devised. As a means of distribution the cure was made into a largely tasteless and odorless liquid that Sullen Hoof subsequently incorporated as an ingredient of a large feast, the idea being that the whole city could be cured as part of a grand festive event.

Cash wasn’t sure , so he met with Speaker and the others in Speaker’s laboratory the next day: “Have you guys even tested this cure yet?”

“Are you doubting my abilities as a doctor?” Speaker said, his voice plainly revealing his disdain for such accusations.
Cash smiled. It was a smarmy smile, clearly fake, but at the same time eerily endearing: “Speaker, friend, you’re the one who told me earlier that one of the side effects of this stuff you’re cooking up is constipation. I just figure that if you discreetly test the stuff first, not to see if it works if you’re that sure, then at least to test how people react to the side effects”

“Since when are you so worried about side effects?” Shimmer wondered.

Cash explained that even since arriving in Chung Do and ousting the corrupt officials that had been playing puppeteers with the Shogun, Cash had been the de-facto mayor of the city – keeping things running, hearing complaints and coordinating with the sijaneese and trying to keep looting to a minimum: “It’s not easy, trust me. The ponies in Chung Do, if they aren’t sick from the plague, are worried sick that they’ll get it – and you’d be surprised how easily that makes a city’s economy break down. I’ve also made contact with the many merchants that have been stuck in the city because of the quarantine. Heck I set up a public office on the other side of twin-fountain square where I’ve run the city from so we didn’t have to let commoners run in and out of the castle”

“You’ve run the city, really?” Shimmer inquired, not sure if she was entirely comfortable with how that sounded.
Cash shook his head: “When we arrived there were no judges, magistrates or other officials left to actually run things – they were all dead from the plague. It was those two ‘advisors’ who’d kept our princeling in the dark who’d played king and queen in the absence of anything else.  I’ve even been told by Captain Bighoof that when we arrived he was maybe a few days away from declaring martial law simply because it’d be that anyway with no non-military officials and judges left”
“So you’ve truly been a lawgiver? What about while we were away in Yu-Shan or visiting the Bull?” Speaker wondered.

Cash despaired, saying that he has a backlog of things to do the size of Mount Meru he’s working through, more so now that he can see the discrepancies that the Ruby and Emerald Mare had snuck in, but he argued that the trip to Yu-Shan had been a necessary one none the less.

“Alright, Shimmer – stash a pot of the cure in elsewhere, we’ll take it out for testing” Speaker said.

Shimmer and Speaker left the castle shortly later, the sun halfway from mid-day to twilight, looking for a place that had enough still living – and hopefully sick – ponies for them to test the cure.

Walking the streets of Chung Do in the afternoon was a relatively quiet. The only regular noise was the grim bells of the sijaneese morticians as they hauled their carts around, carts loaded with the dead and whatever grave goods they had been given to take along to the next life.

Eventually the Solar and Lunar came across a public house down by the east-side docks. It was full of sailors who’d been barred from entering their ships as their captains had isolated themselves there in an attempt to avoid the plague – a wise choice for the captains, but it did leave the sailor ponies to the mercy of the sailor hostels where up many dozens of sailors slept together on mats in large rooms, making transmission of disease quite easy between them.

Coming across one such public house and sailor hostel, Speaker and Shimmer easily got the publican to let the two into the sleeping hall after showing that they were from the castle – apparently the publican was fairly stringent about letting ponies who weren’t sailors in, to prevent theft.

The sleeping hall had the stench of death hanging heavily over it. With the hostel built into the small hillside down the eastern bank of the brown river, with houses, workshops and small warehouses crammed on top of each other, there wasn’t much room for windows in the sleeping hall. Speaker might have called it a dormitory if it had been furnished with beds or simple cots and whatnot, but this was just a large twenty by thirty yard hall crammed full of about a hundred or so ponies, most of them more dead than alive. The whole place looked more like a dank warehouse stuffed full of sick ponies.

Speaker and Shimmer quickly went about diagnosing the sailors on their bedrolls. Most were filthy, caked in the puss of burst bubo and diarrhea. It was clear that the pony who owned the establishment didn’t care much for her costumers – but then again, sailors would usually just come and go – and why should the owner be exposed to plague victims more than necessary?

In the dim light of a few oil lamps Speaker and Shimmer went among the sailor ponies, trying to rouse them or alternately moving the corpses over to a corner. The pile that grew out of that corner quickly got very big. In the end over sixty corpses had been moved aside, as Shimmer recalled the pot with the cure from elsewhere and began to line the barely still living sailor ponies up. Speaker stood ready with a ladle as the sailors came up to him.

“This is some piss poor soup” the first one, a haggard and tired looking mare, commented, the plague rashes clearly visible around her mouth.

Speaker smiled at the mare: “It’s not soup, we told you that when we woke you up. We’re from the shogun, this is a cure we’re testing”

Many ponies down the line perked up at the mention of a cure, and Speaker quickly gave all the ponies a gulp of the watery broth as the line moved up past him.

“Now, there won’t be any immediate effects – but if you get something to eat and then sleep on this, you should all feel a lot better tomorrow. A side-effect might be some constipation for a day or two, but that’s intentional, to counter the diarrhea you get from the plague. Now come along, one at a time” Speaker explained.

In about half an hour all the still living ponies in the hall had been given a dose of the cure, with the weakest who had been unable to get up being given last as Speaker and Shimmer went around and fed them.

“Shimmer, could you go out and get some food for these ponies? They need it badly and they’re in no condition to get any on their own” Speaker asked, having just drained the last bubo of a miserable looking pony stallion in the last stages of the plague – it wasn’t clear if the cure would be able to save the poor soul, so Speaker was giving the stallion some more direct medical aid.

Nodding, Shimmer quickly left hostel, undoubtedly giving the publican who ran the place a nasty look as she left.
While Shimmer was away Speaker suddenly found more ponies coming into the sleeping hall. The sailor ponies he had first given the cure to, and then told to go out and get something to eat, had told others… and now the rumor of a cure being dispensed had spread.

At first Speaker was more than willing to comply with those who came in wanting a sip of the cure, but as more and more came it quickly became apparent to Speaker that he would run out soon – it might have been a cauldron big enough to fit a pony into that Shimmer had brought via elsewhere, but even that could be drained.

“Please, good ponies – I know you’re all desperate for a cure and I do hope that this one works – but I can’t guarantee that yet. Please, return to your homes and make sure to eat and drink enough fluids – I don’t have any more to give” Speaker implored. The throng of sickly ponies all crying out for a cure did not respond kindly this.

Shimmer returned a short while later to a scene of chaos. Even outside the hostel ponies were fighting each other to get ahead in the line, while some were shouting that others were trying to steal or hoard the cure, some saying there weren’t any more, some decrying that as misdirection and lies from the ones trying to steal the cure – all in all it was chaos, and Shimmer’s charms quickly let her know that Speaker was at the center of the riot inside the hostel. Shimmer had not waited a hundred long years in the west to have her Solar mate taken from her by a mob of panicky ponies. This would not stand.

Inside the sleeping hall Speaker was trying to fend off dozens of very angry and desperate ponies. He had explained multiple times that there was no cure left at the moment – but he had been shoved away from the cauldron which by now had been licked clean by multiple ponies, several still fighting to each other over who got to give it another go. It was a riot: Those who had gotten the cure were assaulted by those who hadn’t, with some trying to flee, but most were trapped in the hall as there was only one door out. Of the sailors who had been too weak to move, many had been trampled or kicked to death by vengeful ponies who missed out on the cure – and yet Speaker chose to not fight back, instead using his defensive shielding charm to remain unhurt and defend the weakest of the sailors, as he didn’t want to make the situation worse.

Then half the wall of the hall that linked it to the public house came crashing down in a shower of shattered wooden planks and splinters, as Shimmer in her beast-pony form came smashing through, her foot-long silver talons already dripping in the kind of dark blood you only get from organs, Shimmer slashing wildly at the ponies nearest Speaker, ribbons of flesh and streaks of blood flying left and right.

In the ensuing panic several oil lamps were knocked over, the fire quickly catching on the deplorably filthy straw mats the sailors had been sleeping on. As Shimmer leapt through the ceiling, Speaker held tightly in her claws, the splintered wood that fell down on the fire only fueled it, as well as trapping dozens of ponies in the inferno.

Speaker couldn’t get a word in edgewise, as Shimmer was holding him with one taloned hand tightly around his waist to the point that he could barely breathe, and with another around his head so he couldn't even open his mouth. He was first let go several minutes later when he realized that he was atop one of castle Chung’s highest towers, where Shimmer had somehow made a nest of white iridescent thread.

Shuffling over to the edge of the nest, Speaker looked down at the docks were the fire had spread to engulf almost all of the buildings there – and it was spreading up towards the eastern half of Chung Do.

Turning to the feral looking lunar beast-pony, Speaker angrily, but also with a great deal of sorrow in his voice, shouted: 
“Shimmer! What did you do?! Chung Do is burning!"

Shimmer merely craned her head and reflexively retrieved a very raw leg piece of pork from elsewhere, stuffing it in Speaker’s mouth, before shrieking like an eagle and then crying out: “Eat!”

Spitting out the big chunk of pork that he’d almost gagged on, Speaker once again tried to figure out what Shimmer had been thinking: “What? No, we need to go stop the fire!”

Shimmer didn’t listen, all three of her silvery eyes simply going wide, her expression not as much stern as it was feral. More white iridescent string appeared around her, almost like a spider’s silk, but from invisible spools of essence, which shot down and seized Speaker. With her talons she pried open Speaker’s mouth and with her beak she plucked small bits of raw pork and stuffed it in his mouth, then held his nose shut until he would swallow. Shimmer plucked more food from elsewhere and continued, never giving Speaker a moment to cry for her to stop.

Speaker tried to struggle, but the elder lunar had him tied up with an essence much stronger than his. The force-feeding continued until all the food was gone, despite Speaker vomiting many times during the procedure from gagging on whatever he was being force-fed and from the sheer volume of food being stuffed into his stomach. After that things only got worse: With charms that Speaker had no idea that Shimmer even knew she forced an erection upon the Solar stallion and raped him repeatedly, even as the air around them became full of smoke and the smell of burnt pony flesh and the night grew long.
> Chapter 34: The Rule Risen From Ashes
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

That night almost all of the east side of Chung Do, aside from the castle protected by its moat and stone walls, burned to the ground. Speaker could do nothing but look on in despair, as the fall from the tower roof would without a doubt kill him, all the while Shimmer in her beast-pony form equally never at any point let him stray further than to the edge of the nest before snatching up and pulling him in to nestle him in her feathers.

Speaker wasn’t sure what was worse. The forcefeeding and vomiting, having been forcibly mated to Shimmer in her beast-pony form against his will, or looking down at almost half of Chung Do being but a blanked of ashes. There were small plumes of smoke still rising, but it was clear that the morning dew had killed most of the remaining embers.

As Shimmer began to wake up from the dawning sun and shrank down into her usual pony self Speaker quickly found a greater horror: Three head-sized eggs that Shimmer had apparently laid during the night. The fact that her beast-form’s gestation was so rapid intrigued Speaker, he wouldn’t deny that, but on the other hoof whatever abominations might come of such an unholy coupling… no, such things could not be allowed exist.

With quick but quiet movements taught to him during his time in the Lookshyan special forces, Speaker carefully floated up one egg at a time and dropped them over the edge of the nest. While whatever had been inside might have been half his, then Speaker had in his days serving Lookshy assisted several Lookshyan mares-at-arms who had been taking captives by various enemy forces and raped, giving them abortifacts and later counseling to help them recover from the trauma. For himself he reasoned that as a stallion the experience probably hadn’t been as traumatizing, but having it happen with a seemingly feral beast-pony who had just made him vomit half a dozen times? Sure, Shimmer had licked all of his sick up – which really wasn’t that appetizing either – but… why… Speaker couldn’t imagine what had gone through Shimmer’s head as she had done all of those things to him.

A stray thought occurred to Speaker: Maybe he should just kill her and hope that her reincarnation wouldn’t go mad? Speaker couldn’t determine if he should be feeling angry, or sad, or vengeful – he’d never heard of old stallions getting raped, even less so by mares and not even in his first age memories did he recall hearing of monster-mares raping stallions. To say that Speaker was confused about how to feel would be an understatement.

Speaker knew for certain that he was a lot of things, a healer, a thinker and an officer – but ultimately not a murderer – although… with the eggs… No, those things weren’t ponies. You’re not a murderer if what you’re killing isn’t sapient. Animal abuse at worst perhaps. Maybe Sullen Hoof would scold him for wasting such a strange and exotic food source? It felt weird trying to rationalize what he had done, but Speaker would rather do that than focus on the horrors of the previous night.

On second thought, the idea of being fed his own eggs back to him – even with Sullen Hoof’s masterful cooking in mind – sickened Speaker, so he quickly banished it from his mind by starting to think of how to undo the damages of the fire. Yes, thinking about constructive and useful things were good.

“Hey… whoa… where are we?” Shimmer groggily muttered.

Speaker turned to face Shimmer. At first Shimmer was confused, seeing the mix of rage, fear and confusion on Speaker’s face: “What’s wrong sweetie?”

That Shimmer didn’t seem to understand why Speaker was feeling upset struck Speaker with all kinds of concern: Couldn’t she remember? Or was she completely ok with what she had done?

“Do you remember what happened last night?” Speaker tentatively inquired.

Shimmer looked around in the nest, trying to survey her surroundings: “Well… we were testing the cure, I left for a short while, a riot broke out, I rescued you, brought you back here?”

“You also inadvertently started a fire that has razed half the city, refused to fly me down to the ground so I could help stop the fire spread…” Speaker began, simmering with rage at Shimmer’s apparent lack of empathy for her actions now that it was clear that she remembered what she had done.

Looking like a foal caught with a hoof in the cookie jar, Shimmer gulped: “Which half?”

“The half that most of the ponies of Chung Do lived in. I have no idea how many ponies have died because of you Shimmer, or if there even is a city left to save down there anymore…” Speaker continued, increasingly in doubt as to whether he should be angry or worried.

Shimmer suddenly looked very much as if she realized at least part of the devastation she had caused: “Anything else?”
Speaker wished that Cash was present, for his knowledge of subtle social cues would have been nice here: “Well… do you remember any more of what you did?”

Unlike Speaker, Shimmer quickly got the feeling that she had done something bad – her greatest problem was that while she recalled quite well what she had done, then none of it seemed to be that bad: “I saved you, we got here, I fed you, we had sex?”
“You forcefed me until I puked, repeatedly, then you did… something… I don’t even want to know what, and you raped me! Shimmer, what happened to you?!” Speaker said, despairing at how Shimmer seemed to think her actions reprehensible.

Shimmer’s facial expression soured. Sighing deeply, Shimmer gave Speaker a pair of sorrowful eyes: “I… I didn’t want to lose you. I’ve waited far too long to let anything take you away, I just… Luna damnit, I happened again, didn’t it?”
“What happened?” Speaker wondered, sounding at the same time curious and concerned.

Shimmer explained that every fullmoon all lunars communed with Luna, whether they wanted to or not, for at fullmoon the light of the argent mare was undeniable. The Silver Pact had a long time ago agreed that it was this which occasionally caused Lunars to have their animal overtake them – usually not more than once every year or so, but depending on the circumstances then the results could be quite disastrous.

“I guess the immaculates aren’t entirely wrong in calling Lunars for ‘Moon mad’ ponies after all” Speaker mused.
Nodding ever so slightly, Shimmer added that the animal nature of their exaltation was something that some – but not all - Lunars actually cherished, and tried to make into a dominant part of their personality: “I try to avoid it, the seagul part of me is a very selfish, inconsiderate and ‘simple’ part of me… I… gods, it overtook me when I could see that you were trapped in the hostel! Gods, I’m so sorry… it just overwhelms me sometimes”

Closing his eyes and sighing deeply as he rubbed his forehead, Speaker took a single tentative step towards Shimmer: “Just get me down from here… I can’t deal with this right now. I need to know if we still have a city left to save”

Shimmer swallowed audibly and turned into her monsterpony form, letting Speaker climb up on her back before flying down. As she set off from the tower roof Shimmer instantly noticed the unusual amount of motion down in front of the castle.

Landing in the courtyard, Speaker and Shimmer quickly ran out to the twin fountain square. It was a sea of browns, blacks, white and cream, as most of the city’s ponies seemed to be camping out on the large square.

The pleasant realization that the city’s population hadn’t burnt to death quickly dawned on both Shimmer and Speaker, and when they saw the always hooded Sunrise Glow on a makeshift podium surrounded by hundreds of attentive ponies and approached, they heard her preaching calming words to the masses: “…reduced most of this city ash, I say take hearth and seek comfort in hope, for from these ashes Chung Do shall rise to the heavens as a more glorious and prosperous city! I bid you all to join me at noon for prayers to Celestia that the most high may hasten this coming of these shining times, but now I only require that each of do your utmost to help one another and tend those ill or injured, for a cure for the plague will be in reach of us all soon”

Spotting Shimmer and Speaker standing among the crowd of ponies sitting down around her, Sunrise bowed her head to the morning sun and then quickly leapt to the lunar and solar, and sternly shouted at them: “Where have you two been? Half the city burned down while you two were missing, explain yourselves”

Shimmer was about to speak as Speaker interrupted her: “That doesn’t matter now, does it? What matters is making the current situation better, and before that I need to know what’s going on. Where did all these ponies come from? What’s going on here?”

Sunrise explained that after the castle was alerted of the fire and the circle, minus Speaker and Shimmer, found out that they had no hopes of stopping the flames from spreading, even after Red tried to demolish a ring of buildings around the burning docks, Cash organized and helmed a brilliant evacuation of every home in the city, using his charms and remarkably accurate records over the ponies of Chung Do to direct Red, Sunrise and Sullen Hoof around to call all ponies out of their homes.

Looking around, Speaker nodded as this explained why so many of the ponies in the square had sacks, chests and bags with their most precious belongings with them – they had clearly had time to evacuate, even the ponies too sick to move had been hauled to safety, saving them from a most miserable death by fire. This also made it painfully clear that with almost the entire city’s population of ponies crammed into the twin fountain square, that half of them were sick and the other half would be infected in no time.

Around the square the city seemed positively surreal. There was no city, at least not on the half that was on the east side of the brown river. Long sooty scorch marks ran slick up the eastern stone pylons of the grand bridge spanning the river, while the piles of ruble that had once been half the city now gave way to a bleak view all the way to the city walls at the other side of the city.

Staring into the ground, Speaker stomped angrily: “Damnit… I could have stopped all this, contained and put out the fire”

Sounding equal parts curious and annoyed that Speaker hadn’t simply stopped the fire, Sunrise inquired just how Speaker would have done so.

“My singing staff. I could have raised earth-walls around the fire, stopping the fire before it spread from the docks. I could then have used the staff to make the twin fountains into ground level aqueducts, channeling the water down to the fire at the docks. Did the rest of you try anything beyond knocking buildings down?” Speaker explained, looking back up at Sunrise.

While Sunrise’s eyes were hidden under the hood of her robes, the frown on her face was clearly visible – indeed it looked so bitter that one might fear it would turn in on itself: “Oh we tried a different approach before resorting to demolition – my idea, a perfect idea, one that would have worked even faster than your earthen walls and water channels”

Speaker raised an eyebrow at Sunrise and listened. Apparently Sunrise had prayed to Gudaa, the goddess of the brown river, requesting that the goddess douse the fire with the waters of the river in exchange for no ill will for her actions in connection with the water walkers. What the circle received in response, for with the power of Sunrise’s essence her prayers couldn’t really go unheard, was a minor fish spirit that took a shit before the circle, then leaving the city to burn: “That was Gudaa’s answer to our prayers”

Suddenly Shimmer’s actions didn’t seem that bad. Speaker had seen unicorns getting seized by their elemental nature before, instincts awoken through their dragonblooded exaltations – so a celestial exaltation that carried an animal totem would understandably carry powerful emotions with it as well… but a willful disregard for such an offer of peace and goodwill? Speaker felt his jimmies rustle - and not in the good way like Shimmer could do.

“She just blew you off like that?” Speaker said, finding it difficult to reconcile why Gudaa would do such a thing. All gods desire worship, so why let ponies who regularly gave you offerings burn? Was Gudaa that petty over the death of her offspring at the hoof of the circle?

Cash and Sullen Hoof showed up moments later, both of them quite happy to see Shimmer and Speaker both alive and unharmed. Sullen Hoof in particular seemed quite relieved that Speaker had survived, for he had important news to tell him.
“Ok, I have good news and bad news, what do you want first?” Sullen Hoof asked, looking almost giddy with excitement.

Looking around at the ashen ruins, Speaker failed to imagine what might constitute as good news beyond all the ponies around them not having burned to death.

Smiling from ear to ear, something that really didn’t look that uplifting due to the massive burn scars that covered Sullen Hoof’s face, the culinarian and novice apothecarian said that several dozen ponies had approached the castle over the last few hours since dawn, complaining that they had been poisoned.

Speaker was now sure of it: The fire had addled Sullen Hoof’s mind.

“They said that some old stallion claiming to have been from the castle had come down to the docks and fed them some tasteless watery gruel… and now they can’t shit” Sullen Hoof said. Suddenly Sully’s smile spread to Speaker’s face.

“They didn’t happen to still be sick?” Speaker inquired, not sure if he dared hope for a recovery that swift – but as Sullen Hoof quickly began nodding fervently Speaker realized that the cure not only worked, but it worked surprisingly fast!

Sullen Hoof added that he’d given some powerful laxatives to a few of the constipated ponies and found that what came out didn’t really look normal – the stool produced had been strangely black and almost obsidian-like, but then again what had infected them hadn’t really been a real disease considering the source of it all. Sullen hoof also added that he’d gone ahead and dumped a bucket-full of the cure into each of the two fountains right after discovering this, the ‘sickness’ in the water having almost instantly crystallized into perfectly spherical obsidian beads.

“Oh so that’s why the fountains are full of obsidian pebbles?” Cash said, suddenly not that sure about selling them to jewelers… or having his pockets full of them. At least this meant that the fountains were now both safe to drink from.

“This is amazing, we should start distributing the cure right away!” Speaker suggested, Cash quickly pointing out that they had started that as soon as Sullen Hoof had discovered that the cure worked, although he’d also taken the liberty of distributed concentrated prune juice along with the cure – to be taken after the cure had worked.

Breathing an immense sigh of relief, Speaker looked to the sky at the sun and felt that maybe everything wasn’t that bad, before looking at Cash and Sully again: “So… anything at all I can help with?”

While Shimmer seemed to have disappeared, for reasons that Speaker tried and failed to impress upon the circle weren’t of any major importance, Speaker spent the rest of the day walking among the ponies on the twin fountain square, giving medical aid to ponies in need – which mostly meant draining bubo and otherwise helping the sickest plague victims as they slowly recover with the aid of the magical cure, all the while Sunrise continued her preaching, using her charms to maintain order and keeping the healthy ponies in the square from trying to isolate the visibly sick ponies, since any attempts at quarantine at this point really wouldn’t matter.

The next morning, after the collective consumption of every laxative in town, would forever be remembered by the ponies of Chung Do as the morning of the black poo. What followed was quite a lot of revelry and celebration, as it dawned on the ponies of Chung Do that they were all more or less cured. There were still those weakened by the plague who would probably need several days if not several weeks of bedrest and aid to recover, while the rest of the ponies – having endured a second night out in the open, now without the ‘benefit’ of the warmth of the burning city, were faced with the realization that they really didn’t have any place to live anymore. Some had tried to make shacks or dens in the chared ruins, but such attempts only revealed how brittle the contents of the ruined piles of buildings were.

While many of the ponies in the square called for the west side warehouses to be opened up and converted into dormitories, then on Speaker’s orders Sunrise and Cash talked the ponies in the square to remain there – for Speaker, having lived up the name of his caste, had burnt the midnight oils of the twilight and stayed up quite late, working on a solution to the city’s now quite critical housing problem.

Cash had been positively ecstatic when a very drowsy Speaker had presented his solution.

Shimmer, who had appeared again after having done some soul searching, also reappeared as the circle had breakfast in the castle, displaying a rather moist hunting trophy: “After what I heard from Sunrise yesterday about how you all had tried to stop the fire I couldn’t help but feel that I had to do something, so…”

The head of Gudaa, leaking divine ichors on the floor, was floated out of a sack and displayed before the circle. Red, Cash, Sunrise and Sullen Hoof all applauded Shimmer, while Speaker… he didn’t take to well to what he felt was a very rash decision on Shimmer’s part:

“Are you crazy!? Now the river is without oversight? Who’ll manage the elementals that control its waters?” Speaker shouted, deliberately stomping off in anger before could say anything else.

Shimmer stood in the banquet hall, the head of the dead god dripping, floating in the air beside her. As Speaker left in a huff she cried out: “I… I thought you’d be happy…”

Later Cash found Speaker brooding over a pile of scrolls and architectural plans. Speaker had designed a whole new city to be built within the walls of Chung Do – indeed the city walls would be subsumed in some parts of the design, to make way for the new buildings – and the brilliant part was that with the singing staff Speaker could just have the ground beneath the city swallow up the rubble of the fire, yielding open ground to build on, plus the staff would make building the entire city up again take maybe a week… provided that enough stone could be supplied. It was all made so Speaker could distract himself from the quite uncomfortable thoughts regarding what to do with Shimmer. Should he ask her to leave? Punish her? Did anyone in the circle even have the power to subdue an elder lunar? Would she leave voluntarily? Would she come back and seek revenge like some spurned lover?

First carefully regarding Speaker’s brilliant structural designs, Cash compliment Speaker on his fine work. Of course, Cash wasn’t there to just talk city-planning and construction. Cash informed Speaker that Shimmer had run out of the banquet hall crying after Speaker had left, to which Cash asked – quite insistently – about what had really happened when that fire had broken out.

Turning to face Cash, Speaker gave the young merchant pony a face that only old ponies who had both seen more than enough of the world and more than enough of death in their lives could give. It was a tired and sorrowful face, or more a grimace, full of wrinkles and furrows that spoke volumes without Speaker even uttering a word.

“I see…” Cash surmised, his social and linguistic charms reading Speaker so perfectly that it was actually quite a bit uncomfortable for Cash.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with her. I want be happy, for the plague is now finally over, but with what Shimmer did… and now killing a god and showing us the head, like a cat that gives you a dead mouse in the morning?” Speaker said, despairing.

Cash took a deep breath: “So what if she raped the shit out of you. You said we’re going to live for thousands of years because of our exaltations – you think this’ll be the only time something really bad happens to you? To us? You have to learn how to handle stuff like this better!”

Speaker shot Cash a glare that, if Speaker had known the proper charms, wouldn’t just have killed – but would have slain every blood relative Cash had tracing back three generations. Cash ignored Speaker’s glare completely with an unimpressed smile.

“Speaker – bad things happen. Nine of ten brothels in Great Forks are staffed with slave ponies – do you think they enjoy their work, or sought such work voluntarily? Bad things happen quite a lot these days in creation. Do you have any idea how many times I’ve had to debase myself as a mortal merchant to sweeten a deal, how many times I’ve whored myself to ugly smelly old rich ponies to secure an investment from them? You said to me that we’ll live for thousands of years. We haven’t even lived a year as solars, how many horrible things don’t you think we’ll experience or learn of over the next hundred? Does that prospect mean that none of the hundreds of thousand pony lives we’ll save, the countless heroic deeds we’d do, shouldn’t be done – that we should just burry ourselves in a hole so we can sit and wait as time passes, happy that nothing bad happens to us?” Cash admonished.

Speaker was by no means pleased that Cash was, as Speaker felt it, belittling the horrible experience that Speaker had undergone. Having been bereft control of his body and ‘mated’ with against his will, while Shimmer was in her monsterpony form – it still made him sic to his stomach even to think of it – and worse yet he had tossed the giant eggs that Shimmer had laid out of the nest, killing three unborn foals… or mutants, or whatever they might have grown into.

“What happened to you has stressed and traumatized you, I don’t doubt that and I do not think that you should try to ignore it. However, I will not stand idly by if you just sit and mope. You’re a brilliant doctor, so why not try to heal yourself if you’re feeling so wounded? I’m sure you can come up with something, plus; There are a few thousand ponies outside the castle waiting for homes to move back into” Cash said.

Speaker sighed as Cash up and left. He knew that Cash was right, especially the part about their enhanced lifespan: If one horrible experience like this made him want to shut down – how would he cope with everything to come? There were Deathlords to be thwarted, deathknights to be fought, a heavenly bureaucracy that needed a swift buck in the groin and a city that still needed his help. It was food for thought, if nothing else…
Hold on, food?

Quickly getting up and running after Cash, Speaker quickly asked: “What about the food? Did the city’s rice supply survive the fire?”

Cash smiled and laughed: “The granaries are on the west side. We only lost what food the ponies left behind in their homes – and they brought most of it with them during the evacuation”

Closing his eyes for a moment, Speaker groaned: “Alright, time to rebuild”

Starting around the twin fountain square, Speaker began leveling the ashen ruins of the city. With his singing staff and a smidge of essence Speaker had the ground swallow up the charred remains of collapsed buildings, slag, and ruble with ease. During this, as Speaker attempted to sort all the stone used in the buildings so that wouldn’t get swallowed up, Speaker found a nasty flaw in his plan. He quickly reported it to Cash, who had set up a somewhat temporary city administration in a tent on the edge between the castle and the twin fountain square.

“There’s hardly any stone in the underground here. I can’t rebuild the city with no materials” Speaker digressed.
Feeling a hoof on his shoulder, Speaker turned to find suddenly Shimmer standing next to him: “Uhm… I think I can help?”
Walking from Cash’s tent, Speaker and Shimmer discussed how to solve the stone shortage. Shimmer had a simple but effective solution: She could summon elementals – not like Sunrise could pray for gods to send minions, but directly sorcerous elemental summoning, which also bound the summoned being to magical servitude.

Specifically Shimmer said that she knew how to summon Jokun, earth elementals well known for naturally being able to manipulate rock to make their own underground dwellings.

“Very well – summon up a Jokun, but before you do that… before we do anything else… I need you to promise me one thing Shimmer” Speaker said, looking the lunar straight in the eyes.

Shimmer nodded for Speaker to continue.

“I don’t want to see you kill another pony. Gods regenerate and reform in time, but ponies don’t – so for as long as you want to be in this circle you will not kill another pony, do I make myself clear?” Speaker said, knowing full well that if Shimmer refused he would have to ask her to leave the circle.

The power of Shimmer’s bond to Speaker was mighty, and it tugged at her relentlessly to agree. Adding to that was her own despair over having lost control of herself again, of vividly remembering how she had clawed and slashed her way through dozens of ponies who’s only crime was that they so desperately wanted a cure to a sickness that would otherwise kill them… for in that respect she had failed not just to respect Speaker’s love of life, but as a steward of creation who’s charge was to protect it.

The western mare with the purple dreadlocks gave Speaker a single solemn nod as tears welled in her eyes. She had genuinely feared that Speaker would only agree to her helping with the reconstruction of Chung Do on the condition that she left afterwards – but this second chance? Oh how she cherished it.

Speaker had to hold back his urge to comfort Shimmer as he saw her tearing up – but he felt that he had to remain focused on the matter at hoof. If he showed weakness or mercy he feared that Shimmer might not take his demands seriously, and he didn’t want to think of what that might lead to. Shimmer galloped off, shouting a multitude thanks back at Speaker.
The summoning Shimmer handled alone outside the city, a ritual that would last from dusk to dawn, while Speaker spent the rest of the day leveling the rest of the east side of the city, leaving only the twin fountain square and the roads behind.
It was during the leveling of the city ruin that Cash approached Speaker with a very ambitious suggestion: Level the other half of the city as well.

“Are you serious? What will the ponies say when we demolish the rest of the city?” Speaker wondered, not sure if the overall mental wellbeing of the city, already scared and strained from the massive fire, could handle such a shock.

Cash seemed certain that there would be no problems with his plan: “You’re right, the ponies of Chung Do are in shock – which only makes it easier for us to pull something like this off.  Besides, with the plans you’re making for the east side you’ll reduce the west side to a slum. We need to uplift the entire city or we’ll be leaving half of it behin. With your brilliant designs we’ll be able to double or even triple the storage capacity of the warehouse district, which would mean that we could zone for more residential and commercial buildings, allowing the city to grow while still having the same if not more mercantile activity and business coming through”

Speaker hadn’t been able to keep up with the flood of words that Cash had thrown at him – but he got the distinct impression that Cash honestly believed that demolishing and rebuilding the western half of the city would be a good idea as well.
“Glad to see that you agree with me – by the way, how did Shimmer offer to help with the reconstruction?” Cash seemingly innocently asked.

Speaker took a deep breath and shook his head, his long beard swinging all over. Straightening out his beard, Speaker said: “Well, before we talked earlier I thought my only option was to send her away… but after talking to you I guess it was easier to let her stay”

Then it hit Speaker: “Cash, what did you do to me when we spoke earlier?”

Cash smiled, glad to see himself caught in his machinations for once: “I talked to you – that’s it really. Oh sure, I used a charm or two so I wouldn’t have to spend all day talking you out of resenting Shimmer for what she did, plus making my argument seem too good for you to dismiss outright. Your experience last night shattered your love for Shimmer, that I chose not to fiddle with out of respect for you. I just talked you out of developing an outright grudge against Shimmer so we could all still work together as peers if nothing else. She will still have to earn your affection again if she wants it, which I’m sure she does. I just did what I thought necessary to keep the circle from breaking”

Opening his mouth as if to speak, then closing it again as Speaker tried to process exactly what Cash had done to him, he ultimately came to the strange but eerily comforting conclusion that Cash’s actions were probably for the good of all. It was weird, and he was sure that Cash was using charms to influence him into coming to this very conclusion, but he could see the logic – it was for the best that the circle stayed together, for without Shimmer summoning the elemental the proper reconstruction of the city would be pretty much impossible.

As the sun set Speaker surveyed the now flattened eastern half of Chung Do. Foals played tag on the seemingly vast stretches of wide open dirt lots, while Cash was walking among the thousands of citizens explaining that reconstruction would begin the next day.

One thing Speaker noticed about the thousands of ponies in twin fountain square was that at this point they all had tents or similar makeshift shelters set up. He also recognized that most of the fabric used to make them had come from the castle, it looking as if everything from drapes to bed-linens had been cut up and made into simple tent-coverings, although it also looked as if the linens and whatnot had been treated with something to make it all water-proof. Speaker couldn’t identify what had been used to waterproof the linens, but he figured that it was Sullen Hoof who’d cooked that up. Speaker retired to his chambers and hoped that when dawn came Shimmer would be back so they could start over fresh… sort of.

> Chapter 35: Having Faith in One Another
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was cold that morning in the castle, even with summer having just peaked at its hottest, for most of bed-linens, nearly all the drapes and curtains, as well as most of the tapestries having been removed to keep the thousands of homeless ponies camping outside in the square warm. It was evidently more than the castle-manse’s environmental controls could counter, although by breakfast it was comfortably warm again in most of the castle.

Stepping out into the courtyard Speaker couldn’t help notice the new features dotting the horizon over the castle walls: Huge grey boulders jutted out of the ground all over the flattened parcels that Speaker had leveled the day before – and they were big enough that they ones closest to the castle could be seen from within the castle courtyard, above the castle walls. It looked as if Shimmer very much so had delivered via the elemental summoning.

Speaker rushed out to twin-fountain square and quickly found Shimmer. She stood next to a strange thing that sort of looked like a pony, if you squinted and maybe painted it brown. The equine-looking being appeared as a living statue of semi-transparent crystalline flesh, with red bones of stone shining through from inside of it. Its semi-transparent crystal flesh revealed rusty iron teeth and its whip-like tail which was covered jagged iron spikes also didn’t make it look any less intimidating. This was a Jokun, a kind of earth elemental.

“Well… I think this will be enough stone, at least to begin with” Speaker said, nodding slowly as he looked around at the large five to ten yard tall rocky outcroppings forced up through the ground throughout the leveled half of the city.
Shimmer smirked. She had made the elemental move tons of rocks up to or through the surface, how could this not be enough? “To begin with?”

“Well, Cash has talked about doing the other half of the city over in stone as well, since only fixing up this half would do… things – I think he talked about devaluation and slums or something. His point was that we should work over both, and I agree since it’ll make my geomantic patterns easier to integrate” Speaker explained, waving a hoof about in anticipation of singing staff appearing for him to hold.

Nodding slowly, Shimmer got the gist of what Speaker was talking about quite well. She had seem what happened to western fishing villages when guild merchants set up shop and squeezed the locals for everything by building a fancy mansion and thus suddenly making part of the island far more desirable (and expensive) to live on, completely destabilizing the social, economic and sometimes even spiritual stability of the island. It would split up such a society, creating a divide between the ones who live in the nice part of town or the island… and the poor half would become resentful. Shimmer had seen this happen many times over her long life – so seeing Speaker willingly commit to avoiding such a situation was something Shimmer found quite endearing.

Of course, as Speaker quickly trotted off, singing staff floating by his, Shimmer also realized that she would really have to work hard to make Speaker reciprocate that kind of feelings again. Sighing, Shimmer started to look for Cash, wanting to know how the other half of town was to be demolished.

While Speaker knew that he’d have to change some of his road designs and planned storefronts, then Speaker was still able to start building the new Chung Do. The first priority was making foundations, but to his joy Speaker found that Shimmer’s elemental had replaced pretty much all of the underground of Chung Do with rock, leaving but a few feet of dirt worth of topsoil. How the elemental had done this without causing earthquakes or disturbing the underground geomancy, part of which fed the castle manse, was a mystery to Speaker – but then again… it was an elemental. It could swim through rock like a pony through water.

With the ample supply of stone, Speaker began to play a tune with his singing staff at the edge of the twin fountain square. It was a construction tune, and over the course of an hour or so a large crowd of ponies gathered to watch as the first building of the new Chung Do flowed up from the ground, solidifying into beautifully decorated stone columns around wing after wing of large healing house – all of it modeled after the first age healing house Speaker had searched through in Denansdor for the Pattern Reassertion Rectifier artifact.

By nightfall most of the ponies who had been near death from the plague when the cure had been distributed, who were still so weak that they were bedridden, had been transferred to the healing house. It wasn’t much, for there were no doors, no real beds, no shutters in the windows, but once fires had been started in the various fireplaces and the warmth spread they were at least more comfortable than the ponies still stuck in tents in twin fountain square.

Over the next few days Red and Shimmer led large groups of ponies from Chung Do out into the surrounding forests to collect timber, while Speaker used his educational charms on the citizens of Chung Do, teaching a third of the city basic carpentry. As word spread of Speaker having such powers, many illiterate ponies equally approached Speaker, him gladly giving them a swift and intense primer on reading and writing. It tired him greatly to use his educational charm so much in one day – but a week later it meant that every pony in the city could either help build or outfit the houses that Speaker was making, and the sudden increase in literacy made Cash’s administrative work a lot easier.

Two weeks later, when Heath Rose sailed in from heavenn on the back of a butterfly, elegantly sailing into the castle courtyard after having admired the surprisingly new and half-finished looking city.

The circle greeted Rose, after the guards had been told to stand down – for only the circle had remembered the sidereal. Rose was quite pleased to see how the city had improved, although she wasn’t quite sure what the logic behind the apparently ongoing deconstruction of the west half of the city was. Upon being told of the fire and the circle’s choice to rebuild the entire city Rose simply smiled and laughed: “Really? I guess I’ll have to start getting used to that kind of miraculous things happening regularly now…”

Beyond coming to greet her friends, Rose also explained that the deathknight that the circle had captured had been interrogated – and Rose figured that the information gathered from that interrogation was relevant to the circle’s interest. The circle and Rose gathered in the castle’s war room, a large chamber where the shoguns of old once held council with his generals, warlords and nobles. Around a table replete with rough and worn maps of the hundred kingdoms and the Chung lands in particular, Rose told the circle of what she had learned:

“The Coveter said that the bonestriders he was making were for local use, since they deteriorate quite quickly after extended periods of combat activity. You don’t have to be an oracle to see that this meant that they were built to assault Chung Do – and this kind of activity points to a different Deathlord other than this Barbate Arbiter operating here” Rose began.

The sidereal explained the Deathlord known as the Mask of Winters, the Deathlord who a few years ago had taken the realm satrapi of Thorns south Lookshy with a tide of undead minions snuck in from the shadowland known as the Bayou of Endless Regret, had been linked by the sidereal host with all kinds of trouble in the hundred kingdsoms.
“So you think he’s behind the rebellion?” Red wondered.

The sidereal shook her head: “Not him personally, but it smells like the work of one his Deathknights. We’ve caught them several times trying to instigate wars in the region, usually by encouraging others to take up arms that the deathknights in turn promise to supply… does that sound familiar?”

“You would have to do a lot of talking to convince mortal ponies to fight alongside undead monstrosities like those bonewalkers” Cash noted, wondering just how that was meant to work – because if what Rose said was true, which Cash had no reason to doubt, then this problem would have to have been known to the deathknights influencing the nobles. Of course, the circle had already seen the effects of deathknight mind control, which could easily explain a mortal pony’s acceptance of undead auxiliaries.

Rose couldn’t say for certain if deathknight mind control was the case, but she did note that through heavenly scrying of the loom of fate she had concluded that the actions of the nobles were somewhat out of sync with what should be happening – indicating that there were ponies with enlightened essence at play, nudging events in directions that pure causality couldn’t account for, even with the effects of the plague taken into account.

“But what is the Mask of Winter’s plan by starting wars all ove- oh… right – make us fight and kill each other so they don’t have to when they come to wipe us all out” Sullen Hoof wondered out loud, the obvious answer occurring to him mid-sentence.

Cash nodded: “Exactly. Also if we hadn’t showed up Chung Do might have become a shadowland due to all the plague victims, which would have ended all river commerce on the brown river by making this place a deathtrap to enter – that could be part of a broader scheme to disrupt all commerce in the hundred kingdoms”

“Isn’t that a bit farfetched? But if they did starve the area of trade it might mean that a lot of warlords and kingdoms that benefit from taxing the brown river trade wouldn’t be able to afford to maintain their armies, which would make the whole region more vulnerable to realm invasion” Speaker added, referring to the fact that Lookshy heavily depended on independent warlords aiding during realm invasions of the scavenger lands by lending their forces, something that Lookshy had previously used quite effectively many times over in defense against the Realm which would otherwise have conquered the hundred kingdoms quite a long time ago.

Rose suggested that both were possible outcomes had the circle not come to stop the madness: “Other sidereals have engaged the Mask’s deathknights elsewhere, some near Thorns in the Marukan territories, some in Nexus. They’ve not always come out alive, but we’ve always learned things from these engagements, like  how not all the deathknights are equally loyal to the Deathlords, meaning that it is possible for them to defect…”

“Engaged deathknights in Nexus – you mean the Bodhisattva?” Red inquired, recalling that the ghost-limbed deathknight they had encountered north of Chung Do said something about a contact in Nexus.

Rose wasn’t sure if this was the deathknight that the reports mentioned – the Convention of Deathlords was getting quite paranoid about keeping its information safe. Apparently a circle of deathknights had infiltrated Yu-Shan during calibration and attempted to kidnap several gods during the revelry, minor gods of death, decay, lesser gods of specific burial rites and such – Rose said that she didn’t know anything else, which Speaker picked up as a lie, but he figured that it meant that she would probably just get in trouble if she divulged too much specific information about the event.

“Did they get away with any?” Sunrise asked, sounding at the same time uninterested but also as if she actually wanted Rose to yes. Again Rose said that she didn’t know, while Speaker’s truth-telling charm told him otherwise…

Beyond the information from the interrogation and the update on deathknight activity, Rose added a few other details: “Apparently the Coveter says that he and the other deathknights are exalted – exalted of death. He says the proper term for them is Abyssals, although he was ok with being called a deathknight as well”

“Abyssal?” Sullen Hoof wondered, not understanding the meaning. Speaker explained that it was probably a reference to the abyss, as a term for both death and oblivion.

Cash Charmer, hoping to change the subject, gave Rose a sly look: “Say Rose darling, you shouldn’t happen to have a little something for me now that we’re at it?”

Rose perked up, retrieving an oversized parcel that really shouldn’t have been able to fit in the pocket of green robes: “One suit of silken armor, tailored to your specifications, a Recorder of Everlasting Glories and… because you guys fixed up Chung Do so I don’t have to, I’ve tossed in a little something extra for you”

Cash descended up on the brown paper parcel like a hungry predator, annihilating the wrapping with the surgical precision of someone who knew that the contents of the parcel couldn’t be harmed, and who was in a great big hurry to find get to his prize.

The silken armor was functionally identical to Sullen Hoof’s chef uniform – indestructible, incredibly stylish, and offering about as much protection as a good sturdy steel breastplate, only it looked paper-thin and weighed hardly anything. As par Cash’s instructions the new silks were blue and beautifully embroidered with gold and orichalcum thread. In a single swift move Cash removed his current silken jacket and replaced it with his new exquisite silks – there were guild factors who could bathe daily in gold who didn’t have garments this fine.

Second was the recorder. It looked like a large piece of jewelry the size of a small chicken egg – Cash quickly stashed it elsewhere.

Finally Cash got to the little extra surprise that Rose had added – and he was absolutely ecstatic when he saw it and quickly put it on – the golden choker re-sizing itself and clicking into place with effortless easy as Cash fed it a tiny bit of essence: It was a collar of dawn’s cleansing, a type of fairly common artifact – so much so that most unicorns from the realm and in Lookshy owned or at least had easy access to similar devices made of jade – but despite its commonality making it less unique, then its utility made up for it: It made you impervious to filth. Speaker recalled how the prevalence of such neck-born devices in Lookshy had actually made it fairly common, if still not a bit rude, to attract the attention of your unicorn officer by chucking a wad of mud at them… since the mud would just roll off, leaving no stains. Clearly Cash was so happy because now he finally had silks that literally could not be damaged or become dirty. As far as Cash was concerned, he could probably take on anything now.

The revelry aside, Rose was curious as to what the circle planned to do next. Cash told her of some of his plan, the parts involving Chung Do – while leaving out the parts about Denansdor.

“I have to admit – you wanting to wait until spring to deal with the nobles and the blockades, an interesting choice, but I can see the wisdom in wanting to steal their army out from under them and then use it for defense of the land. But what are your plans after all this?” Rose said, clearly curious about what the circle was going to do next.

Speaker was about to say something but Cash interrupted him before he could say a word, stating that they had a request from the Bull to help out up in Plenilune, something they would have to honor at some point as they owed the bull a dept for having helped them – so that might be their next move, unless anything else came up.

“That’s reasonable. By the way, I’ve heard that my gold faction elders finally managed to send a sidereal advisor to the Bull – he’ll make a powerful ally against the realm” Rose said, sounding quite relieved that it clearly wasn’t her who’d been assigned to advice the bull.

Rose stayed for dinner, enjoying Sullen Hoof’s cooking quite a lot – adding that Robed in Splendor had been the talk of the town ever since rumor had spread in Yu-Shan that one of the Orichalcum Chefs had reincarnated. Also, Robed in Splendor’s nemesis, the god of bland food, had pledged his support to the bronze faction because of this: “…although this mostly means that the food served at Bronze faction poetry nights has taken a really sharp dive in quality. So I guess we should thank you for that as well”

The next morning Rose was gone and none of the ponies that worked at the castle, not even the young Shogun, could remember Rose – although they did recall the circle having had a visitor, but they simply couldn’t remember who or what she looked like. Even the guest log’s entry mentioning Rose had disappeared, leaving only the circle with the memories – for such was the nature of the sidereal arcane fate.

The next few weeks progressed quickly, with Speaker finishing the construction of both halves of the city in record time. The new Chung Do was a marvelous sight, and the citizens rejoiced. Adding to that then Speaker’s use of educational charms on the population had made a third of the city into exceedingly competent carpenters, ensuring that all the wooden components to the new city, such as shutters for the windors, doors, new cargo cranes for the brand new harbor that Speaker had wrought were being made as quickly as possible. 

Cash’s expert management of the city during this time of transition, coupled with a series of ingenious housing and property-ownership reforms, ensured that conditions such as what Speaker and Shimmer had encountered in the sailor hostel could no longer come into existence – for Cash’s power to magical bind ponies to their oaths meant that the proprietors of the new hostels were sworn to maintain a standard of living for their guests that didn’t make them feel like the cargo of a slave ship. This kind of business reforms weren’t entirely popular with the previous owners of such establishment – chiefly because it meant that they couldn’t squeeze their guests for every coin of silver they had on them, plus they would now actually have to work, but none of them could refuse Cash’s supremely convincing charms. Additionally Cash had taken control of quite a lot of the businesses in Chung Do, a necessary move since the combined plague and fire had pretty much annihilated the city’s economy, but thanks to Cash’s social and bureaucratic charms he was able to restart the city’s economy almost overnight through the sale of rice and other foodstuffs in exchange for money that the city’s ponies earned through working on the reconstruction, while Cash had also incentivized and even helped fund several dozen private ventures via interest-free state loans.

The common pony in Chung Do found these new times wonderful: The ponies now had roofs over their heads, and almost every family now had someone who could build them new beds and furniture. Indeed, Cash expected Chung Do to be able to profit greatly via export of wooden furniture and other such products. With both basic necessities and positive future prospects assured, the ponies of Chung Do began looking into lesser issues. A lot of other businesses and local industries, such as blacksmiths and potters, had become completely devoid of ponies who knew how to work in such trades – and without blacksmiths then making simple thing like door hinges were becoming a problem. Cash called upon Speaker to train a few hundred ponies in blacksmithing techniques, which he did. This quickly turned into hundreds of ponies contacting Cash in order to be taught by Speaker in other fields, resulting in Cash organizing several classes that Speaker would be sent to briefly train, although Cash did try to keep the numbers down so Speaker could focus on the construction effort.

In the meantime, all the while Speaker had been rebuilding Chung Do, Sunrise had been preaching to the ponies of the city. Both sailor ponies trapped by the quarantine blockade and the ponies who lived in the city, all of them found solace in her preaching – indeed, it was clear to the circle that without Shimmer to maintain the morale of the ponies in Chung Do during their darkest hours then the city would have fallen into riots and anarchy.

This had originally led Sunrise to form a cult of her own, devoted to the worship of Celestia, shortly after the circle had arrived in Chung Do. When the city had been on the brink of starvation Sunrise had soothed the worried minds and hungry bellies of the ponies of Chung Do with calming words and hopeful prayer, urging all who would listen to her to be mindful of what little food they had left to share with those who had none. When the city had burned it had been Sunrise’s loud and far-reaching charms that had shouted out warnings across the city, allowing Cash Charmer to organize an evacuation in time to avoid any casualties. As the ponies of Chung Do had sat cold at night in Twin Fountain square Sunrise Glow had been a source of light and inspiration, as she told of wonderous adventures from the first age that distracted from the terrible situation of the present. Now that all was well in Chung Do nearly every pony in Chung Do was at this point a member of the cult, making it the defacto state religion since even the young shogun had voiced his appreciation of Sunrise’s council and maintenance of the spirit of the city.

Cash had little to do with the cult directly, but he did notice that the meager fashion trends of the city were changing because of it. More ponies wore long cloaks or robes to cover themselves, and while linens and cloth in general was in short supply, then the ponies of Chung Do – many now trained via Speaker’s miraculous charms – were finding all kinds of ways to solve this problem, although Cash wasn’t quite sure he agreed with the apparent trend of having ones mane and tail shaved off and woven into cloth. This didn’t seem to bother the ponies who did it as hoods were also becoming popular as well, Cash figuring that the ponies wanted to dress like Sunrise did. Oh well, at least it made the ponies easy to govern since he’d heard whispers that it was now considered sin to defy a solar.

After a busy day of tallying the latest census numbers that he had ordered, Cash figuring that it wouldn’t hurt to known how many ponies had been re-housed in the snazzy new homes Speaker had built for everyone, the exceedingly well dressed stallion sauntered down the street from the city hall towards twin fountain square as the sun began to set. The street was dark as oil for lamps were in short supply, so Cash lit his way by igniting his caste mark.

The street looked as if it was paved with a single huge continuous slab of grey rock, although Cash still recalled with awe how Speaker had made that rock flow like water to cover and displace the dirt underneath it. It was strange to think of, but no less strange than the layout that Speaker had arranged the city it. It was, for the lack of a better word, ‘organic’, with streets that curved like the stalks of flowers, with small squares and plazas to the left and right here and there like leaves. Speaker’s explanation had been that it was to harmonize the entire city with the ambient essence flows that powered the castle, not unlike the geomantic patterns that Denansdor had been built after – only now the overall effect should be that it would be very difficult to actually become sick in the city, plus it should in theory prolong the lifespan of any pony who lived within its walls by a few decades.

Cash wasn’t sure about the promised magical effects of the layout, but he did agree that it was pretty. Trotting down the street, his magical shoes clicking against the rock, Cash looked long and hard at the various storefronts that lined the road. The selection of goods available was pathetic and quite a lot of storefronts were simply empty – there just weren’t enough ponies in Chung Do to fill out his grand design for a revitalized city. The young Shogun had agreed that after the rebellion had been put down there would be issued a call for immigrants to repopulate the city, something Cash looked forward to overseeing – especially since he planned on seeing all new Chung citizens magically sworn in to obey the law and whatnot. It simply seemed like a sensible solution, as it would ease the burden of ruling over them greatly.

Of course, Cash wasn’t looking for stores to shop in, or worrying about population density right now. Cash was looking for a brothel.

He knew that he had ‘zoned’ for several to be dotted throughout the city, but he had yet to find any that actually seemed to be up and running yet, which annoyed him greatly – a pony needed release every now and then, and it wasn’t like Speaker who had a lunar to service him every now and then, well, assuming that Speaker ever warmed up Shimmer again. It occurred to Cash that he might be able to ‘borrow’ Shimmer for some fun until Speaker got his act together, but that thought didn’t have much time to linger in Cash’s mind as he finally came across a small alley where there was a sign that read “House of Comforts” with an arrow pointing into the alloy.

Down the alley there was a door with a lit red lantern above it, Cash entered expecting some good times.

A few days later Speaker joined the circle in the castle banquet hall for breakfast. The topic of discussion over the meager meal of oats and steamed vegetables served was what to do with the city now the restoration of it was almost complete.

“I’ve taught glass-workers to filter and use sand dredged from the riverbed to make glass, so the city’s windows will soon have more than just shutters” Speaker noted.

Red was less interested in exterior decorations and more concerned with the defense of the cit: “Nice, but now that the ponies in the city are spread all over it again we can’t police them properly anymore. Before the fire we barely had more than a few dozen guardsponies left in the whole city, while everyone was jammed into twin fountain square they could just barely keep the peace – but now they’re spread way too thin. Heck, there’s only four ponies left on the castle walls, four!”

“Calm yourself Red” Sunrise admonished: “I’ve declared it sin to transgress against solar law. My cult of Celestia will enforce this, meaning that every pony in Chung Do will report any misdeeds done”

While Speaker found Sunrise’s faith in her parishioner’s sense of justice admirable, then he agreed with Red that more actual guards were necessary: “Have you tried recruiting new guards? I’m sure there’ll be plenty of ponies willing to help with Sunrise speaking so well of her flock”

“The last drill sergeant died three days before calibration. I may be a good warrior, but I’m not a trainer. Can’t you train them with your charms Speaker?” Red implored.

Speaker explained that he could not – for the educational charm he knew was purely academic: “There is something I recall from the first age, it was called the Tiger Warrior training technique”

Red looked oddly pensive at the mention of the term ‘tiger warrior’. Speaker explained that the term was a very old one, one of the original titles of the dawn caste ponies: “They were called the bronze tigers – because at the time tigers were the strongest beast we knew of, and bronze was the strongest metal we knew”

Nodding slowly, Red reminisced memories that weren’t entire her own. It was strange: “Whoa, but you’re saying you know this technique?”

Speaker shook his head: “I remember doing a lot of fun things – but I don’t remember how… sorry”

“I guess I could ask around, see if there are any retired veterans still alive in the city…” Red said, looking lost in thought.
Poking at his decidedly dull and tasteless oatmeal, Speaker sighed: “Right – say, how come the food is so bland? Where’s Sullen Hoof?”

“Beat’s me – maybe he’s off with Cash somewhere. Haven’t seen either of them in days” Speaker noted, adding that he hadn’t seen Shimmer either since she’d done her magic with the elemental.

Sunrise calmly and methodically continued to consume her meal: “I have no seen Cash, but Sullen Hoof has been helping cook for my congregation as of late. Why he is not here I cannot say”

After breakfast Red approached Speaker about making her some training equipment for any new guard recruits she could drum up. Speaker turned her down: “I’m still trying to iron out some geomantic essence flow problems in the west side, so I don’t have time, sorry. Even after I figured out how to tap into essence sight so I don’t have to feel my way around I’m still finding minor details I need to fix to avoid essence buildup – but you should ask the new carpenter guild that Cash set up last week. I’m sure they’ll make any kind of wooden training weapons for you”

Red nodded: “Ya ok – but… essence buildup? You mean this weird geomancy-schmancy city plan of yours can be harmful?”
“Not necessarily, but I don’t want to disturb the dragon lines flowing into the castle manse – that can be dangerous. But beyond that, do you think you’ll have time for another round of training later? What you showed on how to yank Gift out of logs and stones it was stuck earlier is really handy” Speaker added, retrieving his singing staff and a rosined bow from elsewhere.

Red followed Speaker out of the castle courtyard and into the twin fountain square. The grand stone facades of the buildings that now surrounded the square, while somewhat plain in their uniform grey stone color, were beautifully decorated with almost every flat surface sporting engravings of floral patterns. It made the buildings look almost alive, and indeed that was part of the logic, for it made them resonate with the wood aspected essence that flowed in the area. Carpenters were running around everywhere, with hauler-ponies bring cartloads of planks to and from the mostly empty buildings, all of them wearing those new-fangled hoods and thin cloaks made from burlap, woven mane and tail hairs or whatever other textiles the local ponies could scrounge up. Wooden frames for windows were being built, doors were being put up, and all the ponies who spotted Speaker bowed their heads respectfully as he had taught nearly all of them the skills they were applying.
“It’s really impressive how much the ponies here like you – although I’m not really sure I agree with this new fashion trend” Red noted.

Speaker shrugged: “I’m guessing its Sunrise’s work, looks like her style – I don’t mind it, as long as they don’t ask me to shave my mane or beard off”

The two split off, Speaker heading towards the grand bridge while Red began asking around for a pony she could place an order for training weapons at.

Speaker spent the rest of the day ironing out essence flow issues on the west side of town. Having unlocked the secret of the bombastically named Sorcerer’s All-Seeing Essence Sight charm he had found his work much easier, plus being able to see the very essence of creation was surprisingly pleasing to behold - like colored vapors that permeated everything. It was a bit like smoothing out a clogged up stream, only here it meant moving lamp posts and nudging buildings around.

The next day Speaker again had breakfast with Red and Sunrise. Red had placed her order and had begun recruiting for the city guard, while Speaker returned to the west to finish up his work there.

As Speaker stepped out of the castle courtyard he immediately noticed the lack of construction noise. There were no saws sawing, no sound of shoe-hammers bucking in nails, no scraping sound from hoof-cranked drills working in the stone, no sound of carts shuffling around planks… and looking around he couldn’t see a single soul working.

Walking up from the twin fountain square, via the main street, up to the grand bridge, Speaker couldn’t find a single shop that was open – not that there were many shops that had even opened up since the reconstruction, but this was still weird. There were ponies visible up in most of the the second, third and fourth story apartments and some visible in the back rooms of the ground level shops, a few even walking to and from places, but none were working.

As Speaker crossed the grand bridge he figured that it made sense to have all the ponies have a day off at the same time. That way the carpenters wouldn’t suddenly run out of nails when the blacksmiths were taking a day off, and everyone would know when to stock up on a little extra food when the fisherponies wouldn’t be out setting nets in the river. It was probably what Cash had been working on.

Arriving at the spot in the west half of the city where he had left off the previous day, Speaker began playing his singing staff to drain the essence pools that had formed in places where he hadn’t fully finished the architectural geomancy. It was then that a group of three hooded ponies came up to Speaker. One could hear as the hooves of the two ponies following the one in front’s hooves clinked against the roughly textured stone road, revealing that they were both wearing heavy hammer-shoes.

“You should not be working on this day of rest – come join us at the temple” their leader, an old mare by sound of it, said from under her hood in a somewhat condescending tone, as if addressing a wayward youth.

Speaker turned to face the trio of hooded ponies and smirked: “I think this is a little bit more important to finish up than going to temple – even if it is a nice temple, I should know, I built myself it two weeks ago”

To Speaker’s surprise the three ponies either completely failed to catch Speaker’s hint that he was way above their station to order around, or they were consciously choosing to ignore it – then again, every pony in the city knew who Speaker was since he had taught most of them a thing or two. Maybe this was some kind of joke, or perhaps just Sunrise’s heavyhoofed way of inviting him to some ceremony? Either way the old mare, well – she sounded old due to her voice, and her cloak revealed an old and bony body underneath, again demanded that Speaker cease his work and come with him: “It is sin to work on the day of rest, for it defies the word of our prophet – so stop right now and follow us to the temple so that you might pray for forgiveness and repent”

As Speaker didn’t immediately let go of his singing staff or the rosined bow the two heavy-shod and hooded ponies that had accompanies the old mare stepped forth, attempting to grab Speaker. Ok, this was new.

With his supernatural martial arts the two would-be grapplers didn’t stand a chance – but Speaker didn’t wish to hurt any of them either, so here merely swatted them away with his singing staff, but the seismic forces contained within the staff discharging on impact meant that this actually knocked the two ponies out instantly as if struck by a large stone mallet. Speaker took note that the singing staff might be more than a construction tool…

The old mare took a step back as she saw Speaker drop her two enforcers, but this didn’t stop her as she shouted for help: “Help! A sinner in our midst! He must be brought to temple!”

At first Speaker just shook his head at the old mare after he’d checked the two ponies he’d unintentionally knocked out, but moments later the clatter of hooves on rock spread throughout the neighborhood – and soon three dozen ponies were chasing Speaker – and none of them seemed willing to listen to reason, nor did they care that he was a solar.

As he ran – for he did not wish to harm these ponies, no matter what strange influence was causing them to behave like this – Speaker dragged the singing staff along the ground and played it, raising yard high earth walls to hinder his pursuers, allowing him to escape across the grand bridge.

Using his perfect balance charm Speaker was able to leap from the bridge when he reached from the other side and land on a lamp pole, giving him additional distance between him and his pursuers – but they were in turn shouting quite loudly, causing ponies on the east side that Speaker was now in to join the chase. Within moments Speaker was being chased by a mob of angry and relentless ponies, but Speaker still had the advantage of knowing charms that allowed him to avoid fatigue or tiring from prolonged galloping, something that none of the mortal ponies in the mob could do, so Speaker could press himself harder and maintain a healthy distance to her pursuers.

Arriving at the castle gates, Speaker shouted at the hoofful of guards manning the drawbridge to the courtyard to begin raising it – but as the shouts from the mobs decried Speaker as a sinner… the guards did not raise the drawbridge, instead they dropped the portcullis, trapping Speaker at the end of the drawbridge.
> Chapter 36: Unwavering Faith
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Red, who had somewhat reluctantly spent the last few days going house to house looking for recruits for the city and castle guard, was talking to the two dozen hopefuls she had managed to round up inside the castle courtyard, when she heard the commotion and moments later saw Speaker trapped in front of the portcullis. Red had never really been an officer in any way, always fighting under the command of others or on her own. This was how she preferred it, but when she saw her friend in trouble she did not hesitate to come to his aid.

“Raise the portcullis and the drawbridge this instant!” Red shouted as she ran to the portcullis in aid of Speaker.

Speaker sighed in relief as he saw Red run towards him, but the guards up on the battlements above the portcullis weren’t responding to her orders…

As Red reached Speaker this apparent insubordination also became apparent to Red – but that didn’t deter her. Using the incredibly unoriginally named Strength-Increasing Exercise charm, which really was less an exercise and more of a temporary muscle-enhancing technique, Red’s muscles swelled with essence under her casual training outfit, endowing her with more than enough strength to squat down and lift the heavy steel portcullis enough to let Speaker crawl through – and just in time, as the mob ran onto the drawbridge.

The ponies in the mob, seeing that they were now blocked from Speaker, were quick to call for the guards on the battlements to raise the portcullis – but Red and Speaker were quickly up alongside those very guards, Red giving them furious glares as only a dawn caste could, while Speaker addressed the mob: “What is this madness? Do you not know who I am? Why are hounding me like some criminal?”

Various voices shouted back at Speaker, but the common thread seemed to be that no pony was above holy law – and any sinner had to be brought to the temple.

Having reduced the guards on duty to quivering wrecks simply by the force of her glares, Red turned to Speaker: “I think that Sunrise has a few things to answer for here…”

Speaker nodded: “I’m inclined to agree – but I don’t think this mob here is going to let me go there peacefully”

Without saying a word, Red leapt down on the drawbridge – the thick oaken beams groaning as Red’s hooves impacted with supernatural force. Looking at the mob Red reared up and flared her anima to its totemic peak, wreathing her in not just golden flame by a beautiful bagua fit to stir any martial heart: “Ok you ingrates, we came here and found Chung Do fit for a shadowland. We have shed blood for you! We have dealt with mad gods for you! We have battled criminals who’d see you all starve as well as sicken and die! …and we have cured you of a disease none thought possible to survive, and this is how you thank us? You ungrateful foals, I should buck you all to malfeas! Now beat it!”

Faced with the fury of a dawn caste solar, especially one so enhanced by her terrifying iconic anime – an anima wrought via primordial artifice to enhance the battle proves of this specific caste of solars to magically intimidate any foe before her – the mob turned and ran. It was a complete rout, with ponies scrambling over one another to get away as Red stood before them full of righteous fury, whatever strange compulsions they were under not being strong enough to make the mob engage their solar opponent.

As the portcullis was finally raised Speaker joined Red: “Remind me never to piss you off…”

“They’re my people – my little ponies – I wouldn’t have hurt them unless they had struck first, but Celestia know that I was tempted” Red said begrudgingly.

The two made their way to the temple of Celestia that Speaker had incorporated into the city’s new layout and built of the finest marble that Shimmer’s elemental had ushered forth from the ground, having used the singing staff to reorient the veins in the marble to create beautiful patterns on almost every surface of the pyramid-like structure.  In front of the temple was a large plaza surrounded by tall marble pillars, each formed with a mirror sheen with their veins forming starburst icons and smaller images of ponies dancing underneath.

No pony raised their voice or tried to stop them as Speaker and Red approached and entered the temple. The interior of the temple pyramid was surprisingly minimal, considering how flashy the outside of the temple was: The whole pyramid was hollow, with only a hole at the peak of the pyramid letting sunlight in and the whole floor being covered in a thin layer of sand over plain rock.

Hundreds of ponies sat and chanted in unison, producing a beautiful and almost haunting song that rang out through the temple, venerating Celestia. Despite the temple’s simple interior architecture it had surprisingly good acoustics thanks to Speaker's subtle design, making their songs and prayers ring out and reverberate quite nicely. In the center of it all, in the spotlight created by the light from the sunlight that came in from the hole the ceiling stood Sunrise, standing both resplendent and humble in her off-white robes.

It was quite unsettling for Speaker as he walked through the crowd of chanting ponies along with Red. They didn’t seem to even be aware of his presence, but he took heart in that Red didn’t seem to mind their eerie presence at all.

“Sunrise, what is this madness?” Red demanded.

Sunrise didn’t respond. She was standing silently in the cone of light shining down from above.

Speaker and Red tried a few more times to make contact – but Sunrise seemed to firmly ignore the two solars from beneath her hood. None of the other ponies at the temple seemed willing to acknowledge their presence, let along respond to their questions, and the two knew quite well that Sunrise’s defensive charms were too powerful for them to overcome if were to try to get rough, so they reluctantly opted to leave instead.

Leaving, Speaker and Red had no idea what to do. It seemed clear that while they had been rebuilding the city Sunrise had usurped power by using her charms on the ponies of Chung Do.

On the plaza outside the temple, Red stomped angrily, sparks flying as her hooves struck the stone: “Damnit, I didn’t come here to save my home only to let it become a crazy cult town”

“Well that does explain why Cash disappeared…” Speaker said grimly.

Turning to give Speaker an angry glare, Red said: “What do you mean by that?”

“Cash was probably the first who saw what was happening – he’s always good at reading other ponies. I’ll bet that he’d know how to undo this as well, or at the very least how to get Sunrise to stop and reign in her followers” Speaker said, thinking about how to find Cash.

Red agreed, but wondered where Cash might be then. Last she had heard was that Cash had been really busy tallying post-plague census numbers, but she knew that Cash been to his office at the city hall in a few days.

“Well, let’s be thorough then. If we go to city hall and assume that he left it before disappearing, because I know that his underlings there saw him leave, where might he have disappeared to?” Speaker thought out loud, looking in the direction of the city hall.

Going to the front steps of the city hall, a large office building with a few green banners that had originally hung from the castle walls, the two looked around for where Cash might have gone.

Looking at the closed shops as they began walking down the street and how all the ponies now seemed to shy away from them, Red’s mood soured: “Damnit, I swear I will beat some sense into Sunrise no matter what”

Continuing down the street, looking at shops, despairing at fact that with the new continuous stone paving it was impossible to read any kind of hoof prints on the street. Speaker worried that combing the city for Cash would take weeks, especially if Cash was moved around to avoid detectino.

“That might not be necessary – look” Red said, pointing to a sign that said “House of Comforts”

Speaker chuckled: “You really think Cash has been in a brothel for this long?”

“Don't think there's enough prostitutes left alive in Chung Do to occupy him for that long– but this brothel is the first one on the way from city hall to the castle, so it's a good place to start” Red said, certain in Cash's carnal preferences.

Speaker summarized Cash’s behavior in a slightly simpler fashion: “True, that pony likes to get his dick sucked – let’s check it out”

The two solars walked down the alley and knocked on the door with the red paper lantern overhead. The door was opened by a hooded bouncer and they were ushered by signs into a sparsely decorated lobby with paper scrolls hung on the walls detailing various sexual acts and their corresponding costs - the available selection wasn't wide, but the usual frills and thrills were all covered.

Standing behind a bamboo counter, a madam greeted her two new costumers. She seemed surprised to see Red and Speaker enter her establishment, but remained cheerful none the less: “My lords, what can I do for you?”

“Has Cash Charmer been in here recently?” Red asked bluntly, not even trying to veil her accusatory tone.

The madam, a pretty mare in a thin but revealing dress, smiled and said that Cash Charmer had sadly not.

“She’s lying” Speaker said unceremoniously, Red instantly leaping towards the mare, a golden hook-sword of blazing essence having formed in the split second it took Red to charge right through the flimsy wooden counter – now holding it to the mare’s throat.

“Where is he!?” Red shouted angrily, fury radiating from her eyes.

At once the lobby was swarmed by a dozen hooded enforcers in heavy hammer-shoes. The fight that ensued between the two solars against the goons was brief, messy and tore the brothel interior apart – this revealed that beyond the lobby there really wasn’t anything to the brothel… no rooms, no beds, no nothing.

Having reduced the hooded thugs to a big groaning heap of barely conscious pain, Red seamlessly resumed her interrogation of the madam: “Now, where is Cash – and keep in mind that Speaker here can tell if you’re lying”

The madam, despite the situation, somehow managed to show no fear again as she calmly stated: “I am sorry, I cannot help you”

Speaker again pointed out that the mare was lying – but despite Red violently shaking the madam about, the mare somehow maintained her reluctance to speak the truth.

“Speaker, this is some freaky shit – why won’t she tell us where Cash is? She knows it, your truth telling charm shows that” Red said, confused and angered in the face of a foe that seemed immune to both reason and intimidation.

The situation suddenly reminded Speaker of how they themselves had been unable to see that deathknight due to her mind control: “Red, use that mind-control-undoing charm you were taught by the bull!”

Red gladly raised a hoof and gave the madam mare a righteous slap across the face. The mare instantly convulsed as golden plumes of flame in the form of loudly hissing snakes erupted from her mouth and eyes…

A few moments later the mare struggled to stand up, obviously shook up by the experience. She looked up at Red and Speaker, now with fear in her eyes, and her voice far more timid. Almost whispering, she begged: “Oh gods… please don’t kill me”

“We won’t, I promise – now tell me what’s going on!” Red demanded.

At first the mare looked a little confused, then motioned as if to speak – but stopped again – then finally she whispered, with much trepidation: “I, yes… Lord Charmer was taken to a warehouse over on the west side. They’ve made it into a prison where she comes and talks to you… and then you become one of them”

Speaker nodded slowly: “Right, and by ‘she’ you mean Sunrise?”

The madam hesitantly nodded, as if she feared that she'd up in the very same prison.

A little more back and forth revealed the full extent of what had been going on: Sunrise had evidently used some kind of mind-control charm to instill certain compulsions in all the ponies who heard her sermons – which at this point was all the ponies in Chung Do. They were to never waver, to never fear, and to never defy her holy teachings, as that was sin.

“Well, at least Sunrise learned something useful from the Ruby and Emerald Mare – how to condense absolute societal control down into three simple magical compulsions” Speaker said, sighing deeply at the prospect of somehow having to get Red to cleanse the mind of all the ponies of Chung Do.

“Hey, at least we know where Cash is being held” Red said in a surprisingly cheerful tone.

The madam, seeing that her usefulness was no more, trembled: “What about me? They’ll come for me now because I told you… they think its sin, they’re mad!”

“Not mad, just not fully in control of themselves. You just get back behind what’s left of the counter and fake it. If they accuse you having said anything simply proclaim your faith again and accuse them of not believing in Sunrise’s power – if their minds are as tightly bound as we think they are, then they won’t be able to second-guess you if you invoke Sunrise’s name directly” Speaker said.

The madam nodded and did as suggested. As Speaker and Red left the fake brothel they could hear the madam  trying to piece the shattered counter back again. 

“Good grief – setting up a trap like this to catch any pony who just wanted a good time? Really?” Red grumbled as they headed towards the grand bridge.

Speaker wasn’t sure it was just coincidence: “No, this place was set up where Cash was sure to pass by. I’m pretty sure it was set up to catch him specifically”

“I swear, Sunrise is going to pay for this” Red said, fuming. Speaker suggested that she focus her fury on whatever ponies that were guarding the makeshift prison they were about to storm.

Nodding, Red looked to the skies: “You know, if Shimmer was here she could probably have sniffed out Cash in no time”
“True… I haven’t seen her in weeks now, ever since she went to summon that jokun and bring me the stone to rebuild the city” Speaker said, suddenly aware that this absence of his lunar mate probably had something to do with Sunrise as well.
Seeing the sudden flash of worry on Speaker’s face, Red quickly pointed out that it was unlikely that Shimmer had been captured – but in turn Speaker pointed out that that would be a good thing: “…because if Sunrise somehow just talked Shimmer into up and leaving us, for good, then we might never see her again”
“Damn…” Red muttered.

The prison on the west side was surprisingly easy to find – it was one of the only warehouses with any ponies milling about it. There were ponies brining in food, water, carrying out what looked like dirty laundry – all of them hooded of course. There were also ponies standing around the main gate with spears.

“Step aside, we have business inside” Red declared officiously.

The guardsponies didn’t buy that for a second, but as Red quickly broke into a furious tirade they quickly knocked on the door to have it opened from the inside: “How dare you question us!? We are here by orders from Sunrise Glow herself! That you can even think to question our holy orders is tantamount to sin!”

“Nice” Speaker quietly said as they were let in.

Red shook her head: “No, not nice, I just did like you suggested to that brothel madam. This means that any pony who claims to have been given orders from Sunrise can get away with anything now. Murder, rape, theft – anything, as long as they scream and shout that Sunrise told them to do it and that you have no business questioning Sunrise’s orders. We just need one pony who resists Sunrise’s mind control and catches on to this loophole and we’ll have another water walker gang looting the city in no time”

Blinking  a few times as his eyes adjusted to the darkness inside the warehouse, Speaker nodded: “Ya ok, that’s… that’s not good”

The sight that met the two solars was not a pretty one. Hundreds of pillories, wooden contraptions with five holes in them for a pony’s neck and hooves to fit through and be locked in, with over half of them filled with ponies who all had crude burlap bags over their heads…

The pillories were arranged within the large warehouse in two circles, one within the other, so all the captive ponies were facing towards the middle – an ideal setup if you wanted to bind their minds through a mind-control charm that required them all being able to hear you.

“This is insane” Red said as she looked around.

Speaker agreed, but not in the way Red expected: “Yes and no – I’m beginning to think that Sunrise has bound her mind just as much as she had all the other ponies”

“Really? And how does that explain this?” Red said, pointing towards one pony in a pillory. The sack over the pony’s head showed murky stains of vomit and there were marks from beatings all over the poor pony’s bruised and battered naked body.

“Think about what the madam said. No fear, that goes all the way back to Denansdor where she said she’d used a charm instead of one of those bracelets. Never to waver, that’d mean that she’s unable to hesitate or even stop and think about what she’s doing… I think she’s as trapped in her own mind and all the other ponies here” Speaker said, hoping to Celestia that he was right – for if not then there was little hope of ever stopping Sunrise, outside of outright killing her.

Looking about at the imprisoned ponies: “That is fucked up… but I guess that explains her choice at the bull, wait, damnit, that’s it!”

Speaker gave Red an inquisitive look. Red explained that while Speaker had been down and out while getting his mind purged of the deathknight’s influence, and the others had been taking turns getting theirs done as well, then Sunrise had opted not to be purged – instead claiming that she would use her own charms to counter the deathknight’s compulsion once the rest of the circle identified the exact nature of it.

“So she’s afraid that the mind-clearing charm would undo her own work?” Speaker said, liking Red’s plan already, as it implied that Red’s mind-purging charm might ‘fix’ Sunrise. Red nodded, but added that first they should find Cash among the prisoners.

Going pony to pony and removing their hoods, it quickly became evident that Cash wasn’t among the ponies in the circles of pillories. It then struck Speaker that Cash obviously wouldn’t be held there, since he could probably resist Sunrise’s mind-control anyway – he would be held somewhere else.

“Right, so how do we find him? I mean, unless they didn’t just execute him” Red pointed out.

Speaker was certain that Cash hadn’t been executed: “Even the exalted can fall to mind control. I remember treating unicorns who’d been captured and tortured for information, subjected to charms by other unicorns. The trick is that it takes a while to mentally break a pony who’s exalted, before they become susceptible to charms that would make them speak”
"Again, what makes you think they didn't just kill him?" Red reiterated, sounding genuinly worried.

Shrugging, Speaker noted that even if Shimmer's disdain for Cash's casual use of prostitutes was well known, then Sunrise would still need someone to run the daily administration of Chung Do and the lands around it.

“Right, so where is he then?” Red said, looking around and not seeing anything with a sign that said 'Solar storage'
“Let’s ask one of the ponies who work here – but cleanse their mind first so they can speak freely” Speaker suggested.

One round of flaming snake-eyes later and the two solars had another quite visibly frightened pony on their hooves – but now they also knew where Cash was.

Going out to the public latrine set up next to the prison, Speaker floated one of the lids up and looked into the ocean of piss and poo underneath: “Hey Red, here he is”

Down in the tank of toilet fed by the public latrine was Cash, tied up very securely in a sturdy oaken pillory, so that only his head was above the ‘water level’ – although it was also evident that his captors hadn’t had the foresight to remove the indestructible, claw-shooting shoes, silks or his colar of dawn’s cleansing, so when Red hauled Cash up only she was sullied – while Cash came out of the septic tank looking as clean as could be and quite stylish. Red guessed that he'd been put in the pillory and then crapper while knocked out.

Cash was understandably thankful as his gag was removed, quickly extolling the virtues of Speaker and Red for rescuing him. Just as quickly as he had praised his two saviors Cash began railing against his captors: “They’re lunatics, you can’t talk to them – what does Sunrise think she’s doing?”

Speaker explained what he and Red knew of Sunrise’s mind control on the ponies of Chung Do, as well as his theory of Sunrise’s own mental constraints. Cash found Speaker’s theory intriguing: “That… that actually makes a scary amount of sense”

“But why?” Red wondered, looking around to see if any prison guards were in sight.

Cash reminded Red of Sunrise’s homeland – the city state of Great Forks, the city of a thousand temples. With all the cults there it had to be difficult for any priesthood to hold on to their cultists, so being able to use charms to more or less forbid her flock from deviating from her course probably appeared to Sunrise as a really handy ability and a very sound idea.

“But that’s not what she did. She made her cultists unable to fear and waver, and they think that defying her is sin” Red countered.

Cash smiled: “It’s the last part that holds them in – if her word is suddenly holy law, then she can simply say that apostasy is a sin. Presto, leaving the cult becomes sin… but this fear and wavering… that’s different”

As the three solars began to walk to the temple to confront Sunrise, Cash discussed this strange mental compulsion to be fearless and unwavering with Speaker: “Do you remember what Sunrise told of her foalhood?”

Speaker recalled what Sunrise had told him while they had been down in the south-eastern jungles, before getting to Denansdor: “After she was orphaned she dodged a number of kidnapping attempts from various pleasure cults that had failed to recruit her willingly…”

“True, and from what I gathered then she even suspects that her parents death was because of their refusal to sell her to one of the cults. That’s the thing: Behind that façade of contempt and overzealous restraint she’s probably a frightened little filly who suddenly found herself walking among ponies far braver and bolder than herself. If she used the Unhesitating Dedication and Illusive Dream Defense charms to bind her mind to not be afraid again and never waver in the face of adversity… honestly it makes sense, but it also means that she’s using her charms like a crutch instead of working out her problems, something that I am certain that the rest of us – me in particular ironically – could help her overcome very quickly” Cash explained as they crossed the grand bridge and neared the temple to Celestia.

Speaker mulled over Cash’s observations and theories as they approached the temple: “But will that allow Red to use her mind-clearing charm to undo all that?”

Cash shrugged: “No idea –but hey, did Red tell you that she didn’t allow the bull to that charm on her?” 
Speaker nodded.

“Well, then it’s do or die – because I sure as Malfeas isn’t going to let Chung Do keep on going like this” Red stated resolutely.

The temple revealed the same sight that Red and Speaker had come across earlier that day when they had first come to reason with Sunrise. The same pyramid, the same columns, the same banners and the same sound of chanting and singing from inside – although this time there was a group of hooded ponies armed with spears out in front, waiting for the three solars, and in front of them stood a pony who’s burn scars on his muzzle under his hood revealed him to Sullen Hoof.
“Sully, please tell me you’re not part of this” Speaker implored.

Sullen Hoof didn’t answer, instead stating: “The prophet does not wish to be disturbed – disperse”

“Don’t try to argue with him, he can’t feel fear… Red, fix him” Cash said, his voice one part remorseful and one part vindictive. Speaker wondered if Sullen Hoof had been part in capturing Cash.

Prior to reaching the temple Red had instructed Speaker to retrieve Gift. Staring at a mind controlled Sullen Hoof made Speaker feel uncomfortably happy that Red had done so as Sullen Hoof and Sunrise’s armed pony thugs advanced on them.

Red made short work of the mortal ponies, swatting them aside with swift and powerful blows of her hooves. Sullen Hoof, for obvious reasons, proved more difficult to combat.

As Red squared off against Sullen Hoof, the solar culinarian activated his Orichalcum Chef Style charms, causing a whirlwind of cleavers flew out from under Sullen Hoof’s cloak, making getting anywhere near Sullen Hoof a very dangerous prospect. Red in turn struck a mighty pose as she positioned herself in the aegis assuming stance, girding her body in her lamellar armor – the flying cleavers harmlessly bouncing off the many tiny red-lacquered steel plates that made up Red's imposing mercenary barding.

Looking on as the two solars fought, Speaker pondered what Sullen Hoof’s strategy was – assuming there was one at all. Did Sullen Hoof honestly think that he could hold off Red, Cash and Speaker indefinitely? Considering what he had seen with the other brainwashed ponies of Chung Do Speaker concluded that Sullen Hoof probably didn’t have such an endgame in mind – he was far more likely acting on orders from Sunrise, unable to object or point out that against three solars even he would eventually fall, unless of course Sully used his cook-fu against them to its full effect.

“Red, don’t bother trying to hurt him, just hit him with the mind-cleaner before he starts having your chop his onions!” Cash shouted, demonstrating quite well that he wasn’t particularly tactically minded, as Sullen Hoof quickly distanced himself from Red via a powerful leap backwards now that he knew what Red was trying to accomplish, hurling several solid steel rolling pins at the dawn caste pony in the process.

“Sully, you don’t have to fight us – think for a moment. We’re trying to end this madness! Please, just stop and listen” Speaker implored, hoping that Sullen Hoof would think of him as more than just a circlemate, but a friend – and through that possibly overcome his magical compulsions.

Sullen Hoof paused for a moment, standing still long enough for Red to close in and try to hit him again – but the night caste solar effortlessly dodged every swipe and buck. As Red roared in anger and frustration, Sullen Hoof simply darted around her and struck her from behind, not hurting Red due to her armor, but none the less knocking her over. Speaker was at first confounded at this move, for Sully could have attempted any number of powerful offensive and lethal moves there – but he hadn’t. It occurred to Speaker that Sullen Hoof didn't seem really to have any kind of real strategy in mind, but at the same time his actions just didn't make sense, since he obviously wasn't bringing his best in the fight. Equally, the fact that Red wasn’t trying to kill Sullen hoof, restricting her from using her sword-forming charms and weapon-based melee charms, put Red at a serious disadvantage since most of her charms were oriented towards lethal forms of combat. Of course, if Sullen Hoof at some point could introduce food into the mix Red might end up being made to eat herself, so a prolonged fight wasn’t desirable. Perhaps Sully's orders were purely to keep the three from entering the temple, not killing them? That might make sense.

Speaker thought furiously at how Red might be able to quickly land a blow on his friend. Sullen Hoof’s defensive charms were clearly oriented towards dodging instead of parrying or magically toughing a blow. With no small amount of reluctance, Speaker threw Gift at Sullen Hoof – the primordial artifact whirring to life with a puff of steam and the unmistakably metallic sound of the revving essence engine within as the blades extended around the edge of disk. Speaker didn’t really expect to hit Sullen Hoof, indeed Sully dodged Gift effortlessly, but that was the plan. As Gift missed it swerved around on its own and came around for another go, and another, and another. Speaker knew Gift wouldn’t return to him until it struck Sullen Hoof or he recalled it, so it simply became another thing that Sullen Hoof had to dodge.

“Cash, shoot Sully with your claw-shoes. Aim for his rear hooves, nothing vital, and take time to aim first” Speaker called out, as he himself rushed into the fray, his caste mark quickly lighting up as a multitude of cleavers bounced relatively harmlessly off his flesh, hardened by his defensive charm, leaving only shallow cuts – but leaving many of them.

Suddenly having to contend not just with a single foe in the form of Red, but also Gift, Speaker, and even Cash as he occasionally shot frighteningly well-aimed claw-spikes at his rear hooves, Sullen Hoof quickly found himself burning through essence much faster than he liked - especially considering that he clearly wasn't using his charms that efficiently, apparently using charms on a case-by-case basis instead of using longer lasting and economic charms that wouldn't see him drained of essence so quickly...

Stepping back to avoid Speaker trying to grab him, quickly lifting a hoof to avoid another claw-shot from Cash, Sullen Hoof spun around to narrowly duck under Red – no, that was Gift, where wa- oww.

Red impacted Sullen Hoof with a right hoof-hook so solid that Speaker could actually hear the wet sound of Sully’s jaw breaking, that disgustingly wet snap of bone and unmistakable rattle of loosened teeth. It pained him to see a friend hurt, even more so as Sullen Hoof dropped to the ground, writhing in pain, as golden snakes of fire shot out of his now painfully twisted and agape mouth and his eyes which he was probably trying to clench in pain anyway.

Speaker quickly rushed to Sullen Hoof, hitting him with his anesthetic charm to alleviate the pain and calling for Red to help pin Sully down. With Sullen Hoof held firmly, Speaker used his medical charms to set the broken jaw and fix the broken teeth, even magically regrowing the few that were missing entirely. Ripping up Sully’s robe, Speaker bandaged Sully’s muzzle tightly, as it was the only means he had at the moment to immobilize the jaw. Ideally he’d prefer to wire Sully’s jaw shut, but that would have to be done later.

Halfway through the procedure to repair Sullen Hoof’s jaw the night caste pony stopped struggling, as the flames from his eyes died down.

When his jaw was as done as it was possible for Speaker to make and he was released from Red’s grasp Sullen Hoof staggered up. The anesthetic charm took away his pain, but it also made it difficult to focus – still Sully managed to float up a rolling pin and write in the dust before him: “I am sorry”

Shaking his head, Speaker smiled at his friend: “This was not your fault. You weren’t able to think clearly. Now, don’t try to speak or your jaw wont set right”

“Come on, enough talk, we have to end this” Red said, motioning for the four of them to enter the temple.

Sullen Hoof quickly rushed over in front of Red and began to write in the ground. A gust of wind blew dust over his attempts at communicating, but Cash somehow still got the message: “Right, don’t enter because she’ll take control of our minds. Well, I wouldn’t worry about that, because Speaker has a plan to counter that, right? Right?”

Seeing as the three were all looking at him, Speaker took a deep breath: “Uhm… well… we know that we can’t hurt her, and if we let her talk to us… hmm… well we're going in knowing what to expect and wanting to resist it, that'll help us a lot”

“So we just rush her, pin her down and hold her mouth shut – shouldn’t be that difficult” Red said, not sounding particularly worried.

Looking at Cash who shrugged, Sullen Hoof who just nodded, and Red who seemed sure of herself, Speaker acquiesced and the four solars galloped into the temple.

Inside they found Sunrise behind what very much looked like several hundred cloaked ponies, all of whom had the same steely-eyed gaze locked on the four of them as they entered the temple.

“Oh come on Sunrise, hiding behind mortals? Aren’t you gloriously powerful enough to face us head on?” Cash called out.
“We do not hide, we are here listening to the holy words of the prophet” a familiar voice stated. It was Chung Onyx, the young shogun. With the burlap hood and cloak he looked just like all the other ponies… but Red quickly slapped him with the mind-clearing charm, her eyes tearful and face twisted in anger as she shouted: “You will not use my brother against us!” and dove into the crowd of ponies, shoving her way through towards Sunrise, while her younger brother twisted around on the ground as the compulsions ingrained by Sunrise were burned out.

Red peered through sea of ponies standing between her and Sunrise with a mix of fury and apprehension – she wanted to save them, but they sure weren’t making it easy. The hooded ponies clearly weren’t attacking – they were simply standing in the way and making every effort to stand still, close together and not be moved aside, standing so close to each other that it was impossible to get past them even with using force.

Sunrise began to preach, her voice amplified by charms so it could be heard clearly all throughout the temple: “Praise Celestia, for all righteous ponies know well that the word of the prophet should be obeyed. To do otherwise is to sin against the will of Celestia as spoken by her one true prophet…”

Speaker, with his essence sight charm, could literally see the waves of mind-bending essence radiating out from Sunrise as she spoke from her pedestal – and he could feel the words tug at his mind forcefully. Sunrise hadn’t even tried to hide the nature of the compulsion she was trying to force upon the circle, while Red, Sullen Hoof and Cash tried to shove their way through the ponies in front of them Speaker could also see that it’d take too long to get to Sunrise… she’d wear them all down mentally before they could ever get to her.

Recalling the old unicorn adage “If the mountain will not come to Pasiap, then Pasiap must come to the mountain” about the elemental dragon of earth and how one must have patience but also be flexible, Speaker brought Gift to bear. The old saying he had remembered rekindled much older memories from the first age, memories of motion, of how to move things by moving other things, or imparting motion through essence – a linear flight principle.

Dropping into his Thousand Wounds Gear Style form, rearing up but also broadening his stance and steeling his muscles tense for strong and powerful motions, Speaker threw Gift with all his might. He silently prayed that he had recalled this technique correctly, as Gift flew and a golden streak from his anima followed it like a golden vapor trail.

Gift zoomed past Sunrise at great speed, curving and banking to strike at her from behind – but just as Sunrise had hardened her form with a powerful shielding charm Gift banked and struck Sunrise with one of its flat sides, the golden streak that followed it impacting through Gift, dispensing tremendous amounts of motile essence upon Sunrise – flinging the young mare up and over her herd of mind controlled ponies.

Sunrise had clearly not anticipated this turn of events, screaming in surprise and shock as she tumbled down among her flock, landing before Cash and Red – Sullen Hoof having had trouble getting through the mass of ponies since the anesthetic charm he was still under made him move like a drunk pony.

“I am righteous, you will not touch me! You will bow to me!” Sunrise frantically commanded, surrounding herself with an intimidating flare of baleful and bright light that shined like the gaze of a judgmental god.

Speaker again felt the words tug alluringly at his the back of his mind. Part of him wanted to submit to her oh so dearly… and to his great horror Speaker saw Sullen Hoof bow down before her – but Red would not be intimidated.

“No” Red unceremoniously stated and defiantly booped Sunrise on the nose. Sunrise took a shaky step backwards, the hooded ponies around her stepping aside without saying a word.

It was clear that Sunrise was fighting the mind-purging charm that Red had inflicted on her, but ultimately Sunrise was fighting a charm that elevated truth – and her own charms and essence resonated with this divine ideal and imperative, defying her own will, letting plumes of flame erupt from Sunrise’s mouth and eyes, burning away her hood to reveal the face of a very young mare with an orange mane roughly sheared and cut away, having left ugly and uneven tufts of orange hair jutting out from her head and neck.

As the circle gathered around Sunrise it became clear that the mass of hooded ponies around them was unable to do anything without Sunrise telling them, probably due to whatever orders Sunrise had given them. Speaker sighed at the thought of what might be going through the minds of the many ponies, having to somehow contend themselves with being prisoners in their own bodies thanks to Sunrise’s mind-bending charms. Hopefully now Sunrise would be able to undo her own work.

As Sunrise’s mouth and eyes slowly stopped emitting flames – for they seemed to have done so a lot longer than Sullen Hoof had – the young mare began to cry.

It was deeply uncomfortable to see the many hooded ponies and their blank faces staring at the crying little mare, but as Speaker attempted to approach her Sunrise simply sobbed and flipped over on the ground, turning away from him.

“Right, I am waiting around for this” Cash suddenly said, hauling the reluctant and still crying Sunrise up on his back and galloping off. At the gate into the pyramid temple, bathed in sunlight, Cash called out to all the hooded ponies: “Spread the word to all ponies in the city: Your prophet will speak to you all at dusk at twin fountain square – make sure that all are there to hear her speak, but ensure of this nicely, without using force.

Taking this as their cue to leave, the throng of hooded ponies scattered. Speaker, Red and Sullen Hoof followed Cash back to the castle, Red hauling her younger brother along who seemed quite confused and distraught over what had happened.
At the castle, barely inside the courtyard, Cash bucked Sunrise off his back and onto the ground. Red led her brother inside the castle.

“Ok little lady, you have a lot to answer for. Your cronies tried to drown me in shit! They tried to lynch Speaker for working on finishing the city! And you brainwashed the Shogun! Give me one good reason not to have you up between the boats!” Cash shouted angrily, Speaker unsure what Cash was playing at – hoping that he was just trying to make Sunrise snap back into reality.

Sullen Hoof poked Speaker on the shoulder, having written on a piece of paper: “Boats?”

Speaker explained Sullen Hoof the horrible execution method known as Scaphism, where you tied a pony down inside a hollow contained on their back – usually a small boat with an upturned boat on top out in the open, then force-fed them milk and honey, while also smearing their bellies with honey – and then you left them for insects to come and feast on the honey… and ultimately on the pony. The really nasty part was that usually this also involved returning to the pony once a day to force-feed them more milk and honey and smear more honey on their belly to attract more insects. Back in medical school Speaker had heard of victims lasting as long as seventeen days before they died to being eaten alive, belly first, by multitudes of insects.

Sullen Hoof gave Cash a very frightened look. Speaker understood the reaction.

Sunrise looked up at Cash, choking back sobs: “I… I was afraid”

Cash rewarded Sunrise with a slap across the face - from the howl of pain it appeared that Sunrise hadn’t used a shielding charm to counter the blow. Speaker took this as a good sign.

“To a certain degree I don’t really care why you did what you did – we’ll address that later – right now you need to start thinking about what you’re going to say to the city and specifically how you’re going to undo your mind control, because I sure as Malfeas don’t think that Red will have the patience to slap every pony in the city across the face to right your wrongs” Cash sternly stated.

Sunrise nodded in defeat, trying to say something, but it all just came out as sobs and half-choked crying.

“Come on Cash, give her a break – she’s clearly traumatized here, give her some room” Speaker urged, finding it difficult to see Cash shout at the crying mare – despite what she had done.

Cash gave Speaker a thousand yard stare: “I was suspended in shit up to my nose in almost three days - I don't have charms like you so I can breathe underwater. Drowning in piss isn't fun”

Speaker, somewhat unmoved by Cash’s excuse since the latrine’s content hadn’t really done any damage or left any stains thanks to Cash’s collar of dawn’s cleansing, shook his head: “If you want to motivate her to undo her damage, why not try to cheer up her a bit first?”

At first rolling his eyes at Speaker, Cash sighed. He then put on a pained but frighteningly sincere-looking smile and suddenly it was as if Cash had not been angry at all: “Sunrise… darling… you all told us of how horrible your foalhood had been and how the Cult of the Illuminated had basically saved you from being foalnapped, but you clearly used your charms here in a very inconsiderate and unfortunate way. Now be a good filly and undo the damage you’ve done, or this city won’t be possible to save”

Sunrise looked up at Cash and whipped her eyes: “I… I’ll try”

> Chapter 37: Second Chances Have High Prices
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As dusk approached and ponies began filling up Twin Fountain Square, Speaker was unsure how Sunrise could undo her own work – but he had faith that after spending the rest of the day talking with Cash that the young mare was ready to face facts and own up to her actions.

Speaker had spent the time fixing up Sully’s jaw, allowing the night caste pony to speak again – but not chew anything harder than soup or really thin porridge for the next few days – just in time for the circle to lead Sunrise out to address the ponies of Chung Do.

Twin fountain square was filled with ponies, although unlike a few weeks ago when they had been spread out in small makeshift tents, they now all stood perfectly in rank and file as they stared silently at the portcullis in the castle walls. As the portcullis was raised and the circle crossed the draw bridge there was but eerie silence as the population of the city, obedient to a fault, parted to give way for Sunrise and the rest of the circle, minus Shimmer and Sullen Hoof, who had been sent out to search for the lunar.

Speaker retrieved his singing staff from elsewhere and raised a podium of stone for Sunrise to get up on so that all could see her. It was with heavy and hesitant steps that Sunrise ascended to address the city.

“You sure she won’t just order them to grab us and then brain-wash us all?” Speaker quietly said with no small amount of trepidation to Cash.

Cash bowed his head slowly: “Have some faith in my ability to talk to ponies ok? Just like I talked you out of developing  a grudge against Shimmer, then I’ve worked my magic on Sunrise just the same – although I will admit that I had to use charms to get through to her…”

Sunrise drew in a deep breath and pulled down her hood, revealing the mutilated remains of her mane and eyes filled with regret. With charms enhancing the volume of her voice, so that all could hear her clearly, Sunrise spoke: “Ponies of Chung Do, I come to you not as a prophet, but as a pony… and as a pony I am as fallible as the rest of you are”

Murmurs spread throughout the crowd, but no pony spoke out.

“I had thought that by giving you my guidance that I would free you all from doubt, from fear, from hesitance. Now I realize my mistake. I have been shown the prison made in my name but without my knowing, and I have seen how any claim of my name forces unquestioning obedience. This is not what I wanted, yet it was the result actions and lack of foresight. To this end I must instruct you all to know that to doubt is not a sin, and neither is fear, for it shows that you care and that you cherish that which you fear losing. It is our love of the things we do not wish to be without, such as your foals, your spouses and even hope, that makes us ponies, that puts us apart from common animals…” Sunrise said, her charms enhancing her voice so it rang out across the square.

“…so what exactly did you take out of her and what did you put in?” Speaker whispered to Cash.

Cash looked up at Sunrise as she turned to face the part of the crowd that had been behind her: “I took a few ideas out of her head and put a few new ones in – nothing drastic, but the mind-clearing charm had only broken the magical bond that made her unable to resist her compulsions to be fearless and whatnot. I took her wish to be fearless out entirely, and replaced it with a little something I picked up from you, that you should acknowledge your emotions and impulses, but not let them rule you”

“Wise words… you know, under different circumstances I think you’d have made a fine doctor” Speaker replied.

Chuckling quietly, Cash shook his head: “Nah, I wouldn’t be able to stomach the blood or the responsibility. Holding the lives of ponies in my hooves? I don’t want that. I’d much rather that they can take care of themselves so I can have fun doing the things I like”

Speaker nodded, accepting that while Cash may be selfish in his motivations, he was at least clear in his desire to aid others in order to help himself.

Sunrise continued speaking for about half an hour, weaving into her words counter-compulsions that put a set of new ideas into the heads of the ponies of Chung Do – and Speaker got the distinct impression that Cash Charmer had coached her on everything she said:  “I hail from Great Forks, the city of a thousand temples. There they have a law which is above all others, a law that I should have remembered when I came here, for that law states that the theft of free will is illegal. What I have done to you all has impaired your ability to think properly… and so I would urge you all carefully consider your actions, instead of blindly venturing forth without ever thinking about the consequences of your actions”

Ultimately Sunrise mamaged to de-program the ponies of Chung Do, first removing their compulsion to never waver, then their inability to feel or express fear, and then finally she pointed out – referring to all of her previous statements and observatinos during her oration – that she, as a young pony, was truly fallible, and as such her word could not be considered holy and absolute law.

“Ok, and now we run back to the castle” Cash quickly stated just as Sunrise had finished her oration about not blindly obeying her every word. Speaker didn’t quite catch why this was necessary, but as the counter-compulsion sank into the crowd around the circle the quiet murmurs and whispers of the crowd soon turned into a roar of angry shouts, as the ponies of Chung Do were finally able to express every ounce of their disapproval and rage at having been mentally enslaved…

Cash, Sunrise, Speaker and Red all quickly ran back to the castle where the drawbridge was quickly raised and the portcullis quickly lowered, granting the circle a brief reprieve.

In the courtyard, Sunrise was mortified at the crowd’s reaction – but she none the less seemed to sympathize with them as well. It was clear that she and Cash had discussed the very likely possibility of a hostile reaction upon the ponies of Chung Do finally having their minds freed up, but Sunrise clearly hadn’t expected them to be this furious.

“Right, and now it’s turn” said Cash somewhat drearily, trotting towards the steps up to the battlements above the drawbridge and portcullis.

Following Cash over to the stairs, Speaker asked about what Cash meant: “Your turn to what?”

“Simple. My turn to address the crowd. Can’t have them put Sunrise’s head on a stick, now can we? I mean, what kind of precedent wouldn’t that make?” Cash said in a tone that was just as tired as it was nonchalant.

Speaker watched from the courtyard as Cash walked past a frightened Sunrise on to the battlements.

“My fellow ponies of Chung Do, you all know me, Cash Charmer, so I will broker no lies or honeyed words with you now” Cash began, his voice amplified by charms to so all could hear – just like Sunrise had. On a whim Speaker checked that statement via his truth-telling charm and to his surprise then Cash wasn’t actually lying…

“For the last three days I’ve been imprisoned just like a good number of you, held tight in a pillory over at the old sofa and quill warehouse on Westside. Adding insult to injury I was held not among the other ponies held prisoner there, but I was chained down in the latrine, so that I was up to my nose in shit and piss for the duration…” Cash continued, the crowd quieting down as they found Cash’s sympathetic voice sounding as if it spoke for their plight.

Speaker wasn’t sure he wanted to keep listening, but at the same time he was curious as to what Cash and Sunrise had talked about during the day.

“…and yet I’ve chosen to forgive Sunrise Glow for doing what she did, because she didn’t really intend for any of this to happen” Cash said. The crowd broke out in murmurs and shouts, many again decrying Sunrise and calling for her execution.
Cash took the shouts with a smile: “Allow me to explain, for indeed while Sunrise certainly apologized for her actions and undid her damage, then she failed in one aspect: She didn’t explain why she did it, and I promise you my dear ponies, once you understand the context of her actions you will not hate her – at worst you will feel pity for her, for she is but an adolescent thrust into a world of uncaring politics and cruel monsters”

What followed was a gory retelling of Sunrise’s foalhood misadventures, the loss of her parents, the kidnapping attempts, even a brief mention of the circle’s adventures in Sullen Hoof’s old manse: “…and then we found that in the first we were clearly not afraid to play around casually with death-traps that could maim or butcher a pony in seconds. Sunrise despaired for she was frightened at all of this, and so she used some of the charms she had learned upon exaltation to bind her fears away, so they would no longer trouble her”

Speaker was happy that Cash didn’t mention Denansdor, and so listened on as Cash’s story finally caught up with current events: “When the cure was finally distributed Sunrise Glow, fearing nothing, despaired again – for you my dear ponies were rejoicing, so her council and sermons seemed unnecessary, now that you all seemed busy to get on with your lives and rebuild. She hates this feeling, this not knowing what to do, this about her purpose. This was because you all listened to her freely, indeed you had all begun to thank Celestia for having sent her chosen to save you… and the rest of us stood so proudly and simply continued with our work to rebuild and restore the city. In her youthful foolishness she wished to remain in equal esteem, without having to embarrass herself by asking us what else she might do. This led her to quell those feelings by simply repeating what she had done previously: She locked away her ability to doubt, her ability to waver – and then she found herself lost, for she could no longer stop and consider the consequences of her own actions, no longer doubt the righteousness of her actions”

Hearing the origins of Sunrise’s mind-control on herself gave Speaker a new understanding on her condition. O one hoof it made sense, for indeed many a warlord and general would love the power to see their troops made fearless and unable to hesitate against their orders – but as Cash continued the cruel results of this mindless pursuit of spreading the worship of Celestia became apparent.

“And so I now stand before you urging you all to not hate Sunrise, for her intentions were benign and born of inexperience – and as many of witnessed earlier today, then she has been purged of the binds her mind” Cash wrapped up. With essence sight Speaker could see the strange but subtle flows of essence that Cash was weaving through the crowd of ponies. Cash wasn’t doing as Sunrise had, directly applying mind-control to all who heard him – no, he was influencing the crowd itself.

Cash wasn’t changing the minds of the individual ponies in the crowd, he was changing the crowd’s opinion and behavior as a whole. It reminded Speaker of some of the ‘tricks’ that he’d seen Lookshyan unicorn officers employ on their troops on the eve battle: Individually each soldier might be scared, but if they all had a sense that as a whole their unit was ready for battle then they would stay quiet and follow that unicorn into the fray. Cash was doing something similar, for through the portcullis Speaker could still see angry faces, but now they were tempered by an understanding that as a whole their individual opinion of Sunrise wasn’t representative anymore: Now the ponies in twin fountain square pitied Sunrise for her folly more than they hated her for it.

Cash bid the ponies return to their homes and stepped down from the battlements.

“Well then, that was easy enough” Cash said confidently. Speaker shook his head, at the same time awed and somewhat terrified at Cash’s ability to subtly turn a violent mob into a somewhat content crowd.

The circle returned to the castle for a good night’s sleep.

When morning came Speaker awoke to the sound of the city bustling again. There was the distant sound of blacksmiths pounding iron, carpenters bucking in nails and other noises coming from beyond the castle walls.

As the circle gathered for breakfast, the topic was damage control to counter what remained of Sunrise’s work. A chief topic of this was manes, as Sunrise – now not wearing her hood up – displayed her shamefully badly cut mane for all to see.

“Ok, Sunrise, why the manes?” Sullen Hoof had to ask – he just couldn’t wrap his head around why Sunrise had cut her own mane off, and done such a poor job of it, as well as why she’d bid the rest of the city to do the same. Even the young shogun sat at the table with no mane, it having been shaven off while under Sunrise’s influence.

Sunrise looked up from her bowl of rice and grains, giving Sullen Hoof a regretful look: “I… It just made sense, I wasn’t thinking right”

“Remember what we talked about Sunrise. Don’t just say sorry, explain why you did it” Cash noted.

The adolescent mare sighed: “I had a really pretty mane. Ponies everywhere told me so – it was part of why I had been targeted for foalnapping. I figured that the best way to avoid lusty looks and distractions in life would be no longer look good, so I cut my own mane to be uglier… and later I told everyone to cut off their manes, so no pony would look any better than the rest of them”

“At least it’ll grow back… but really Sunrise, you should let a barber try to salvage what’s left of your mane – you’re a very beautiful mare, you shouldn’t hide it” Speaker said, trying to comfort Sunrise.

There was a clatter at the sound of a dropped spoon. Cash looked like he had gotten an idea: “Her Speaker, couldn’t you and Sully mix up some magic brew to grow everypony’s manes back? A mane-growing potion would be a great thing to sell too… I’m sure there’s a bunch of old balding guild factors who’d love to have the manes of their youth back.

Speaker nodded: “That’s actually not a bad idea… but I have no clue where to even begin. Shimmer had a charm that could grow hair back – and I based the plague cure on my own medical charms – I’ll need her back if you want a mane-growing potion before the next century”

“Right, well – Sunrise, do you know where Shimmer went, or why she’s disappeared?” Cash said, his voice perfectly calm and non-accusatory.

Sunrise slumped forward, nearly faceplanting her breakfast. She hit the table with a loud thunk: “Oh no… I told her to go away, saying that Speaker was still upset at her causing the fire… I… gods… I’m so sorry, I don’t know where she is”

Between Speaker and Cash, having their worst fears regarding what happened to Shimmer confirmed, the mood of the dining room soured. Sunrise added, in between tears, that Shimmer had been incredibly upset when she’d been sent away – and that at the speed she’d left Shimmer could be half-way back to the west by now.

“Damnit. There has to be a way for us to get in touch with her” Cash said frustrated.

Speaker suggested that they seek out a sorcerer to send a magical message – but Cash pointed out that without Shimmer they were in a tough spot for transportation, and conventional travel was somewhat difficult due to the rebel blockades around Chung Do. This all meant that getting to anywhere there might be a sorcerer who’d be willing to sell her services, which Cash added would not be cheap, would be difficult. 

“Let’s call that plan B then – but hey, Shimmer said that it was her exaltation’s bond with Speaker that led her to him originally… how about a way to use that to lead us to her?” Sullen Hoof suggested.

Cash quickly caught on to the idea: “That’s perfect – in fact… I think I remember a couple of charms that can do just that”
Over the next couple of days Speaker and Cash spent their time going over what little that remained of the construction effort to finish city, as well as joint meditations on what Cash recalled of what he called the Sun and Moon Method – a way to send a solar’s essence through his link to his lunar mate and then sense in what direction its going, allowing for perfect tracking.

Figuring out the charm wasn’t easy: Speaker, with his essence sight, could help Cash direct his inner essence flows – but finding Cash’s lunar bond tether proved difficult – it wasn’t as strong as Speaker’s – but they ultimately figured it out and then Cash was able to instruct Speaker on what to do to sense the direction of Shimmer. One thing Speaker was a big disappointed over was that the charm only provided a sense of direction, not a measure of distance – because Shimmer felt as if she was somewhere to the north-west, and she was most likely traveling a lot faster than Speaker or Cash could.
“Ok that’s not entirely true…” Cash noted. Speaker peaked an eyebrow.

Cash explained that a charm he’d recently begun to recall quite vividly was one that allowed him to empower any animal he rode in such a way that could ceaselessly gallop at incredible speeds, only limited by how much punishment the body of the beast could handle.

Speaker wasn’t sure if this was that useful: “Cash, we’re ponies – we don’t really ride anything… and what few chariots I’ve seen some unicorns travel by are usually drawn by other ponies”

“Yes, but when we followed that guild caravan to get here the guild wagons were drawn by yeddim – those things are tough as nails – I can’t even imagine how fast something like that could go with this charm” Cash noted.

This mention of speeding yeddim stirred strange memories in Speaker’s mind, but it also helped clarify a few of his first age recollections: “You know, that might just explain how yeddim came into existence… but where are you going to find a yeddim here? To my knowledge there are none, at least not in the yeddim stables I built for future guild caravans”

Cash conceded that getting one might be a little difficult – but there was sure to be other things in or around Chung Do that could work for his charm. The critical element was ultimately just to ensure that they would go faster than Shimmer was – and while Sunrise had told them that Shimmer had flown off in her monster-pony form, then Cash pointed out that to be absolute sure to catch up with her, they would need to move faster than her magic cloud.

“Ok… well… I guess we could send Red and Sully out into the forest we found the magic mushrooms in to find us something big and tough there” Speaker mused. Cash found this to be an excellent idea, as he truly missed having Shimmer around – if for nothing else then as a really handy means of speedy transportation.

Red and Sullen Hoof thus ventured forth into the woods around Chung Do, while Speaker began work on a harness for Cash and himself to strap themselves into. Speaker also began drawing up designs for a yeddim howdah for when Cash would finally get a yeddim… because Cash seemed really intent on trying that new charm of his on a yeddim.

The two solar hunters returned the next day dragging a very big unconscious bear behind them. The looks that the two got as they hauled it to the castle were priceless – especially since they seemed to have taken the bear down with only their hooves – but that was nothing compared to the sight that was Cash racing around the periphery of twin fountain square, strapped on to the back of the quite feral bear that none the less somehow obeyed Cash’s commands as he jerked the reigns.

The plume of dust that trailed the bear and Cash as the sped around the square was as almost as tall as the buildings they were passing by, but ultimately Cash steered the bear into the castle courtyard and slowed it to a halt.

The bizarre sight of Cash, in his heavenly silks, on top of a bear, confused Speaker as to whether he should laugh or shake his head – but Cash cut him off before he could do either: “It’s not fast enough. Shimmer’s cloud went faster than this”

Releasing himself from the bear-saddle, Red quickly leapt in to wrestle the bear down as it began to turn to attack Cash: “So, we don’t need her anymore?”

“Nope, sorry for troubling you – you can do away with it now” Cash idly stated.

With a single buck to the head Red knocked the bear out – again – although this time she called for a buggy to haul the bear out of the city with.

As the bear left their sights, Cash and Speaker discussed what their options were. The local wildlife didn’t seem to have anything sufficient to sustain the speeds needed to catch Shimmer. Cash suggested they made Sunrise send a message in the form of a prayer to a god in Yu-Shan who could then relay that message to the gold faction.

“That’s not a bad idea – but what can they do? Any magic cloud a sidereal sorcerer can conjure will only go as fast as Shimmers. We won’t really be able to catch up with her that way” Speaker noted. Cash frowned.

Speaker shook his head. It really bothered him that Shimmer was out there somewhere, thinking gods knows what about him, all based on a lie that Sunrise had put in her head: “I can’t believe that this Sun and Moon Method is all we can use our bond for. She said that she felt a longing through it – there has to be a way to pull on that enough to make her overcome whatever Sunrise told her… what?”

Cash looked like he had an idea. He looked very much like he had an idea: “Speaker, friend, I think you just solved our problem”

Over the next week Speaker finished the geomantic details that he had been interrupted in working on previously, as well as working with Cash on a charm that supposedly built on the Sun and Moon Method… a charm that, according to Cash would allow them to do more or less exactly what Speaker had described: It would enable them to send telepathic messages to their lunar mates via the connection their bond made.

While difficult to learn, indeed it felt almost impossible to form the delicate essence patterns in his mind and around the soul-spanning bridge relay that he was trying to create, Speaker couldn’t deny the extreme usefulness of such a charm. It could allow for peerless coordination between him and Shimmer during medical procedures, or if Shimmer was scouting a location in the form of a bird she could relay information back in real time.

“No hold on – this charm is one-way… she won’t be able to send thoughts back to you” Cash noted, opening an eye from his meditations.

Speaker shrugged: “I will have to develop such a charm then – two-way is much better than one-way communication. Heck, one of the charms that are pretty much mandatory for Lookshyan unicorns to learn is a charm that allows for general short-ranged telepathy. It’s extremely useful on the battlefield to discreetly send new commands around” 

Agreeing that such an improvement to this new charm didn’t sound that bad, Cash sighed as he was growing increasingly frustrated himself with the charm. It seemed impossible to get it to work…

It became evening as Speaker got up from the mats they were sitting on and looked out over the city from the castle balcony: “I’m beginning to suspect that this charm is beyond our ken right now. We would probably need to refine our essence quite a lot before we can make it work – but that you remember such detailed charms from the first that’s quite impressive Cash”

“I think you’re right – damnit” Cash begrudgingly said. All of his plans for how to deal with the rebel nobles and the rest of Creation had hinged on Shimmer’s transportation and communication spells – this truly frustrated him, but as fate would have it then Cash didn’t get very long to frown about the situation as suddenly the loud hoot of a snow-owl interrupted him.
Speaker turned to look at the owl. It was almost comical: Their meditation ended by frustration and now a random animal had hooted at them for no reason what so ever. Cash cracked a smile at the situation. He clearly shouldn’t.

In the blink of an eye the owl had turned into a stunningly beautiful mare with a grand moonsilver spear who pinned Cash against the floor of the balcony, impaling him through his left shoulder so quickly that it took a moment for even Cash to register that he had been hurt.

“You will never learn the Soul-Spanning Bridge Relay technique – swear it!” the mare shouted, an unquestionable feral air about her look, her dark mane streaked with white streaks and grey owl feathers, the fury in her eyes, all of communicating the unspoken message that she could kill both solars in a heartbeak.

Cash was too shocked to know what to say – the sudden attack, the strange demand – and Speaker could at the very least tell that this lunar, who clearly wasn’t Shimmer, meant business.

The light-grey coated  mare in moonsilver armor twisted the spear, causing Cash to scream in pain. Speaker was about to reach for Cash to administer his anesthetic charm but the mare somehow used the shaft of her moonsilver spear to swat Speaker’s hoof away, without ever withdrawing the spear from Cash’s shoulder and balcony floor underneath him, as if the shaft had momentarily turned into a flail or nunchago.

Through gritted teeth that Speaker could see before his very eyes grew fangs, the mare screamed: “SWEAR IT!”
This time, through the pain and seemingly imminent prospect of death, Cash feebly nodded: “Ok, I promise”

Clearly not satisfied, the mare smacked Cash over the face with a hoof that grown silver-blue claws, leaving three long and bloody gashes along Cash’s face: “Do it right! Sanctify it!”

It slowly dawned on both Cash and Speaker the implications of the lunars actions… this was Cash’s lunar mate – who clearly had a problem with Cash learning that solar to lunar telepathy charm. In response to this dawning realization, along with the unbelievably painfulfact that his right eye had just been ‘popped’ open by the mare’s moonsilver claws, Cash barely managed to speak under the haze of pain, but still managed to utter: “Wha- no!”

Enfuriated by Cash’s defiance, the mare yanked Cash and her spear off the ground threw him against the castle wall, impaling Cash on the now vertical surface: “You don’t have a choice in this! Do it or I kill you now and wait for your next incarnation!”

At this point Cash was barely conscious, both from the bloodloss, being cut up and now being slammed against the castle wall, but Cash didn’t want to die either, so against his better judgement he feebly raised a hoof and touched his bloodied forehead, his caste mark erupting along with golden streams of essence that formed old realm glyphs that briefly swirled about him…

Before the light from Cash’s castemark had faded the lunar mare was gone in a flutter of wing-beats, shouting “This is your second chance, you will get no more”. Cash collapsed on the balcony, the spear holding him to the castle wall having dissolved nothing as the lunar had shapeshifted. Speaker instantly rushed to Cash to try to save his friend.

Cash’s skull was cracked, he had three deep lacerations across the face and his right eye was ruined – plus his left shoulder was a mess of bone splinters and bloodied meat-sponge. Steeling himself, Speaker quickly administered  his anesthetic charm and then went to work, channeling enough essence through his medical charms that he erupted in a bonfire of golden light, lighting up the front of the castle with his anima.

Red and Sullen Hoof appeared moments later with a hoofful of guards in response to the screaming, finding Speaker busy with trying to piece Cash back together. Speaker could offer no explanation for what had just happened.

Suddenly there was a rush of air in the evening wind and a familiar seagul-cry: Shimmer flew in on the balcony, turned from seagull to pony as she  landed. She took one look at the situation, sighing in relief that both Cash and Speaker were still alive: “I can tell you what happened: Lilith happened”

> Chapter 38: Drums of Old Wars
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

While Speaker tended to Cash’s wounds – which were grave, but very much possible for Speaker to mend – Shimmer explained her and Lilith’s story, well that was the plan evidently, but upon seeing Speaker she burst out crying. Evidently she had thought that the other Lunar had come to kill Speaker.

As Shimmer calmed down and Speaker wrapped up both Cash and his treatment of Cash, leaving the eclipse caste Solar’s face covered in glimmering stitches of essence as well as a new eye that was slowly but surely growing into place, plus a very sore shoulder, the circle moved inside the castle and assembled in one of the castles four tea rooms.

“I’m glad that you came back” Speaker said as everyone sat down. There hadn’t been much thought behind it, and it certainly didn’t sound very affectionate, but there wasn’t any malice in his voice either. He had missed her as a friend, nothing more – and Shimmer picked up on this quite acutely, but at the same time she clearly picked up on the message that he’d never wanted her to leave to begin with.

Wiping the last of her tears Shimmer confessed that after Sunrise had told to leave Chung Do on account of Speaker’s apparent change of heart and dissatisfaction with her, she had fled to the nearest ‘friendly’ Lunar enclave she knew of. It had been there she had learned that an elder Lunar, Lilith, had passed her in the opposite direction.

“Ok, and who the hell is this Lilith? She sure seemed to know me. She’s my Lunar mate, isn’t she?” Cash inquired inbetween short pained breaths. Shimmer nodded.

“Lilith is… famous, sort of, among the silver pact. I’m not sure if I’m the one who should tell you why, but lets just say that she’s not happy with you Cash – and that the fact that you’re still alive speaks volumes about her right now” Shimmer explained.

Speaker noted a curious flaw of a sort in Shimmer’s explanation: “Hold on. If she is Cash’s Lunar mate and has a grudge against him, or his past incarnation… wouldn’t that mean that she was alive during the usurpation for her to remember him like that?”

Shimmer sighed and nodded: “She’s one of the four oldest lunars in existence… and very powerful on account of that”
“ Ok, bad blood behind me and her, right – why did she force me to sanctify an oath never to learn that soul-spanning telepathy charm? Cash wondered.

Shimmer’s ear swiweled and folded back, her lip quivered ever so slightly, and her brows furrowed in a way that made Speaker think that they were shapeshifting into a more menacing form: “That charm… is pure evil. I can understand why she chose to have you promise never to learn that”

“And how is that bad? I thought it sounded really handy to have a telepathic connection – although it’d clearly work better if it was two-way. We were just trying to learn it to send you a message to come back home… I never wanted you to leave” Speaker noted.

Shimmer paused for a moment. Her gaze went from Cash to Speaker repeatedly: “If you can develop a charm that allows that every Lunar in creation will breathe a sigh of relief, that much I can promise you. Until then it is something I can only pray to Luna that you will all stay away from”

“I’m still not seeing why it’s such a ‘bad’ charm” Cash said, resting uncomfortably on a futon. His shoulder injury made it difficult to sit in any position that didn’t hurt.

“It’s obvious. It allows you to send any message, no matter how manipulative or cruel, straight to your Lunar mate – and they have no means to prevent you. It’s doesn’t sound much different from what I did to all the ponies here in the city” Sunrise explained, having entered the room just moments earlier.

Shimmer turned to face Sunrise – and turned into her monster-pony form: “You!” With a powerful leap Shimmer grabbed Sunrise in her talons and shook her violently. Sunrise had anticipated a reaction such as this and had armored herself with her charms, so she wasn’t harmed.

“Shimmer! Let her go!” Speaker shouted. Shimmer gave her Solar mate a look like a dog that didn’t want to let go of a toy it was having fun biting into, but Speaker was having none of it, so she put Sunrise down.

The circle quickly explained the events of last few weeks, including Sunrise’s fall from grace and subsequent penance: “If it wasn’t for Cash I wouldn’t even have been able to reconnect with the ponies here, but over the last week I’ve worked hard to make amends, still am. I’m… I’m sorry Shimmer. I wronged you so very much… if there is anything I can ever do to make it up to you” Sunrise said.

Shimmer closed her eyes and frowned momentarily, rubbing her brows with her talons: “Among Lunars we mark a debt owed with a circle carved into the flesh of the one who owes it. I’ll spare you that, but you Sunrise, you owe me big-time”
Sunrise nodded apologetically, humbly bowing her head so low that her ears touched the mosaic floor: “Anything”

Looking over at Speaker, Shimmer quickly noted: “She’s different…”

“Told you the bonds she’d put on her mind changed her. She’s her true  self now” Speaker explained, feeling relieved that Shimmer had listened to him and put Sunrise down.

With things settled, at least as much as possible, the circle briefly celebrated that they were once again united by sharing a bottle of of the castle’s sake. After that they discussed the idea of fixing mane-shortage of the city. Shimmer found this to be quite amusing, and seemed greatly amused to regrow Sunrise Glow’s mane – leaving Sunrise with a huge and slightly curly orange head of hair that reached all the way down to the floor. The young shogun was also helped out in a similar albeit slightly more restrained fashion.

The next day Speaker, Shimmer and Sullen Hoof met in the medical laboratory where they began work on creating a potion that could mimic the effects of Shimmer’s body-altering charm, specifically so it could be distributed to the ponies of the city to regrow their manes. By nightfall they had nailed down the key alchemical factors needed and by the end of the week the city saw a boom in the hair-stylist industry. By that time Cash had also stopped wearing the eye-patch that Speaker had equipped him with, as his new eye had grown back, plus his wounds had fully healed. At Cash’s request Speaker also used his charms to remove any scars from the injuries.

With the city now fully restored the question was what next. Cash reminded the circle of the issue with the rebel nobles – for while the city was now whole and reinvigorated, it was still down to slightly less than half its original population, and while they did have enough food for the winter, then if the blockade around the city wasn’t broken come spring there would be trouble of the starving kind.

It was second month of the season of Air, the winds having already begun to cool as an early herald of the coming winter of water when the east would be blanketed in ice and show. Cash once again argued that the circle shouldn’t move against the rebel nobles until spring came at the end of the season of water, his logic being that by then the army that the nobles were training would be nice and ready for the circle to coopt and deploy against any outer threats facing the Chung lands – as Cash was certain that the neighboring territories and warlord holds south and west of the Chung lands were keeping tabs on what was happening, waiting to see if there was a moment of weakness for them to strike at.

“Ok, but what are we going to for the next… what, four months?” Red wondered, looking out over Chung Do from the windows in the banquet hall.

“Govern, adjudicate, be the rulers we once were – or at least practice for it” Cash idly mused.

Sunrise nodded: “It’ll take time for the ponies here to warm up to me again – I need to earn their trust again”

“Both sound reasonable – but if you’re open to it, then I have another idea: Meditative essence refinement” Speaker suggested.

Red frowned: “That’s some big words there, what do you mean?”

Speaker explained that this period of hopefully relative peace and quiet would be a great opportunity for everyone to purify their essence. It would allow them to learn powerful and complex charms, as well as improve their grasp of the essence within and around them. Red liked the idea of more powerful charms, while Cash was curious at what more complex charms he might learn. The circle ultimately agreed that this was a worthwhile pursuit, especially after Speaker added that the way that one did this was a very individual way – it  simply required that each of them find an simple activity that matched them well and, ideally, was somehow iconic of their very nature.

“You know… I’ve actually begun finding doing paperwork kind of relaxing” Cash noted in relation to Speaker’s explanation.
Nodding, Speaker agreed: “Exactly. Refining your essence doesn’t have to mean sitting down all day and going ‘ohm’. If that was the case not even unicorns would have the time to refine their essence”

Shimmer added that her elders always suggested that Lunars who wanted to refine their essence venture into the wyld and meditate on the endless protean potential and change that was around them – but she’d also once spent five months as a seagull acting out purely her animal side and connecting with her instincts, purifying her essence that way: “The trick is simply not to think too much, because that muddies your essence flow. You want perfect balance and stillness of the mind”
And so it came to be that the circle spent the next several months on various meditative tasks. Cash would spend days slowly drafting legislation as if it was poetry, while Red trained with a zen-like patience on a series of wooden training dummies that Speaker had supplied her. Speaker spent his time operating a medical clinic, letting Shimmer handle all the ‘costumer relations’ and whatnot while he simply performed the healing that he loved to do.

Winter came as it had seemingly always done, at least as far as anyone currently alive in creation was concerened, with the howling of the windigos. These elemental s  of chilling winds would race forth from their elemental courts in the north and herald the coming of the snow and ice as the bureau of heaven rotated its seasonal leadership to match the new season. Speaker would idly recall a time in the first age when the Solars controlled creation to the degree that even the weather and thus seasons only changed when allowed.

When the thaw came Speaker found that he missed the creation-wide winter wrap-up celebrations that he remembered so vividly. Cash couldn’t remember anything of what Speaker described, instead finding it more curious how Speaker’s geomantic architecture allowed things to grow within the city walls as if the winter wasn’t even there. It apparently meant that nearly everyone in the city had set up small gardens in large pots, with almost everything growing remarkably quickly. It had apparently helped lessen the effect of the blockade on the city – but there still wasn’t very much rice left.

The essence purification was difficult to gauge – one couldn’t simply plot the power of an exalted pony on a chart rating from one to ten, but the circle still felt their powers having noticeably improved around the last days of resplendent water, during some of the coldest days of the winters. This marked the end of the circle’s meditations. Speaker was also running out of timber to construct more training dummies for Red to smash.

Shimmer also reported that from her daily flights over the city, something she had begun a few weeks earlier to check for rebel activity nearer the city than the blockades, that scouting parties had begun camping closer to the city – no doubt looking for signs of survivors from the plague.

Cash convened the circle in the shogun’s war room, as now was time to plan how to finally deal with these troublesome nobles. 

“Our first point of order should be food. We have three weeks worth of rice left in the granaries, and the blockades the farmers around the city aren’t being allowed to come here with the earliest shoots. Beyond that then I figure that a lot of the surrounding farms probably have large surplus stores on account of not having been able to sell their produce here, assuming that they’ve been able to preserve what they grew” Cash started.

Red was more interested in directly confronting the nobles, but Cash pointed out that even if they traveled to Birdstone, the capital of Daimyo Crane Lotus’s hold – where, if the original information they had gotten from the blockade they had smashed through when the circle had originally come to Chung Do, the rebel army was stationed – and brought the nobles to heel in a day, then it would still take a while to get recall orders around and open up the trade roads: “The city will starve before the usual flow of goods and food into the city opens up properly”

“Wow, you’ve really thought this through, haven’t you?” Shimmer said, sounding ever so slightly incredulous.

Cash gave the Lunar a somewhat tired glare: “For the last three months all I’ve done is numbers and seeing how they’ve kept shrinking, especially the numbers for Chung Do’s food supply. We have less than thirtyfour thousand sacks of rice left, and we eat about two thousand a day. You do the math”

“Oh I believe you, although if that’s the case wouldn’t that give us almost four weeks before the granaries run out?” Shimmer mused. Cash explained that his calculations factored in the hoarding and theft that were bound to start happening once word got out that there was less than a week’s worth of food left in the city. Shimmer conceded that she hadn’t thought of such events: “I’m more used to tribal island communities in the west where you just send a few boats out with nets or harpoons every day to bring home food – starvation isn’t really something you see very often there”

With Cash having impressed upon the circle the importance of shoring up the city’s food supply, the question became how. Cash suggested that they do it in combination with destroying the blockades: “That way we can open up the city in one fell swoop and hopefully be able to inform the surrounding farming communities that they can start showing up with their good on their own – that’ll speed up the whole process as well”

“Won’t the rebel daimyos simply send more troops to rebuild the blockades – and then lay proper siege to the city once they realize that we’re not dead from plague?” Red wondered.

Cash pointed to a map of the Chung lands, noting that the distance from Chung Do to Birdstone, if traveleld on hoof as – say – an army of ponies, would be a little over four to five days. Shimmer nodded and added that a siege had some very stringent logistical needs: “You need to be able to feed your army very well – but beyond that we have to remember something: When we first came here and came up to the northern villages to combat the Bodhisattva they said that the rebel daimyos had taken most of their produce. Now if I understand you right Cash, then Chung Do normally stores all the produce from the surrounding farming communities in its granaries, right? So where are the daimyo’s putting all the stuff that hasn’t come to Chung Do? I think what we need to look for is where they’ve set up stores and raid them – and I’ll bet that they’re set up not too far from the city in order to feed the blockade troops and later a siege”

“That would make sense from a military point of view – a siege is all about starving your opponent into surrendering” Speaker noted.

So it was decided that Shimmer would fly out to do some serious scouting. In a few days she had charted most of the surrounding lands, adding what she’d learned to the maps Cash was using. This yielded the locations of two blockades on the trade roads going east, as well as one on the western and the southern trade road. Shimmer also spotted the naval blockade that was holding back the river traffic trying to go to Chung Do south of the city.

“You mean there’s no river blockade north of the city?” Cash wondered, surprised that his foes had overlooked such an obvious means to resupply the city.

Red pointed out on the maps that the brown river terminated seven miles north of the city into four different creeks and streams that were too small to support merchant shipping: “The only boats that might have come from that direction would be farmers or fisherponies – and I’ve not seen a single one do that in the months we’ve been here, so whatever the nobles have done they’ve stopped that as well”

“All right, but these supply depots. Shimmer, you say they’re fortified barns with troops garrisoned around them? If we hit them we should be able to increase the city’s food supply to last long enough for the regular supply to resume, that way we’ll also be able to send a message to the nobles that we mean business and have the power to oppose them – then we go to Birdstone and pluck Daimyo Crane Lotus’s feathers” Cash noted.

While Red was all for finally taking the fight to the rebels she did have a few things to say first: “Hold on – we need to prepare properly for this fight”

Cash wasn’t sure what they needed to prepare for, firmly believeing that between everyone in the circle they had more than enough might to throw down these unruly nobles. Red wasn’t impressed: “Cash, a week ago you lost an eye and nearly bled to death. You need to learn a defensive charm before we go anywhere, and Shimmer didn’t scout out Birdstone so all your plans on how to deal with the nobles are based on guesswork. Now I agree that hitting these supply stations and blockades first is a good idea, and that when we do that we’ll have about as much as it takes for news of this to get to Birdstone and the nobles to organize a response which will most likely be marching their army on Chung Do – we should use that wisely. Equally we should take a few prisoners for interrogations when we go raiding the supply stations, for information”

“You know, you might say you don’t like to lead, but you’re sounding more and more like a general these days Red” Speaker mused. Red brushed off the comment saying that she was merely looking out for the plight of her people.

Thus the circle set about shoring up their abilities, Sunrise teaching Cash a defensive charm that Cash found extremely appealing to his sensibilities: It enhanced his abilities to sidestep attacks based on the power of his own ego: “I swear, it’s like this charm was made for me!”

“Perhaps, but you should test it first. Speaker and Red have been sparing in the courtyard while we’ve been training, go join them and see how the ego shield works.

In the castle courtyard Speaker and Red had been trading blows left, right and center for almost a week. Speaker had found the experience most satisfying, his sparing having revealed to him another technique for his unique martial style, one that Red had found extremely annoying. Cash emerged into the courtyard a scene of Speaker sitting on a small chair while Red was sweating profusely, dodging left and right while trying to keep her guards up, swearing like a sailor as Gift kept flying around her and trying to strike her – the technique that Speaker had found allowed him to override the feature in Gift that would make it return to him after hitting its target. Gift had been assailing Red for well over an hour.

“I swear I’m going to get you for this Speaker!” Red shouted as she swatted Gift away with a hoof wreathed in golden essence, only to have the bladed disc fly back at her a few seconds later.

Cash found the scene endlessly amusing as he approached Speaker: “She hasn’t tried to just catch the damned thing?”

“It doesn’t like being caught. The best she’s managed so far has been to smack it into the ground so it gets stuck, but that doesn’t even do much since Sully taught me a charm that works any thrown projectile free with ease” Speaker mused.

Cash explained his new fancy defensive charm, asking Speaker if he could get to test it. Speaker accepted Cash’s request: “Hey Red, take a breather”

Gift suddenly changed course and zoomed back to Speaker: “You may want to distance yourself a little”

Cash took a few steps backwards when Speaker suddenly threw Gift at him – but Cash, having activated his new charm seemed to not even have to try, Gift simply passing by him. Gift swerved, and tried again and again to hit Cash – all with the same result: Gift missed, not by a wide margin, but in none of the cases did it appear as if Cash even had to try to move out of the way.

Recalling Gift, Speaker nodded in approval: “Ok, that’s fairly impressive. I imagine this means that I won’t have to patch you up as much now?”

Cash laughed: “I should hope so”

During the time that most of the solar part of the circle had been training in preparation for the attacks on the supply stations Shimmer and Sullen Hoof had been scouting and infiltrating Birdstone. Shimmer, in the form of  a local bird, had spent time trying to get an accurate read on the state of the rebel army, while Sullen Hoof had infiltrated castle Birdstone and learn everything possible about the rebel nobles and the possible deathknight that Heath Rose had warned them about. It had been agreed that the two would spend a week doing this, meaning that they returned via magic cloud a few days after Cash’s lessons in defensive essence use had concluded.

Having gathered in one of the castle’s tea salons, the circle and the young Shogun listened as Shimmer first told of her exploits: “We landed in the treetops of a forest north of the city so nobody would see the magic cloud descending and split up. I turned into a small bird and had a look at the army encampments. They’re stationed in a crescent around northern edge of the city, completely blocking the main road to Chung Do. I checked the quartermaster’s ledgers and they’re at least buying enough food to feed some seven thousand ponies daily. Looking at their drills and exercises it was clear that the vast majority of the soldiers are levied farm-ponies who’ve never held a spear in their hooves before, although it was clear that some of the older troops had gone through the motions before”

“Makes sense. Father used to have the daimyo’s levy troops often for whatever was needed” the young Shogun said.
“Do they look ready for battle? Were they well-fed?” Speaker wondered.

Shimmer explained that while the food they were serving to the troops was bland, then it was plentiful: “I’m guessing that a lot of what would usually go to feed Chung Do has been diverted to the army. As for battle-readiness, then it’s a mixed lot. Most of the army is just levied militia, armed with not much more than spears and some very simple leather barding, but from what I overheard their officers talk about then the army is chiefly there for the numbers, not for usefulness. They don’t seem to expect much of a fight for Chung Do, but they want to be able to brag about having a big army to ward off enemies outside the Chung lands”

Cash was disappointed that the army itself wasn’t much use, but could see the logic that the Daimyos were using.

What Sullen Hoof had to tell was a bit more dire: “When I first got into the city as a traveling mendicant I ran across a very sad sijaneese mortician at a tavern. He was drowning his sorrows in some local swill that tasted like crap, and told me in between sobs that he’d been fired…”

“Why would you fire a mortician? What are they doing with their dead?” Red wondered, her voice clearly giving away the fact that she really didn’t want her question answered.

Sullen Hoof sighed: “The mortician didn’t know – but said that for the last several months there’s been no funerals in Birdstone – and all ponies in and around the city are now required by decree from the Daimyo to deliver their dead to the castle”

“Zombie army?” Speaker wondered. The worried looks in the light from the flickering fireplace showed that he wasn’t the only one thinking something along that line.

Sullen Hoof shook his head and gestured for the others to calm down: “No, nothing like that. In the castle basement and dungeons I found all the corpses. Yes they’ve been animated, and a lot of them were falling apart, but they seemed mostly to be doing menial labor and busywork. When I looked around in the castle proper there weren’t that many zombie servants walking around – from what I could hear from the other nobles staying there, then some of the found the practice quite upsetting…”

“If Daimyo Crane is that far in bed with the deathknights that he’s letting them raise his dead as servants… good grief” Red mused, not really sure what to make of this revelation.

Going through his notes, Sullen Hoof added – with on small amount of disgust: “The discussion I heard on that ended when another pony suggested that the noble who didn’t like the zombie servants talk to someone called Typhon. Apparently he’s the pony who’s ‘organized’ the zombie ponies, and he’s the one who’s somehow convinced almost all the other nobles of accepting undead labor. They apparently like the idea of serfs and peasants that can’t rebel and are unquestioningly loyal”
“Did you kill anyone while at it?” Speaker asked hesitantly. It was clear from how Sullen Hoof had described the notion of converting one’s servants into undead zombie-slaves that he found the idea revolting – and knowing Sullen Hoof’s aspirations of punishing the greedy and powerful for their abuses against the weak, then it certainly wasn’t unlikely that Sullen Hoof had done something like that.

Shaking his head dismissively, Sullen Hoof’s expression soured: “No, but I know which ones I will if we don’t find a way to make them all renounce this madness. If they’re under the mind-control of a deathknight then I might give them a pass… but if not”

“Very well – did you learn anything else while in the castle?” Cash wondered. Sullen Hoof noted that most of the nobles there seemed to have arrived over the last few weeks, so they were probably gathering in anticipation for a final assault on Chung Do. Shimmer said that with what she’d heard the army officers say, then all they were waiting for was word back from their advanced scouting parties, the ones she’d seen camp around the city, looking for ways in to check if there’s any pony left.

“Do we have anyone on the walls?” Cash wondered, as that would show that there was still a military presence in the city. Cash shook his head.

“They also knew about the fire – the blockades had seen the smoke” Shimmer added.

Taking a deep breath, Speaker floated his tea-cup down to the table and stood up: “Then I think it’s time we open up the city. Lets hit the supply posts and blockades tomorrow – all of them. We can do a sweep east first, then one west, then one south down the river”

“If we’re assaulting the river blockade, could we try to take whatever ships they’re using intact?

Red craned her neck and looked up at the vine-line carvings of the wood paneling on the ceiling: “What about prisoners? If we slaughter all the ponies at the blockades there’ll be none left to run back to their masters and tell of our exploits”

“Spoken as a true mercenary –but you’re right: We should actually ensure that some ponies escape from what we do tomorrow. It’ll send a powerful message back to the nobles and that’ll give us a better position to negotiate from when we go visit them next, say… a week later. That’ll give the survivors from our raids time to report what happened, and it’ll let the nobles stew for a few days” Cash said gleefully, sounding eager to boldly go forth and buck some flank.

Speaker shrugged: “Well, that sounds reasonable. As for prisoners, then we know enough about their numbers and readiness – we don’t really need any more information – but at the same time I think it’ll also send a strong message if we simply rush and wreck the blockades without necessarily killing any pony there. Let them know that we are powerful but also merciful – that’ll make it easier to convince the soldiers to accept our command once we take over. If they only know us as ‘those ponies who killed all our friends’ they’ll be less cooperative” 

“That makes sense – plus if we have to hunt down every pony at each blockade it’ll start getting boring. I’ve been part of raids back when I was a merc where my orders were to hunt down entire tribes of wyld mutants – that gets boring fast if you’re looking for that single one who got away” Red said, sounding quite comfortable with talking about the fact that she’d been part of slaughtering a whole tribe of mutated ponies. Shimmer gave Red a disapproving glare.

> Chapter 39: Fury From The Heavens
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was shortly after breakfast that the circle assembled in the castle courtyard. Shimmer had a cloud ready, and they were quickly off in an eastern direction. Sullen Hoof spotted the first blockade quickly, but they flew past it towards a location that Shimmer had identified as the supply station where a lot of the grain and rice that should have been sold in Chung Do had been stored, in anticipation for the siege it might have to feed later.

It was a large farm and apple orchard, which had been fortified with a wooden stockade around the perimeter. Shimmer said that it had a garrison of about fifty soldiers, ten junior officers and one senior officer. Red said: “A target-rich environment – love it already”

The circle briefly discussed whether or not they should use any obvious powers. Sure, they were flying in on a cloud – but they could still land some distance away from the supply depot and walk the rest of the way. The real issue was that if any survivors from the depot made it back to Birdstone and spoke of nies with golden and silvery powers… well, it might make any formal negotiations difficult.

“Honestly – we can’t hide our exaltations forever. And Speaker, remember when we first came here after the guild caravan had been necro’d? The officer at that road block had heard of you and the unicorn you’d fought. If they knew about you, then the daimyos know – and then it won’t matter. So I say we go in full force” Cash argued. The rest of the circle couldn’t really find any faults in that logic. Cash noted that if the rebel nobles are already chummy with a deathknight, then they might not even consider them anathema, only powerful ponies to be reckoned with.

Shimmer flew the cloud down into the middle of the farm. The soldiers on the ground quickly spotted the suspicious cloud descending and sounded the alarm – Red only found this amusing as she roared and leapt at them, a large tetsubo wrought of her own essence swinging around her. The cloud dissolved into wisps of silvery essence as Shimmer transformed into her beastpony form and dove for the soldiers as well.

Speaker, Sullen Hoof, Sunrise and Cash Charmer all dropped down onto the roof of the big barn as the cloud dissolved, Sullen Hoof leaping down to join the fray with the soldiers.

Speaker and Sunrise stayed up on the roof, watching the fighting, while Cash began climbing down the side of the barn using his shoe-claws to dig into the side of the building as he made his way down. By the time Cash had reached the ground the fight was over. Red was lording over a big pile of unconscious soldiers, while Shimmer had ensnared two dozen ponies in threads of essence – like the webbing of a spider – and Sullen Hoof emerged moments later with a beat up officer, a cream colored mare from the looks of it, wearing a dented steel helmet with the same white crest of a flower that the soldiers at the blockade the circle had first encountered when traveling to Chung Do – this revealed the troops at the supply depot to be under the command of Daimyo Crane Lotus.

Shimmer tied everyone up with her essence strands, while Speaker and Cash inspected the barn. It was filled to the brim with sacks of grain, rice, dried fruit, barrels of beer and wine. Enough to feed a small army for a month or two, or Chung Do for a few weeks. The question was how to get it all back: Speaker had an idea.

Three hours later Sullen Hoof, Red and Sunrise looked on in a mix of despair, confusion and a general loss of words as Speaker had used his singing staff to raise the barn up from the ground and give it a thick stone plate to ‘stand’ on, it not having been built with any real floor. He’d then cut down a few surrounding trees using Gift, and with Shimmer’s help fashioned four giant wheels and two giant axles – and turned the barn into something not unlike a guild wagon.

“Right, now how are we going to move this thing?” Cash wondered.

Shimmer beheld her and Speaker’s work with a strange mix of pride and incredulity: “I could turn into a tyrant lizard and pull it – but even then, that thing probably weighs more than I can pull in that form”

“If we had a yeddim…” Cash mused…

Sullen Hoof pointed out that according to the map they were using, on which Shimmer had marked the various blockade and supply depot locations, then there was a guild caravansary not far from the farm they were at. Cash started to get a funny look in his eyes.

A short walk, no small amount of haggling, and the exchange of a big purse full of silver later Cash had a yeddim and an even funnier look in his eyes.

Beholding his purchase, its brown shaggy fur and cream-colored mane making it look like any other yeddim used to haul gargantuan loads, meaning that while the massive quadroped stood at a little over seventeen yards at the shoulder it was by no means special in any way, Cash smiled: “I think I’ll call him Appah”

“It’s female” Shimmer noted.

Looking up at the towering giant of a beast of burden, Cash frowned: “Right, well… honestly, considering what I’m planning to do with this beauty I might as well dub her ‘Rape Train’. I honestly can’t think of anything more fitting”

The circle agreed to name the yeddim Nah, Cash objecting but ultimately accepting the majority vote.

The taskmaster of the caravansary looked on in a mix of confusion and financial satisfaction as the circle began to slowly ride off on the howdah atop Nah. The taskmaster’s look changed into one of dumbstruck awe as Cash activated his Flashing Thunderbolt Steed charm…

To the circle the experience of sudden acceleration was slightly different: When on Shimmer’s magic clouds they were all naturally shielded via the cloud against the oncoming rush of air – Cash’s charm offered no such protection – it also made Nah suddenly accelerate to a speed half again as fast as top speed of Shimmer’s magic clouds. Cash relished in the rush of air going through his mane.

Clinging to the wooden railings of the howdah on top of Nah for dear life, the rest of the circle did not share Cash’s enthusiasm – but before any of them could even manage to call for Cash to stop or slow down they found themselves back at the supply depot, as well as no longer moving.

“Ok, Cash, I can see why you wanted to name her Rape Train – I mean, with a bit of barding and armor for its legs you could plow through any formation or light fortification… but please, in the future, give us a heads up before you pull something like that” Red admonished as she caught her breath, looking far less frightened than the rest of the circle, although the part of the howdah railings she had clung to showed clear signs of having been crushed by supernatural strength by someone who’d clung to them very hard.

Speaker added that the wheeled barn would break apart in an instant if moved that quickly – but Cash ashured Speaker that he could make Nah move at more restrained velocities when needed: “I just wanted to see how fast she’d go”

It took some creative refashioning of half a dozen logs, molded via Shimmer’s protean charms, to make a crude harness for the yeddim that connected to the wheeled barn. When time came to mount up and haul the barn back to Chung Do the question that remained was what to with the prisoners – most of which had regained consciousness since the sudden attack, although waking up to see the barn they had been guarding up on wheels had made some of them question if they had been struck on the head during the fighting.

“My dear captive ponies. I’ve been told that your bonds will dissolve come nightfall, at which time I hope you’ll journey back to Birdstone and tell of how effortlessly the six of us bested you all and made off with the barn. Tell them that Chung Do is neither dead nor defenseless and that Cash Charmer sends his regards” Cash proudly sounded off as he bit down on the heavy rope that Speaker and Shimmer had set up as reigns for the yeddim.

Knowing to brace themselves, and with Cash not speeding up Nah to more than around fifty miles an hour – and doing it slowly at that – the circle managed to remain standing as the wheel barn shuddered, groaned and began to move forward.

“Ok, you know – I think we’ll have to redesign the howdah here if we’re ever going to go as fast as earlier. I’m thinking a thick glass windshields and seating where you can buckle down” Speaker mused as he kept throwing worried glances back at the wheeled barn every time the wooden structure moaned from the quite unatural stress put upon it.

The bizarre one-wagon caravan quickly came across the eastern blockade, with the officer in charge quickly stepping out to ‘greet’ the oncoming yeddim and its guild ma- no hold on, that wasn’t a guild wagon, that was the supply depot barn.

“What in the name of the heavens!? You will stop this instant in the name of Daimyo Crane Lotus!” the stallion shouted, his hoarse voice revealing a seasoned officer who had shouted commands for many years.

Cash looked down from atop the howdah: “I’m riding a barn, your arguments are invalid” and yanked Nah’s reigns, somehow wordlessly commanding the yeddim to gently nudge the felled trees that made up the bulk of the road block aside.

The officer quickly shouted orders to stop the yeddim and kill all the ponies on the howdah. As archer-ponies reared up and drew their bows Speaker threw Gift to cut their bow-strings to great effect. The few soldiers stupid enough try to attack Nah’s large elephant-like feet, which were over twice the width of an adult pony, quickly learned that yeddim have hides so tough it’s not even funny. It was like attacking an old oak with a dull sword: Their spears were more likely to get stuck in the dusty hide than Nah was likely to even give notice of what was going on – incidentally then yeddim were known for being the absolutely dumbest animals in creations, infamous for not even taking notice that they were on fire due to their thick skin under their shaggy pelts.

“The road is cleared – will we actually need to fight here?” a very diminutive Sunrise Glow quietly asked Speaker all the while Cash and Red threw disparaging taunts down at the ponies on the ground.

Looking over the railing of the howdah to assess the situation, Speaker nodded: “No I don’t think so – Cash, lets get going”
“Won’t they just rebuild the blockade?” Red wondered, both looking and sounding eager to jump down and take a few swings at the soldiers on the ground.

With a flutter Shimmer landed and turned back into a pony from having circled the barn as a bird: “That wouldn’t matter – we’re not going back here again anytime soon, plus if Cash’s plan works out this place will get orders to dismantle in a few weeks anyway”

The Birdstone soldiers looked on and stomped their hooves in anger as Cash drove Nah and the barn on towards Chung Do, the blockade soldiers helpless to stop it from happening as Speaker kept disarming them every time they tried to set the barn on fire. Like the with depot Cash gave the soldiers of the blockade a boastful little tirade about the might of Chung Do and that he, Cash Charmer, sent his haughty regards to the rebel Daimyos.

As Nah and the wheeled barn approached the city Shimmer flew ahead with Red to open the city gates. The thick stone doors, another recent addition wrought of stone thanks to Speaker, rolled on something akin to greased ball bearings making the doors swing open surprisingly easily. The city gate had always been big enough to let guild wagons pass through, so the wheeled barn passed through with plenty of room to spare. Cash parked Nah and the barn in the northern market square, dozens of ponies quickly rushing to side of the strange sight to see what was going on.

Cash quickly organized an effort to empty and then dismantle the barn. Speaker co-opted a lotof the timbers and iron fittings, arguing that he would need to make better cargo racks for Nah for the raid on the western supply depot: “We can’t be sure that the roads there will allow for another wheeled barn, heck even going up a hill might break it apart… better we just load up Nah”

It took the rest of the day and most of the subsequent morning, but soon Nah was riding off with a nice clear glass windshield at the front of the howdah made of sand sifted from river silt, giving the circle some reprise as Cash sped the giant and usually lumbering beast along the western trade road, only making a brief stop at the blockade where Red and Shimmer wreaked havoc and had quite the merry time, leaving three dozen thoroughly bludgeoned and largely unconscious (or wishing that they were) Birdstone soldiers and officers behind.

The supply depot was another fortified farm with an ample supply of punching bags for Red, and while Shimmer moving all the cargo from the barn up into the multitude of cargo racks that Speaker had prepared took some time, even in the form of a giant octopus that could grab eight different things at the same time, then Nah was soon moving at breakneck speeds back to Chung Do for unloading.

The last thing on the to-smash list was now the river blockade – to which Shimmer quickly pointed out that yeddim don’t really swim that well… they’re just too heavy, hence why crossings such as the one at Chung Do made for such lucrative trading posts. Cash didn’t seem to see a problem: “Trust me, I know just the thing”

Riding out west of Chung Do and taking the trade road going south, the circle quickly came across the blockade they had once passed when they had traveled to Chung Do in the first place. They left it in a similar state of ruin as the first time, although with less dead bodies littering the ground this time – there being no sense in killing what would soon be loyal Chung subjects once this was all over.

The southern trade road didn’t follow the brown river, so at one point Cash stopped Nah and surveyed the landscape – as well as floating out a rag to wipe the worryingly thick layer of splattered bugs off the windscreen: “Speaker, you do realize that here in the east the insects get a little bigger than average…”

“True – but then again sugar-roasted fleshbettle tastes good, so I don’t see the problem” Speaker mused.
Cash frowned: “Just find a way to clean the windshield that doesn’t involve getting outside with a rag”

Speaker nodded and began to think of means to combine the self-cleansing properties of Cash’s colar of dawn’s cleansing with inanimate objects as Cash readied himself for a grand feat not seen in creation for quite some time:

“Ok, now hold on everyone – I’m really not sure if will work, but if it does it’ll be all kinds of awesome!” Cash shouted, yanking Nah’s reigns.

The yeddim bellowed a long drawn-out rumbling sound and its eyes flashed with bright white light – Shimmer recognized it as a yeddim battle cry of sorts, typically heard in the south among the few remaining wild herds of yeddim when the bulls fight each other for mating rights. However, Nah was female, and moments later Nah trotted up into the air…

“Cash, what in the six shaven testicles of Celestia is going on!?” Red shouted, suddenly finding herself clinging to the railing of the howdah very tightly - again.

“Red, language!” Sunrise admonished.

Cash smirked: “Oh, just another fun riding charm I’ve been dying to try out… because, well… it’s a sometimes horses fly approach, just a little trick I thought would be fun to try”

On one hoof Shimmer was a little relieved since this actually meant that the circle wouldn’t have to rely exclusively on her cloud-conjuring  anymore, but on the other hoof the thought of Cash steering a flying yeddim in the same way he’d up until now steered Nah on the ground while going at least a hundred and fifty miles an hour? Sure Shimmer had seen quite a few things in her century long life, some maddening, some amusing – but this… this was new, this was different, so much so that the Lunar didn’t really know how to react. The rape train name made all the more sense now.

Nah rose into the air and somehow began to gain speed. In no time at all the yeddim was going as fast as Cash’s essence could make it move, and the two anchored military junks blockading a narrow point in the brown river quickly appeared over the horizon.

Cash steered Nah in to land on one of the ships after having dropped off Sullen Hoof and Red on the others. Having approached from the direction of the sun the two crew of the two ships couldn’t spot the flying yeddim until it was far too late – Red and Sullen Hoof made quick work of the sailor-ponies on their ship, while Shimmer turned into a large squid and flopped down on the deck of the other ship, grabbing ponies left and right, tossing them all into the river. Without any warning, the crews on the two ships didn’t have time to turn and aim the deck-mounted balistas on the ships, nor bring arms to bear in any coordinated fashion, making the fighting very one-sided.

A half a minute or so into the fighting the amplified voice of Sunrise Glow pierced the noise and shouting of battle: “Sailors, surrender now and no further harm will befall you! Submit now!”

On top of the howdah on Nah stood Sunrise Glow, gleaming like a small sun – not blinding to look at, but undeniably awe-inspiring and authoritarian thanks to her charms, despite her adolescent size. To Red’s annoyance nine out of ten of the remaining sailors surrendered on the spot, giving in to the compulsion that Sunrise had laced her statement with along with another charm she’d used which put the idea into the heads of all those around her who were weak-willed that she had an unquestionable authority over them.

It took only a few more minutes to handle what few remaining brave souls that still dared raise a hoof against their betters – and soon thereafter Cash guided the two junks to Chung Do.

“Cash, what exactly do we need military junks for?” Red wondered, not entirely sure about this acquisition.

Feeling exceedingly happy with how the day’s raids had gone, Cash gladly explained to Red that the junks would do well as river patrol vessels to help ward off pirates – plus he loved the idea of having ships under his command.

Back in Chung Do the two ships were moored and the sailor-ponies were told that while they were free to roam the city, then they wouldn’t really be set free again until the conflict was resolved. This they accepted and understood, especially after seeing that the city was not only plague free, but marvelously rebuild into a grander and far more impressive form. What they didn’t really believe was that Cash expected the conflict to be fully resolved into just two weeks time, but then again if anyone had told them that they would see a flying yeddim earlier that day one would have been accused of being crazy. A few bald sailor-ponies did find the city’s supply of mane-growing potion quite to their liking though. Personally Cash was far more pleased as around that evening the first merchant barge sailed under the new arch of the city wall that extended over the river and came to in the harbor.

In accordance with Cash’s plan the circle waited a week for the news of the raids to spread to Birdstone, plus a few days for the nobles to stew on the news. The circle used the time to prepare, although Cash also had quite a lot of fun in buying nearly everything that the barge merchant had brought in. Speaker and Red spared some more, Speaker finally mastering the Thousand Wounds Gear style he had once created – although for some reason he found the experience oddly less than satisfying.

To Red Speaker’s final recollection of this ancient and strange style chiefly meant that Speaker was suddenly able to punch her once – only to find herself struck thrice in total as Speaker’s essence would trace and repeat his attack twice over like undeniable clockwork, making it impossible to dodge or parry the blows lest she used her more powerful defensive charms.
Speaker himself was less than satisfied: “It still feels as if something is missing…”

“I don’t know – you’ve remastered the style, that’s for sure. Now both you and Sullen Hoof can call yourselves masters” Red said with no small amount of pride in the accomplishments of her fellow Solars.

Speaker didn’t share the notion: “I get what you mean – heck, for a mortal pony to just master an ordinary hoof to hoof style can take years if not decades, and the rest of your life to perfect – we learn advanced magical martial techniques in days and can internalize entire styles in a few months. Maybe it’s because it’s become so easy for me… I just don’t feel the same level of pride I would have before I exalted”

“Oh I know what you mean – we’re solars now! Mastering a single magical martial art is nothing. You need to defeat a giant monster using the style, or do something grand with it – then you’ll feel better, trust me” Red said, the martial glee she was feeling radiating from her in a way that made it almost palpable.

Looking up at the castle from the courtyard, Speaker drew a deep breath: “Perhaps. I do remember doing a lot of really amazing things in the first age. Most of those memories don’t even make sense to me, but I do feel that they were grand things. Oh well, there’s Cash, maybe he has something that can cheer me up”

Into the castle courtyard strode Cash Charmer, followed by the young Shogun Chung Onyx.

“Red, Speaker – if you’ll come with us to the war room – we’ve got things to discuss” Cash calmly stated.

A short while and a cup of tea later the whole circle convened in the war room. Maps of the Chung lands, trophies from battles of yore led, and tapestries on which images of grand battles fought by brave shoguns and fought by mighty pony samurai were drawn, decorated the chamber. The circle assembled around a large table where Cash filled them in on his plans:

“Ok gang, I’ve given how to deal with the rebel nobles a lot of thought. You all already know of the original plan, although with Shimmer’s news of the ragtag nature of the rebel army then it won’t be nearly as useful as we first planned. That’s ok though, because I’ve had Shimmer fly out and have a peek at some of the neighboring territories, and according to her we’re largely in the clear, as everyone else seem to have their own brushfires to put out at the moment” Cash began.

Cash’s revised plan was much of the same: Go to Birdstone, make the nobles cooperate or kill a few of them to make the rest cooperate, then swear them to fealty and sanctify that oath. One thing that Cash had been talking with the young Shogun about was how to handle the issue of the young Shogun himself. Red wasn’t sure what Cash meant, but as Cash explained the idea was simple enough: “I’ve discussed this with Onyx and he’s ok with it: I’ll offer the nobles, as part of the peace negotiations, to form a council through which they’ll lead the Chung lands until Onyx comes of age and can assume the throne”

“What’s to prevent them from assassinating my brother the moment we’re gone?” Red worriedly asked.

Cash pointed out that the terms of the peace negotiations would be bound, on the noble’s side, with a magic oath that Cash would oversee – so they wouldn’t be able to weasel out of the deal without serious repercussions: “Plus, I figure that we can check in on Chung Do every now and then – if for nothing else then to relax and unwind”

“I… bro, you’re ok with this?” Red asked, looking at her younger brother. The young Shogun nodded, appearing both confident in his choice and aware of its implications.

Satisfied with that part of the plan, Cash explained the second part of his scheme: “Ok, now we know that there’s a deathknight influencing the nobles, but we don’t know the extent of it. Red, your mind-clearing charm will be needed, that’s a given – but to get a proper excuse to slap some sense into the nobles you’ll need the right title”

With that the young Shogun stepped up and, in an at least honest attempt at sounding officious, declared that Red’s exile was formally ended – followed by offering every member of the circle the title of samurai in his court.

“Hold on, doesn’t being a samurai come with all kinds of strings attached? I don’t want any of that” Shimmered stated.

Cash reassured Shimmer that this would chiefly be for the title only – and honestly the circle already wielded power far greater than regular samurai ever would in Chung Do, so it was a bit of a moot point: “The trick will be that as samurai of the Shogun’s court we’ll hopefully be afforded a bit more respect by the daimyos – and most importantly, because I’ve studied old court records on Chung etiquette, then as samurai we’ll be able to challenge anyone who questions our honor or loyalty to the Shogun”

“And this is useful, how?” Red wondered.

Speaker sighed: “Simple. As samurai we can challenge any noble who scoffs at us to a duel to the death– it’s basically legitimate way to kill them as opposed to assassination”

“Ok, this I can get behind” Red quickly said, looking eager to start issuing challenges.

Shaking his head, Speaker pointed out that it was for that very reason that dueling was illegal in Lookshy, because it would simply kill too many good and useful unicorns and officers on account of minor disputes.

“Right – but just keep in mind that we’ll only be able to pull this off once. The moment they see our magical martial arts we can’t expect any of them to consent to duels” Cash said, but added that ideally they wouldn’t have to make an example of more than one noble, especially if it could be made into a humiliating enough defeat.

Ultimately the circle decided that it would only really make sense for Red to samurai for this charade, chiefly because the rest of the circle either didn’t want one or in Cash and Speaker’s cases because there were titles far more fitting. Cash would be the Shogun’s official representative and right hoof – a most honorable position, while Speaker came up with the idea of being named the Shogun’s chief apothecary, as a means of both being able to take credit for curing the plague and to properly take umbrage at anyone who dared doubt his word that the city was cured. Sullen Hoof and Sunrise both declined any titles and Shimmer said that she would shift into a flea and hide in Speaker’s ear, so they would have her as a backup in case things went awry, or as a secret spy.

Sunrise, having regained her ability to doubt and ponder her place in Creation, noted that she really wasn’t sure what role she had to play at such talks. At the moment she’d rather stay in Chung Do and continue to rebuild her relationship with the city’s population.

“Oh come on Sunrise, your presence is very much needed. Our sidereal friend said that this deathknight has probably been supplying the nobles with weapons and gods knows what else – when we blow the lid on this thing we’re going to need a strongly moral and righteous preacher to pick up the pieces of their shattered moral compass and give the nobles something to rally behind that won’t lead them astray” Cash eloquently stated.

Maybe it was the prospect of being able to redeem herself through righteous actions, or being able to redeem others that appealed to her, but Sunrise slowly began to nod at Cash’s words and ultimately seemed quite positive at going to Birdstone.

Sullen Hoof excused his reluctance to partake in the titles and whatnot by stating that he wanted to do something akin to what Shimmer seemed to be planning: “I’ll come along as your servant and cook. Having seen the layout of the castle and the way these nobles ignore their servants, then that should let me roam freely and listen in or ask questions where none of you can – plus I’ll be able to spot any attempts to poison your food from miles away”

With everything decided the circle went to bed, the plan being to head to Birdstone early the next morning.

Later in his chambers, as Speaker was getting ready to go to sleep, there was a knock on the door.

“Who is it?” Speaker called out, a little annoyed that anyone would disturb him at such a late hour, especially as he hadn’t heard any hoof-steps outside in the corridor.

Shimmer crept in silently, giving Speaker an apologetic look.

Sighing, Speaker flipped out of bed and floated up an ember from his chamber’s fireplace and used it to light the candle on the nightstand next to his bed: “What do you want?”

“I… we need to talk” Shimmer hesitantly said.

Speaker took a deep breath, not really sure what to say – and honestly not really in the mood for much talk at the moment. On some level he knew that if he cared more for Shimmer he would be more accommodating, but right now she was making him miss out on sleep. The friendship he felt towards Shimmer had its limits.

“It’s about the lunar that attacked Cash… and Sunrise” Shimmer said, walking up to Speaker and sitting down on his bed. The bed creaked ever so slightly, the shogunate era jadesteel springs inside the thick canvas mattress yielding softly as they had been designed to do well over a thousand years ago.

Speaker gestured for Shimmer to speak her mind and sat down next to her.

“This last week… I’ve been sending messages back and forth with my elders and a few other Lunar friends about what happened to Cash and Sunrise. I just got a message back from a Lunar who safeguards an ancient library full of salvaged first age literature. He looked up stories of first age solars who did similar things to what Sunrise had done and found a match” Shimmer said in a decidedly somber tone.

Speaker gave Shimmer a raised eyebrow: “That bad?”

Shimmer nodded: “It actually made sense. Do you remember back when you lost your mind after we got out of Denansdor? At one point you said to Sunrise ‘The Hierophant will not rise again’ while you were throwing a fit”

“You’ll forgive me if my memories of that time are a little hazy – I wasn’t really myself at the time” Speaker noted, furiously trying to recall any connection between Sunrise and the title of Hierophant.

“The records my friend found say that the Hierophant was the oldest of three Zenith caste solars who survived the primordial war without dying and reincarnating at some point, and thus became the undisputed high priest of the Solar deliberative – any of this sound familiar?” Shimmer inquired with a worried tone.
Speaker suddenly got a strangely distant look in his eyes: “Oh…”

Sensing that Speaker was starting to remember, Shimmer continued as she read from a scroll: “Correct me if I’m wrong here ok? This stuff was part of a travel advisory, specifically on how to treat the mortal pony citizens of the Hierophant’s private and most holy prefecture: It specifically advises extreme caution as the Hierophant’s subjects were known to be under multiple layers of quite obvious and intrusive mind control to enforce and spread the Hierophant’s creed – to the point that they would often attack mortal foreigners who failed to show the same levels of constant reverence to the most high, that’d be Celestia. All of the prefecture’s landlocked neighbors have… had closed their borders to the Hierophant’s, citing themselves not being worthy, but any pony can see that it’s to avoid spontaneous crusade-like riots spilling over their borders”

“No, that… that sounds about right” Speaker said, sounding browbeaten and sad, now that he recalled many of the less savory aspects of Sunrise’s past incarnation and the first age in general.

Shimmer folded the scroll away into elsewhere: “My friend was quite surprised to hear that you guys had managed to stop her, but… do you think what happened here is what happened back then to?”

“I don’t know. It’s really hard to compare. Me and Sunri- the Hiero-, no… I don’t remember the name of her last incarnation, although I do recall it was a stallion that bore the exaltation. No, we all exalted at the Ochre Fountain, at the very cradle of pony civilization. We were still basically tribal ponies who lived under the supervision of the dragon kings who to us were impossible, immortal and godlike – until we became impossible, immortal and godlike. I guess under those circumstances a pony would have plenty of things to be afraid of as well, especially with the knowledge that you would eventually have to fight the creators of the reality you lived in. In that sense it’s not impossible that the same happened back then, but I’m not sure” Speaker mused, his forehead a sea of wrinkles as his brows almost appeared to do battle as to which would make him look the most worried.

“Well, it’s good that you all caught this – I’m sure the silver pact will appreciate it, but that brings me to the second topic…” Shimmer said, fidgeting with her hooves.

Speaker put a hoof over Shimmer’s and tried to calm her: “What is it? You mentioned something about the Lunar who attacked Cash, Lilith was it?”

“Yes. Do you remember anything about Cash’s past incarnation? Shimmer began, giving Speaker a look that was both worried and quizzical.

Squinting for a moment as he tried to recall an image of a first age Cash Charmer, Speaker ultimately shrugged: “A really good diplomat, died a number of times during the primordial wars, but stayed alive for the most time following that?”
“There’s a few more things to that, especially with his final first age incarnation, but I’m not surprised that you didn’t know any of that” Shimmer said, sounding not disappointed, but a little sad that she would now have to break the story to Speaker like this.

It was a tawdry tale of over three hundred years of chronic and systemic physical and mental abuse, none of which Lilith had been able to speak up about due to the then-Cash’s mind control charms in combination with the extremely powerful bond Lilith had to him – a bond that was even greater than that Shimmer had to Speaker. While the revelation that Sunrise’s past incarnation’s overzealous use of mind control charms on the ponies around her then incarnation might not have been entirely by her own accord, then Cash’s past life painted a different picture, one well known now by most Lunars of the silver pact as a cautionary tale of how abusive a Solar could be in the first age: “She exalted young and was, as was custom then, married to her solar mate very quickly. He exploited her in every way he could, using her regeneration charms and his mind control to hide what he did perfectly. Well over five hundred miscarriages due to his cruelty… and she couldn’t speak a word of it until her mate finally died during the usurpation, at which point she fled civilization and almost went feral”

Speaker wasn’t quite sure what to say, but if it was true (Something his truth-telling charm confirmed, at least to the point that Shimmer seemed believe what she was saying) then it certainly helped explain why Lilith assaulted Cash so savagely.
“So that’s why she didn’t want him learning that charm” Speaker finally said, breaking the long silence.

Shimmer gave Speaker a guilty look: “Same reason I’m not that keen on you trying to learn it. It would have allowed Cash to enslave Lilith from halfway across creation, again – and while I honestly can’t imagine you ever doing something like that, then I would still prefer you not learn that charm either”

“Ok, but tell me – did your friend find anything about me, Red or Sully?” Speaker wondered.

Shimmmer shook her head, her purple dreadlocks flopping about lightly: “I didn’t ask, and the favor this Lunar owed me didn’t warrant that much research”

Taking a deep breath to compose himself, Speaker looked Shimmer in the eyes: “Thank you for telling me this… and I think you should show that scroll to Sunrise, she deserves to know what her actions could have led to. She’s really reigned herself in, but Cash says that the best way to help her is to talk to her and let her learn from her mistakes. I think that scroll will be a great lesson she can learn from, as well as something she can take solace in having already averted”

“Not really sure she’ll take it that well, but ok” Shimmer said, shrugging lightly and getting up from the bed.

Flipping over into the bed properly and floating the covers back over himself, Speaker got one last though before Shimmer turned to leave: “What about Cash, should we start keeping an eye on him to see if he becomes a… bad pony?”

“No, we won’t have to. Lilith was the greatest Lunar huntress of her time, now probably only Luna can be said to be better than her. She’ll keep tabs on him no matter what we do… and take him out if she see’s any of his old self in him” Shimmer dejectedly said, knowing quite well that none in the circle would have any chance at taking on Lilith to defend Cash should that even be possible.

Speaker didn’t catch the subtlety of Shimmer’s mournful tone, but got that she wasn’t happy about it: “We should tell him”
“Lilith would know if Cash started acting differently just to fool her – Lunar hunting charms for someone that powerful can’t really be fooled” Shimmer said.

Giving Shimmer that unique kind of old pony smile, the type hardened by sorrow and a life of trials and tribulations, but still somehow with a little hope in it, the twilight caste Solar noted: “Cash might be selfish, but he’s not cruel about it. He wants to life a life of luxury and peace by making all the ponies around him so content and happy that he doesn’t have to exert any effort to govern them. I’m certain that if Lilith just understood that she’d warm up to him”

Shimmer could see the logic that Speaker was using, but at the same time it was clear to her that Speaker didn’t fully understand the centuries long life of terror that Lilith had lived through. Closing the door to Speaker’s quarters she made her way to Sunrise’s.

> Chapter 40 From Words, Power
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

That morning, as Nah was prepared and groomed by three dozen ponies in preparation for carrying the Shogun’s emissaries into the heart of enemy territory.

As Speaker stepped into the courtyard he surveyed the scene. There were a surprisingly large number of ponies from the city of Chung Do there to see of their saviors – for they knew the stakes. Cash Charmer had made it known that the circle was about to leave, as well as his intentions to see the circle return to Chung Do with the conflict resolved one way or the other. To the ponies of Chung Do, who in so many ways had witnessed the terrible might of the circle, the question wasn’t whether the circle would return victoriously, but how.

It was a little amusing to Speaker as he saw that the many ponies had brought freshly grown flowers thanks to the enhanced and focused geomancy of the city, which was only really possible thanks to him. Of their idle chatter Speaker could hear the ponies talk about what the circle would do to punish the daimyos. Would the circle kill them all? Would the circle use mind control charms on them? Would the circle come back to Chung Do with the Daimyo’s in chains? This made Speaker wonder how the ponies of Chung Do would react to circle simply swearing the Daimyos to an oath of fealty and then sending them on their way again – or that was at least how Speaker perceived Cash’s plan – but then again, when he had been a mortal pony he’d been quite used to nobles and unicorns being treated differently than regular commoners and peasant ponies.

Finally finding him in the courtyard, Sunrise approached Speaker quietly. Speaker was up on the howdah making some last minute modification to what appeared to be some kind of retractable gangway, and didn’t notice Sunrise trotting up the steps of the gangway: “Thank you”

Looking up, Speaker saw the mare with the orange fiery hair. Following the probably quite noticeable improvement in her diet over the winter, compared to whatever she’d been living off back in Great Forks, she had experienced a bit of a growth spurt and was now firmly in the realm of young mares – no longer in any way mistakable for an adolescent. The smile on her face didn’t hurt either, for indeed Sunrise Glow had grown into an absolutely stunningly beautiful mare and while she didn’t wear the hood up on her cloak anymore, then she still hid the rest of her behind those worn old linens. Finally catching himself in analyzing Sunrise instead of responding to her, Speaker cleared his throat: “It was the least I could do. You should thank Shimmer, it was her friend who dug up the information”

“I did. I told her I now owed her two boons” Sunrise said calmly, inspecting the strange retractable gangway as Speaker reeled it in.

The rest of the circle appeared in short order, Red wearing a very fancy suit of samurai style lamellar armor, Cash in his quite literally divinely fashionable robes and Sullen Hoof… who Speaker wouldn’t have recognized if not for the chef uniform, for Sullen Hoof now appeared to have an all-brown coat, and no horrid melty face scars. Now that was a disguise.

“Now we just need Shimmer” Speaker noted, wondering what Cash had ordered packed in the barrels and crates that Nah had been loaded with.

“In your ear” a tiny but familiar voice that only Speaker could hear said.

Nodding and speaking up so the rest of the circle could hear him, Speaker smiled: “In my ear, of course. Cash, I think we’re ready to go now”

As Cash made Nah leave the ground and fly into the sky, Red commented that Speaker could at least have tried to dress at little better for the occation: “I know you love your old Lookshy uniform, but do you think it’ll be fitting for this?”

“I’m a Lookshyan medic, now chief apothecary for the Shogun. Lookshy is well known for its large supply of first age weapons and artifacts, so a Lookshyan doctor who can produce an impossible cure is a far easier sell than pretending to be anything else – Cash’s idea” Speaker noted.

Red nodded: “Ok, but I still think it’s going to be a hard sell to convince the Daimyos that we cured the city”

“We can fly them over the city if they want proof” Cash injected into the conversation.

“If they don’t believe me I’ll have to take offense to that and demand satisfaction” Speaker said matter of factly, although a smile did creep up on his face afterwards.

Red nodded with a pleased expression and took off her kabuto, briefly fiddling with her mane to reset her hair-bun as she floated her helmet down to the floor of the howdah: “True, although you’re missing one thing to really pull that off”
“And what would that be?” Speaker wondered.

Red smiled and swiftly drew an unsheated katana from elsewhere: “You can’t summon Gift instantly. You really need to learn that”

Speaker couldn’t deny the utility of being able to do so, and Red noted that it wasn’t difficult – although to learn it would probably take a week or so, since it was, if not difficult, then it did require a few basic techniques that needed mastering first.

“When we’re done here” Speaker suggested, sounding confident that the nobles would be dealt with quickly.

Cash nodded to this sentiment.

Cash flew Nah high up in the air to avoid any immediate ground detection. This also gave them an incredible view, allowing especially Shimmer and Sullen Hoof with their sight-enhancing charms to see for miles. Of course, not everything they saw was good…

“Uhm, guys… this is bad” Shimmer suddenly noted. Sullen Hoof peered in her direction with his glowing essence-enhanced eyes and nodded.

The rebel army was marching towards Chung Do. It didn’t look as if it had been on the move for long, indeed the last bits army camp kit was just being packed on carts or loaded into heavy saddle-bags to be hauled by camp followers.

“We have to stop them. If not the nobles could just draw out or delay any negotiations until they’ve taken Chung Do – and then we’re screwed” Cash quickly noted.

The circle furiously debated what to do, and while Red would love nothing more than to leap down and start bucking flanks, then Speaker suggested a different alternative: “Sunrise I… hmm… Sunrise, would a magical message from Shimmer or a prayer from you reach a god in Yu-Shan first?”

Shimmer and Sunrise looked at each other for a moment. Shimmer finally noted: “A prayer would probably be quicker”

“Ok, Sunrise – I need you to pray to Resplendent Buttflow, the god of diarrhea. Tell him loverboy says hi and needs a favor” Speaker quickly stated.
The rest of the circle looked at Speaker in a very weird way. Shimmer looked a bit jalous.

“What? Oh come on Shimmer, you heard you what I went through when we were looking for Lytek….” Speaker said, explaining his torid toilet adventures with the god of the gaping sphincter back in Yu-Shan.

Cash found Speaker’s plan to stop the army nothing short of inspired: “I have to give it to you Speaker, this is one hell of a plan”

“It all depends on whether Sunrise’s prayer gets to him in time – and whether he can even make something like this happen” Speaker noted.

What followed was less a prayer and more of a very dirty erotic poem that bordered on the obscene, courtesy of some quick thinking from Cash, that made Sunrise feel so very much dirty having recited as a prayer to the god of torrential excretion.
Moments later a great brown light in the shape of an eye appeared above the marching army and winked, and seconds after that the circle could hear the combined cries of thousands of ponies from down on the ground, as every single pony that had been marching on Chung Do was stricken with a most furious, a most generous and a most heavenly bout of instant, explosive and – if Sullen Hoof’s farsight charms were to be believed – quite viscous bout of diarrhea.

Speaker sighed as he also felt his bowels begin to churn: “Yup, he is generous”

“No good deed goes unpunished my dear” Shimmer said in support as she retreated into Speaker’s ear, inquiring if Speaker had built any kind of toilet into the howdah. He hadn’t.

Extending the gangway a little bit, so he didn’t just go right over the side of the howdah and down the side of Nah, Speaker noticed a change in course for the flying yeddim: “Cash, you’re not flying us over the army so my shit will hit anyone?”
“Just giving of the gifts freely” Cash said with a truly shit-eating grin.

Speaker couldn’t help but crack a grin, which quickly faded as the full impact of the most generous god of bowel wrecking’s blessing hit home. It didn’t hurt as much as much as last time, indeed this round seemed tempered so that mortal ponies would survive the onslaught – something that had been a specific part of the otherwise quite sleazy prayer sent to Resplendent Buttflow.

Leaving the scene of fecal carnage, certain that the army’s advance had been stopped quite thoroughly for the time being – not to mention how the generals of the army might react to such a clearly ill omen – Cash flew Nah towards Birdstone, passing over the city walls at a frightful speed and very low altitude.

“One last thing” Sullen Hoof noted: “We know that there’s a deathknight here, we don’t know what he or she looks like – and we saw the Ruby and Emerald Mare shapeshift… sort of… so stash anything of value elsewhere, so they can’t be stolen by someone you don’t suspect”

The circle agreed although Cash remained adamant that he’d keep his recorder of everlasting glories hanging around his neck like a large chicken-egg sized jeweled bauble: “I’ll notice if it goes missing, and it’s too important to hide away”

Circling the city a few times and buzzing its watch towers, Sullen Hoof pointing out that archers up on the city and castle walls were trying to aim at them.  Cash bid Speaker to ‘untie the thing’, which turned out to be several large banners in the Shogun’s colors which Speaker had fastened to the back of the howdah, making the brilliant green banners trail behind Nah in a colorful display of allegiance. Sullen Hoof noted moments later that the archers had lowered their weapons.

Putting Nah down in the middle of the Birdstone castle courtyard, a much smaller courtyard than that of castle Chung, Cash bucked out the gangway and triumphantly trotted down right in front of the gate into the castle keep where several ponies in expensive silk kimonos and other flavors of noble fashion both hid and looked on in awe.

“Greetings Birdstone, my, what an entrance – don’t you say?” Cash Charmer beamed. Had Speaker been able to see Cash’s face from up in the howdah he’d have sworn that the eclipse caste pony should have dislocated his jaw from smiling that much.

The rest of the circle, Shimmer still in Speaker’s ear as a flea, and Sullen Hoof as a lowly but trusted servant last, followed Cash down the gangway and was quickly greeted by a visibly frightened master of ceremonies, an aging pony in officious white robes with blue cranes embroidered on them: “Be you the emissaries from Chung Do?”

Cash nodded ever so slightly. The old pony, his gray beard and bushy eyebrows nearly completely obscuring his face, quickly snapped to attention and shouted: “Announcing: The emissaries from Chung Do!”

Having heard the announcement, the nobles hiding in the gate leading into the keep quickly scurried away to get dressed properly, while the master of ceremonies led the circle into the grand hall. It quickly became quite obvious to the circle that the theme of white colors and blue cranes were probably the colors of Daimyo Crane Lotus – the name at least fit, and the white livery of the soldiers encountered at the blockades equally did so.

After having been led to the grand hall the circle was swarmed by servants that offered them tea and small treats. Cash quickly identified this as a stalling tactic and demanded that he and his associates be led to an audience with the Daimyos for proper peace negotiations: “…and I will accept no less. I, Cash Charmer, speak for the Shogun, and I demand to be treated accordingly”

With Cash’s stern words said the servants quickly scattered, both to bring the news of Cash’s identity to their masters as well as to try to accommodate his request.

“Ok gang, remember: They will try to test us here to see if they’re to take us seriously. It’s too early to issue duel challenges, so just try not to be baited into getting angry – this goes especially for you Red and Speaker. My immediate goal will be to make them take us seriously and recall their army while we negotiate – I’ll appeal to their honor to have them halt the army while we talk” Cash said, sounding just as serious as when he had addressed the servants.

Red nodded and shifted nervously in her ceremonial armor. Sullen Hoof wondered if he should excuse himself and try to mingle with the servants. Cash hastily gestured for Sully to leave as the master of ceremonies approached, the old stallion’s bearded face revealing much trepidation – no doubt from having been shouted at by his noble masters and thus feeling caught between these strange flying ponies from a supposedly dead city and his lords.

The master of ceremonies ushered the circle to a large hall where most of the nobles had had assembled for negotiations. The room was beautifully decorated with long tapestries and decorative paper scrolls on which virtuous proverbs were written. In the center of the room was a very big wooden table, it being more than two yards across and at least five yards long, covered in an even larger table-cloth. The nobles, in all their fancy gowns, sat on one side of the table on tall chairs to elevate themselves above the massses, with their advisor and bodyguards by their sides, while four meager and lowly chairs had been made ready on the other side.

Cash smiled as they approached. Speaker, Red and Sunrise showed a bit more apprehension, for while they had all become good friends with the young Shogun, then for them this was the first time since exalting that they had truly met nobles – oh sure, they had met gods and whatnot, but that was different, or so they would at least argue if asked. They might be solars, but parts of them still behaved like mortal commoners.

In his impossibly elegant heavenly silks, which he knew for certain was already drawing envious looks from many of the Daimyos and other courtiers present, Cash sat down first and had the rest of the circle sans Sullen Hoof sit themselves down around him, with Sunrise on his left and Red and Speaker on his right.

An uncomfortable silence followed, or that was at least how Speaker felt. Red and Cash seemed more at ease, and he couldn’t see Sunrise’s face under her hood which Cash had suggested she wear up while at the castle – he had said it made her look more pious and mysterious for this event.

“Honorable lords, I am Cash Charmer, Emissary of Chung Do and the rightful Shogun Chung Onyx” Cash opened up, breaking the silence. This statement was met with many a look of concern and curiosity from across the table, undoubtedly because his name had been passed on to them from the ponies-at-arms that had returned to Birdstone from the smashed blockades. Cash followed suit by introducing the rest of his associates: “To my right is Chung Red, older sister of Chung Onyx and samurai to his highness’ court, to my left is Sunrise Glow, my spiritual advisor, and to my far right is Bright Machine Speaker, royal apothecary of the court of castle Chung and my personal sage from Lookshy”

Murmurs spread out from the nobles and three messengers quickly and quietly darted out of the room. These murmurs were quickly interrupted by a loud but brief bout of laughter from none other than Daimyo Crane Lotus of Birdstone himself, a stately-looking stallion in a white broad-shouldered silken garb with many  a blue crane embroidered onto it:  “Oh this is rich. The pretender brings us two prince-slayers, a no-name pilgrim and a… whoever you are… to speak in his name? I should have you all flogged”

Red was about to say something but Cash quickly raised a hoof: “I can assure you that any rumors you may have heard of my associates are grossly exaggerated – although I cannot say the same of myself, so I beg of you oh lord of Birdstone, do take us seriously, for the fate of the lands of Chung depend on it”

In Speaker’s ear, Shimmer whispered: “The Daimyo, he’s testing you… just let Cash talk, and don’t say anything even if they talk about you attacking that unicorn punk – right now they need to get to know you all, to see if they can take you seriously… I’ve done this a lot with tribal chieftains, and they can be just as annoying”

Since it quickly became clear to the nobles that the Chung delegation wouldn’t take their initial bait, the nobles nodded to Cash and Daimyo Crane Lotus graciously permitted Cash Charmer to speak his terms.

“I come from the court of castle Chung where we see the people of the city still stands strong, now even more so under our guidance over the winter. Our apothecary here, born of Lookshy, developed a miraculous cure before the winter, so the city is free of plague and has been so for over a season. Still, the death of the late Chung Ivory-Hoof and his wife weighs heavily on us all, even more so on their son and heir, the young and honorable Shogun Chung Onyx, so we come here to end this folly and bring peace to the lands” Cash stated.

Speaker marveled at Cash’s ability to speak so much and yet say so little…

Cash continued by stating the terms he had prepared, speaking quickly and officiously: “On behalf of the young Shogun we would propose a cessation of all hostilities and the formation of a council of Daimyos to rule the Chung lands in the interim until Chung Do comes of age. At this time he will ascend the throne under proper circumstances and all things will resume as the nobles traditions of Chung have always dictated. In return none of you will be persecuted for your rebellion and you will have all honor restored”

Again murmurs and whispers broke out among the nobles, their advisors and their courtiers – and again this was cut short by a brief burst of laughter from Daimyo Crane Lotus: “So bold! Now I see why the pretender sent you mister Charmer – you’re a court jester! I have never heard such ridiculous claims!”

“I assure you oh great Daimyo, I am quite serious” Cash stated, his voice firm and serious.

Speaker could see that Red’s hooves were twitching ever so slightly, mainly because he was keeping his gaze down – he wondered for how long Red would be able to hold back any outbursts.

Daimyo Crane Lotus, with his impeccably groomed beige coat and perfectly brushed black mane set in a high hair-bun atop his head, gave Cash a serious glare: “As we speak our army marches on Chung Do. You have nothing to bargain with. For a pony as well-spoken and disciplined as you, I would have surely hope that you can see your own folly”

Cash smiled: “Oh we have plenty to bargain with. And your army is not marching. I saw to that just prior to my arrival”

Two more messengers left without a word, young foals who know how to discreetly move from one place to another – one returned moments later, looking very frightened regarding the news that the poor filly had to deliver…

As the news rang out, the murmurs among the nobles and their advisors quickly turned to shouts: “What? The whole army!? In shit?”

Cash smiled.

A few minutes later the nobles all turned to face the circle. The master of ceremonies announced: “In light of recent news we will adjourn early for lunch. We shall reconvene in the afternoon”

The nobles quickly began shuffling out of the room, their heavily embroidered and ornately bejeweled garbs weighing heavily as many of them struggled to rush to their private chamber to consult their advisors and spies without others listening in. Cash motioned for the circle to leave, and on the way out Speaker felt several of the nobles maintain their distance to him, even stopping to let him pass so he wouldn’t get too close to them.

“See, even if they’ve been told that you’re anathema you have nothing to fear – they’re far more afraid of me now” Cash noted. Speaker wondered if it was healthy for a pony to smile as much as Cash was.

The lunch banquit was very different from how meals had been at castle Chung. Castle Birdstone was untouched by plague, so Daimyo’s kitchen was fully staffed and fully supplied, allowing for delicacies that only the circle’s experience at the jade kitchen in heaven and some of Sullen Hoof’s better concoctions could match. Honeyed lark’s tongues, exotic fruits that not even Shimmer had heard of, sweet meats cured with expensive spices and much more, all arranged beautifully. Sullen Hoof took careful note, but also informed Cash upon arrival that he had tested all of the fare for poison, having found none.

“Good. Now, all of you just sit down and eat – we have to wait for their move now” Cash said, his voice revealing how certain he felt he understood hundred kingdom courtly procedures.

As the cirlcle settled in to eat at their designated seating arrangements, again on chairs lower than those of the nobles, several servants quickly passed by them, discreetly whispering things to Cash who simply nodded each time.

Speaker barely got the opportunity to even sample any of the dishes before him when Cash cleared his throat and announced that him and his associated would be leaving for a private audience.

Following Cash’s quick steps down a hallway from the banquet hall, Speaker inquired into who wanted an audience. Cash gave Speaker a bemused reply: “The Daimyos”

“All of them? That’s not much of a private audience” Speaker mused.

Red sighed: “No silly, one at a time – but they all want to talk… this is how alliances like this fall apart: You divide and conquer”

“It’s not that straightforward, but this does show that we have their attention and that the rebel alliance members probably want to see if they can’t get better terms from us than Birdstone” Cash explained, adding that now it was a question of showing the nobles proof of Chung Do’s health and readiness to ward off siege.

With that in mind, Red wondered how Cash was going to do that – without letting the nobles and their ponies at arms into Chung Do. Cash simply told Red not to worry: “I have that covered – and if nothing else we can offer them a fly-by on Nah”

The first meeting was with three Daimyos at once, with Red recognizing the three variations of the same red livery on the gaurdsponies standing outside the door: “That’s house Fu colors – father split up the hold of uncle Fu and had his three kids take over when Fu got too old”

“Why would your father split up a Daimyo’s hold?” Cash quickly asked before they entered.

Red shrugged: “Fu was a good general. He expanded his territory south by conquest, got too big. Father knew that Fu was loyal, but his kids weren’t, and the size of the Fu lands would allow them to secede and weaken Chung. Last I heard the three of them were on polite terms with each other, but not friendly with each other enough to band together and split away”
Cash nodded and opened the door.

The room that the circle entered was a much smaller chamber than that of the grand meeting hall that they had been prior to lunch. It was none the less richly decorated, with drapes adorning the walls and many a scroll and ledger littering the few tables in the room that weren’t filled with empty carafes and treys with wine glasses, plus lots of crumpled scrolls around the floor. Overall the room bore the hallmarks of intense negotiations.

The three Daimyos Fu sat in the middle of the room, Speaker recognizing them from the negotiations. Fu Lee was a portly and balding pony stallion, but with a stern look on his face. Fu Yu had a bitter look on her face, while Fu Me looked to have eager eyes that danced all over Cash as he sat down before them on the chair provided, both mares looking well beyond their foal-bearing age. All three wore similar but uniquely cut red garbs befit of nobility, each with unique symbols and crests embroidered.

It didn’t take much for Speaker to realize that these three had probably joined the rebellion as a means to stick it to the late shogun for dividing their lands – even if they were too covetous of their own titles to forego them and unite under a single leader. They probably each wanted to lead their combined holds too much to let any of their siblings gain an upper hoof. Speaker found this amusing as the three and Cash began talking, as it quickly became apparent that Red’s stated of dividing and then conquering had already been done half-way here for them.

Cash chiefly addressed Fu Lee and Fu Yu, only giving Fu Me the odd lusty glance which seemed to please the old mare endlessly. Fu Lee and Fu Yu on the other hoof were initially very apprehensive and attempted to extract as much information about Chung Do and the nature of its defenses without giving anything in return themselves. Of course, Cash didn’t want them to ‘give’ him anything – not yet anway – so he marveled them with imagery from his recorder of everlasting glories.

It took a moment for Speaker to recall just how common such devices had been in the first age, with many cities having had such simple image and sound-recording devices on almost every street-corner to project semi-transparent holograms of news, religious sermons, or solar propaganda. Cash used his to great effect, displaying images of a city that the Fu Daimyos could at first barely believe was Chung Do – and while it was clear from the images that the city’s population had taken a dive, then it was equally clear that the ponies there weren’t suffering from any plague.

“By the by, my apothecary recently developed a wonderful little tonic that – when applied on the head and neck, grows your mane out quite spectacularly. I am certain that we could arrange a private sampling if that sounds tempting…” Cash noted, Fu Lee listening with rapt attention.
Seeing that both her sister and brother had seemingly fallen Cash’s charms, Fu Yu sneered: “And what exactly can you then offer the Fu holds? Crane Lotus already promised us more land, what can Chung Do offer instead?”

“What Chung Do can offer? Nothing, but that’s ok isn’t it – you get to keep your power, you lose nothing, isn’t that a good deal?” Cash boldly suggested. 

Speaker couldn’t believe how outrageous Cash’s suggestion was, but judging from the slightly glazed look in Fu Yu’s eyes then it hadn’t just been words Cash had used. Sure enough, Daimyo Fu Yu slowly nodded her head.

Having ensured that all three Daimyos Fu were either willing or interested in cooperating, Cash excused himself and his ascosiates and left, the rest of the circle following suit.

Outside in the castle Birdstone hallways again, Speaker curiously asked why Cash hadn’t actually tried to strike any deals with the three Daimyos – it would have gained the circle the allegiance of half the rebel alliance!?

“Speaker, I get what you mean, and I could have – but if I didn’t have to. If we have to strike deals with each of the Daimyos we will very quickly run out bargaining chips. All we have to give is the position as head of the council that’ll rule until Onyx comes of age, and if need be, Onyx himself for marriage – and with six Daimyos then being able to make three of them interested in dealing with us without having to give them anything… you get the picture” Cash pointed out.

Nodding, Speaker conceded that with so few positions to bargain with, then holding them holding them close was the wisest.
The next meeting that Cash hurried the circle along to, for they had to finish all of the meetings before the lunch banquet ended, was with Daimyo Lang Tung Ting of house Lang.

Red sighed audibly when Cash said that they were to meet Tung Ting: “Oh gods not him”

“Anything we should know?” Cash wondered.

Red craned her neck and briefly tried  to work out her uneasiness with a good stretching: “He’s smart, but his father spoiled him rotten – so he’s a fat and disgusting little pig, who knows that as Daimyo none can speak against him, and the few who can don’t because the Land hold sits on the trade roads going norths so they’re rich from taxes”

Despite Red’s description, then the sight that met the circle as they entered into Daimyo Lang Tung Ting’s chamber was not one for the faint of heart.

Sitting on a pile of utterly crushed futons was a pony who was twice as wide as he was tall, the rolls of fat on this supposed noble pony simply overflowing. In one greasy hoof was the nossle to a hookah that, from the smell of it, was burning a mix of choice hashish buds and quality tobacco, filling the room with a thick sweet stench. In his other hoof was something that Sullen Hoof might once have called food, prior to evidently having been battered, fried in oil, rolled in sugar and drizzled in honey. Had Sullen Hoof not held his distance and forced himself to maintain the appearance of a servile serf he would have wept at the sight of such a culinary against good taste.

With fatty cheeks stained with wine and half a dozen servants and sex slaves hovering about him, the poor souls  seemingly used to his otherwise atrocious body odor, and the pony’s stately garbs more of a table-cloth with sleeves draped over his bulk than any semblance of proper robes, Daimyo Lang Tung Ting greeted the circle, along with unintentionally but also uncaringly gifting them with a light shower of half-chewed food as he bellowed: “Ah, the strange flying pony and the two prince-slayers, how quaint. What can I do for you?”

Displaying a measure of courtly discipline that Speaker found most impressive, Cash stepped up to the disgusting Daimyo without ever showing anything but a professional demeanor: “Honorable Daimyo, it is I who come here to service you through wise advice”

The fat Daimyo waved a greasy hoof as if to gesture for Cash to continue.

“Your house benefits from trade, as does Chung Do. I’m sure that you’ve felt over the last year how that trade has dwindled due to this little disagreement with Chung Do. My advice is simply to end this as quickly as possible, that we may get back to our comfortable lives – and I carry the authority to see this done on behalf of Chung Do, to which end I can promise that your house will have all honor restored should you choose wisely” Cash said, not missing a beat.

As Cash spoke Speaker couldn’t help but notice the defeated looks of Ting Tung’s servants. None looked happy, few managing to maintain even a façade of being content to serve their lord.

“You know, that’s not really that bad an idea – except Birdstone has promised me a far greater share of the taxes my hosue collects on the northern trade roads, so I can assure you: My house stands to benefit far more from Birdstone’s leadership. Plus, Soaring Blade is an old fart; he won’t able to fight the north-eastern raiders and barbarians forever, and he has no martially inclined heirs, so I’ll need the extra money to fund my own defences”

Red quickly leaned in to whisper to Cash: “Soaring Blade is the last Daimyo we haven’t talked to yet. He was old when I was sent into exile, he must be ancient by now… he protects the north-eastern border from barbarian raids. It’ss thanks to him that house Lang doesn’t have to spend that much money on protecting their trade routes”

Cash nodded: “Well Daimyo Ting, if you’re afraid that you’ll need to spend more money on defenses then I hope that you’ve considered what we could do with our many flying yeddim. If we mount a ballista or two on them, load them with archers and shock troops with grappling hooks and then we could just fly off with your precious merchant caravans”

Daimyo Ting made a gurgling sound as if he began to choke on whatever it was he’d been eating – but he managed to swallow hard and clear his throat ultimately: “What the – the nerve! You dare threaten me!?”

“No of course not. I have not at all threatened you, your hold, or your ability to tax the merchants traveling through you land… I’d have the merchant caravans picked up and ferried over to trade routes that lead into your parts of Chung Do long before they actually arrive in your territories or get in reach of your armed escorts” Cash smugly noted, his voice remaining ever so calm and his demeanor so sickeningly ‘professionally pleasant’ as Speaker called it.

Not able to hold herself back, Red chimed in: “The Talinin gem-stone merchants pass through your holds, right? I’m sure they’d love us taking a month or so off their travel-time, say, all the time needed to pass through your hold and stay at your tax posts?”

“Wow, they go through the Ting lands on their way to Nexus? No wonders this guy is loaded – they’re the only other major gem-stone supplier in creation other than Gem itself” Shimmer said inside Speaker’s ear, referring to the legendary city of ten thousand gemstones nestled deep in the mountains of the south, said to be so close to the edge of creation that from its tallest minarets one could see where sands gave way to endless oceans of elemental fire.

At this point the Daimyo was jiggling, like some of the nasty-tasting jelly dishes Speaker’s old army buddies would make out of glue and sugar – although Cash could, through his social charms, tell that the fat pony was in fact simmering with rage: “So, might you reconsider your support of Daimyo Crane Lotus’s rebellion? I ask of nothing more…”

Like a foal denied a sugary treat, the Daimyo began shouting and hollering incoherently. As the less-than-noble-looking pony flailed its greasy and corpulent limbs about one of the Diamyo’s advisors stepped forth: “Our gracious lord will consider your proposal – and, given his record of fury followed by thought, will likely accept it – but do be warned, he will not take this lightly”

“I would never ask to be taken lightly” Cash smirked, turning and gesturing for the rest of the circle to follow.

> Chapter 41 A Wit Like Swords
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As the circle hurried to their final meeting with the last of the Daimyos Cash sent Sullen Hoof back to the lunch banquet to keep an eye of what was going there.

“Maybe that deathknight, what was his name, Typhon – maybe he arrived late for lunch, go check, but don’t do anything beyond that” Cash commanded as the circle rounded a corner.

“That Ting fellow, nasty – but I didn’t see him earlier, do you think he sent another to speak for him?” Speaker wondered to Cash.

As Cash shrugged Red answered: “Ya, that’s how he’s always been from what I’ve heard. I bet those sex-slaves of his cry themselves to sleep at night... if they don't get crushed if he rolls over”

The circle agreed that it wouldn’t be that big a loss if Daimyo Ting was replaced with a slightly more proper Daimyo. 
“By the way, how did you know that threatening him would work?” Red wondered.

“His sort always worries about loss of revenue more than small raids – my social charms did the rest” Cash confidently stated as the circle approached the final Daimyo’s quarters.

The guards outside Daimyo Soaring Blade’s quarters were vigilant and looked incredibly disciplined as the circle approached, their gaze never wavering from their constant pattern of looking from one of the hallway to the other. They didn’t even respond when Cash asked them to announce his arrival.

Regarding the uncooperative guards for a brief moment, then letting himself and the circle in, the circle was met with several stony-faced ponies with serious expressions – all of them silent and adorned garbs befit of advisors and samurai, except for the pony who stood at their center: He was an old stallion, older-looking than Speaker (but then again Speaker didn’t really act his age anymore in that regard) by virtue of his very long white beard, the multitude of healed scars that adorned his face and chipped hooves which protruded from under a stark grey coat. The stallion was wearing ceremonial lamellar armor, Speaker recognizing the gilded bits on the armor from the earlier negotiations.

A servant calmly bid the four ponies to take a seat. The chairs provided were of equal height to what the Daimyo was sitting on, meaning that .

“Took you long enough” The Daimyo grunted in high realm as Sunrise and Speaker finally settled in as the last of the four to sit down.

Cash bowed his head answered in kind: “I humbly apologize great warlord, our meetings with-“

“Enough prattle” the old pony bellowed. His voice was coarse like gravel, having clearly shouted many a command in his lifetime, with his annoyance being the only thing clearly communicated to Speaker and Sunrise as neither of them understood High Realm, the language of unicorns and uppity nobles everywhere.

Cash waited for the old pony to speak again, Speaker, Red and Sunrise equally waiting – none of them entirely sure what this old pony wanted to say – although Red did understand High Realm and Shimmer, having heard the noble, translated as quickly as she could.

“Yeddim do not fly – how did you make it fly?!” the old pony barked, his bushy brows and balding mane quivering ever so slightly, his question just as inquisitive as it sounded accusatory.

“Oh, now that’s for me to know and-“ Cash began, but was again interrupted by the old pony as he shouted “Enough prattle, can’t stand all that wishy-washy crap – just say you don’t want to tell me if that’s it! I've lived through too many decades of meaningless crap, don't need any more from you”

Looking pensive for a moment as Cash reevaluated how to address the Daimyo, Speaker found himself comparing Soaring Blade to how some of the really old unicorn commanders he’d seen acted: They were too old to fight, and wise enough to see how their younger counterparts were doing it wrong, but not strong enough in either body or mind to stand up and correct them, slowly filling them with resentment and annoyance. He didn’t need to understand what the old stallion was saying to see this.

The old Daimyo leaned in towards Cash, his ceremonial lamellar armor creaking: “You made the yeddim fly. Unicorns don’t do that, can't do that. So tell me Cash Charmer... what is the color of your soul”

Both Red and Cash were both surprised by this question, Speaker as well once Shimmer finished translating. Speaker wondered what Cash would say, now that Cash hopefully had caught on that the usual courtly act of verbally around a touchy subject didn’t really sell well with this ornery old noble.

Flashing a brief smile, Cash responded with a question of his own: “Why do you want to know?”

From under bushy brows that almost entirely obscured the Daimyo’s eyes, a furious frown gathered – and like a sudden storm it erupted with a furious condemnation: “Because I want to know if you’re the same as that blackhearted Typhon who’s been filling Lotus’ cofers with realm jade and promising him undying servants with unwavering loyalty”

“Oh he has those down in the basement already, the zombie serfs” Cash casually noted.

The old warlord cracked a menacing smile with many missing teeth, the kind of smile that had announced many an execution: “Oh I know… disgusting little things. Crane Lotus put them on show when we arrived here a week ago in preparation for the siege. Typhon has sold the other Daimyos on the idea, but not me – now answer my question properly before I gut you just to be safe”

“Now hold on, that’s no wa-“ Cash began, but was quite literally cut off as Soaring Blade, in a lightning move, leapt from his seat and drew his blade in one smooth motion, holding the blade tightly in his hooves up to Cash’s neck. Not even Red had managed to react in time…

His blade – a straight-edged short-sword just long enough to reach across the table -  held tight in worn hooves, the old pony stated firmly through gritted teeth: “Answer”

Cash swallowed audibly. Whatever Soaring Blade was it was clear that he was faster than Red, and Cash’s forte was his endlessly eloquent use of honeyed weasel words…

After a tense moment that felt far too long Cash finally replied: “No” in high realm. Speaker didn’t need Shimmer’s translation for this.

Soaring Blade withdrew his blade and tossed it up in the air, catching it in his sheath in a maneuver that Red found very impressive: “Very well, that is at least a straight and honest answer”

“We have no love lost for Typhon – if we can help it he won’t leave the Chung lands alive” Red commented, speaking in common riverspeak so Sunrise and Speaker could understand.

The old Daimyo nodded as he sat down, his demeanor changing from lithe warrior to aching old stallion as if nothing had happened. Cash took a mental note: This old fart knew how to play others, even if there wasn’t much point in playing weak and decrepit at this point. 

“So, whatever you are, were you serious about your proposal on forming a council of Daimyos to rule the Chung lands until Onyx gets old enough to ruler properly?” The old stallion suddenly began, speaking in Riverspeak, the circle still reeling from the previous sudden display of clearly supernatural speed and precision.

Cash nodded, feeing his throat with a hoof… there was a clean-shaven patch.

The old pony smiled, again with that menacing execution-sentencing smile: “Good. I will head that council and have Onyx as my assistant. Furthermore, he will marry one of my daughters who will move in with him in Castle Chung. These are my terms, you will agree with them”

Cash considered the proposal for a moment, then considered Soaring Blade’s previous reactions to answers that weren’t definite yes or no questions.

“Wait a second, how do you know that the other Daimyos will agree on that?!” Red burst out.

The old stallion gave Red an disapproving glare, but it did not frighten the dawn caste solar: “Ting will shit himself if I even consider withdrawing my patrols that safeguard his part of the northern border. The Fu know that if I wanted to I know lay siege to and take at least two of their holds before they can raise enough militia to form a counter-offensive, and Lotus talks a big game but is only playing his hoof here because Typhon is backing him. Once Typhon is gone or revealed for what he is they will all accept your plan with me as head of this council of yours”

Cash nodded, not appearing that surprised by what Soaring Blade had said – even if it was fairly surprising to see the old stallion suddenly turn into a very alert and eloquent, if not still very direct, negotiator: “Assuming that the other Daimyo’s agree then that could be acceptable, as long as you do not double cross us the moment we leave and let Onyx become Shogun when it is time”

“Do I look like someone who would renege on my word? Of course I’ll keep my word!” Soaring Blade stated, again giving Cash that menacing sugary smile that just looked so fake and forced that it practically dripped with malice.

Turning to Speaker, Cash very bluntly – yet without saying a word – indicated to Speaker that he wanted to know if Soaring Blade had lied or not. Speaker nodded: “Sounds good to me”

Turning to Red, Cash shot her a pair of inquisitive eyes, as if to ask her if she is ok with the terms put forth. She nodded.
“Good, well then – Sunrise, sing the good lord a little verse, like the one you sang to the mighty warrior we met up north. Let’s see if Lord Soaring Blade here likes it just as much as the Bodhisattva did” Cash said, his face smeared in a sly but friendly grin – as if about to reveal a surprise gift.

Sunrise cleared her throat and used the charms she had employed to burn the deathknight known as the Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes with the might of her zeal and righteous fury. What came out was a pleasing hymn to Celestia. Soaring Blade did not burst into holy fire. Speaker sighed in relief.

“Well then – we best leave for the negotiation table” The Daimyo proclaimed. His entourage quickly and methodically picked up their gear, stuffed their saddle-bags and readied scrolls and quills – the whole group leaving so quickly that the circle was in the room wondering what had just happened.

“Is he a sidereal or something?” Red wondered.

Cash shrugged: “Wouldn’t surprise me – he seemed intent on testing us and figuring out what we were with that soul question. At least he accepted that I wouldn’t say. Whatever he is we just promised him the Chung lands and Onyx in marriage… let’s see if we even need to follow up on that, come on”

The circle quickly made their way to the grand meeting room. Sullen Hoof was there waiting for them, with ragged breath and a most freaked out and frantic tone: “Typhon is in there, you can’t miss him – and be careful… he knows, everything – literally everything. Water Walkers, Shimmer starting that fire, us down in my old manse, what I did in Great Forks…”

Gesturing for Sullen Hoof to slow down and breathe, Cash reassured the the disguised orichalcum chef that no matter what everything would be ok: “Seriously, calm down. Other ponies are looking. Now, go down to the kitchen, then to the basement… bring up one the zombies, don’t ‘kill it’ or knock it out – hide yourself and it near the door and wait for my signal – we’ll show these fools just what Crane Lotus and this deathknight has been doing - gah, no wait, Soaring Blade said that Crane Lotus had showed them... damnit,  just make yourself scarce”

Sullen Hoof bowed and stepped back, followed by Cash gesturing for the circle to head into the meeting room.

Just as Speaker passed Cash, Cash whispered to Shimmer: “Go somewhere secluded and send a magic message to Heath Rose, ask if there’s one of her coworkers on the case here – perhaps one specifically tailing Typhon”

“She’s in the other ear” Speaker noted, but he none the less felt a slight itch as Shimmer left him and turned into a fly, buzzing up towards the vaulted ceiling.

Cash nodded: “Right, and Speaker, I want your essence sight on all the time – you have to warn us if this Typhon fellow tries to use charms on us or the nobles”

The remaining members of the circle entered the meeting room and took seat just as last time, with the nobles on their elevated and ornate thrones opposite them. Speaker regretted not having gotten any lunch.

“Good to see you return. I hope that you have enjoyed your private audiences” Daimyo Crane Lotus proclaimed with a smug tone, flaunting the fact he had gotten the circle followed and spied upon during lunch.

Cash did not smile at this; instead he assumed a much more serious demeanor: “We all did, I assure you. Now, with that said, I would move that we put my proposal to a vote. The sooner we end this unfortunate episode the better”

There was some mumbling among the nobles, but then a clear and strong voice spoke out. It was in a bright and cheerful tone, tempered by great knowledge on etiquette and a wit sharps as swords: “Let us not rush to hasty acts, lest we forget why it was decided to remove Onyx from his throne…”

Sunrise, Cash, Red and Speaker all turned to see a very pretty beige-coated stallion in an exquisitely embroidered and decorated black garb, his face framed by a wild by well kept black mane, punctuated by deep green eyes and the most kissable lips anyone had ever seen. Of course, this wasn’t what Speaker was seeing.

To Speaker, using essence sight, looking at Typhon was almost painful. The clothes that the stallion wore were illusions wrought from the pony’s ear-rings, although Speaker couldn’t see through the illusions, and all around Typhon was a carefully suppressed aura of the darkest of shadows eating all light around him. It looked as if the shadows writhed and were ‘alive’ somehow - Typhon was a deathknight: No doubt about that. 

“…oh but where are my manners, please forgive me. I am Typhon, emissary of Thorns” the eloquent stallion said, bowing his head in the tiniest of nods while somehow never breaking eye-contact with any member of the circle.

Speaker instantly felt Red swelling with fury, but Cash spoke out before she could do anything in breach of protocol: “So, you are the illustrious pony we have to thank for all of this?”

Typhon flashed the circle a sickeningly fake smile: “Oh I don’t know about that… I am merely here at the behest of my lord to improve relations between Thorns and the hundred kingdoms, such as by funding worthy and righteous causes”

At the mention of his cause being a worthy and righteous Daimyo Crane Lotus nodded, appearing quite pleased with himself.

“Really, because from what I understand if it wasn’t for your funding then Daimyo Crane Lotus wouldn’t have been able to afford to organize this here rebellion – and I must admit, I am not feeling very much gratitude towards Thorns because of that” Cash noted. Speaker felt Red quivering next to him, her ornate ceremonial armor giving off slight rattles.

Typhon craned his neck and sighed: “Well, in any conflict there is bound t be winners as well as losers – I cannot help that you and your companions chose poorly”

The nobles got a good chuckle out of that, although Soaring Blade and his coterie remained silent.

Finally Red couldn’t hold herself back anymore, standing up and shouting: “Typhon! If you hadn’t interfered then an outbreak of plague – caused by another deathknight I might add – might just have stayed that way, and the relief caravans heading to Chung Do would have been able to take the main roads to the city, instead of having to detour through forests and wilderness – thousands of ponies are dead because you and master chose to fund Daimyo Crane Lotus’ dreams of power. I demand satisfaction!”

Speaker looked up at Red. Her breath was ragged, her face a paragon of righteous indignation. Cash looked, if not pleased, then at the very least quite ok with this development. The nobles chuckled… which they really shouldn’t, since if Typhon died they wouldn’t be able to fund their army – so Speaker had to wonder: What did they know that amused them over this, rather than frighten them? Or did they simply think so little of Red's abilities since she was an exile?

Typhon nodded: “Very well, I understand that ronin cannot understand how it is honorable to support righteous rulers – so I will let that one slide. Now, Cash Cha-“

“Courtyard, us, now!” Red shouted, pounding her fore-hooves down on the thick oaken table.

Daimyo Crane Lotus looked over to Typhon who merely nodded ever so slightly: “Very well, if you wish to embarrass yourself in front of Daimyo Crane Lotus’s court so be it”

The nobles, Typhon and Red marched down to the castle courtyard. Trailing them came the circle, as Cash had gestured for them to wait to get up and leave until last.

“Cash, this isn’t right – the nobles laughed when Red challenged Typhon. They should be scared of losing their war-chest” Speaker said in a hushed tone.

Cash nodded cautiously, taking careful note of anyone watching them: “I know – but it could just as well be that they don’t think Red is that good a warrior. Remember, as an exile she never got the formal training a normal samurai would get - and what Soaring Blade said hinted that Typhon had revealed the extent of his powers to them, so they might think that Red as a mortal pony doesn't stand a chance”

Speaker wasn’t convinced and noted that there had to be more to it than that as they followed the nobles down in the courtyard next to Nah where a large circle was formed for the two duelists to fight in.

The usual protocol for duels of this sort, duels to the death, was for each participant to enter into the dueling arena with equal armament: There was no honor in a samurai striking down a servant who had no blade. In this case Typhon entered the dueling arena bearing no arms. Red followed suit after removing her ceremonial suit of lamellar armor, confident in the knowledge that she had not needed to carry around swords for quite a while now.

As the nobles had lavishly decorated chairs brought out for them to sit on, Speaker attempted to sneak around to ask Soaring Blade a question – his attempt at subtlety failed miserably – but Soaring Blade gestured for his guards to let Speaker approach none the less. Quickly asking about Typhon and the other noble’s reaction to Red’s challenge, Soaring Blade explained the situation in a tone equally tired and worried, although that nuance was lost on Speaker. Typhon had apparently arrived with the rest of the nobles a week or so ago, but Typhon had apparently visited Birdstone often during winter and before that. Every morning Typhon would assemble five of Crane Lotus’s strongest ponies-at-arms and train with them in the courtyard. This ‘training’ consisted of the five guardsponies wielding clubs and beating Typhon black and blue – but he would never fall. This had been how Typhon had impressed upon the nobles that his master, this Deathlord called the Mask of Winters, had gifted him with enlightened essence and powerful magical martial arts that made him both master of his sense of pain, as well as invulnerable. Speaker understood why Soaring Blade found this worrying.

“…but three days ago he also demonstrated that he could do the same when he turned a blade bare-hoof. He cannot be hurt. I do not know how he does this, but he wields a strange martial style that I have never seen before. A mere mortal samurai has no hope against Typhon” Soaring Blade noted.

Ok that… that was bad – and Red didn’t seem to be in a mood to stop and listen.

In the makeshift dueling arena Red and Typhon squared off, initially trading a few minor blows. Typhon then pulled back and gestured for Red to disengage: “I must say; it is quite good to see one so stout and brave defend her honor. I thought you were all talk. I see that you’re not. I thus concede this duel. You and your friends were quite right: If not for my funding this little would-be war could not happen – and for the undue suffering of your people I do apologize, even if it was all done to secure a better future for the Chung lands. Now, if possible, we should return to the meeting room an-“

“No! You started this, so I’m ending this!” Red roared, thoroughly ignoring Typhon’s half-hearted plea to simply be allowed to give up, following through by galloping towards Typhon and head-butting him quite spectacularly, the force of the impact – thanks for the charms Red used – translating directly from Typhon's head into the ground as if Typhon had been up against a solid stone wall when struck, conferring all the more force into the deathknight. The ground shook and  splinters of stone coble erupted left and right as the cobblestone was shattered by magic in an instant in response to Red’s blow, leaving Typhon at the center of it all in a huddle of dusty robes and broken stone. The noble's ohhh'd and ahhh'd, as if watching as show, rather than showing any kind of fear.

As the dust settled, to Red’s great surprise, Typhon slowly got up. His face was nearly one continuous welt thanks to Red's mighty blow, with both his eyes almost pure red from burst blood vessels, plus a slight but insignificant bleeding from his nose and mouth. Still, a quick hoof-twiddle at one of his ear-rings and his illustrious robes cleaned both themselves and Typhon – he then looked at Red: “That was very nice my dear, but really, if that is all you have then I must say that I find you sorely lacking”

Red gave the deathknight a most furious glare and reared up only to stomp down with both her hooves for a mighty blow to Typhon’s head – it should have caved in already from the charm-enhanced head-butting, but if he wanted it rough then she would gladly deliver! To Red’s horror her Hooves of Iron charm, which would enhance her hooves with gleaming cutting edges of pure essence, had no effect on Typhon – for his head didn’t fall to pieces like a melon struck with a sword... in fact she didn't even leave a scratch

Looking at her hooves in despair, Typhon smiled: “So, not so much of a warrior anyway… I must say, I am disappointed”

Back among the nobles and the rest of the circle, Speaker noticed that Sullen Hoof had showed up, briefly exchanged words with Cash, then left again looking disappointed. Shimmer’s faint voice had also reappeared in his left ear – but Speaker took little notice of it, for between looking at alternately Red fighting and the bemused smirks of the nobles the Solar felt really bad about the situation. It was in the first pages of the junior Lookshy field officer’s manual: If you find your forces in unfavorable circumstances then never fail to act on it, lest your foes exploit the situation – but Cash didn’t look like he was trying to end the fight as seemed busy chatting with the nobles, and Red didn’t look like she was stopping either…

In a frightful mix of fury, despair and rage Red flared her anima to its fullest, displaying the glorious might of her soul for all to see – but Typhon was not swayed by this intimidating display – not even when Red drew each of the golden weapon that appeared above her anima’s bagua and slashed, stabbed, chopped, punched, and shot an arrow with them… for while Typhon was hit perfectly each time, each time with a lethal force great enough to kill a pony at least twice over if not more, he seemed quite unaffected. Red couldn’t even get her golden blades forged by her very essence to draw his blood!
Finally, after Red’s barrage had ended, her anima fading, Typhon stood up. His robes has been cut to ribbons, but they reformed quickly as strands of essence flowed from his ear-rings to dress the regal looking stallion in the finest of silks black once more.

“What… what are you!?” Red said, taking a step back. With the Bodhisatva she hadn’t been able to pierce his armor or cut his ghost flesh, but she was ok with that for she had understood that foe to have been made to be a perfect and unstoppable killing machine… but this pony, this arrogant smirking creep who was giving Red such a haughty grin right there was wearing nothing but flimsy silk robes. This could not be.

“I am but a dutiful servant to a master who has forbidden me from death, until such a time that my services are no longer needed” Typhon eloquently noted, speaking with painfully faked humility.

Having blown nearly all her essence on her all-out attack, an attack that had previously proved more than enough to slay that other deathknight who had even worn actual bloody armor, Red hesitantly stepped near Typhon – never dropping her guard, but at the same time weary of actually attacking: Perhaps the deathknight had cursed her somehow? Perhaps she could no longer fight properly?

Typhon gave Red a predatory smile: “I take it that you’re done now? Yes?” The stallion turned and walked out of the circle to the nobles, receiving many an approving nod as he did so.

Red stood and watched as the nobles withdrew to the castle, after which she slumped down on the ground, looking at her hooves in disbelief.

Cash, Speaker, Sunrise and Sullen Hoof all rushed to Red’s side once the nobles had cleared away. Speaker relayed to the circle what Soaring Blade had told, Red still finding it difficult to believe.

“…and when I looked at him with essence sight all I could see was that he was sheathed in necrotic essence, but he’s a deathknight, so he’s full of that anyway – and honestly, not even first age solars could maintain that kind of effortless invulnerability for so long… it doesn’t make sense” Speaker explained.

“Plus, while Red was fighting I had a hell of a time convincing the nobles that we could even continue the talks after this – they weren’t sure after Red started using her powers...” Cash noted glumly.

Speaker had completely overheard any such talking Cash had done, having focused on Red’s duel, but of course the nobles would have freaked out at the sight of Red’s anima and display of powers: “So… are the talks still on, or do we leave?”

Cash waved a hoof at Speaker as a calming gesture: “No no, we’re good – although they were… disappointed… that we hadn’t revealed her true nature, which of course wouldn’t have been that bad if Sunrise had noted that we’re all equally blessed with powers” Cash said, giving Sunrise a disapproving look.

Looking at Sunrise, even Speaker had to admit that such an utterance during the duel was poorly timed, but Cash noted that it turned out quite well anyway: “…and I think we have Typhon to thank for that. It seemed that he’s convinced all of them that the celestial exalted are no more a threat than unicorns”

“Hold on, they still thought I was bad when we got here” Speaker wondered.

Cash shrugged: “Well ya, because rumor still has it that you tried to murder the son of a Daimyo – they apparently couldn’t care less of us being Solars”

“And that’s supposed to make our work here any easier?” Red wondered, sounding particularly dejected.

Of this Cash was quite sure. Thanks to Red’s performance the nobles thought that Solars were much weaker than whatever Typhon was, plus now they also thought Solars weaker than unicorns since Cash had managed to compare the two situations: “…because you, as a Solar, couldn’t kill a unicorn – and heavens knows that even a group of mortal farm ponies with hatchets can get the better of a lone unicorn. They think that as chosen of the sun we can at best do tricks of light, which is how they now think Red’s conjured weapons worked… and why they didn’t work”

Red didn’t look very pleased by Cash having spun a tale to the nobles that made her look completely unable to fight properly, but Speaker saw what Cash had worked the situation into: “Red, now they’ll underestimate us. Once we figure out how to circumvent Typhon’s tricks we’ll be able to surprise them and catch them off guard”

That kind of talk was something Red could understand much better: “Alright, but how the hell do we figure out Typhon’s secret? Ask him?”

Cash shook his head while flashing Red a broad smile, his lightly tussled golden mane bobbing ever so slightly: “Already on it – Shimmer hitched a ride on him when he walked past. All we have to do is find a means to discredit him in the eyes of the nobles…”

“Hold on, I head-butted Typhon so hard I left an imprint on the cobblestone under him – how did you explain that to the nobles!?” Red suddenly wondered, having though furiously about the story Cash had told to explain her powers as harmless illusions of light.

Cash noted that it was well known that unicorns, especially earth aspected unicorns, could smash boulders with ease – so a little magic hoof to hoof fighting was easy to explain.

“I still don’t like you making us sound this weak and useless…” Red said, frowning deeply.

Cash ignored red’s whining as he addressed Speaker and Sunrise: “Ok, we need to get some dirt on Typhon – and quickly. I have a few ideas, but I’d love to hear from you two”

“Why not wait until we’re alone before talking of such sensitive matters?” Sunrise suggested, looking over beyond Cash.
Speaker, Cash and Red turned to look in the direction Sunrise was looking. There was nothing, and yet when he turned to face Sunrise Speaker could see that her eyes were tracking something…

“Sunrise, what are you looking at?” Red asked cautiously, not sure if maybe Typhon had addled the minds or bodies of the whole circle somehow.

Sunrise pointed towards a spot near the castle wall, then moved her hoof as if tracking something that was moving: “There’s a pony in a servant uniform looking… and she’s not happy that I’m pointing at her”

To Speaker there were very few a pony could be in a place and not be seen – one would be advanced stealth charms that would render one invisible, like what Sullen Hoof could do, but that wouldn’t really make sense here… but there was one other option that made all kinds of sense all of a sudden!

Speaker turned and tried to spot what Sunrise was pointing at, using essence-sight as it also allowed one to see dematerialized spirits… or ghosts. He quickly spotted the pony, a young mare in a Crane Lotus servant uniform, looking uneasily at the circle and trying in vain to get out of Sunrise’s tracking gaze.

“I see it – hold on” Speaker said, leaping into action as he ran down the ghost before it could escape by walking through 
Against a servant who had no real combat training beyond what foalhood rough and tumble she'd taken part in there was no contest - but to the others it looked really weird as Speaker wrestled with an invisible foe.

"Talk - who are you, is Typhon having you spy on us?" Speaker inquired in between catching his breath.

The semi-transparent ghost of the servant mare quaked in fear, half-crying: "I... I'm... I was Dutiful Petal, and yes... It hurts if I disobey him"

Cash quickly suggested that they all relocate to a more private location - the ghost following along willingly: Apparently it was under orders from Typhon to spy on the circle.

In an empty room that Speaker and Sunrise both checked for spirits, Speaker relayed what the ghost said to the rest of the circle as they gathered around him and the ghost of Dutiful Petal. She had been one of Daimyo Crane Lotus' many servant-ponies, but when Typhon had arrived almost a year ago when the new of the plague had just come to Birdstone he complete sold Crane Lotus on the idea of undead servants... and Dutiful Petal was 'used' for the initial demonstration...

"That's horrible!" Sullen Hoof exclaimed angrily, finding the idea of a noble ordering a perfectly good servant killed just to have her reanimated absolutely deplorable.

The ghost noted that while her body was reanimated, much to the Daimyo's amazement, then she found herself and the dozen other ponies killed and reanimated bound to a new master... 

"And Typhon didn't tell you not to ever talk to anyone else?" Cash wondered, finding such an obvious oversight in the operational security of a spy-network laughable.

Sullen Hoof inquired into the exact appearance of the ghost. Speaker described her as a brown-coated mare with a cream mane, and what had once probably been green eyes.

"I've seen that zombie... it's down in the dungeons doing laundry, barely holding together, almost completely decayed" Sullen Hoof solemnly noted. The ghost burst into tears, crying that Typhon had forbidden her and the other ghosts from going near their old bodies...

"Hold on, ask her if the nobles know about this ghost-enslavement that Typhon has going on" Cash inquired.

According to the weeping ghost, the nobles knew nothing of her conditions - and she was powerless to tell them, because as a 'young' ghost she was too weak to even materialize, leaving her trapped as ghost where the only other ponies that could hear her were either fellow ghosts or Typhon.

Cash nodded as a sinister grin appeared on his face: "Well then, all we have to do is find a way to show the nobles these ghosts and we'll have this situation turned around in an instant - I mean, I'm certain that they'll be thrilled to know that Typhon has invisible spies keeping tabs on them all this time, even more so the ghosts of their own former servants"

> Chapter 42: Cash and Murder Games
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With renewed hopes and what could turn out to be an ace up their sleeves, the circle began a game of cat and mouse: They needed to find a ghost powerful enough to materialize so they could force it to do so, in order to reveal Typhon’s trickery to the nobles.

The timid ghost of the servant they had originally caught bemoaned that none of the servants that Typhon had talked Daimyo Crane Lotus into killing for zombie conversion were powerful enough – but there was another ghost… a cruel taskmaster than Typhon had seemingly brought with him from thorns:

“He… it… it’s hideous, and laughs when it beats you. He patrols the hallways and makes sure that we’re on our posts” the servant ghost said, tears in her eyes.

Speaker relayed the information to the circle, all the Cash noted that this ghost mare sounded awfully melodramatic…

“That’s because ghosts are nothing but emotions – emotions strong enough to keep them tethered to creation” Sunrise glumly noted.

Cash nodded, trying to think how he might exploit that bit of information if he was to meet other ghosts in the future.
Seeking out Typhon’s ghostly taskmaster proved remarkably easy: The ghost wasn’t exactly trying to hide, for mortal eyes could not see it – but Sunrise and Speaker both knew charms to let them see immaterial spirits.

Trapping the taskmaster was slightly more difficult, as it involved talking the ghost servant into playing bait – but Cash masterfully played on her still strong loyalty to her former mortal masters: “Don’t you want your lord to know that he has been deceived? What greater show of allegiance is there than to aid him from beyond the grave?”

Thus the ghost servant lingered in the courtyard while Shimmer used lunar charms most tricky to conceal Speaker in plain sight, Cash and Red distracting the guards with inquiries about Typhon’s morning ‘training regiment’ and finally Sunrise walking the halls of the castle so the taskmaster would spot her and see that no ghostly spy wasn’t following her…

Moments later the taskmaster emerged into the courtyard, and Speaker instantly understood why the ghost mare feared it: It was the ghost of a stallion, but its translucent flesh was pulled back, taught against its ethereal bones – making for a horrid and very permanent grin. Similarly its ghost-flesh was pulled so very tightly away from its hooves and what few other bits that were visible, the rest of it being covered in a garb of blue-grey cloth that seemed to flutter in a breeze that wasn’t there. This was an old ghost… the kind of ghost that the priests back in Lookshy routinely went to exorcise: a specter, a ghost that had abandoned sanity and given itself to death…

Speaker steeled himself as he charged the cruel-looking ghost. He knew that Red was far more competent at the kind of martial moves that could lock joints and immobilize another pony – his own Thousand Wounds Gear style was more oriented around ranged combat meant to kill quickly and efficiently.

Lunging from behind, Speaker tumbled around with the ghost for a brief moment. Like the ghost of the servant mare, this one hadn’t really expected to be attacked – but it did know how to fight… and every mother in creations tells their foals of hungry ghosts and malevolent specters that hunt and devour the living, especially naughty foals who don’t finish their steamed veggies, or foolish ponies who walked alone in the dark at night.

The ghost flailed its limbs around like a feral beast, its eyes glowing with a baleful light so strong that it shined through the back of its head, allowing Speaker to see it – then the ghost’s maw extended and peeled back, swallowing its face and head before its eyes popped out of its taught ghost-flesh through tears that oozed dusty blood, its entire body having turned inside out and flipped the other way to face Speaker…

Speaker hurried to deliver a series of swift blows to knock the ghost out: “Give up, you’re not getting away!”

The ghost didn’t answer, instead its mouth opened again revealing far too many rows of iridescent spiky teeth – they looked more like iron spikes hammered into a toothless jaw than actual teeth – and even Speaker’s defensive charm couldn’t hold back all of the force of the ghost’s powerful bite, although it prevent the ghostly pony from biting his left shoulder off, so while it drew blood then it didn’t manage to severely injure the Solar.

Trading blows back and forth, Speaker quickly realized that this ghost was either far too tough to beat or too insane to surrender, so he opted for plan B: Sunrise was meant to return to the courtyard, but she wasn’t there yet… luckily Speaker’s Thousand Wounds Gear style included a unique technique well suited to hold a captive, so Speaker heaved and fortified his grip with essence as he flipped the specter over and up into the air… where it remained, locked in a holding grip of essence force, positioned like skeet for anyone to shoot at, even if Speaker and Sunrise were the only ones who could see the ghost.
Sunrise arrived moments later as Speaker kept bucking the ghost back into the air each time it floated down low enough for him to hit. The plan was for Sunrise to use her ability to burn unholy things with her voice to make the ghost surrender… but even after she had prayed to the point that the ghost was replete in blue and white cinders, its taught flesh flaking off like hideous translucent snowflakes.

It was first when Cash joined the fray, so to say, giving the ghost an odd ultimatum – especially considering that Cash couldn’t hear or see the ghost – but it was enough that the ghost could hear and see Cash…

“We know you get and give orders, so you’re sane enough to understand us. Surrender now or I will speak apathy and indifference to you, and I will use charms to imprint these feelings and ideas into you above all other – do you understand what that will do to you? If you want to continue existing, you will surrender to us, now” Cash calmly said, Speaking to the ghost’s need for intense passions in order for it to keep existing, lest it fade in reincarnation.

Typhon’s taskmaster calmed down very quickly after hearing such a potent threat– and Speaker let it float down to the ground.
“I will not betray my master!” the ghost screeched, it voice like rusty iron nails on a chalk board. Being able to hear this horrid sound, Speaker’s ears bled as he relayed the ghost’s words, while also tending to injuries from the fight with the ghost.

“Oh we do not want you to betray your master – we want you to glorify his work before the nobles here! Let all know that Typhon and you have ensured their doom now, to tell them that death has stalked them for months without them ever knowing – and then you can tell them that they are about to die…” Cash said, speaking in an eerily slick tone, as if a murderer taunting a victim while twisting a knife – but only with words, even if they felt just as sharp.
Speaker told the circle how the ghost smiled with a most unsettling grin and nodded slowly.

As they walked back into the castle, Red commented to Sullen Hoof that she couldn’t believe that the specter had bought that load of crap.

“Speaker said that specters are ghosts that have given themselves to death, but they still work like ghosts: Great passions guide their minds, not reason – so Cash appealed to this obvious passion for death and suffering…” Sunrise coldly stated, sound calm and yet displeased at not having been allowed to finish her smiting of this undead abomination. That Cash had used so much essence that he had briefly glowed like a gilded campfire in order to make his suggestions get through to the ghost. That such charms had made his words supernaturally powerful hadn’t hurt either.

Red nodded, somewhat sure that she had understood what had happened: “So… some ghosts aren’t that bright, but they’re all very emotional?”

It took no small amount of sweet talking, a little bribery, and some subtle threats, but the circle managed to gather the nobles for one last meeting – on the pretence of discussing rules of engagement for the supposedly inevitable siege of Chung Do.

It was the same meeting room, the nobles all sat in the same places, on the same grand chairs, with the same servants and advisor ponies by their sides, and some of them looked bemused – others, including Soaring Blade, looked very not amused.

“My good ponies, I would like to make one final appeal to you all – to your honor and oath of fealty you have all sworn to the throne in Chung Do” Cash began, but he barely managed to speak a word more before all the Daimyo Fu, Tung Ting, and Crane all angrily shouted at Cash to not speak of foolish pursuits, that him and his fellowship clearly was too weak for the present nobles to ever broker peace with, and that Chung Onyx was a foolish foal that had to die for his transgressions. Soaring Blade remained silent, but looked very displeased.

It was a very much different tone than before, the Daimyos trying to out-shout each other – their eyes alive with hate and scorn.

It was painfully clear that Typhon had done… something – ponies didn’t just start shouting like that when they had previous been at least courteous about their disdain. Cash’s charms for detecting subtle social cues told him that the Daimyos had been triggered by the mention of honor and fealty to the young shogun – his previous main talking points during the earlier talks. Part of Cash found this quite creative: Make ponies hate what you speak of… even if did make his work so much more difficult – of course, he didn’t just have to talk about that. Typhon sat to the left of Daimyo Crane Lotus, looking exceedingly pleased.

“Right, my mistake your lordships – of course you are all mighty, for you all rule your territories absolutely, with all of your servants perfectly servile, commanding their loyalty absolutely – which, I have been told, is why some of you have enjoyed Typhon’s gift of zombie servants, as they are truly loyal and obedient” Cash monologued, trying to appeal to each lord’s sense of personal power and control over their domains.

Making a gesture that Cash had agreed with the ghost taskmaster in advance, the eclipse caste pony signaled for the taskmaster to make his entry ready: “But truly, you have all been fooled – especially you Daimyo Crane Lotus, for while you have been given zombie servants, then Typhon has pulled the wool over your eyes and spied on you most egregiously… all part of our master plan to doom you all”

Crane Lotus huffed and puffed, as if swelling with indignity. This was understandable, as even Speaker was surprised that the Daimyo didn’t just call for the guards-ponies stationed at the door to go cut Cash’s tongue out… but that didn’t happen, for instead a ghastly sight appeared right on the heavy wooden table.

The look on Typhon’s face was absolutely priceless as his undead taskmaster gleefully boasted of how the Daimyo’s had been had – thinking that it was time for the big reveal before their slaughter. The look on the Daimyos, their servants and advisors on the other hoof were more terrified – except Soaring Blade and his retinue.

“…and now, the trap is sprung and your doom is cealed!” the undead taskmaster finally screeched and cackled, its taught skin cracking and bleeding as the ghost smiled sadistically, with eyes that glowed with bloody shades of red.

Many of the Daimyo’s servants and advisors scrambled to flee the room, but before the ghost could leap to attack anyone Sunrise got her way as Cash subtly gestured for her to smite the beast with a hymn to Celestia most glorious.

It was strangely amusing to see some of the Daimyos attempt to chime in on the chorus, even if they really couldn’t sing, thinking it would burn the monstrous ghost faster as it tumbled off the table enveloped in bright blue flames of holy might – it end up a twitching pile of sticky ashes by the time Sunrise was done. Typhon was nowhere to be seen.

Even while still under the influence of Typhon’s strange charms to be quite hostile at the mention of the young shogun, the Daimyos and their servants and advisors all cheered on as the ghost’s ashes where demonstratively stomped on by Sunrise – this also marked a change in attitude from the Daimyos, as Cash again appealed to their own sense of sovereignty, now that it had been revealed that Typhon had been spying on them and using that information to manipulate them…  plus now they thought that Typhon had planned on killing them.

To Speaker it was strange – the Daimyos would still react with outrage at the slightest mention of the young shogun – but they were otherwise smiling like foals in a candyshop around the circle.

This ultimately led to the topic of what to do with Typhon: “So, honorable lords, with your leave we would go and find Typhon and interrogate him as to his true motives here… and then kill him – would that be permissible?”

Daimyo Crane Lotus nodded fervently, the rest of the noble ponies agreeing as well – although they couldn’t entirely agree on who’s torturer should have the honor of prying all this information out of Typhon…

The circle left the nobles to figure out that particular detail – right now the hunt was on – but before the circle could even leave the meeting room Shimmer came in and blocked their path: “I have something you need to see before going after Typhon”

What Shimmer had, which she had ‘hidden’ as a dead flea in her coat, was… the corpse of Typhon. As it changed back into the form of Typhon everyone stepped back.

The circle and the nobles quickly gathered around her, cheering and congratulating her – but with a swift gesture she motioned for silence, a silence that became all the greater as she yanked the wig off the corpse, revealing fine stitches on a shaved scalp: “This isn’t Typhon…”

It turned out that while Shimmer had been spying on Typhon she had witnessed him preparing for a possible assassination attempt from the circle, as revenge for the humiliating duel – and this fake Typhon corpse would have been used to frame the assassin for Typhon’s murder, while the real Typhon would have escaped: “No doubt he’d have returned later, saying that his lord had truly granted him immortality or some other bullshit”

While Shimmer’s social grace in the face of nobles might leave something to be wanted, then her revelation still showed just how callously Typhon and his ilk treated the dead. The three Daimyos Fu were enraged that Typhon would even treat a corpse like that, more so when Shimmer showed other stitches in the corpse, revealing that the Typhon fake had been made of several corpses… and yet they didn’t mind the zombie servants?

“Hold on, won’t he know that his escape plan is missing?”  Red quickly wondered.

Shimmer smiled gleefully: “Lunar tricks… he’ll see something where this thing was - and he’ll think is the real deal”

With that cryptic message the circle quickly rushed to Typhon’s quarters, the Daimyos and two dozen ponies-at-arms right behind them.

Outside of Typhon’s quarters stood two gaunt ponies in black leather barding reinforced with steel plates. They had black rings under their gaunt sunken eyes and their manes appeared matted and the color fading from them, telltale signs of living in a shadowland – for doing so would slowly drain both the life and color away from anything living: Not enough to kill you, but enough to mark a pony for life.

The two guards would at first not let any of the throng of ponies in, but Red made very swift work of them, while Cash shoved the door open and burst in – finding two zombie servants pulling at a pony dummy made of melons lashed together with iridescent white strands, trying to pose it in a chair.

“You know, Shimmer, I had expected it to actually look like Typhon…” Cash noted, sounding somewhat disappointed.

Shimmer shrugged, pointing out that since she’d told Cash and everyone else of the illusion they were very unlikely to fall for it.

Red snorted angrily: “Who cares, I want to find Typhon!”

Aside from the two zombies and the melon puppet – which quickly fell apart as Shimmer no longer felt the need to maintain the illusion or the essence strands that held the melons together – there was nothing else in the room. There was some tasteful furniture, fit for foreign dignitaries and visiting nobles, just like in the other guest quarters the circle had been in – but there was no Typhon…

Shimmer stomped a hoof firmly into the stone tiled floor. Around her hoof the tiles cracked ever so slightly, but she paid no heed this, as she suddenly turned and lunged at a corner! Tumbling into what was at first an unseen foe, Typhon quickly appeared as he was knocked aside – his veil of invisibility shattered.

“Sunrise! Burn him with your brightness!” Speaker shouted, remembering all too well Typhon’s invulnerability to blades and blows alike – but Sunrise said nothing, looking oddly distraught and yet remaining motionless.

Despite Shimmer holding him tightly, appearing quite unaffected – even if he was more or less immobilized in a quadruple leg-lock, Shimmer’s limbs having coiled around Typhon’s as if they were powerful snakes or squid tentacles – Typhon merely laughed: “You think local weakling ghosts were the only minions I had here? I have a full talon of war-ghosts following me everywhere, hiding in the walls and floors!”

Looking at Sunrise with his spirit-detecting glance, Speaker saw how war-ghosts were holding Sunrise’s mouth closed from inside her own body. Their hooves, carved into ghastly claws, couldn’t harm her, but they held her quite well. Speaker leapt at the war-ghosts, trying to free Sunrise.

Cash figured that Typhon had some kind of ghosts interfering with Sunrise, and demonstratively told the nobles present how this display showed Typhon’s true colors: “Ghostly warriors hiding in your walls and floors? That doesn’t sound like a friendly emissary on a polite visit, that sounds more like an enemy agent waiting for you to bludgeon your forces on Chung Do’s walls, so that he can give the signal to have everyone here killed!”

The nobles expressed their outrage in various colorful euphemisms, few polite enough to be committed to writing.
Red, feeling annoying powerless against the ghosts – and knowing full well that she could do nothing against Typhon – fumed, and silently promised herself to learn Speaker’s spirit seeing and fighting charm as soon as this was over.

“Now, will you let me go? Or do I have to call in the rest of my retinue? I can have everyone here dead in a second” Typhon gleefully proclaimed, even as Shimmer tried to tighten her grip in vain – for Typhon’s bones were as the hardest of jade, and his skin like impermeable stone.

Flipping around and flining Typhon with all her might, augmenting her strength with both charms and by shapeshifting the might of both bulls and greater monsters into her limbs, Shimmer threw Typhon straight through the castle wall – leaving a very large hole as the part of the stone brick wall above the hole collapsed as well. In a flash Shimmer leapt through the hole, shifting in her monster-pony form as she flew down into the courtyard after Typhon: “Red, I need you help here!”

The nobles were… of mixed feelings at the sight of this – some of Crane Lotus’s advisor’s seemed to be thinking more of the cost of repairing the castle wall, while many others were horrified at the sight of Shimmer shapeshifting… but Cash quickly spoke calming words, explaining quickly and supernaturally eloquently how Shimmer was blessed by Luna with powers of beasts and the changing ways of the moon.

Red leapt down to the courtyard as well, landing with a heaven-sent elegance, while also hitting the ground running – quickly catching Typhon once more in an iron grip like a dragon coiled around helpless prey: “Ok Shimmer, what’s the idea here?”
Shimmer landed in front of Red and Typhon, brushing dust and stone chips off her feathers – then staring intently at Typhon with all three of her eyes glowing with baleful moonlight: “Tell me Typhon, did you master anticipate your coming up against only assassins – or also lunars?”

“Your claws can’t do anything to me! But while at it, I don’t your filthy claws touching me at all” Typhon laughed, his head and neck held at a strained angle as Red was trying to snap his neck to no avail.

Shimmer smiled, her beak demonstrating a strange ability to subtle change its shape to mimic the expressions of a mouth: “Oh please, you don’t know anything. Don’t you know why the immaculates call lunars monsters that bring the wyld with them, mutating all they touch…”

Even as her left eye popped like a grape and bled due to having defied Typhon’s command augmented by a killing word technique, Shimmer raised a grim talon that turned silvery and fluid, as it extended to twice its normal length: “Feel the generous gifts of the moon”

Striking Typhon with her magical talon on his face – the claw doing no physical harm, it even looking like a pointed silvery banana having smeared on the stallion - Typhon’s skin rippled as he began to scream in a most horrible and gurgling way. Red released her grip as she stumbled backwards, feeling Typhon… change… and her not wanting any of what he’d gotten on her.

Typhon, resplendent in his fine garbs, and invincible to blades and blows alike, dropped to the ground and thrashed around, feebly touching his face as skin began to liquefy slowly, his tongue falling around and splattering on the ground like a rotten tomato, his eyes becoming like milk and running down his face, and his teeth denaturing into something akin to semi-fluid white tree-sap… it was a nightmarish sight to behold, Red galloping away from the scene as quickly as she could.

From the hole in the castle wall into Typhon’s quarters the rest of the circle and the nobles looked on – hearing only Typhon’s horrid gurgling screams as the deathknight’s voice slowly gave way to a bubbly kind of pitiful howls.

“What is she doing down there…” Cash wondered out loud, smiling as the nobles beside him lost their lunch.

Sullen Hoof, with charms enhancing both his sight and hearing, shook his head in disgust: “You really don’t want to know…”
Speaker wasn’t sure what to make of Sullen Hoof’s reaction… but suggested that they go down into the courtyard to survey the damages. Sullen Hoof didn’t look pleased at the suggestion, but Cash eagerly led the way.

When the circle reunited in the courtyard, along with the nobles and their entourages, Shimmer had returned to pony form – but Typhon… well he wasn’t really much of a pony anymore.

What had once been a beautiful but terrible stallion who could no doubt have seduced any pony he wanted with but a coy glance and a suggestive shake of his supple flanks, was now an eerie reminder that immaculate propaganda sometimes had a hint of truth to it: Typhon’s body had been partially melted, his limbs no more than wiggly nubs, his head a featureless sphere with a mouth-hole but nothing that looked like a jaw, or teeth, or a tongue… just a hole to breathe through – there weren’t even anything left of a functioning throat, so Typhon could only make breathing noises, which he did quite frantically. What had once been a lush coat was now bare and sagging skin, with a few bruises and minor open sores where Typhon had thrashed around at the coble-stone beneath him. He looked more like a half-finished mannequin puppet that hadn’t been fully assembled than a pony.

“Good grief Shimmer…” Speaker slowly spoke, horrified at the sight before him.

Shimmer beamed with pride: “He won’t be doing much of anything for the time being…”

Flipping Typhon over, revealing what had once been a handsome and rugged chest, showed a strange device of jade grafted to Typhon’s chest set with a glittering smooth black ovoid stone – like a piece of fancy body jewelry.

“Well I be… A gem of adamant skin, the seventh legion would love to get one of these” Speaker idly mused, carefully removing the earth-aspected hearthstone out of Typhon’s skin-mount hearthstone amulet.

Looking at the black gemstone Cash frowned. It wasn’t cut in a particularly pretty fashion, so its market value based purely on aesthetics was quite low – you could polish black sandstone to look quite similar: “So what does it do?”

“This is how Typhon was invulnerable. A gem of adamant skin is a very powerful hearthstone that hardens your skin and bones so neither can be broken – still, the force of impacts and blows should have hurt him, but it’s always easier to tough out blunt trauma as opposed to a knife-wound” Speaker noted, retrieving the un-shaping gun from elsewhere and socketing the hearthstone into the gun.

Seeing what Speaker was doing with the gem, Red protested: “Hold on, can’t we use that gem? I wouldn’t mind being invulnerable to blades”

“You would have to find the manse that this thing comes from – and that’s probably deep in Thorns territory – for now our best move would be to keep the stone to deprive Typhon’s master of it. You would have to severely damage a manse to break its connection to a hearthstone, which is quite dangerous for powerful manses, then repair it again to make it form a new stone – so this is by far the best thing we can do right now, plus we are so taking the skinmount amulet as well” Speaker explained, surgically removing the implant – well, yanking it off the sagging skin.

Beyond the hearthstone and mount then Shimmer had recovered Typhon’s ear-rings back when her horrible wyld-mutation-inducing charm had turned Typhon’s ears into tiny ashen nubs – they turned out to be quite interesting: Speaker identified them as a paired Infinite Resplendence Amulet, artifacts often worn in the first age… but these skull-shaped ear-rings were wrought of soulsteel, a material hardly even understood in the first age.

Cash was less impressed with the history of the magical doodad’s history and more with its function – it had kept Typhon’s clothed quite nicely… and he was certain that others might pay well for such functionality.

“Hold on, things like these always had extra features beyond clothing – and these are made of soulsteel… so I’m sure it’s not nice ones” Speaker noted.

Weary of testing the ear-rings, especially considering what the circle had experienced with the Bodhisattva’s cursed blade, Shimmer suggested that they simply keep them for safe storage – perhaps to break them down later to make something more benign and useful.

This left the circle and the nobles with the question of what to do with the husk of a pony that was Typhon.

The nobles, while previously outraged at the revelation of Typhon having both spied on them and hidden a force of… uhm… where did the war ghosts go? Sunrise noted that when Shimmer had chucked Typhon through the wall the ghostly grip on her mouth had disappeared…

Looking around at the ground – since Typhon had said that his war ghost body guards hid in floors - Speaker and Sunrise both saw many pale and weary translucent eyes peering up at them… but beyond that the ghosts did nothing.

“Rise war ghosts of Thorns, attend your master!” Cash commanded – Sunrise noting that the ghosts actually obeyed. The glowing caste mark on Cash’s forehead hinted of how much essence he had spent to make that command palatable to the ghosts.

The way ghost, souls of warrior ponies bound to Typhonn, slowly floated up from the ground.
“Why aren’t they attacking us?” Sunrise wondered to Speaker.

Considering the situation, Speaker slowly nodded as he came up with what he figured was a plausible answer: “Well, Typhon said they usually hide right? And since he wouldn’t want them found he’s probably bound them with orders not to attack anything unless he tells them… and now he can’t talk anymore”

Servants were sent to the castle kitchens for salt, so that the war ghosts could be trapped a circle of salt – something that ghosts for some reason simply could not pass. With the war ghosts taken care of, the question again was Typhon. The noble didn’t want to ‘keep’ him – fearing reprisals from Thorns. The circle didn’t mind this at all: “We know someone who would love to take him into custody” Red said, looking towards the heavens.

“Excellent – with this you have all regained your honor in the eyes of me and my court. This will make you worthy foes when we meet on the battlefield for the siege of Chung Do” Daimyo Crane Lotus proudly proclaimed.

Cash sighed and rolled his eyes: “Your lordship, please – you have seen our might demonstrated here before you. No army of mortal ponies can withstand our wrath unleashed”

“Pish posh – Typhon left plenty of silver and jade in my coffers, and even if we don’t get the siege he promised to supply we’ll find a way to batter down the gates of Chung Do – it’s been done before” the Daimyo smugly noted, feeling extraordinarily high and mighty, now that thanks to Typhon’s treachery he owed no favors to Thorns anymore, while his coffers were still full.

Cash looked at the rest of the circle, flashing them a toothy grin before turning to face the Daimyo: “Tell me oh lord of lords, did Typhon ever specify what kind of siege he would supply?”

The Daimyo shrugged in his voluminous robes: “Siege is siege, I’m guessing Xuanfeng and heavy Sijiao catapults, wheeled towers, ladders?”

Shaking his head while keeping his smile up, Cash took a deep breath: “Oh that wasn’t what Typhon had in store for you… you see, when we arrived in Chung Do we learned many things: For one the sijaneese corpse caravans traveling west to Sijan were being raided and looted of corpses… now, that’s grotesque enough,  but think about it: What does Sijan do if someone raids their funerary caravans?

“I… they… they suspend services” The Daimyo hesitantly said, many of his advisors looking quite worried as they clearly understood the implications of such an event.

Cash craned his neck backwards and gestured towards Speaker: “If not for our highly skilled apothecary here finding a cure for the otherwise incurable illness Chung Do would have become a shadowland once the Sijanese stopped coming – but beyond that, we tracked the corpses being stolen – for they had been reanimated to move on their own to a foul necromancer’s lair…”

The nobles and their retinue looked quite uncomfortable, some even queasy.

“They were building perverse warstriders out of the corpses… now, most of you reacted quite harshly to Typhon’s stitched together corpse double… how would you and your generals feel about fighting alongside giant flesh-things lashed together with the blood and sinew of Chung Do’s own dead?” Cash triumphantly declared, using his Recorder of Everlasting Glories to display haunting images of the bonestriders built in the Coveter’s necro-surgical workshop manse.

Shimmer quickly picked up on the bigger picture that could have unfolded, had Typhon’s plan gone ahead: “If you had marched your army into Chung Do it would have walked into a trap of tens of thousands of ghosts and zombies, feeding the underworld with thousands of new souls – all in all helping Thorns cement a new colony in the hundred kingdoms…”

The nobles quickly exchanged hurried whispers with their advisors and generals - it looked like they found Shimmer’s scenario frighteningly possible, given what they had learned over the last hour.

“Don’t forget that we know this because we found the place where these things were made and put a stop to it – something that Typhon no doubt knew – so you stand to gain no extra siege at all now” Red noted.

The nobles again grumbled and whispered among themselves, with many of the Daimyo looking predictably disparaged.
“Now, we’ve seen your army – inexperienced peasant ponies levied as troops that you’ve been since last summer… and you’ve seen or at least hear d of our ability to have the gods themselves halt that army. So, please tell us again how you think you can take Chung Do, with no siege, with your entire army busy shitting itself half to death as we speak” Cash inquired sarcastically.

With the prospect of a siege with no siege equipment beyond what simple ladders their army might be able to make themselves, the nobles quickly despaired, or at least they began to – they were again angry that Cash had withheld this information about Typhon’s promised siege engines – but Cash pointed out that he hadn’t known the exact nature of Typhon’s promised military aid until the good Daimyo had revealed it, plus Typhon could have claimed that it was all carefully fabricated lies if he hadn’t been both silenced as well as revealed to dabble in grotesque corpse manufacture.

“We still have one advantage for the coming battle of Chung Do. Try not to make too much of a mess” Daimyo Crane Lotus callously noted, not so subtly gesturing for his ponies-at-arms to take position and take out the ‘enemy’ leadership.

Cash sighed deeply: “Oh come on… Red, you heard him, try not to make a mess”

Red complied – and a split second later seven spears had been cut in half, along with Daimyo Crane Lotus.

As the top half of a very surprised looking Daimyo slid off the bottom half, blood spraying everywhere, the combined entourages of the nobles erupted in shrieks of terror and panic – what other ponies-at-arms in reach looked understandably hesitant.

With Crane Lotus so effortlessly dispatched with one of Red’s essence-shaped blades – blades that all the nobles had been thinking were naught but illusions and tricks of light and essence – the nobles suddenly became a lot more cooperative… even if unwillingly so.

> Chapter 43: Greater Goals and Glory
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the courtyard, next to Typhon’s heavily ‘reduced’ form, Cash quickly negotiated a very stern albeit surprisingly lenient surrender from the remaining nobles. The other Daimyo wouldn’t be persecuted for their treasonous acts, but they would have to pay the shogun all the taxes they owed him… Tung Ting was particularly displeased about this, but managed to reign himself in after a particularly furious look from Red.

“And will you simply leave the Chung lands to be helmed by a colt with no experience? Or do you still intend to form this council of nobles you spoke of earlier?” Daimyo Fu Lee inquired.

Cash nodded: “That is still an option: We’ve spoken with Daimyo Soaring Blade, he will lead the council”

Looking around, Speaker couldn’t see Soaring Blade or his retinue anywhere… did he even come down into the courtyard?
“Hold on, you’ve spoken with that old fart? Is he even still alive?” Daimyo Fu Me wondered, the mare sounding quite surprised.

A few short questions back and forth revealed that all the nobles, their servants, their advisors, as well as any pony-at-arms in earshot were all quite certain that the aging Daimyo Soaring Blade hadn’t been part of the rebellion, merely staying in his hold – the old Daimyo having supposedly lost his interest in politics almost a decade ago. If nothing else, then they were at least all adamant that Soaring Blade had not set hoof in Birdstone for ages…

The circle quickly huddled together, Cash asking the obvious question: “Sidereal?”  The rest of the circle nodded, none  of them entirely sure of the consequences of this.

Turning to face the nobles, Cash quickly continued: “Right, well – we may have to work out a few details before forming a proper council, however in the meantime you all owe the lord of Castle Chung quite a lot of back taxes… also, who stands to inherit Crane Lotus’s title and power?”

A terrified young brown-coated stallion in fine clothing was pushed forward from among the nobles. His name was Jade Anemone, the oldest of the now late Daimyo Crane Lotus’ still living sons – and he looked unsurprisingly terrified: “Please don’t kill me”

The circle looked at one another, then at the diminutive young noble before them. They laughed.

A few hours later Cash had masterfully drafted a detailed and surprisingly comprehensive contract that he had the present nobles sign, reaffirming their fealty to the throne of Chung in Chung Do and that they would behave themselves: It was all the usual clauses one might expect an agreement between a king and his nobles to have, plus a few fun clauses on the topic of celestial exalts and their treatment. Daimyo Tung Ting protested that such oaths were usually always sworn in the presence of the lord one swore yourself to, plus it was never committed to writing, then Red simply pointed out: “Well these are strange new times – now sign or we’ll have your heir sign it”

After the nobles had signed document Cash began sanctifying the promise the nobles had made by signing the document: “Do you all swear that you have signed this document in good faith with the intention to uphold the terms you have agreed to?”

The nobles nodded, some reluctantly – but they ultimately all gave a solemn “Yes”

Cash briefly looked at Speaker to see if the lie-detector had said anything.

Speaker nodded, and so Cash flared his caste mark and made the treaty binding in eyes of heaven with a spectacular light show comprised of golden ribbons of ancient sigils encircling the document and the nobles.

While everyone was still ohh’ing and ahh’ing Cash quickly explained what he’d just done meant. The nobles were quite displeased with this, but Cash calmly pointed out that he would know instantly if the nobles broke their renewed and now also heavenly sanctified oaths of fealty – and he would know which one of them it was – and that his flying yeddim could cover well over one and a half thousand miles in a day, so there would be no hiding if needed to track down an offender. Cash graciously made supernaturally swift copies of the treaties for each noble to have fun with.

“Now go home to your castles and count yourselves lucky – I know of few other rulers who’d allow nobles who actually revolted against them to live, but Chung Onyx specifically did not want any more ponies to die, having seen plenty of that in Chung Do already. Oh, and make sure to come visit Castle Chung within the next four months or so – you know, to keep up appearances” Cash commanded.

With whatever hopes of greater power, greater riches or possibly independence that the Daimyos had dashed, the remaining zombie staff that the late Crane Lotus had left behind were quickly rounded up, slain, and given proper burials. After the ceremony Sunrise reported that she could no longer detect the ghosts of the servants at the castle, Speaker confirming this.

Having wrapped up their business in Birdstone, the circle left for Chung Do, Cash with his little treaty, Speaker trying to chew through the legalese of that treaty, Shimmer and Red taunting the husk of Typhon, while Sullen Hoof and Sunrise remained quiet – probably out of disgust or horror of what had been done to Typhon.

Speaker was curious about the paragraphs in the treaty about how the nobles were to treat the celestial exalted in their lands. This included rules that forbid willfully ill treatment, directly or indirectly of such heavenly chosen ponies without a legally warranted cause – and a specification that this treaty most certainly was not one such thing. Cash noted that this prevented the nobles and the ponies they lord over from reporting to the wyld hunt, a necessary clause since he was sure that sending a messenger to Cherak, the headquarters of the wyld hunt, would otherwise be first on the noble’s to-do list once they returned home.

“But will you know if they do that?” Speaker wondered, unsure of the degree of accuracy that Cash’s oath-breaking sense.
Cash nodded slowly, pulling on the reigns of Nah as they came in for a landing in the Castle Chung courtyard: “I’ll only know if a lord willfully did something wrong – I won’t know what – but we can just go ask…”

As the giant yeddim landed graciously on the magically reinforced cobble-painted wooden tiles of the castle courtyard, several ponies came to meet the circle.

Red’s little brother, the young shogun, was first among them, but also Heath Rose: “I predicted that you’d be back early – did you have a fruitful trip?”

Cash tossed the husk of Typhon down from the howdah, Typhon only emitting a hoarse huff as Red caught him and dropped him before the sidereal: “Sure, but we caught a real rotten apple”

Heath Rose looked confused at the horror before her. It was clear that it was a pony, or had been, but who it was wasn’t clear anymore: “Right, uhm… you did send that message about this Soaring Blade fellow as well, what was that about?”
“Another sidereal, for sure” Sullen Hoof noted, jumping down from the Howdah.

Heath Rose didn’t look surprised: “I checked into that – but the convention of deathlords is controlled by the bronze faction, so they wouldn’t say if they had anyone tailing Typhon – now who is this and what did he do to deserve this?”

“That is Typhon, as to what he did – he’s a deathknight, that’s enough justification” Sunrise quickly and grimly stated as she descended on the gangway.

The sidereal raised an eyebrow and bowed down to Typhon: “Oh we are going to have so much fun up in the Forbidding manse of Ivy”

“Oh, and thank you all – catching this guy… even if he can’t really talk anymore, you have no idea how much this will help us – Typhon has been screwing around all over the hundred kingdoms the last year or so, leaving a trail of ponies who died of mysterious illnesses weeks later, convincing kings and nobles to embrace undead labor and of course trying to legitimize his deathlord master’s reign of terror in Thorns” Heath Rose ecstatically stated, bouncing around all over the place in some kind of happy little dance.

Recognizing some of what Heath Rose had told of, Red nodded: “Ya, he’d sold one of the Daimyos on the idea of zombie servants – but he’d been using their ghosts to spy on everyone as well”

“Ya, around deathknights you always have to expect ghosts – always check for them” Heath Rose noted.

After the friendly banter and chit-chat Heath Rose and the young shogun entertained the circle over tea. Heath Rose had apparently clued the young shogun in to her true nature already, or done something similar to make him consider her a trusted advisor. Beyond that Speaker inspected how his geomantic architecture had held up during the day – it had worked flawlessly – and additionally a lot of the ponies of the city came to him and asked about the rebellion, Speaker telling each the good news, although including a warning that the advanced patrols and scouts of the rebel army might not be gone for another few weeks until recall orders had reached all of them. Heath Rose was gone when he got back, having taken Typhon with her.

“Does this mean that we’re done here?” Sullen Hoof idly mused as the circle partook in dinner, enjoying many of the fresh and juicy shoots that the city’s foragers had been collecting for the past few weeks.

Red pointed out that as long as her family ruled the Chung lands her work there was never done. Cash agreed, pointing out that with the friends they had in Chung Do they should be sure to visit regularly, especially since he’d set up the new tax code to give the circle a nice little expense account.

“How big is it?” Sunrise wondered, sounding less curious with regards to what she might be able to buy, but more worried what any sum too large might get wasted on.

Cash shrugged: “It’s flexible, but we’ll have more than enough to live for once the nobles ship in what they owe and the merchant traffic picks up again. In the mean time I’d really like to find a buyer for the rest of the shogunate jewelry we took from Denansdor – if we go to Nexus we could get a king’s ransom for it, especially with my charms”

Frowning, Speaker expressed his dislike of Nexus once more, but Sunrise pointed out an important fact: “Speaker, I understand your trepidation – I know Nexus’s reputation, and I’m familiar with how often Lookshyan forces have to clean up from mercenaries that operate out of Nexus, but such a den of sin would be perfect for making a positive impact in the lives of quite a lot of ponies”

“Hold on, what about Cash’s grand plan, training ponies here to raise an army and retake Denansdor?” Red wondered.
Cash perked up at the mention of plan, smiling at the fact that at least one in the circle had remembered it: “Well, Chung Do will need a lot of time to recover – it lost half its population, so there’s not really enough ponies here to raise any armies. Plus, Speaker said that we’d need to refine our essence even more to properly deal with the miasma – and while sitting around thinking about the sun gleaming off piles of money does like fun, then I would rather go out and do something right now… like sell our shogunate jewelry, get us all filthy rich, and invest that money in something worthwhile that’ll aid us in the future”

Red nodded, Cash adding that the new Chung Do city administration he’d worked on to set up would issue a call for immigrants soon enough: “Plus, if need be then Nexus has quite a lot of slums – if we need to repopulate Chung Do quickly we could just recruit ponies there and fly them over on one of Shimmer’s clouds”

“That’s a great idea!” Speaker exclaimed, thinking how that could probably solve a lot of problems for a lot of poor ponies. Sullen Hoof sounded positive to the idea as well: “It’s been done before – there are always at least a dozen places advertising that they need immigrants in Nexus, trick is usually to get there alive and then survive any local hate against strangers… even moving to another neighborhood in Nexus can get you shanked if a local thinks you’re going to steal his job”

“All the more reason to get them out of Nexus then – I’m sure Cash and Sunrise can talk the ponies of Chung Do into being more welcoming if need be” Speaker mused.

Red gestured with her chopsticks that she had something else to talk about: “So… uhm, since we agree on the Nexus thing, I just had a thought… what if we leave here and a wyld hunts and wrecks the place?”

“It would not be the first time they level a city or village after some ‘foul anathema’ tainted it… that’s at least their usual excuse” Shimmer noted, sounding very much as if she spoke from painful experience.

Speaker nodded: “It would make sense for a wyld hunt to show up here – no matter what. They’d want to purge the city of our influence… and since I rebuilt everything… then that would mean leveling the whole city alright. Hmm… say, Red, did we ever find the hearthstone of the castle manse?”

“I don’t think so, why?” Red said, curious as to Speaker’s apparent solution to her stated problem.

“I think I remember how to… hmmm… how to describe this – it’ll be a device locked into place where the heartstone would usually go – and it’ll suck in and use that power  - but instead of a hearthstone it’ll allow a pony to send magical messages to other ponies” Speaker explained, likening the device to something that would cast a spell similar to Shimmer’s messenger spell.

The whole circle agreed that such a device would be exceedingly handy – not just as a device to warn the circle if Chung Do got into trouble again, but other ponies all over Creation could benefit from a thing like that. Speaker wasn’t sure how to react to that: “They were really common in the first age, every city and village had at least one. Also had these little magical bees made of small gears and tiny blue jade shavings, modeled on some of Autochton’s messenger spirits. Not as fast, but even unenlightened ponies could use one with the right tools”

So the circle spent their last few weeks in Chung Do, Speaker creating a device of jade, river pearls and rare heartwood cores that could send magical messages. Cash spent the time wrapping up his work with the city administration, his co-workers there very sad to see him leave for apparently the city administration had never as well as it had while Cash had been there, even with the plague and everything in mind. Cash chalked it all up to good use of charms that ease and speed up the work that went into governance. Red equally managed to train up a very small but dedicated new batch of city guards, Cash swearing them in to serve the law faithfully. Sunrise did her temple thing, saying her goodbyes and giving her blessings to those willing to accept them.

The day before leaving the circle and the young shogun arranged a feast, Cash having taken Nah on a quick flight to Great Forks to buy ‘party favors’ – which apparently so much sweetmeat that Nah could barely haul the load. Sullen Hoof did the cooking, creating a banquit so good that many of the commoner ponies who took part in the feast wept, loudly. Sunrise was even surprised of the numbers of well-wishers who gave her a last farewell at the temple – apparently Cash’s charms had worked quite well, for the ponies there had little to no hard feelings towards her considering what she had done, instead they expressed understanding and sympathy for acts done while scared.

It was the ninth of Ascending Water, the spring and monsoon season in east, when the circle left at speed going south-west, dodging rain and storm-clouds as spirits of water and wind swirled high in the sky.

A few days later the circle was flying down the yellow river at great height as smoke rose in the horizon on the southern bank of the river. At the convergence of the grey river and the yellow river, where the mighty yanaze river formed, distributed over a set of five hills with a maze of canals in between them to transport goods around, with both gleaming first ages towers of strange materials that none knew the name of, as well as endless slums that covered countless acres, was Nexus: the heart of the hundred kingdoms.

Circling the city high above, Sullen Hoof gave the circle an introduction: “So… this is Nexus, the city of a million lice”

Sullen Hoof described each of the five districts of the city from left to right: “Ok, you see the big enclosed harbor pool at the west end of the city? That’s the Nighthammer district, the harbor area and most of the city blocks around it – that was the smoke we saw earlier. The refineries there work nine of out ten lump of iron ore that flows down the rock rivers on guild barges to this place, so pretty much all iron and steel in the east comes from here. Then you have the Nexus district on the big middle hill, where you have big market and little market, and as well as pretty much all the big merchant houses and the council offices – plus the big merchant harbor on the north side towards the yellow river.

“Big market?” Speaker wondered, having figured that Nexus would simply have hundreds if not thousands of market squares.

Cash perked up: “Instead of buying one apple, you can only buy a whole barge-load at a time – think big volume market. Big business – little market is for buying one thing at a time”

Nodding, Sullen Hoof continued: Then you have the hill to the south-east of that, Sentinel hill. The two big towers you see there, the really high ones, the one of the right is the council tower and the other one is the guild tower… the city is ruled from there”

“Ya I never understood that setup – Nexus doesn’t have any king or shogun?” Red asked, having heard many a tall and strange tale of how Nexus supposedly didn’t have any laws either.

Sullen Hoof smirked, the burns covering his face yielding ever so slightly to make the expression: “I’ll get to that. Now, north of Sentinel Hill you have Manehattan. It’s a really expensive place, the mercs at the district gate charge you silver just to get in – but I’ve worked at a lot of restaurants there. Any wealthy merchant worth his salt lives there just to show off. To the east of that there’s the last hill: Bastion, where all the city’s mercs and their nursemaids live”
“Nursemaids?” Red inquired.

Sullen Hoof explained that the ruling council had long ago decreed that no foal born in Nexus could be sold after his second calibration – so the mercenary outfits of Bastion occasionally bought a lot of infant foals to train from the ground up, literally: “They apparently turn into good soldiers, otherwise I doubt they’d bother – it’s a long investment after all”
“That’s disgusting – you don’t buy foals! Not even slaves are traded that young” Shimmer burst out.

Shaking his head, Sullen Hoof merely said that it got much worse: “The last district… you can’t see it from this far away… but once we get closer – south of Bastion, you can see the towers on the inner wall that isolates the district: Firewander District”
“I flew over the place before I found you Speaker, it’s real bad there…” Shimmer noted, sounding none to happy that she hadn’t already fixed the issue.

Cash flew Nah lower towards the city – and soon a rainbow of colors and wyrd lightning rose up against the yeddim, as if the fell hoof a strange god was trying to grab them. Sullen Hoof quickly shouted for Cash to ascend or get away from the city…
“That’s wyldfire. All of the district is saturated in it. Story goes that during the Great Contagion the changelings set off some kind of evil in the middle of the district – and the wildfire still burns today, slowly mutating the ponies who live in the district… and I can tell you: No pony lives there by choice, but it’s the most unwanted and thus cheapest real estate you can find in Nexus. Even the ponies in the undercity are better off than the wretches that slum it out in Firewander” Sullen Hoof elaborated.

Speaker had heard of the wyldfire of Firewander, but he had never known it to be that bad. Looking down at Nexus all he thought was “Wasn’t there somethere something in the first age around here?” – like a great city in the first age, the pillaged ruins upon which Nexus was constructed – a fact that Speaker knew nothing of.

Sullen Hoof continued, explaining how great gates and walls of banded iron encircle Firewander, allowing for reasonably tight control of what leaves – ensuring that no changelings got out – nor any heavily mutated ponies.

“Well that certainly sounds like that something we can earn a little goodwill by fixing” Cash mused, looking at Speaker as if expecting him to come up with a plan to do so in an instant.

Shimmer laughed: “Cash, I heard stories of the wildfire here when I far younger than you were – it’s been here for over seven hundred years – no pony knows what the source of it is, and no pony who’s entered the heart of the flames has ever left there alive, not even that many lunars to my knowledge… there’s something really powerful in there, so don’t get ahead of yourself”

With even Shimmer urging for caution, and Sullen Hoof explaining the Nexus legal system (or lack thereof) the circle began to get the impression that Nexus might be a place where one had to step lightly: “There are no laws in Nexus. No Cash, not like that, things just work differently here. There is the dogma, eight rules that must never be broken unless you want to invoke the wrath of the emissary”

The emissary. Every pony in the circle had heard of this mysterious pony, even Shimmer back in the wast. Always clad in grey robes and wearing a faceless mask of silver, floating above the ground, proclaiming the council of entities latest civilities – the council was the ruling council of the city, and civilities were ‘extra rules’ that were less than then dogma, but still usually enforced by mercs. The dogma were simple enough: 1) No taxes shall be raised,  save by the council 2) None shall obstruct trade 3) None shall bring an army into Nexus 4) None shall commit wanton violence 5) No one shall falsely claim the council’s name or sanction, and finally 7) None shall harbor a fugitive from the council’s wrath.

The circle looked at Sullen Hoof with a quiet mix of awe, disbelief and fear. Sullen Hoof had recited the seven rules as if a prisoner with a knife to his throat, forced to recite a memorized series of facts. Sullen Hoof had trembled as he had spoken the dogma…

“Well that’s a load of crap” Shimmer quickly exclaimed. Speaker felt that she was right, but Cash vehemently disagreed: “Oh no it isn’t – the dogma are… beautiful, I mean, they condense what most other rulers write dozens of lawbooks on down to seven basic rules of life”

Sullen Hoof shook his head and put a hoof on Cash’s shoulder, speaking very much as if talking from hard earned and terrible experiences: “Cash, the dogma are shit. They’re made for those with money to enable ruthless exploitation and horrible abuses”

Cash wasn’t convinced – Sullen Hoof said that Cash would learn soon enough: “and to the rest of you: as basic rules of hoof in Nexus: Accept no business proposition before checking with me. Not even street vendors, hell, especially not them. You’re more likely to buy a colored and flavored lump of mashed up paper and glue than a boiled beet on a stick. The dogma do no outlaw fraud, bribery, assassination, theft, blackmail… anything and anyone not contributing to ‘trade’ is fair game for almost anything, so ponies in Nexus aren’t kidding when they say that everything has its price: Here everything must technically be for sale… otherwise it can freely be stolen”

Speaker found all of that quite difficult to accept: “Hold on… assassination is legal? How?”

“It’s business. Money have changed hooves. Arguably it’s a grey area, and guards paid to protect a targeted pony are of course allowed to stop you – because they’re paid to do that. Much of Nexus’s wealthy elite is never seen without a heavy presence of armed mercenaries” Sullen Hoof glumly noted.

Red gestured quizzically, having had a curious thought: “Wait, if mercenaries can be in Nexus, how does that work? You said there was a dogma against brining armies in Nexus, and I’ve heard the stories about what happens when you do…”

Sullen Hoof nodded. The few stories there were of the fate of armies that occupied Nexus were told by many in the hundred kingdoms – for they were all part of the greater stories of the many times the realm had tried to conquer the hundred kingdoms. The stories were all similar: A realm legion would occupy Nexus and often begin to tax its merchants ruthlessly – and the next day all of that army’s senior officers would have been turned inside out, their heads trailing after the Emmisary on a hooked chain… it was often a very long chain. Sullen Hoof explained that the mercenaries were always careful never to have more than four-hundred ponies-at-arms in the city at one time, and to always be gainfully employed within the city, so their presence can be excused as being a part of the whole ‘trade’ deal.

“Nexus doesn’t have a police or official city guard force. Different neighborhoods are patrolled by mercs, with bidding wars often breaking out for the really lucrative guard contracts. There’s also the Nighthammer watch, they number in their thousands, a neighborhood watch for hire, real cheap – but not much more than ponies with clubs” Sullen Hoof explained.

With a hearty laugh, Cash tried to cheer the gloomy mood up: “Oh come, it can’t be all bad. Nexus is the beating heart of the hundred kingdoms! Think of all the fun we can have here!”

“We’re not here to have fun – we’re here to do good” Sunrise admonished.

Cash flew Nah down and landed outside of the city, stabling Nah up at a caravansary similar to the one Nah had originally been bought at about twenty miles from the city gates. Paying for a month’s feed and stable space in advance, the circle walked along the broad and heavily trafficked main trade road leading into the city.

The landscape around Nexus was a mix of wild swamps and muddy rice paddies as far as the eyes could see. Thousands of rice farmer ponies toiled in mud up their haunches, while dozens of guild caravans slowly moved towards or away from the city. Speaker was pretty sure that just within a mile of where the circle was, there were more ponies than there currently were in Chung Do.

It took several hours, but finally the circle got to the huge and wide open gates on the east-facing city wall that cordoned the city off. Two dozen mercenaries in dark blue hoods and thick mail barding with spears were doing something that looked like a mix of customs, immigration control and… shaking down anyone who wanted entrance into the city.

Sullen Hoof explained that the mercs were, by the council of entities, authorized to exact a toll of a ‘reasonable’ amount from anyone seeking entry into Nexus – the exact size of such a toll depended on how wealthy looked… basically you paid what you looked like you could afford to pay.

Cash smiled, retrieving a jewel-encrusted hoof-ring, part of the Denansdor treasure, from elsewhere and approached the mercs with a most confident swagger: “Greetings good gentleponies – Me and my friends seek entry into Nexus. Now, as you can see with my impossibly fine clothing then I am a pony of fine tastes and high income, so have this and try not to spend it all at once…”

Tossing the bejeweled hoof-ring at the mercs, the circle was quickly waved in as the mercs started to fight each other over who got to keep the ring.

Inside of the gate the circle was met by a solid wall of sound and smells. Barkers stood at every corner, advertising for random businesses and services, street vendors selling foods of dubious origins and composition filled the air with greasy scents of fried bits of plants and meat. The many guild caravans, with their towering four or five story guild wagons, pulled by yeddim that were just as tall, left behind myriads of strange smells as their unknown cargo and piles of yeddim shit was moved to equally unknown destinations to be sold. Every building was a mix of wood, stone and mud bricks in countless styles, although the facades of nearly every shop visible was painted in bright colors, often contrasting vividly with their neighbors.

“Ok gang, here’s what we’re going to do – we need a place to stay. I don’t want to stay in another hovel like in Great Forks, no offence Sunrise, but we’re trying to be taken seriously here – and for that we will need a fancy place to live. Sully, where do you suggest we go for that?” Cash quickly said, his eyes drinking in the sight that was Nexus at ground level.

“I know where there are a few manehaten real-estate merchants, but they don’t do business with no-ponies… you’d need to become known by the right ponies to go there – it’d be easier to find a nice townhouse in the Nexus and Sentinel Hill districts” Sullen Hoof mused…

Cash was about to ask in what direction those places were relative to where they were when he noticed that the rest of the circle was looking to their left. South of the circle were seemingly endless slums, and yet they were oddly colorful… the buildings even seemed to shimmer and jostle about a little – no, wait – some of them were actually dancing… with ponies failing out of the windows to their death. Firewander district.

“It didn’t look that bad from up in the air…” Red mused, sounding apprehensive, if not downright scared at the thought of having to fight changelings.

Shimmer shrugged: “It was just as bad last I was here seventy years ago…”

The circle moved on down the enormous square at the entrance into the city. The square was big enough that guild caravans, with their impossibly large yeddim-drawn wagons, could circle around and exit the city again – indeed many were doing so, loading their cargo onto prams down in the canals that ran throughout the city. It was much faster to move large volumes of cargo via the waterways – although some of the channels did go into firewander… wise merchants avoided these.

At the end of the square the beginning of the large inner city wall that separated Firewander from the rest of the city began to loom. Most of the district was already cordoned off via the channel network, but there was one small part of Firewander, nothing more than an area four by eight blocks wide, which still connected directly to the city. Sullen Hoof said that the place was known as Tellnaught, not that he know why, and that it was completely walled off: “Ponies just don’t go in there… I think something really bad happened there once”

Crossing the half-mile wide east canal, where almost all of the goods on prams from the guild caravans were going, the circle found itself marveled by a much fancier part of Nexus: On their right they had the cosmopolitan Manehaten district, famous for its rich denizens patronizing artists, playwrights and fashion designers from all over creation. On their left was Sentinel hill, where dozens of first age towers remained, including the two tallest towers in all of Nexus – the Council Tower, which stood well over a mile high as the highest and most impressive first age building in all of Nexus. It was made of a cream colored stone, replete with arabesques and floral motifs, making it almost seem alive and blooming in the spring sun.

As the circle finished gawking, the circle continued down main street – the almost hundred yard wide road which had so many ponies going back forth, some carried in rickshaws or palanquins, some hauling carts with goods, some being vendors with carts full of snacks for the pony on the go, and others just minding their own business. Sullen Hoof quickly had the circle go down a road into the sentinel hill district, or rather uphill in the district. This led to a curious elevated building that connected to Nexus’s pulley-car system – a strange yet still functioning relic of the first age: Carts made with a jade-steel frame, plated with ancient sheets of wood, hooked on to beams of light emitted by several obelisks dotted throughout the city. The weird but indestructible trams hooked on to these beams of light allowed for frictionless horizontal motion along the beams – but whatever original means of propulsion the things had were long gone. Thus, the carts were pulled around through a system of pulleys attached to the carts and threaded through hoops and hooks attached to the obelisks that emitted the carrier-beams. It wasn’t a perfect system, as Sullen Hoof pointed out that the as the cart approached an obelisk the rope hooked to that obelisk had to be unhooked, or the cart would get stuck… and that rope had to be re-set back into the hook afterwards – and the robes occasionally broke, especially if it had been raining.

“So what’s the point of these things? They’re slow, I mean you say we have ponies pulling ropes at the other end of the tram-line” Cash wondered, disappointed that his dream city of Nexus had such a weird and ineffective thing running.

Sullen Hoof shrugged: “It’s part of a still working first age transport system… I think that’s all the justification the council needs – plus its faster than walking across the city. It allows for tens of thousands of workers to get around to work”

“It’s the remains of a light-rail system. Lookshy had a working one connecting the main city to the Lookshy harbor three hundred years ago, but they couldn’t keep it running – I guess this is one way to get around that, but ya… Cash is right, I think recycling this system for parts would be a better solution unless someone fixes it completely” Speaker mused, looking around at the cart interior. A worn wooden floor covered the bottom of the interior, obscuring any essence machinery that might be underneath, while glowing pods of glass filled with luminescent liquid gave off a light that could barely be seen in the noon-day sun.

Sullen Hoof had the circle disembark in the nexus district, where they sought out a realtor.

After the circle had stopped laughing at the realtor who had pissed herself when Cash had thrown her a hoof-full of shogunate jewelry as payment, Cash bought the circle a very classy townhouse a mere stone-buck from Big Market – a very lucrative location, if one was a merchant dealing in big volume trading. Speaker wasn’t sure what to think, but the house looked nice – and realtor had given the circle directions to nearby furniture dealers, something Shimmer appeared quite keen on having a go at. Maybe it was a mare thing? Either way, then the circle had arrived in Nexus, and none of them had any clue what was in store for them there…

> Chapter 44: The Love of Money
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Having settled into Nexus, for better or for worse, the circle spent that evening discussing what they were going to do.
Cash had some oddly reasonable suggestions – at least when it came to what he was to do: He had been graciously permitted by the young shogun on Chung to market the goods and services of the Chung lands, chiefly by spreading the news that the trade routes going through Chung Do were open once more – plus spreading hype of the mane-growing potion that Speaker and Shimmer had managed to teach the citizens of Chung Do to make, plus there was the large number of freshly but highly trained carpenters and other craftsponies in Chung Do that were probably making all kinds of things in anticipation of the returns of regular merchant traffic.

“Well, there’s that – and we need to sell the rest of the jewelry…” Cash noted, scribbling notes on a piece of paper.

Sullen Hoof nodded: “That sounds good, I need to check up on the latest civilities – seriously, they can change a lot, and I’ve been gone from Nexus almost a year. Incidentally, if you plan on doing anything before I can get you all up to speed, then there are plenty of guides you can hire. Just ask around for one, and be prepared to pay in silver up front”

“And how do we know they won’t just take our money and gallop off into a crowd?” Red wondered suspiciously.

Sullen Hoof explained how there were entire guilds of ‘street advisors’ that made their living by staying up to date with the latest civilities and then selling that information – anyone trying to make some quick coin by swindling costumers were usually not just caught, but beaten half to death with their tongue cut out and the wound cauterized brutally with hot coals. Sullen Hoof also added that such a punishment was on the light end of the scale of things in Nexus: Nearly any form of not paying your taxes would result in a very gruesome death, typically something involving your friends or family finding your remains next to a neatly folded pile of one’s skin.

“This place is crazy…” Speaker muttered to himself. He felt a comforting hoof on his shoulder, Shimmer’s: “We can make it better”

Nodding, Speaker expressed that he’d like to do the one thing he couldn’t do back in Chung Do when they had originally arrived: He wanted to open a medical clinic for the poor straight away – and from the sound of it, then putting it in Firewander sounded like a good fit. Shimmer instantly volunteered to assist him on this.

“Well, you still have that un-shaping gun, right?” Sullen Hoof inquired. Speaker nodded, adding that he could use it on himself if need be.

Red was curious of the mercenary outfits that worked in Nexus, being a former mercenary herself, and Sunrise similarly wanted to see if there was a cult of the illuminated in Nexus. 

With that the circle adjourned. The next day Cash and Sullen Hoof left to sell jewelry and learn of the ‘laws’ of Nexus. Cash returned first of the two, appearing back at the townhouse several hours later, with saddle-bags straining to hold in all the silver within – under escort from the local mercenary police force.

Speaker, Red, Sunrise and Shimmer, who had all been waiting, curiously quizzed Cash on his experience.

“Ok, this place will take some getting use to, but there is a method to the madness. Sully got me over to the specialty neighborhoods, that’s where a lot of craftsponies cluster together – there we weaseled out what jewelry shops in Manehatten the best of them supply, then went there and well…” Cash unstrapped the saddlebags, the two dropping to the floor with heavy thuds and a clear rattle of quite a lot of coin. Cash smiled oh so much.

Looking into the saddlebags, Red shook her head in disbelief: “Holy crap Cash, just how much money is that?!”

“Enough to buy all the property and all the businesses in this entire neighborhood, and then some! Friends, we will not be lacking for funds any time soon” Cash beamed.

As everyone filled their purses, plus stashing a good hoof-full of coin elsewhere, Cash had Shimmer store the saddlebags full of money elsewhere. Speaker wondered why Cash wouldn’t store it in a – what was those places called, bank? Cash said that Sully had adviced against it: “Sully doesn’t trust the money lenders here. Said that they might just ‘lose’ the record of my deposit, since I’m still not known well enough around here to be taken seriously as a business-pony”
“Ok, but not we have the money we’ll need to open a clinic at least” Speaker noted.

Cash agreed, but said that he was certain that it wouldn’t be that easy: “I might not know the local laws, but I know that the guild has its headquarters here in Nexus. Once they learn of your skills, any of our skills, we’ll have to contend with them – and remember: The guild doesn’t hire exalted ponies, well, not unicorns, because in their experience exalted ponies tend to have greater aspirations than just making money – so if they find you being the best doctor in Nexus, and a solar one at that, I think they’ll be more likely to try to make you close your clinic instead of buying you up”

Frowning, Speaker wasn’t sure what to think. He knew well enough of the stories of the guild’s economic warfare – but why would they object to him wanting to give free healthcare to ponies stuck living in a wyld zone?

As Sullen Hoof returned later that night, quite pleased, he informed the circle of the latest and most crucial council edicts and civilities that they had to be mindful of – but that wasn’t what the circle noticed… because Sullen Hoof had gotten his orichalcum mask back.

“So, you finally got it back” Red noted, nodding in a congratulatory manner.

Sullen Hoof nodded, the golden helmet with its triangular holes for his eyes, nostrils and square mouth-hole looking not menacing – but oddly neutral in its expression: “Yes, but listen – there’s a few civilities you all have to be aware of… and not all of them makes that much sense”

Apparently it was illegal for ponies to consume meals in darkness, punishable by ten strikes of a wooden rod or cane to be carried out by whatever mercenary agency caught the offender, plus a ten silver fine to be paid to the same mercenaries. There was also a civility against dumping corpses in the city canals, against punishable by a fine. There were apparently several Sijaneese barges on the north end of nighthammer that would accept all corpses, no questions asked. Basically most civilities could be summed up as “Mind your own business and don’t complicate the lives of others – or else”, however there were others which made far less sense: You weren’t allowed to eat on any rooftops, and all foals who weighed less than a stone had to wear weights to double their weight if going outside.

“There’s a civility requiring all mothers to weigh down foals foals with rocks if they’re to walk about outside in Nexus” Sullen Hoof bluntly noted. He explained that this was due to the presence of the Karmeus that nested in Firewander. The Karmeus were giant mutant birds of prey with beaks of stone and twisted pony faces inside their mouths… that liked to snatch up ‘soft’ targets, fly up into the sky, then drop them down in order to kill them – and then they’d usually leave the bodies to rot on the top of often inaccessible rooftops in Firewander, since they liked rotten meat. They couldn’t lift up ponies that were too heavy though…

Horrified that such things were allowed to exist in Nexus, Speaker quickly asked why these Karmeus hadn’t simply been hunted to extinction. Shimmer explained: “Those things were here seventy years ago too – I tangled with a few up in the sky above Firewander. They’re scary smart, intelligent in some aspects even, though not in any way that ponies can talk or reason with them… but I never stayed long enough to make a dent in the population. Plus, they’re really big. The biggest ones don’t just grab foals, but adolescents or elderly – Hey Sully, did you check if they still have archers on the Firewander wall to hold off the things from raiding into Sentinel Hill?”
Sullen Hoof nodded.

All of these horrors that Speaker was learning about Nexus were becoming too much. Stepping outside, he quickly joined by Shimmer who had sensed his unease: “If you want that clinic of yours set in Firewander we will probably have to deal with Karmeus”

“But you said they’re intelligent. If they’ve been smart enough to avoid hunters for over seventy years…” Speaker despaired. He couldn’t understand how ponies could live in a city where they had to be neighbors to such horrors.

This was a mystery that needed solving. Going back inside, Speaker declared that he intended to go straight to Firewander, so he could start to set up shop – to which end he asked Cash for an additional sum of money, something he was quickly provided.

“Red, if you don’t have anything planned right now, why not come along – I want to see just how hard it is to hunt these Karmeus while in Firewander” Speaker suggested, his intentions clear as day.

Thus Speaker, Shimmer and Red made their way to Firewander with Sullen Hoof as their guide – disguised as a servant once more, while Sunrise left with Cash to learn about any local chapters of the cult of the illuminated.

Standing outside their townhouse, a somewhat simple but undeniably roomy four story building set in a row of ten identical structures, Speaker briefly wondered just how poor the living conditions in Firewander were compared to nice homes for the wealthy like this one. He quickly found out, as Sullen Hoof took the circle past his place of birth and where he had grown up: The part of the three by four block area known as The Harlotry – an area that specialized in the sex trade, much like how Little Cogging next to Yinhang Square was home to most of the city’s tinkerers and watch-makers.

Now, there were brothels all over Nexus – but like any of the specialist neighborhoods then in the Harlotry all the exotic, unique, high priced and often quite exclusive businesses within such an area had clustered together. Speaker remarked that it was oddly clean, having expected a lot more streetwalkers looking for costumers, but Sullen Hoof explained that just as with any other business then you actually had to get a license to be an independent prostitute, pimp or brothel owner in Nexus – the council of entities were, if nothing else, quite good at taxing the businesses they ruled over. To this end the number of streetwalkers were apparently quite low, since lone streetwalkers often couldn’t pay the license fee, but at the same time it didn’t cost anything to work at a brothel. This had the benefit of keeping the streets somewhat clean – but it wasn’t everywhere that the mercenaries or council officials patrolled and checked licenses, as Sullen Hoof took Speaker, Red and Shimmer down into the undercity.

“Its noon now, so it’s not easy to spot on the surface, especially not this far from nighthammer, but closer to it and especially in the morning and during winter you can see the Poor man’s breath – the poisonous black fog, or if the nighthammer forges are running really hot you’ll get black snow – the ash from the foundries raining down over the half the city… so do not breathe the stuff” Sullen Hoof explained, as he guided his friends down through a hatch into a dark, dank and partially flooded tunnel which he had promised was a much faster way to Firewander… which featured that very telltale black fog that reached up their haunches.

It turned out that the hills that Nexus was built on had been hollowed out – making for a vast underground city of tunnels, collapsed caverns and exceedingly shady dealerships. Nothing that resembled law-enforcement came down into this part of Nexus, making it a haven for anyone on the run from the law – although the feared and famous emissary was well known to stalk the dark halls and underground tenements.

One thing Speaker found odd as the four exalts made their way under Sentinel Hill was an apparent lack of any ponies trying to rob them. Red quickly noted that the four of them probably didn’t look like the usual emaciated workers and paupers that probably lived in the undercity, Sully agreeing and adding that the dogma that states that only the council can tax ponies in Nexus means that any kind of ‘toll’ or similar form of extortion levied by criminals against ponies passing through parts of the city, or at shops and businesses, ran the risk of getting the emmisary’s attention.

“So there’s no crime of that sort, at all?” Speaker said with amazement, his impression of Nexus improving quite a bit.

Sullen Hoof laughed: “No, it’s just far more complicated – and of course someone’s made a business out of it. Like, most homeowners and landlords pay fire-insurance to local gangs or mercs who’ll keep arsonists away. The arsonists are paid by the construction companies to burn down random buildings so they’ll have work in rebuilding whatever burns down. This doesn’t mean that random muggings don’t happen, but that kind of thieves take care to spread out their activities, because if ponies start getting the impression that it’s a toll being taken in order for them to go through an area… then the mugger might just turn inside out”

Speaker wasn’t really sure how to respond to that. It seemed absolutely preposterous: “What about assassins then? Do doctors pay them to hurt ponies so they can drum up work?”

“Nah, assassins get their work the usual shady and discreet ways here – as do bounty hunters and everyone else working like that, of course you’re allowed to hire mercenary bodyguards who’ll try to stop them just the same. As long as whatever violence being done isn’t just random wanton violence… because then you’re in real trouble” Sullen Hoof noted, pushing aside floating debris from an algae-covered staircase cut into stone that led up from the murky tunnel the ponies were in.

Back in the daylight, the exalts quickly concluded that they were in Firewander: The colors around them were strangely vivid, despite most of the buildings around them looking like extremely poorly maintained tenements and other buildings that all looked as if begging to be condemned. Shanties and cobbled-together hovels could be seen on every rooftop, in every alley and in the ruins of collapsed buildings. A thick scent hung in the air, like a strange scent that couldn’t be identified – it freaked Shimmer out quite a lot…

The ponies in Firewander looked and acted quite different from the rest of Nexus. Back in the Nexus district merchants walked everywhere in exceedingly colorful garbs, replete in jewels (Even if Speaker suspected that most of those jewels were fake) to show off their wealth – but in Firewander the ponies wore drab cloaks and hoods in dull grey and brown colors… here you didn’t show yourself. Sullen Hoof said it was to conceal mutations and to make one less appealing to changeling raiders:

“If you look uninteresting they might not take you… so we actually look like we’re looking trouble here” the orichalcum chef noted.

Finding empty storefronts in Firewander turned out to be slightly more challenging than expected: There were far more shops lining the streets than Speaker had expected – and while it didn’t take the four exalts that long to find their first empty storefront, then it was being refurbished for another shop scheduled to open soon. There were street vendors selling iron trinkets everywhere, as well as food vendors – because no matter what, ponies still had to eat… and even if the ponies of Firewander were poor, then there was money to made on them.

It was a bit odd seeing ponies walking around with rusty iron lumps or bundles of nails as some kind of ugly jewelry – but there was a meaning to the madness: It was common knowledge that changelings reacted quite badly to the touch of raw iron. Purified, alloyed and refined metals, such as bronze or steel, had no effect, but the touch of iron upon a changeling or a changeling’s creations wrought of wyld energy and stolen dreams would burn quite violently – so it wasn’t because bundles of rusty nails were any kind of fashion statement: It was for self defense…

Suddenly a brief series of cries and shouts from within a nearby building was drowned out as the entire  building collapsed, the ponies in the street quickly scattering – from within the dust-clouds of the ruined building poured forth half a dozen insect-like ponies, their bodies covered not in soft short fur, but black armor-like chitin. On their heads were twisted dagger-like horns with strange gouge-like dents, the marks of iron… and there were similar holes on their legs, where foul mockeries of hooves melded with blades hooks protruded.

The four exalts did not flee – but Shimmer was the first to respond, her century-old hatred of changelings making her react faster than even Red could. In a silvery flash her monster-pony form was ripping at the insect-like ponies, tearing their strange translucent bug wings from their bodies, ignoring their feeble attacks clawing at her bone-feather armor.

By the time Red and the other solars had gotten to where Shimmer was, the lunar was drenched in strangely colorful ichors leaking from eerily hollow corpses: Changelings often simply mimicked the ‘outsides’ of things they saw – they didn’t actually need organs for their wyld-powered assumption-forms to work.

“Well that was quick” Red noted, sounding disappointed in that she didn’t get to kill any of the changelings…

Shimmer looked at the rainbow of colored liquids dripping from her talons, which through her charms appeared almost as living silvery tentacle-claws, as they writhed quite unnaturally: “These things weren’t any challenge – just foragers, meant to haul back captives – still, it’s a good start”

Speaker couldn’t see the ‘good’ in changelings wreaking havoc like this, as he and Sullen Hoof tried to sift through the ruins of the building in case there were any survives buried alive. Shimmer quickly shifted into a swarm of crickets and crawled into the ruin, emitting cricket sounds where-ever she found a pony – even if most of the ones she found were dead and in no state to be shown to the public.

As a small crowd of hooded ponies gathered to help bring the wounded away from the ruined building others began to cheer on the three ponies digging survivors out. With Shimmer spotting survivors it didn’t take long for the ruin to be cleared of both living and dead, after which many ponies – mostly relatives or friends of survivors – personally came up to Speaker as he tended to the injuries of the wounded… and apologized profusely, for they could not pay him for the healing he was doing. Many even shied away from Speaker, refusing treatment on the ground that they could not pay him and that they didn’t want to go into debt over it… more even seemed insulted that Speaker had ‘forced’ his services on others that hadn’t agreed to a price for it. Apparently the idea of charity was somewhat alien in Firewander.

Pulling Sullen Hoof aside for a moment, Speaker inquired: “Say… the council of entities, they don’t have anything against charity around here?”

“There is a civility forbidding you from giving free services or goods to ponies outside of your own family – on the pain of death” Sullen Hoof said apologetically…

Speaker mused over the strange wording of such a civility. Outside of one’s own family, why have that kind of clause in a… oh, right, so mothers don’t have to charge their foals for housing, feeding and raising them: “That can’t be all – Shimmer, go find Cash, ask him if there isn’t a loophole here”

Shimmer quickly left, while Sullen Hoof and Red tried to keep the crowd under control. A few minutes after Shimmer had left a large twenty-five pony squad of mercenaries from the Hooded Executioners, the biggest police-contract merc outfit in Nexus, showed up. Each pony merc wore a dark blue hood and gray armor with blue trim, each wearing worn but well-maintained thick battle-shoes, meant for delivering brutal punches and bucks. They scattered the crowd and interrogated the three solars on what had happened.

Upon showing the remains of the changelings the merc officer in charge unceremoniously threw a small bag of coins at Red, stating that there was a bounty on changelings given by the council, then the mercs left.

“Wait, that’s it? They’re not going to help the wounded?” Speaker said in a mix of confusion and righteous indignation at the mercenaries simply stepping around the wounded building-collapse survivers lying in the street.

Sullen Hoof sighed audibly: “They’ll haul away corpses, but they aren’t paid to be nurses”

Shimmer returned a short while later, smiling from one of her beak to the other: “Cash said he’d found a loophole! Pebbles!”
The three solars all gave the talking seagul an incredulous looks.

Shimmer explained: “Speaker’s singing staff, you can melt stone together that way… well then ponies can pay you with pebbles and rocks, that turned into stone blocks which Cash can sell to construction companies… it’s the closest thing to being able to do anything for free Cash could come up with in five seconds”

Speaker looked at Sullen Hoof for approval. Sullen Hoof looked to the heavens: “Only in Nexus would you have to jump through that kind of hoops... but I don’t see why this shouldn’t work. Just tell ponies that we re-sell ‘stone products’ so they can pay us with rocks. It’s ridiculous, but you get your free clinic”

There were already five ponies who’d been in earshot of the conversation who were trying to hold up small rocks or mouthfuls of pebbles – difficult tasks if your jaw or shoulder was broken. Speaker quickly obliged his waiting costumers.

After having treated the building-collapse victims and seen them off, most of them absolutely ecstatic to have survived and now be whole again, Speaker looked around at the collapsed building: “So… think we could build something there?”

Sullen Hoof ventured off trying to figure out who actually owned the building, while Red scouted the area to see if there were more changelings lurking.

Shimmer and Speaker took a look at the surrounding neighborhood. Apparently this part of Firewander was called Brookside. It wasn’t anything special, with the biggest shops in sight being the one with the big sign that read “We buy rags” and a pawn shop that looked quite imposing with its spiked iron bars lining the shop’s front and door.

“What are we going to use rocks for?” Shimmer wondered, looking at the small pile of stones that Speaker had been given as ‘payment’ for his healing services so far.

Shrugging, Speaker simply smiled: “I have no idea, but it looks like word has already spread” as he pointed towards a family of hooded ponies approaching with a bucket full of rocks.

The family of ponies, a stallion, a mare and three foals all had a host of conditions that Speaker made short work of, most of their ailments stemming from what could only be miserable living conditions: The family was filthy, the youngest of the foals was suffering from malnutrition, the mother looking too emaciated to be able to produce milk, and the stallion had the telltale burns and lung-infections that Sullen Hoof identified as that of a foundry worker from Nighthammer.

“You’ll get a lot of costumers like this” Sullen Hoof noted as the family happily returned from whence they came with their bucket empty of rocks.

Speaker chuckled: “That’s what I hope, now did you find the owner?”

It turned out that the owner of almost all the buildings in the neighborhood was a rich merchant who never ever came to the area. There wasn’t even a local landlord to collect rent, because that would apparently cost more than what could be earned from the wretches that lived and worked in the area.

The circle left Brookside and returned via the undercity to their townhouse in the Nexus District.

“Say, Sully – while I do love being flank-deep in dank swamp water and sewage as much as the next pony – why don’t we just take the overland route like normal ponies, you know, walk on the streets back home?”  Red wondered as they pushed through some of the least savory parts of the undercity.

Sullen Hoof chuckled, walking on the walls thanks to his charms: “Do you think that you’d be let into the rest of the city if coming from Firewander? Only the mercs that patrol inside Firewander are let out without question – everyone else have to bribe their way out, and very few can afford that in here”

Speaker found it difficult to be surprised by this, even though it was atrocious. It didn’t help that Shimmer swimming around his haunches in the form of a fish, trying to cheer him up by tickling him with her fins.

Upon returning they found Cash ordering half a dozen servants around the house, guiding the hauler-ponies who were arranging furniture and occasionally signing documents brought by messengers. Smelling like dead shit, the four were quickly ordered into the newly furnished bathroom where servants brought warm water and exotically perfumed soaps.

“I hope Cash still has some money left…” Red wondered as she tried to look out from under her mob of a black and now quite wet mane.

The circle reuniting for dinner, Cash and Sunrise told of their exploits: Apparently Sunrise had actually found another chapter or cell of the cult of the illuminated… but so had the local immaculates.

“From what I was told, the cult had gotten quite popular with a lot of Nexus’ poorer ponies. I couldn’t tell if there had been a solar helping, but the cult was broken up by the immaculates after they supposedly spirited the cult’s monthly payments to their local mercenaries away – without protection they were robbed blind, their temple defaced and burnt to the ground” Sunrise told the circle, sounding not at all pleased – but still quite calm, despite the topic clearly bothering her greatly.
Red was less subtle in her reaction to the story: “Any way we can get back at the immaculates for pulling that?”

“Plenty, but that will require more money – plus you have to be careful not to upset the emissary, I’ve heard stories too – the emissary has apparently already killed a dawn caste solar not that long ago” Cash said, giving Red eyes that wordlessly spoke a multitude of warnings.

It had begun with a dawn caste solar having set up a dojo in the bastion district, offering magical martial arts training to any enlightened pony who could afford it. This had apparently offended the master of the Iron Brotherhood, a former immaculate unicorn pony by the name of Mountain Stomp, who pulled a similar stunt on the solar’s dojo… only it was the dojo’s very first tax payment Mountain Storm had ‘delayed’ to the point that the city administration simply foreclosed on the solar’s dojo and sold the business-space to another shop. Now ponies there made thick cloth for use as padding in armored barding there.
“How does this lead to the emissary killing this solar?” Red wondered.

Cash gave Red a weary look: “Well, how do you think the solar reacted? I was told this story at least four times today by different ponies, since it didn’t happen that long ago, and the solar… well, he confronted Mountain Storm while the unicorn was training his disciples in the middle of Parko Llana, he apparently always makes a big show of his martial arts students. Problem was, the solar attacking Stomp there broke at least seven different civilities, plus those students pay well for that training – so he disrupted trade…”

Red nodded, remembering that dogma well: “And then the emissary showed up?”

“Pretty much. They’re apparently still cleaning up from it, even though its two months since it happened. Apparently a lot of body-parts were buried under the snow, and some of that is still thawing in the park” Cash said, sounding at the same time sad to tell the tale of a solar’s death, but at the same time admiring the guts it would have taken to face a raging dawn caste solar and surviving until the emissary appeared.

Speaker frowned: “Cash, do you think anyone will do the same to my clinic?”

Cash wasn’t sure.  To his admittedly limited knowledge, then there weren’t that many good medical services being offered in Firewander. The only thing that worried Cash was what might happen when word got out beyond Firewander: “There will be merchant princes who’ll want to monopolize on the healthcare industry – and that’ll means controlling you, one way or the other. Just be careful and be sure to tell when they start trying to shake you down”

“I’m sure me and Shimmer can fend for ourselves if anyone tries to threaten us” Speaker reassured Cash.

Cash smiled. He’d meant attempts at economic warfare tactics on the clinic, like trying to force exclusive supply deals and charging ridiculous prices through that, as a means to control the clinic or force it to sell itself – but it was clear to Cash that Speaker didn’t get the subtleties of that kind of aggressive business strategies, so he didn’t press the subject. It would probably be easier to undo later once Speaker got himself into some kind of mess.

The next day Cash covered the paperwork and licensing needed to open up a healing house, enabling Speaker to officially set up shop.

“Explain to me again how this makes you my boss?” Speaker inquired, sounding not particularly pleased of the business scheme that Cash had set up.

Walking through Brookside, past empty storefronts and rag vendors, Cash and Speaker momentarily stopped as a wyld ripple in reality raced through the air – like a pulse of mutation. They could both feel it tugging at their very souls – but fortified by their enlightened essence nothing happened to them – the same couldn’t be said of a few hapless mortal ponies caught by the riptide of change, one sprouting a fifth leg right before the two Solars… the five legged pony ran off screaming, stumbling over her legs.

“…I’m only your boss in so far as I’m your business manager. Someone has to sell the stone bricks you’ll make out of the pebbles you’re getting– heck, if I don’t somehow make this crazy scheme turn a profit we might just be in trouble” Cash mused, shaking his head at the prospect of having to visit a place that  by simply being in would mutate ponies.

Speaker, at first wanting to call out to the suddenly mutated pony fleeing before them, came to a stark realization that completely made him ignore what Cash had just said. Cash quickly noticed the troubled gaze Speaker had, and inquired.

Taking a hoof to his forehead, Speaker sighed: “There’ll probably be a lot of ponies like that mare there – mutants – but the unshaping gun takes a whole day to recharge”

“You know, normal business practice would have it that rare and desirable services cost a premium…” Cash suggested, giving Speaker a toothy grin.

Giving Cash a most disapproving and unsurprised look, Speaker turned to look at the ruins of the collapsed building from the day before. It had been picked clean of pretty much anything beyond broken rocks and clay bricks, with any timbers or broken bits of furniture having been scavenged as cheap firewood: “No I’ll find a way to get around that – but hey, what place did you buy for the clinic?”

“You’re looking at it” Cash said confidently, facing the rubble.

Taking a deep breath, Speaker opened his mouth as if to Speak – but then he closed it again as a very tired expression crept across his face.

“Alright then, now – what kind of paint do you want for the walls?” Cash grinned.

With the aid of Shimmer again summoning an elemental or two to bring forth sufficient stone, something Cash found endlessly ironic due to the clinic’s future payment model, Speaker was able to use his singing staff to quickly bring forth a very simple and humble, but spacious, four story structure. It was less a clinic and more a hospital – even though the storefront at street level, with its pale blue paint only advertized: “The sun and moon clinic – magical healing services”

It took just under a day to get the place set up – and it didn’t take much longer before curious ponies, attracted by the sign out front explaining the unique payment system.

Inside the clinic, behind a wooden counter, Shimmer stood ready to receive customers – she even had a big pail ready to fill with rocks. For the job of nurse she had tied up her purple dreadlocked mane into a lumpy hair-bun and for once she’d even put on clothes: A very plain off-white nurses uniform, which looked almost like a cheap cut-off kimono. It certainly wasn’t a 7th legion standard nurses uniform

Speaker stood beside Shimmer, occasionally looking around with some trepidation at the waiting room setup around the counter: There were only eight chairs – would that be enough? Glancing back into the ‘treatment room’ where a thick woven reed rug covered most of the floor, Speaker sighed. It was a strange feeling having to run his own business, instead of simply taking orders from Lookshy’s legion command – even if Cash officially headed the business, but Cash had made it quite clear that the clinic was Speaker’s to do with as he saw fit.

The first ponies through the door were three reasonably well-dressed ones, a stallion and two mares, all wearing similar looking grey jackets. They certainly didn’t look like they needed medical assistance – they looked like business-ponies to some extent. Speaker couldn’t tell what kind of business they represented, but he could tell from the bulges around their hooves under their long sleeves that they were all wearing hidden flick-down hoof-blades – a choice weapon among thugs and brigands who weren’t shy of a good knify-hoofy fight.

Oh this was looking to be such a good first day of business.

> Chapter 45: Helping Hooves Hit Hardest
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Greetings, I represent the Brookside Firefighting and Insurance company” the mare in front said, not even bothering with giving her name. Their grey uniforms, barely-concealed weapons, and with what Sullen Hoof had told the circle of ‘insurance’ scams and protection money rackets, didn’t leave much to the imagination with regards to the intention of these three ponies.

Shimmer stepped up to the counter and leaned in over it: “We’re not buying – now unless one of you is hurt, beat it”
The mare pulled out a stogie from her grey jacket. The other mare in the trio whipped out a small tinder-box full of embers, lighting the stogie for what looked to be her superior. With a few puffs the mare in charge blew a plume of foul-smelling smoke towards Speaker and Shimmer: “We offer a very serious service. Here in Firewander you have to be careful, so you would do wisely to listen to our offer – anything less would be rude, and Brookside doesn’t like rude business owners – even for charity cases like this”

Shimmer would have leapt over the counter if Speaker hadn’t raised a hoof: “We’re not buying – now beat it” 

“You know, I get that you’re trying to help the ponies here, but you’re not doing them that much of a favor… most of the ponies here pray for the day they die so they can end their misery. You’re just prolonging that by doing this” the mare haughtily stated, parading around the waiting room, looking at the chairs as if to assess what they could be sold for.

“Shimmer, entertain her escorts” Speakers stated as he stepped out from behind the counter and slowly trotted towards the ‘insurances sales’ mare with a slow but determined pace.

The mare didn’t find Speaker’s show of defiance very impressive. She had talked down far more intimidating ponies in the past – indeed by her reckoning she’d seen it all, and made them all pay their dues. It was a carefully rehearsed speech, indeed she didn’t even need to look at Speaker while reciting it as she strutted around as if she owned the place: “Listen, what we’re asking for isn’t unreasonable – and the service we provide is quite legit: You pay us fifteen to twenty percent of your intake, on a weekly basis, based on what services you require, and we keep trouble away from your little clinic here and compensate if something does happen. We cover everything from graffiti, property damage, loiterers. So, what do you… uh”

The mare finally looked at Speaker. Her two escorts weren’t there anymore, neither was the grey-coated nurse, and the door to the street was open… and Speaker didn’t look the least bit intimidated: “…think”

With a firm hoof and martial skills far superior to the back-alley brawling that the mare knew, Speaker quickly grasped her and threw her up against the wall: “You listen here you little shit. I’ve barely been in Nexus for two days, and all I’ve heard is doom and gloom about how horrible it is, how ponies are exploited left and right, how everyone and their cat pays protection money…  but that ends here: If you or your thugs come back here again without any pressing need for medical assistance – then you will quickly need some”

“Do you have any idea who you’re messing with here? I’m with the Grey Collection Agency, you don’t want to mess with us!” the mare said as she struggled against Speaker’s iron grib.

Speaker took a deep breath and sighed: “You were one the one who came tomes with me – I’m simply making you leave”
The grey-jacketed mare was summarily tossed out into the street where she landed in a neat pile on top of her two unconscious escorts, next to Shimmer who appeared to have been expecting such a turn of events.

Speaker and Shimmer returned to their spots behind the counter and began to receive curious customers, most of which wondered what the fight had been about.

At the end of the day Speaker was beaming, and Shimmer was relishing in Speaker’s good mood. Together they had helped several dozen ponies with everything from tooth-aches, limbs that had been broken which had grown together wrongly, a host of various diseases – and indeed, a rather hesitant mutant pony who had wondered if Speaker’s magic could cure her.

The mutant pony, under her cloak of burlap and sack cloth, had been without any disernable coat – instead she had a blue and redish skin of slime, which made a mess on the floor as it trailed goo behind her. Her hooves were bulbous and misshaped, strange feelers protruded from her forehead, she didn’t even have a visible cutie mark anymore – but one shot with the unshaping gun and she was a plain cream coated mare with a curly red mane and a cutie mark resembling a cooking pot and a heart. Her elation was beyond anything Speaker had ever seen – not even the celebrations in Chung Do following the cure of the plague had been this intense and heartfelt.

“I wish we get more customers like her” Speaker idly mused. Shimmer nodded in a most pleased fashion as she swept up the slime-trail that the no-longer mutant mare had left behind upon entry.

That evening the circle discussed the Grey Collection Agency – both Sullen Hoof and Cash Charmer had apparently heard of them. Sully confirmed that the GCA was a run of the mill protection racket focused gang, but added that the other services the mare had listed were quite legit: “They will keep thieves and hoodlums away from the shop – but if you don’t pay them you go on the local list”

“List?” Speaker wondered as he slurped up Sullen Hoof’s wondrously spiced noodles.

Cash explained that it was considered best practice among nearly all the mercenary outfits in the city who dabbled in policing gigs to have a list posted at certain central spots in the city – the list was of the shops and landlords who weren’t paying protection money.

“So it’s basically a go-to list for thieves and stuff? That’s ridiculous!” Shimmer burst out – finding such a practice extremely inappropriate.

“Can’t we accuse these grey-farts of breaking that dogma, what’s the one, the inhibiting trade thing, by inviting others to rob us?” Red suggested, sounding keen on trying to use Nexus’ own twisted laws against it.

Sullen Hoof shook his head: “First of all, the clinic is a charity in all but name – Nexus doesn’t recognize that as legitimate business, so there’s no trade to inhibit – second, then the GCA is a legit business, even if it’s an exploitative one.
Firewander isn’t patrolled by mercs in the same way the rest of Nexus is: They only patrol the main roads by contract with the council, to prevent changelings from entering the rest of Nexus – the rest of Firewander is at the mercy of gangs and operations like the GCA, who lord over most of Brookside”

Speaker sighed: “So… if we earn a profit – then they have to leave us alone?”

“If only it was that simply – but then we could hire mercs to guard the clinic, which would probably be cheaper – even with the higher rates for gigs in Firewander” Cash noted.

Speaker was finding all this talk of business very depressing – he longed to return to his clinic.

The next day Speaker and Shimmer returned to find three things waiting for them at the clinic: A group of hideous mutant ponies, all extremely hopeful to be returned to normal – well, except the screaming wails of one of the mutant’s second mouth (which was on the pony’s belly), which kept yelling obscenities at Speaker until the unshaping gun silenced it forever. It deeply saddened Speaker to have to turn the other ponies away – but he told to come back the next day, when the pattern rectifier would have recharged.
'
The second thing Speaker and Shimmer found was an invoice from the GCA nailed to their front door – on it was written, in no uncertain terms, that failure to pay the listed dues would result in the clinic appearing on the ‘bad payer list’. Speaker took no heed to this, although Shimmer suggested that she stay the night in the clinic to keep watch…

The third thing the two found – once they finally inside the shop – was a hole in the stone floor. Someone had tunneled in through the floor over night and had stolen the wooden chairs in the waiting room and even the woven mat in the treatment room. While this was of course deeply troubling, then these lost items were not of any real value – plus Shimmer said that she could smell the scent of the thieves, so she asked to go hunting for them – Speaker obliged the Lunar as he recalled his singing staff and played a little tune to make the rocky floor seal itself and usher forth a series of stone chairs and benches – he could buy blankets and seat covers later, maybe when Shimmer returned.

The rest of the day proceeded relatively uneventfully – dozens more ponies came by, the pail for rocks and pebbles soon found itself nearly half-full, and Shimmer returned a short while before Speaker closed the clinic for the day with a big purse full of silver: “Compensation for stolen property and floor repair”

“You didn’t kill any of them?” Speaker wondered, Shimmer’s predatory glee giving him a worried feeling.

Shimmer shook her head: “Didn’t have to – burglars aren’t brawlers – but hey, did you know that there is like a ton of first ages ruins under the streets here?”

That didn’t just get Speaker’s attention – that completely stole it, to the point that the mare with the bum leg he was treating felt sufficiently ignored to speak up about it: “Hey!”

Speaker quickly gave the mare a quick swat on the flank – instantly and quite magically curing the disease which had been eating away at the mare’s hip joints – then he sent her on her way even faster. Turning to Shimmer, Speaker stared at her intently: “Tell me everything!”

It turned out that while Shimmer had been hunting the burglars, tracking their scent through the hole in the floor, she had come across quite a few first age ruins – all of them picked clean from centuries of hopeful treasure hunters – but after shaking down the burglars she had checked in Sullen Hoof, then at the city library near the big park in Manehattan: “…and you won’t believe the entrance fee you have to pay to get in there – I’m surprised there were any scholars poking around in there at all”

“Doesn’t surprise me, but what did you find?” Speaker inquired, most curious.

With a smirk, Shimmer simply said: “Nothing – the few books they have on first age stuff aren’t available unless you pay a huge security deposit… and I didn’t feel like parting with one of the Denansdor jade talents”

“They charge that much to let you read books about the first age? Wow” Speaker said in surprise, sitting down in one the stone-benches he had music’d up earlier – darn things really needed some soft blankets or cushions.

Nodding, Shimmer flicked her tail about in frustration as she sat down next to Speaker: “Ya, the library was a bust – but on my way out I got chatty with a scholar who was having the same problems, some traveling purple unicorn mare from the realm, Clover the something something – anyway, she said that Firewander was once known as Hollow – that ring any… bells?”

Speaker looked as if he’d seen a ghost. Oh he knew Hollow quite well… it had been one of the places he’d sought refuge when the usurpation had taken place – and he had found no sanctuary there, only more hostile dragonblooded unicorns already burying their dead solar masters in five horrid tombs around the hills of Hollow.

“Hello?” Shimmer waved a hoof in front of Speaker’s face – but he was lost in thought and ancient memories.

Eventually Speaker snapped out of his memory fugue, at which point Shimmer noted that pretty much all of the accessible ruins had been picked clean – if not outright dismantled – with only the few dozen towers and other surface-level first age buildings that dot Nexus still being in use.

“Ya, and we’ve seen how they’ve mangled the light-rail system…” Speaker said, sighing heavily: “It’s like Nexus sucks everything good out of anything that comes here, then bottles it and sells it back to you at twice the price – or tries to force you to do that yourself”

Cuddling up to Speaker, Shimmer comforted the Solar by pointing out that the good they were doing would doubtlessly help fix at least the local area.

Standing up abruptly, leaving Shimmer to fall over on the stone bench, Speaker drew a deep breath with renewed vigor and sense of purpose: “You’re right – and I know just how to help fix the place up, but we need to do something about the changelings and the wyldfire first”

“Sounds good to me, what’s the plan?” Shimmer said, nursing the bump on her head.

Shrugging, Speaker admitted that he had no idea – the source of the wyldfire would have to be uncovered first, although he was certain that if that could be deactivated, stopped or just moved out of the city and perhaps chucked back into the wyld then the changelings would thin out as well.

That evening, as the circle reconvened at the town house in Nexus district to rejoice at another of Cash’s culinary masterpieces, Speaker and Shimmer told the circle of what they knew. To the pair’s surprise the rest of the circle knew full well of Nexus’s past as a first age city – the city of Hollow.

“You make it sound like it is some kind of unheard of feat – Lookshy, most of the realm, most larger cities in the south and the north; they’re all built on the ruins of the first age” Sunrise noted without much care in her voice.

Cash was less dour about the revelation, but pointed out that it well known that scavengers, treasure hunters and even construction companies had picked the remains of Hollow centuries ago – to the point that some parts of Firewander occasionally would collapse or cave in from having barely any actual foundation, beyond the shell built on top of the ruins beneath.

Sullen Hoof confirmed what Cash said: “It gets really bad every year when the spring thaw really hits Nexus, the yellow and grey river both flood and basically wash away most of the lower lying neighborhoods – as well as some parts of Firewander’s underground. The wyld energies there are too powerful, and the changelings too numerous, for any ponies to safely go down and fix the damages”

“All the more reason to get rid of this wyldfire thing then” Speaker resolutely noted, sounding none too pleased that a mercantile power as forceful as Nexus hadn’t managed to do something on its own in over seven hundred years.

Shimmer put her chopsticks down: “Hey, I’ve heard of dozens of Lunars who’ve braved the wildfire – not that many have come out alive, and those who did all bore marks from it – but don’t think that the ponies aren’t doing anything. Yesterday when looking around for those burglars I saw several dozen mercs on the streets in Firewander, decked out with iron weapons and iron barding, much of it with that wyld sizzle you get after touching it to changeling glamour – so the ponies here do fight the changelings and even keep them at bay. For mortal forces to pull that off for seven centuries, that’s impressive”

“Perhaps, but Lookshy could probably have come up with a better and more permanent solution far sooner” Speaker counterpointed, not entirely pleased that Shimmer wasn’t just siding with him on the issue.

The Lunar gave Speaker an accusatory look: “And so might the realm, but both those options would mean giving up the freedom that ponies here have to make their own fortunes”

“I can’t believe you’re saying that – you’ve seen what that ‘freedom’ affords the ponies that eke out a living in Firewander! This place needs some proper oversight, badly” Speaker adamantly implored. Sullen Hoof nodded, but Shimmer seemed to remain firm in her beliefs.

Drawing in a sharp breath, as if to quickly say something, Shimmer paused as she was overpowered by her exaltation’s link to Speaker – she simply couldn’t reject his point of view, even if as a Lunar she was very much a fan of the idea of survival of the fittest, the most shrewd and those who best adapt to difficult living conditions. Still, she tried to rationalize her forced change of heart: “I… you’re right – plus the guild sells thousands of pony slaves every year to the changelings at the amber post, that’s exploitation on a level that even I can’t accept. Reigning in the guild and Nexus wouldn’t be that bad idea, but not too much either”

Thinking for a moment, Cash found himself struck with an inspired thought so profound that he felt that he simply had to share it. The rest of the circle mainly just noticed the peas rolling out of Cash’s mouth, back into his bowl: “Tell you what – the guild would be a lot easier to reign in if they couldn’t oppress their workers here so effectively. If the working ponies of Nexus unionized they could influence the guild far more effectively”

“No chance – labor unions, and even the mention of that kind of things in public, are forbidden in Nexus” Sullen Hoof noted, his voice quite overtly revealing his very negative opinion of that fact.

“By dogma or civility?” Cash asked Sullen hoof.

“Civility – but good luck trying to find a council member who’ll overrule that one – it’ll be reinstated so quickly you wouldn’t know it had been gone” Sullen Hoof said, followed by a sigh.

Cash didn’t seem deterred: “Well that would be a problem, but say, does the emissary ever issue any civilities himself?”
There weren’t many stories of the Emmisary issuing civilities – but there were one or two that he could remember, although Sullen Hoof had to admit that even if they were true then he had no idea of the circumstances of such abnormal events. Cash suggested that he and Sullen Hoof investigate that the next day.

The next few days came and went relatively uneventfully for Speaker and Shimmer – the only thing of note that really happened was a rather worrying development taking place outside of the clinic: First it was gangs of mutant ponies who started trying to control who got enter the clinic, basically charging for admittance for other mutants out front – and their prices were steep. Shimmer dealt with them quickly, but the damage had been done and the precedent had been established. After that the Grey Collection Agency started pulling the same thing, almost putting up barricades around the clinic and then charging the hopeful, the desperate and the very ill for what Speaker was giving away for free.

Red suggested a direct assault on the GCA headquarters,  but Cash said that doing so would be just as likely end up making things more difficult than need be – especially since the GSA employed Night Arrow mercs to guard their properties…

“And these Night Arrows are to be feared? We’re solars, come on – they’re only mortals” Shimmer said in a bemused tone.
Clearing her throat, Red took command of the conversation: “The Night Arrows are the most popular and well-liked mercenary outfit in Nexus, because they patrol the public parks – plus they give the best entrainment: They are the guild’s and the council’s go-to mercs for public executions of prisoners. If we mess with them we’re messing with some very well liked ponies”

Pouting, Shimmer leaned over onto Speaker’s shoulder. Speaker couldn’t help but think that for a pony who’s supposedly a hundred years old, then she sure didn’t act it from time to time. Of course, what Speaker didn’t know was that Shimmer based her ‘hundred years’ on time also spent in the wyld – in narratives and under conditions that weren’t entirely synchronous to Creation...

Ultimately Cash suggested that Speaker and Shimmer try to wait it out – the GCA needed to realize that there weren’t any money to get from the clinic. The problem was that doing so wasn’t much of an option: Even with the mutant gangs, or the GCA trying to profit off the clinic-going ponies, then enough were showing up that Speaker was running out of essence several times during the day, as he used a lot of essence to speed up his treatments to handle everything, so he could work faster and cover the full patient load nobody would have to leave without getting treated.

“I don’t see the problem” Cash noted. Sure, he could recognize that it meant that Speaker was working really hard and servicing a ton of ponies, but any pony selling anything would have to slow down his business if couldn’t meet the demand, or… expand, which it then occurred to Cash that Speaker wanted to.

“The main problem is recovery – almost half the essence I use is to ease and speed the recovery of the ponies I’ve treated. With the four stories of the clinic building, we have plenty of room we don’t use to have patients stay and remain under observation as they recover normally – but that’ll need nurses, orderlies, actual medical supplies since I am currently using my own essence as everything from bandages to medication” Speaker explained, Cash nodding slowly.

The problem with such an expansion of the clinic, in the face of the GCA wanting money from the clinic, was that it would clearly demonstrate that the clinic had money to spend on salaries, supplies and furniture. Of course, Nexus’s civilities did offer solutions – but it was all solutions that required spending even more money: “The only way to keep them from camping in front of the clinic and charging for your help would be to buy the whole block, since that’d give me control of the road outside it…”

“Then do that, please – I don’t want the emissary knocking down our door for beating up grey-coats, but if they keep this up I don’t know if I’ll be able to stop myself – they just won’t stop trying to extort money from us” Speaker implored.

A deep frown gathered on Cash’s face, like a storm brewing: “I could do that – but it would have to be done very quickly once I start it, since the asking prices for the properties will go up very quickly once word spreads of what we’re doing. Secondly, I honestly don’t see how an investment like that could ever pay off… but…”

Seeing the frown turn into a devious and gleeful expression, like that of a predator ready to pounce its prey, the rest of the circle leaned in to hear what Cash was saying – especially Speaker and Shimmer: “Speaker, could you and Shimmer could find a way to clean up that part of Brookside? I’m not saying go and stop the wyldfire permanently, but if you can find a way to at least locally clean the area of wyld energy so it’d be safe to live and work there I could open up any number of business there… I just need something to use the properties there for”

“You know Cash, I’ve actually been thinking on doing some experiments to that end – just to see how the wyld energy of Firewander works – I’ll get back to you on that as soon as I have anything to tell” Speaker said enthusiastically.

Over the next few days Shimmer caught Speaker increasingly doing strange gestures up against the walls of the clinic whenever she was fetching new patients – and one day when she came into the treatment room with a frail looking wretch of a pony - a stallion with a worn face, one that spoke of a life mired in occasional bouts of violence and daily exhaustive physical labor – Shimmer found Speaker wearing that strange mechanical hoof-device that Sunrise had fetched from the outskirts of Denansdor just before they left that horrible place.

“Ok, what’s with the gizmo?” Shimmer said, ushering the frail pony into the room and onto the examination table.

Speaker beamed with pride as he struck the ground hard with the clockwork hoof device: multiple tiny pistons and tubes of irridecent fluid springing to life, emitting a mystic pattern of golden essence that seemed to fade into the air and ground around him. Shimmer instantly felt it. As a Lunar she was very much able to sense ambient wyld energies, a crucial skill if living in the outskirts of reality, but at that very moment she felt absolutely no wyld energies, only the serene calm of reality’s stability in the air: “What did… how?”

“One of the oldest wards the solars deviced – the chaos repelling pattern. No changeling, demon or stranger thing can bend reality around me when I have this working” Speaker said proudly.

“An island of stability… Oh this is perfect, can you make it into a permanent ward for the clinic, or the whole district?” Shimmer wondered, her thoughts running amok with the potential of such a powerful ward – truly, a charm that made solars worthy of the sobriquet of Lawgiver: They could enforce even the heavenly laws of reality.

Looking at the seemingly pulsating machine wrapped around his right fore-hood, Speaker frowned ever so slightly: “No, and the ward only works for a couple of yards around me – but now that I know how to stabilize and manipulate wyld energies on a basic level I can start working on much more advanced techniques that reshape wyld energies”

“Uhm… not to interrupt, but Buck-eye Joe down at the lawless front said that if I gave you two a rock you could help me out…” the emaciated stallion on the examination table blunty stated.

Speaker smiled at the stallion and gave him a brief glance, his eyes flashing gold for a split second: “Three badly set broken ribs, early onset of arthritis in the shoulders and hooves – probably from carrying heavy loads – malnutrition, slight scurvy, rotten teeth all around, skin-parasites in all the usual places, irritation of the bowels – probably linked to the malnutrition and parasites – did I miss anything?”

The stallion’s tired eyes lit up in a mix of surprise and awe – a reaction that Speaker at this point was quite used to when he had properly diagnosed a patient. The stallion didn’t even get to say anything, as Speaker quickly hit the patient with his anesthetic charm, the weakened pony falling unconscious instantly.

Smiling, Shimmer took a light breath and rearranged the patient so Speaker could work his magic: “So… what do we do now?”

Speaker knew that his Lunar mate was talking about the wyld energies and the techniques and charms he’d mentioned – but right now his focus was elsewhere, so with a smirk and a coyly raised eyebrow he simply stated: “We practice medicine”

From outside the clinic the flashes of golden and silver light that came from Speaker’s and Shimmer’s healing and flesh-manipulating charms made many a curious pony turn and look as they trotted past, but the locals had gotten used to the lights from the healing house, so they paid it little heed – merely smiling as they knew that it meant that another pony was getting a new chance at life.

Informing the circle of the development, Cash congratulated Speaker and pointed out that he had always been sure that Speaker would find a solution to the wyld taint of Brookside. Speaker added that it would require at least a few weeks of intensive meditation, training and practice to fully master the wyld shaping techniques he had begun to remember from his past life – but once he understood them he could start siphoning off wyld energy form Brookside to see how the ambient wyld energy levels reacted.

“Do you really think it’ll help?” Sullen Hoof inquired curiously.

Smiling to the melty face that was Sullen Hoof and his burn-scars, Speaker nodded: “In the first age the solar host quite literally stabilized the wyld around creation to the point that we expanded the size of Creation tenfold, if not more. Creation back then was impossibly vast… so trust me, I can stabilize this, the only question is how I have to do it. By the way, come by the clinic one of these days… you said I could have a go at your face once you got your mask back”

Sullen Hoof nodded, but before he could answer Cash spoke: “I would suggest you keep the clinic closed until you have stabilized the area and allowed for the business expansion – you will probably also need to train your nurses and whatnot as well – spend the time training, and just do house-calls if you want to keep working as well… in fact I have a few potential costumers lined up if you’re up some concierge medicine”

After explaining what concierge medicine was – the service of being an on-call private doctor for the rich – Speaker at first rejected the idea: “I treat ponies – I don’t pamper them. Plus, if I have to be on call for whenever some guild factor has the sniffles I won’t be able to help the ponies who really need my help – it’d a pain, no a royal pain to have to run back and forth across Nexus for that”

Cash retorted that it would be more than possible to set up service contracts where checkups had to be booked in advance: “Plus, there are two mitigating factors you have to consider: Most of the things these wealthy ponies suffer from aren’t very acute, so I don’t think you’d need to come running all the time –and if they do insist on un-booked appointments then we can simply charge them extra for that, to the point that they’ll want to book appointments no matter what”

The hesitant and frowny face that Speaker was making – the sort that only truly (physically) old ponies could really pull off – said it all, but at the same time Speaker actually liked the idea of charging the rich ponies extra for emergency appointments: “How much extra can we charge?”

“Well, for guild factors and the likes – they know they won’t live forever, so they’re usually more than willing to flaunt their wealth by spending as much as possible… hell, if we do this right you could probably earn enough money this way to fund the clinic yourself, without my help” Cash suggested.

Red yawned, finding all this talk of medicine and rich ponies boring. With a nod to the rest of the circle she excused herself – she had found more fun things to do while the rest of the circle talked at the fighting rings in Bastion district, for apparently the reigning champion in the one on one pony fights, a gladiator known as Panther, had recently gone missing, so quite a few hopefuls were fighting to take his spot.

Speaker liked the idea of financial independence, although he insisted that Cash stay on as financial manager or something similar – all Cash had to say was that he wanted to be paid very well for his services…

The next day Speaker and Shimmer returned to the clinic. Despite dawn barely having broken then there were already ponies waiting outside the clinic. The exalted duo helped those who had arrived early, then closed the clinic by putting a sign out on front that read: “Closed for renovations and expansion. Will open again sometime come Resplendent Water”
What followed were two weeks of – if not intense – then at least highly focused training and mental exercises, only occasionally interrupted when a building would collapse, or there was a fire nearby, and the two rushed to help.

As Speaker mastered the basics of shaping wyld energies into forms native to creation a different kind of distraction appeared: Draining an area of wyld energy would catch the attention of quite a few changelings – forcing Shimmer to defend Speaker as the rituals and incantations that were part of the wyld shaping technique didn’t allow for breaks, pauses or interruptions more than a few seconds long.

The fighting that usually ensued on account of this was often brutal, making Speaker and Shimmer quickly stop training inside the closed clinic – instead opting to relocate to a spot out of sight of the mercs patrolling the Firewander wall, but only barely: They could still see the changelings coming, and whittled down many of them with iron-tipped arrows.

Seeing the changelings heading for you be pincushioned with arrows that each burst into brilliantly chromatic displays of light and disintegrating fantasies was unnerving  - but Speaker also found it immensely satisfying, as changelings had always been the one type of foe that Lookshy could never truly defeat…

Shimmer experienced the events a little differently – chiefly because she was the one doing all the fighting, ripping changelings apart with a brutal cunning that saw most of the wyldlings destroyed before they could initiate their own shaping attacks.

This all came to ahead on the sixth day of practice, when Speaker finally felt that he had figured out how to permanently give shape to the raw ambient wyld energies, for this apparently elicited a far greater response than previously: This wasn’t the usual half dozen drones, no mere mindless figment’s of a powerful changeling’s imagination: These changelings were larger, bigger than adult ponies, with bodies replete in chitinous scales that looked like black leaves, but worst of all they seemed far more… imaginative… and aware of their surroundings: These changelings were actually sentient – individual changelings of great power, like the samurai to a Daimyo.

These intelligent changelings at first caught Shimmer off guard, as they spat arrows of green lightning and burrowing seeds that drilled into stone and sent out tangling stinging tendrils from afar, held a loft on their insect-like wings. The rooftop that the duo were on, so Speaker could easily draw in wyld energies, was quickly covered in a hellish maze of flashing green lightning and thin wiry tentacles of gnarled stone-roots that tried to grab anything that moved in reach. Suffice to say the charm training was thoroughly interrupted – but the changelings didn’t stop on that account.

Shimmer tried to leap out and engage the changelings, dodging most of the seeds and arrows, but the few that hit made flight extremely difficult – Speaker looked on in horror as the two dozen flying changelings dove down to chase the tangled and falling Lunar…

It was difficult to see what was happening in the alley Shimmer had crashed in – and Speaker was having his own problems with the tendril-seeds that were trying to pin him down: With every swing of Gift half a dozen tendrils would snap like taught metallic string, but new ones would simply erupt from the seeds. All Speaker managed to see down in the alley was a mass of blackness pulsating. He would have cried out for Shimmer, cried out for others to help, but he knew quite well that in Firewander no ponies ever willingly ran towards changelings – not even the mercs who were paid to do so.

As Speaker twisted and slashed at the tentacles trying to pin him down, a bone-colored heap suddenly fell down near him – the tentacles instantly swarming over the form and pinning it down. A second or two later a chill wind announced what landed on the rooftop a split second later: A figure of living shadow, its limbs writhing with spectral worms burrowing through translucent flesh and hooves…

“Bright Machine Speaker, I have need of your services” A voice spoke, a voice that tore at Speaker’s mind unlike anything else – well, one voice had… so as the dust settled Speaker looked up and felt his stomach churn at the sight of the Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes in all his inglorious splendor.

> Chapter 46: Devilish Deeds
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With ghostly hooves that blackened the thin dusty layer of pale gray ash and dust, and wooden tiles of the slightly angled roof that a surprised Speaker and now also an annoyed Shimmer was on, the deathknight pony known to them as the Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes bowed his head.

Noting how the entangling tendrils seemed to actively shy away from the Bodhisattva, fading into nothing as he passed close by them, Speaker quickly made the decision to help Shimmer up – she wasn’t hurt in any meaningful way, what wounds she might have gotten from the changeling warriors having healed already thanks to her shapeshifting powers. Still, the immediate urge to help her was stronger than his curiosity of what the deathknight wanted, and she appreciated that.

Seeing that Speaker was still paying attention to him, albeit without acknowledging that fact, the Bodhisattva explained his plight: “I require the aid of you and your circle to recover a cache of first age artifacts”

As Speaker helped Shimmer back on her now hooves, the deathknight explained that he had been searching through the underground of Firewander, exploring Hollow to find… a series of hearthstones. Apparently the Bodhisattva had learned through interrogating ancient ghosts that the old first age rulers of Hollow had owned the hearthstones to a series of ancient war manses, manses made in the form of fortresses and weapons platforms – places now lost to the wyld, but supposedly still existing as lone islands of reality in the seas of chaos beyond Creation’s current borders. He hoped that via the use of hearthstone-compasses he could find lost weapons of primordial slaying, so that he could finish his grim task.

“Ok – but you say that someone took them? You don’t look like a pony who gets robbed, let alone look like a pony” Shimmer quipped.

Nodding as he pulled up a hood of sewn-together rat pelts to cover his hideous head with something only slightly less revolting, the Bodhisattva added: “I was close to finding what I sought, but then another treasure hunter beat me to it…”

“Any idea who it was?” Speaker wondered, finding the idea of possibly learning of the location of first age war manses irresistible. Lookshy  was well known to richly reward those who sold it exotic and rare first age weapons – it would be a fitting way to return to Lookshy as a solar.

The Bodhisattva’s face rippled, furrows forming in the spectral flesh – culminating in a momentary sea of wrinkles: “Yes and no… It was no unicorn, but the pony was with enlightened essence and knowledge of the first age mechanisms that held the vault I sought closed. Equally the pony had powerful disguise charms, although I’m no tracker so they might not have been that impressive”

“Could it have been a solar who lived here before the usurpation?” Speaker wondered. The deathknight noted that whatever the source of the pony’s powers were, then he did not know of it.

Returning to the town house, lugging the deathknight along by having the Bodhisattva dispel his own ghostly limbs, leaving only a rib-cage encased in near-indestructible soulsteel armor and a ghostly head, which was stuffed in a thick sack, the circle was summoned and the deathnight presented his plight to the whole circle, except Red and Sunrise who couldn’t be reached – and the Bodhisattva did not wish to wait.

“Well, with what you're offering to pay I can fund the clinic expansion… but, is this all you have for tracking this pony?” Speaker wondered, looking at the otherwise quite nicely detailed painted sketch that the Bodhisattva had rendered of the rather unique hoof-prints he had found of his quarry.

The hoof-prints were unique in the sense that, while undeniably hoof-prints, then they had claws on them. Shimmer had pointed out that such hoofprints might hint of the pony being a Lunar, but while poking around in the Firewander underground she hadn’t seen any fresh ‘markings’ indicating Lunar activity in that area.

“Well Mister uhm… what exactly do we call you? I mean, sorry, anyway with these prints – I will need to examine the place you were trying to get into, to see how this other pony got in” Sullen Hoof noted, thankful that the Bodhisattva was wearing a hood and cloak over himself. The irony of such a sentiment considering Sullen Hoof’s own melty facial appearance was not something he considered.

Bowing his head ever so slightly, the deathknight spoke – his voice still sounding like a horror from beyond the grave: “I can escort you to this location, but beware: The wyld energies there are strong, so you will need means to resist its mutating powers. Beyond that, then I no longer go by my given title of Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes, for I have chosen a title more befitting my freed will”

“And what exactly would that be? Ghostfaced Spookyhoof?” Cash said in jest.

The Bodhisattva turned to give Cash a piercing glare – not that he could give much else, considering that the blood-spheres that were the deathknight’s eyes could be seen clearly through the abyssal’s transparent ghost flesh: “I call myself the Recalcitrant Bodhisattva of Penance and Suffering Ended. You can simply continue to address me as Bodhisattva for short”
Speaker offered to join the expedition, to grant the protection that his chaos repelling ward could offer, with Shimmer saying that she would join as well – surprising no-one.

The trek into the undercity of Firewander, the ruins of ancient Hollow, was not easy. There were no officially sanctioned or maintained passages into the area – indeed, most such passages that were officially discovered were officially sealed, to prevent changelings from pouring out of them. Additionally, with spring coming into full effect the waters of the Grey and Yellow river had already begun their annual rise – soon they would flood most of the lower-lying parts of Nexus, including the place that the Bodhisattva wanted to show.

Following the deathknight through several dark tunnels in the undercity, through holes smashed in ancient walls of mysterious materials, past hovels of scrap and the pathetic looking and wretched ponies that lived in them, the circle ultimately crossed past the ramshackle warning signs that marked the underground entry-points into the most heavily irradiated underground wyld zones of Firewander.

Outside of the island of normality enforced by Speaker’s charm, the stone and dirt around the circle began to change color, texture and even consistency wildly. In some areas colors were supernaturally bright, to the point that the dancing lights thrown off even bits of dust from the glow of the circle’s glowing animas looked hypnotic. The abundance of claw-marks and pony skeletons didn’t bode well either, for they were the sad remains of the hapless victims of the changelings once they had been drained completely of emotions, dreams and willpower.

There were surprisingly few changelings to be seen so deep into the wyld zone, the very heart of Firewander, but the Bodhisattva explained that in the months he’d been searching he had made his presence and abilities well known to the changelings: “The few who bothered to speak to me has let me know that their leader, a changeling noble who calls itself King Everfree, considers me a dark void to be avoided – so her drones stay well away from me where possible”

“I assume that they didn’t think so to begin with?” Shimmer wondered.

The deathknight peered into the darkness of a low-roofed cavern through a hole in the wall of the tunnel they were in: “Of course not, but I can destroy Changelings quite effectively – also, this is the spot, in through here”

Slipping through the small hole in the wall thanks to his malleable ghost limbs, leaving the rest of the circle to break down bits of the tunnel wall to make way, the Bodhisattva surveyed the area. It was a dusty and claustrophobic undertaking, as it was clear that few mortal souls had been in this part of Firewander or Hollow for a very long time. Only the faint hoofmarks left behind by the Bodhisattva’s spectral hooves – and that of the circle’s – were there to give signs of living ponies having been there. In the distance, down dark tunnels and through other holes or smashed windows of ruined buildings faint buzzing and chitering could be heard, the sign that the local changelings with their ravenous insect-like forms weren’t that far away…

The vault that the deathknight had sought was part of an ancient building made of a pale yellow, almost greenish, stone. It had bits of its original decoration still intact: Floral motifs and tiny dancing ponies etched into its façade – all echoes of a time when Creation had been so much richer and more vibrant.

The vault itself was a marvelous construction of three foot thick jade-steel – the bright white metal was a dead giveaway – it was also worth a fortune, but was far too massive to ever be moved. The locking mechanism was so complex that Sullen Hoof at first found himself completely at a loss at how a pony might have even activated it, but Shimmer and Speaker helped with their essence sight, finding trace amounts of strange dark and greenish essence…

“Dark essence – was it another abyssal exalt?” Sullen Hoof inquired, sounding no small amount of worried.

The Bodhisattva shrugged under his cloak: “It’s could be – I don’t know specifically if any other deathknights are operating in Nexus, but I would be very surprised if there weren’t. It’s a prime target if striking against the east”

While that was in no way very uplifting, Speaker pointed something out regarding the greenish essence him and Shimmer had also spotted traces of: “This isn’t wood aspected essence – its emerald green…”

Sullen Hoof looked around at the Bodhisattva, Speaker and Shimmer – their faces all told him that they knew what this meant. He did not: “And that’s a sign of what?”

“Demons” the Bodhisattva solemnly stated, sounding quite displeased.

Sullen Hoof’s only encounter with demons being the time the circle had slogged through his first age training manse and found the giant demonic spiders, he wasn’t entirely sure how to react to this news.

Speaker and Shimmer were, with Shimmer sounding particularly worried: “I’ve encountered Akuma in the west – this is really bad. If demons get a hold of war manses creation would be in all kinds of trouble”

“Akuma?” Sulllen Hoof asked.

Apparently the term was what one used to describe a pony who’d literally sold his or her soul to the yozis in exchange for power. Shimmer explained that in the west, where many tribes were at the mercy of the changelings that came with the tides to eat their hopes and dreams, it wasn’t that uncommon for the few ponies who knew how to contact demons to attempt to strike bargains with them – for protection initially: “…but deals with demons never end well. To demons ponies are lesser things that are to be kept as slaves and playthings. Akuma are ponies who’ve given away their free will and become a puppet for a demon master”

“Perfect! Then I think I know who we’re looking for!” Sullen Hoof blurted out, looking around at the circle.

Sullen Hoof explained that he’d recently been trying to track down a rapist and murderer who’d been killing off street walkers in the Harlotry district. He had always wondered why the immaculates had been involved, and why the talk in the area had been of a ‘demon rapist’ – but if it was a pony empowered with demonic essence, then it made all kinds of sense – even if it begged the question of how that name came to be.

“It even fits with what we can see here – or rather what we can’t. Look around: There’s no hoof-prints of this pony here, but there is a demonic essence signature. Bodhisattva, where did you see his hoof-print?” Sullen Hoof quickly said, scanning the scene for any clues he might have overlooked.

The Bodhisattva gestured with a ghost limb at a tunnel leading away from the small cavern they were in: “When I came here I briefly saw the pony fleeing the scene. I gave chase, but he outran me – leaving tracks down the tunnel there when he began to run”

Inspecting the hoof-prints Shimmer quickly noted a less than obvious fact: “These hoof-prints are too far apart – this is much faster than a mortal pony can gallop”

“If he’s empowered with demonic  essence then that’s a given” Sullen Hoof noted, pointing out that the hoof-prints were in an almost perfectly straight line, hinting that the pony couldn’t turn well when galloping really fast.

The Bodhisattva was pleased with this development: “I will make inquiries to the immaculates about what they know – I can contact them through the morticians up in Sijan town: They can say it’s about putting the ghosts of the victims to ease”

Sullen Hoof nodded: “Fair enough –I guess you can’t show yourself very much in public looking like that, even with the cloak”
With little else left to do at the vault, Speaker just wanted a look inside it before they left for the surface.

The inside of the vault was full of tiny metal and wooden boxes strewn across the floor – many smashed or crushed. From the crumbling shreds left in some of the boxes it was clear that most had contained documents and scrolls. The walls of the vault contained rows upon rows of shelves for the boxes, but they were all empty.

Shimmer, when she was sent into the vault to fetch Speaker as the circle was about to leave, did sniff out one thing that hadn’t been destroyed in the vault – or been taken by the demonic pony: A small woven bag with a hoof-sized plant bulb which had somehow remained fresh since the first age. It was stashed elsewhere for later examination, after which the circle made haste out of the ruins.

Back in the town house the circle took stock of the situation, the Bodhisattva having left for his apartment in sijan town – a four by five block part of northern Nighthammer district where the sijaneese morticians stored and shipped out the dead of Nexus on their corpse barges for Sijan itself.

The first thing the circle did was listen to Sullen Hoof was he filled them in on this demon rapist of Harlotry: “He’s apparently been active for almost six months now, approaching streetwalker prostitutes like normal but then… well… you’ll have to see 
one of the crime-scenes to believe it, but he fucks his victims to death”

“Well that’s a novel way of murder – but are we sure it’s the same pony. Couldn’t there be more than one of these akuma ponies here in Nexus? I can think of several ponies who might be willing to strike dark deals to further their own business interests…” Cash noted.

Shimmer again explained how that becoming akuma meant giving away your free will – unless it had been possible for the pony to negotiate his new purpose in life before the final soul-rendering ritual, then any business interests had likely been pushed to the side in favor of simply pleasing and serving a master who wished nothing good for Creation.

Sullen Hoof added that, with regards to the demon rapist, then he had so far proven impossible to track.

“I’ll bet he hasn’t been tracked by a Lunar” Shimmer noted.

Making an uncertain gesture, Sullen Hoof expressed his doubts: “I’ve been trying to nail this pony almost ever since we got here – the bounty for him is almost twice what the Bodhisattva is paying us for this”

“Wow, does that mean that the brothel owners in Harlotry are scared that this pony will start going after their workers?”  Cash wondered.

Frowning, Sullen Hoof explained that it was more likely because it was scaring away clients: “Streetwalkers are a rarity in Harlotry. The brothels don’t like the competition, and it’s usually easy to send out muscle to force away streetwalkers. The problem is that clients won’t go near Harlotry if it’s hosed down in blood”

“Wait, what? I thought you said this stallion just fucks ponies to death – why the blood-splatter?” Shimmer inquired, confused regarding the connections between dying from what she figured was coital exhaustion and blood being smeared all over the walls. 

“Like I said, you will have to see it to believe it” Sullen Hoof said, sounding very much as if he had seen what he’s talking about.

The next day the circle made rounds in the Harlotry district, on the eastern fringe of the Nexus district, not that far from the circle’s town house. Cash found it endlessly amusing as Sullen Hoof gave the circle a guided tour of where he had grown up: “Over there you have Softest Sushi, where you can eat sushi off naked ponies – there are other restaurants where you can eat other things off ponies as well all over here”

Cash spotted a place called “Hay Holes” but didn’t inquire into its exact meaning.

Trotting past two brothels that seemed to run in tandem, one specializing in peeing or being peed on – the other one dealing with even less savory and hygienic bodily excretions - the “Brown Bounty” and the “Gilded Lilly”, Sullen Hoof stopped to gaze down an alley that led to the channel that separated the Nexus district with the Manehattan district. For a brief moment, as the wind shifted direction, a lot of quiet sulking and weeping could be heard from the direction of the channel.

“What’s down there?” Shimmer asked, looking concerned – thinking it was a orphanage or brothel that did in spanking, judging from the sound of tearful cries.

Sullen Hoof’s face – disguised as some random generic-looking servant pony as always - soured: “The screaming cages”
“And that is, what?” Cash followed up. Moments later he wished he hadn’t: Sullen Hoof explained that when slaves destined to work in Harlotry’s less savory brothels came into Nexus – since it was against the civilities to enslave free ponies inside Nexus – they were put into cages hanging over the grand canal. There they would be starved and beaten with sticks until they were fully broken, then they would be trained as exotic sex slaves, be it for brothels where you pay to beat up hookers, or ‘sexy’ mud wrestling arenas. 

“My mother was ‘reborn’ in the screaming cages – took her almost all her life to break her conditioning and demand her freedom. You see, if a slave breaks her conditioning but can still work they’re usually freed and then hired as free ponies in more normal brothels” Sullen Hoof elaborated, his grotesque face making it difficult but not impossible to see the disdain he was showing.

Speaker couldn’t put into words how horrible and disgusting such a practice was. Shimmer could, and several nearby sailor ponies blushed as they overheard her decidedly salty utterances. Cash gleefully took notes.

“When Nexus comes under Solar control this place will be the first to burn” Sullen Hoof quietly but resolutely stated, nodding to himself.

Trotting further along through Harlotry, past scores of brothels that each offered a unique kind of service – some with creatively costumed prostitutes, so the costumers could act out various fantasies, while others looked down right heretical by most civilized standards:

“Sully, is that place serious?” Speaker wondered, looking at a brothel that had a sign out in front that indicated that its costumers could have sex with actual demons. Sully nodded, noting that it was run by a unicorn sorcerer who summoned various demons and bound their wills quite safely – it was one of the weirder brothels in Harlotry.

As he was about to move on, Speaker noticed that Shimmer looked oddly lost in thought as she was staring at a brothel that had the peculiar name of “Anathema” – written in silver letters on a dark blue sign: “Shimmer, is – wow, Hey Sully, what’s up with this place?”

Shimmer didn’t say anything – at least not anything intelligible beyond making hushing sounds as she quickly ushered the circle onwards, out of sight of the heretically if not humorously named brothel.

“Ok, care to explain Shimmer?” Sullen Hoof wondered, curious to whether Shimmer had some kind of past connection with the place.

Visibly shaking, Shimmer took a moment to calm herself: “No – I mean yes, but last I was here I never spotted the place. I thought it was a legend, one I’ve been told back home in the west: It’s run by a snake-totemed elder lunar much older and much meaner than me – so stay the hell away from there, because you do not want her giving you attention”

“Her personality matches her totem?” Sullen Hoof inquired, curious if his little theory applied to all Lunars or if it was more random, and if so how Shimmer’s personality was gull-like.

Nodding ever so slightly, Shimmer said that the lunar that ran Anathema was the source of a lot of sea-serpent myths in the west – and that she supposedly had a rumored habit of shifting into a pony-sized snake and eating those who displease her, including bad lovers. Cash suddenly seemed far less curious about the place.

As the circle passed a cloak stall for ponies who didn’t want to be recognized going in or out of brothels, the crowds around them suddenly parted – a young foal ran past them, hollering at the top of her lungs: “The demon rapist struck again!” over and over.

With a swift motion Shimmer had the foal scooped up, Cash speaking calming words and offering payment if the foal could take them to the scene of the crime.

One and a half block over the circle was shown an alley that was already cordoned off by mercenaries – mercenaries who were amusingly familiar with Speaker and Cash.

“Captain Ironmane, fancy seeing you again” Cash cheerfully exclaimed, stepping up to the very surprised mercenary officer and the three other ponies at arms from the mercenary company known as The Merchanter’s Armory. One of them was wearing an eye-patch and looked positively horrified to see Cash again.

The look on Captain Ironmane, a stern mare with a helmet that was actually made to look like a polished steel mane, with her lamellar armor and her short spear, was not a pleased one. She would have been far more happy if she had never seen Cash or Speaker again… and they had brought friends, how not lovely: “What do you want – there’s nothing to see here”

Cash gave the mercenary a disarming smile and tilted his head to the side a little: “Oh come now – we’re hunting the demon rapist and we heard the news. We need to examine the scene of the crime before the Sijaneese take the body away”

“You bounty-hunters now? Well tough cookie, I’m under orders not to let any pony back there while the monks do their thing” Ironmane grumped, amazing the circle with her display of all the fucks she did not give.

Flinging the mercenary a  pouch of coin changed her tone in a heartbeat – the circle trotting the down the alley to find an unholy mess waiting for them... and five immaculate monks, one of them a wood-aspected unicorn.

“Damn mercs – you four, you shouldn’t be here – this place has been desecrated, we’re performing rites to cleanse it of demonic influence” one of the mortal monks said as the circle approached.

Sullen Hoof quickly stepped up as he sensed Shimmer tensing up: “We’re hunting the monster who did this – it’s important that we get to have a look around before the trail grows cold. You can still do your rites if you want to”

The monk looked at the four ponies in front of him, an old stallion in an equally old but clearly Lookshyan uniform, a westerner, a pony who looked far too well dressed walking around in alleys and what looked like their servant: “I… ok – but be quick about it – it’s just like the other victims if you’ve seen those…”

The alley between the two brothels that formed it opened up into a tiny back-alley courtyard where barely any sunlight was able to filter down between roofs and hung laundry. Heaps of trash and broken bits of furniture were strewn around the place, making the place for a tiny dump – it smelled accordingly. There certainly wasn’t room for nine ponies there – even three of the five monks were politely waiting in the alley, not the tiny not-really-a-courtyard. From the alley itself it was only clear that the walls at the end of the alley were awash with blood.

The circle decided the only Speaker and Shimmer should go down the alley – there wasn’t room for more – and between the two they had excellent tracking and investigative skills, so if anyone was to find clues or means to track the rapist it would be them.

The crime scene was the stuff of nightmares. The walls were coated as if a pony-sized balloon with blood had been popped – of course, Shimmer didn’t know what a balloon was, for she hadn’t seen the festive and colorful foal-toys that Lookshy occasionally brought out during festivals, since they knew the ancient first age manufacturing techniques for such strange things.

Upon seeing the victim – a young colt, barely a stallion, prostitute with a handsome face – Speaker ‘s first thought was death by large sledgehammer to the hips, but… the positioning of the corpse was all wrong.

Having witnessed heated battle between unicorns, especially unicorns armed with mighty artifact weapons of elemental jade, Speaker knew well of the horrible injuries that a pony could get from such weapons – and the similarities were hard to miss: The colt’s hips, abdomen  and his chest and ribs had exploded outward from an inner force.

The closest thing Speaker ever seen to such a death was the remains of a mortal pony who had been flipped on his back and then struck – using a mighty jade grand goremaul – at the groin in the direction of the chest, which had subsequently compressed, gouged and forced everything inside out in the path of the massive battle-sledge. But this pony – what was left of him – had not been on his back, he’d been on all fours, most likely getting ready to ‘receive’ from client.

Shimmer looked more disgusted than intrigued – but then again she was trotting around sniffing at every puddle of blood and bodily fluid, for the santorum coated the ground in a thick slurry of shattered organ pulp, dirt, half-digested food, semen and shit.

The unicorn monk didn’t take much notice to the two apparent mortal ponies poking around at the crime scene – but at one point Shimmer discrete trotted over and whispered to Speaker: “I think he’s seen through my illusion – time to leave, I have enough of the rapist’s scent to track”

Indeed, the unicorn looked oddly shocked and surprised at the two as Shimmer quickly turned to leave – but Speaker couldn’t help but notice the trepidation and hesitation which marked the unicorn’s face… which made sense if the unicorn was frightened that Shimmer would do something drastic if called out as anathema for having those moonsilver tattoos
. Speaker did manage to notice one crucial element via his essence sight though: He spotted the same faint demonic essence signature as at the vault in Firewander – this was the same pony for sure.

The circle reuniting outside the alley – Cash and Sullen Hoof having waited at a tea house across the street – Shimmer led a merry chase through the undercity, the Nexus district, Nighthammer district, by which time the sun set and Shimmer found that she had lost the scent… but not due to her quarry having evaded her: “No it just stops… if it had been wafted away the scent would have faded – no it’s not just there anymore”

“Masking charms? Did he veil himself somehow?” Sullen Hoof wondered, looking around with his awareness enhancing charms to try to pick up the most minute of sound or shadow moving.

Taking a deep inhalation through her nose while turning around a few times, Shimmer sighed: “No – even the scent trail I’ve been following is gone… it’s like he was never here – that’s not natural. I’ve tracked other Lunars like this, including ones who were trying to cover their tracks and scent, but this… this is all kinds of wrong”

Cash looked around the alley they were and where they’d come from. The only other exit was out into a Nexus district street – it wasn’t even that long from where their town house was: “I think he lives somewhere around here”

“You’re suggesting we check our neighbors out to see if they’re suspects?” Speaker asked in an uncertain tone – they only had a scent which was now gone to track the rapist with, so it would be impossible to identify any pony.

Sullen Hoof raised a hoof as he peered out into the street: “yes and no, I think I can narrow who and what we’re looking a bit first”

Having used special charms to form a profile of the demon rapist Sullen Hoof felt that he had a very solid idea of the personality of the criminal: “Ok, every time this pony struck it was in an alley, out of sight – nobody ever hears anything, and he’s always long-gone before anyone comes across the remains. This tells me that each event is well planned and that he most likely cases his targets to find a streetwalker that doesn’t share alley-ways with others. Equally, the mess he leaves behind is a bold statement, one meant to really rub it in everyone’s face that he is really powerful – but at the same time it’s a cowardly act, since it’s clear from the remains that there’s no struggle, no fight. It’s domination from a pony who wants to feel mighty, but at the same time that pony is very careful not to get caught or even seen – It’s a stallion who wants to feel powerful, but is afraid to show it”

“And you got all that from a crime-scene you haven’t even really seen?” Cash said in a mix of apprehension and amazement. Sullen Hoof noted that he’d seen over half a dozen other crime scenes from the same pony – all were equally messy.

Shimmer nodded, agreeing that Sully’s conclusions made sense: “But what does this say about the pony? I mean, none of that really helps us to find him”

“Oh yes it does – we’re looking for a pony who is careful, meticulous and maintains proper social appearances – no pony ever sees him approach the victims, so he most likely has a social or professional life he wants to hide or protect from his activities” Sullen Hoof elaborated, pointing out that they were most likely looking for an unlikely suspect, a merchant or some other well off pony that had secretly gained these dark powers.

Speaker chimed in adding that in most of the gang violence victims he’d treated at the clinic the victims always knew who it was who had hurt them: “Any demonstration of might has to be showy– so word can spread that you’re not to be messed with. Basic para-military strategy. This looks far more random, like he’s just doing this for fun to terrorize everyone”

Sullen Hoof sighed: “There are brothels in Harlotry that offer punching-bag services, where you pay to beat up sex slaves – not very nice places, but they’re there if you want that kind of stuff. If that was all he wanted he could go there. This is different, but I can’t figure why”

Returning to the town house, Shimmer suggested that Sully mark on a map of the city where the demon rapist had struck. It was clear that she had hoped to find some kind of pattern in the killings, but between her experience with rogue spirits and changelings and Speaker’s first age memories of arcane demon sigils, then none of them matched even slightly. It genuinely appeared as if this monster was just stalking and killing ponies at random.

“Could we lay a trap?” Cash suggested, thinking that they could buy off most of Harlotry’s streetwalkers fairly easily – he even volunteered to keep them entertained while the rest of the circle dealt with the rapist.

Nodding, Speaker figured they could use an old Lookshyan tactic for countering enemy messengers during a siege: “Sure we can – but we can’t hide away all of Harlotry’s streetwalkers, they’re way too many and others would probably take their spots even if we pay the first ones to hide away somewhere. Why not just try to monitor the area we lost the trail in and look for the ones who often sneak away… Sully, how often does this pony strike?”

It turned out that the frequency of the demon rapist’s attacks had slowly been increasing in frequency. From what Sullen Hoof had heard then it had started as a once a month deal, but now it was twice a week – plus there were services they could use which would make their search in this way a lot easier: “Most of the merchants and other rich ponies in the area here flaunt what they do – they need to show their wealth to maintain their social status. We just look for the ones that disappear regularly without saying what they’re doing, Shimmer can follow their trail and see if their scent disappears when they change disguise – and then we’ll know who it is!”

The circle agreed that this plan sounded the most promising – although Cash was sad that it meant not having all the streetwalkers of Harlotry to play with.

“By the way, have any of you seen Red or Sunrise? I haven’t seen them for several days now” Sullen Hoof wondered.

Cash shrugged: “Last I saw Sunrise she asked for a fortune in silver to fund something she was trying to do – I’m sure she’s just trying to bring back that cult of hers or something. Red is probably still fighting in those Bastion tournaments and having fun there”

“Ok… but I think we’ll need Red once we find this akuma pony” Sullen Hoof noted.

> Chapter 47: Fury of Unleashed Hells
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It turned out to be surprisingly easy to get most of the information on the circle’s neighbors: As Cash put it “If there is a demand there’ll be those selling” – and to Speaker’s surprise this also applied to information that would require extensive stalking of your neighbors. Apparently it was groups of foals organized by adolescents who – being too young to do much else – would run around and keep tabs on who came and went from their local neighborhoods, selling that information to anyone willing to pay. With this type information gathering services available, for a fee, the circle was quickly clued in on what ponies near them disappeared and when.

“Ok, so most of our esteemed neighbors – of the ones who do try to sneak off with any regularity – go to visit lovers, shady business partners, rival business partners they aren’t meant to be seen with, or other things that we don’t really care about. The Pipsqueak Watchers told me that there’s only four ponies they haven’t been able to keep tabs on, and I have their home addresses here” Cash proclaimed, displaying a list of addresses to the rest of the circle.

Speaker had a look at the list: Two of the ponies were wealthy guild merchants, one was a renowned sculptor, and the last one was listed as a ‘blue hat’: “What’s a blue hat?”

Sullen Hoof quickly explained that council officials, such as tax collectors or license vendors, had as symbols of office various colored hats instead of any kind of uniform. It was a cheaper solution, plus it made them easier to spot at a distance when moving through large crowds of ponies as one would when walking about in the city -  so this particular neighbor was a property tax assayer: “…and him sneaking off probably means that someone is bribing him regularly to keep their tax levels low”
“Actually, the blue hat is a mare” Cash said, looking at his notes.
Shimmer looked at the rest of the list: “Well then we can cross her of the list - we’re looking for a stallion”
With the list reduced to three, the circle split up to allow for a quicker search. They understood that Shimmer would ultimately have to verify the unique scent loss phenomena – but to begin with it seemed reasonable not to have everyone stalk the same pony.
“Also, Cash, please send another messenger or two to Sunrise and Red – if we’re dealing with demons here we’ll need both of them” Speaker noted.
Leaving the town house after breakfast, the circle split up. Sullen Hoof went after the sculptor, leaving Cash, Speaker and Shimmer to check on the two merchants.
Cash approached his target like an investor performing due diligence on a potential investment opportunity – indeed, through a mix of petty bribes and smoothtalking he managed to convince most of the merchant’s house staff that he was investigating their master as a potential  target of investment. This quickly gave Cash almost unrestricted access to the merchant’s records – which when coupled with the interviews he did with the merchant’s staff, quickly told him where the merchant was sneaking off to… namely a brothel in Harlotry where the merchant got spanked, regularly – so this wasn’t the pony they were looking for, especially not after Cash checked that the merchant was actually in Harlotry getting spanked, although he did get a few pictures of it in his Recorder of Everlasting Blackmail Material. Also it turned out that the merchant had a lot of debt, so Cash didn’t invest any money in his business.
Speaker let Shimmer track the other merchant like she would any other creature she was hunting – allowing him to fiddle around with his wyld-shaping techniques, plus check up on the clinic. It had been vandalized ever so slightly, with a few rocks through at the large storefront window, but to Speaker the most telling thing was the numerous small piles of rocks and pebbles outside the clinic… there had clearly been quite a few ponies who had come for help and treatment while the clinic had been closed.
Against his better judgment Speaker left the rocks undisturbed, instead entering the clinic and using his wyld shaping technique for the first time to conjure up something useful: Donning his magi-mechanical hoof and securing himself with his chaos-repeling wards, Speaker pulled in all the stray wyld energy of the area and shaped it into a neat pile of pristine silken bandages.
It wasn’t much – by Lookshyan field hospital standards it wasn’t even half a day’s worth of bandages – but at the sight of the neatly rolled up bandages Speaker wept, for he recalled the glories that had been made reality through that technique in the first age… and so much of it was not just gone now, but forgotten, meaning that it would never be possible to recreate any of it.
Shimmer came across Speaker in that weeping state, unsure of what troubled him: “You ok?”
“I… yes, just waxing nostalgic – how was the hunt?” Speaker asked, wiping away his tears.
Sighing deeply, Shimmer regaled how she had tracked their sneaky merchant and his disappearing act to Sijan-town where he apparently bought the bones of dead ponies in secret – then had them ferried to the Nighthammer district where the bones were hammered into tiny bits and used in steel production: “Now, I honestly don’t know that much about making metals… but pony bones, really?”
“Bone can be used to draw out impurities of iron when smelting it – makes it into steel – but still… that’s horrible” Speaker said, getting up and giving himself a shake, as the thought of someone’s old granny being pillaged for bone to make swords and spears gave him the chills.
One thing the two very much did agree on was that such a questionable business practice certainly explained why the merchant hid it so carefully – half the city would probably eat him alive if it was known to the public.
“Oh well, we can use the information later if we need to blackmail him for a cheap deal on steel – for now let’s get back to the others” Shimmer suggested.
Back at the town house the circle spoke of the two merchants who turned out to be duds – Sullen Hoof wasn’t there however, indicating that the sculptor was the pony they were looking for… and possibly indicating that Sullen Hoof was in trouble.
“Cash, do you still have the sculptor’s address?” Speaker inquired with a worried and hurried tone.
Cash quickly delivered, leading to Speaker, Shimmer and Cash rushing down out the door and down the street. The sculptor’s studio and townhouse wasn’t far away – but it was a few blocks away.
The sound of earth quaking and the screams of ponies hinted that the circle had indeed found the demon rapist – although as Speaker, Shimmer and Cash rounded a corner and was nearly struck by none other than the Emmisary as its cloaked and silver-masked form flew right past them and slammed into a building wall they also got the distinct feeling that Sullen Hoof’s remark of needing Red for this fight was very much right.
Down the road was a townhouse with its façade in ruins, Sullen Hoof in the middle of a maelstrom of whirling kitchen knives and cleavers, and a strange pony who looked like something out of Firewander – its body was strangely large, enormous even, making its head which was the size of an ordinary adult pony stallion’s head look quite small. Its hooves were even greater, but the strangest and most worrying thing was that he was glowing with baleful emerald fire off skin which seemed to be of black basalt stone and glowing hot brass. Also the demonic stallion looked exceedingly angry if his roars were any indication.
“Shimmer, I think you’re up” Cash meekly suggested, Shimmer taking no time at all to shift into her warform and below a mighty warcry as she leapt at the demon-essence-infused pony, tackling him as her feathers grew together to form a near impenetrable carapace.
Looking at Speaker, then back at the monstrous pony who’s roar radiated such infernal heat that it melted the outermost layers of Shimmer’s carapace, Cash hesitantly asked: “So… do akuma normally look like that?”
Shaking his head, Speaker’s worried expression said it all: This most certainly was not how akuma looked – at least from what little he knew. That he couldn’t see the glowing image of two crossed brass sabres on the monster-pony’s brow didn’t help either – but then again, such things had never been seen before in creation, so who knew what that meant anyway…
The monster-pony, in retaliation to Shimmer’s bulrush, struck back with a blow from a hoof that on impact was so powerful that it shattered the basalt skin that covered it, revealing a solid brass core that burned with green emerald flame – Shimmer cried out in pain but slashed back in return, her claws like moonsilver scythes as they cut at her foe.

“Can we even do anything here?” Cash wondered, looking despairingly at his own hooves and his magic claw-shooting shoes.

Thinking for a moment, then looking around to spot any nearby mercenaries, Speaker got an idea: “Yes you can – go spread the news that the demon rapist has been spotted and is being fought. Get as many mercs as possible to come help, remind them of the bounty”

Nodding, Cash quickly ran off. Speaker looked back at the fight – Shimmer and the monster trading blows, but from the looks of it then it seemed that Shimmer was losing, if the blood leaking from under her feather-fused carapace was any indication. Summing Gift as quickly as possible, Speaker spent the precious seconds waiting for the disk to appear from elsewhere trying to understand the monster-pony’s fighting style – for it was far too coherent and calculated to be the work of blind rage and unrestrained fury… although the difference was hard to tell at times, with the monstrous demon-pony bellowing fire and brimstone as he kept pounding on Shimmer’s cracking carapace armor.

It struck Speaker that the demon-pony’s right fore-hoof was particularly… wrong: It seemed to be of solid black basalt that never cracked with glowing old realm glyphs, its edges sharp and very solid nature allowing for supernaturally mighty blows, further enhanced by the grotesquely bulging muscles of the pony that just kept swelling – truly, the demon-pony was too swole to control.

Shimmer’s slashing kept proving futile, telling Speaker that Gift probably wouldn’t be able to do much damage either – unless he could find some kind of weak spot – and where was Sullen Hoof? Oh wait, there he was, no cutlery-tornado around him, but three hearthstones on strings hanging from his mouth! Clever pony, now the demon-pony here at least wouldn’t be able to get any first age weapons.

As Sullen Hoof disappeared himself, Speaker finally felt Gift near him in the material realm – he assumed the tense and strong stance the informed the Thousand Wounds Gear style and rushed into the fray, throwing the disc in such a way that it would strike the demon-pony from behind, while Speaker would strike from the front.

Getting close to the demon-pony allowed Speaker to see a series of gruesome details of the demon-pony’s anatomy that had previously been occluded by its swift movements and the dust thrown up by the debris around them, as well as the fight: Four rows of small crimson horn-like protrusions lining the demon-pony’s brow, and the pony’s teeth… curled fangs like only a demon could have, but those were by far not the worst feature that getting close to the demon-pony revealed…

As Speaker quickly began to regret engaging the monstrous stallion, its muscles rippling and bulging as if empowered by each blow it struck – even if it’s massive stone-covered hooves missed, he could feel a dread sensation: The ambient essence around the demon-pony was the strongest Speaker had ever felt. It contained a power far beyond that of normal unicorns, or any of his circle-mates. Even the gods that Speaker had met in Yu-Shan would not be able to match such raw power. Only a hoof-full of elder unicorns in Lookshy had ever felt that powerful, and possibly some of the sidereal elders Speaker had met – but while they had felt potent, they hadn’t radiated such baleful power.

A brief look with essence sight nearly left Speaker blinded, as he staggered backwards – the vision of the demon pony’s soul up close having been as if looking into an angry hell-star… a very apt comparison, for the only thing Speaker could think of was that this pony seemed fueled by something so similar to the primordial emerald-fire sun that was the very heart of the demon realm. Also not being able to see properly was generally considered a really bad thing when fighting.
To Speaker’s brief reprieve a figure with pale white hooves hanging from out under an off-white cloak suddenly appeared between Speaker and the demon-pony. At first Speaker thought it was Sunrise… but this pony wore a silver mask – oh dear… it was the Emmisary, who Speaker had earlier seen get flung into a now very collapsed building. The Emmisary didn’t look any worse for wear, the cloak and mask looking completely intact and unblemished.

With a pale hoof the emissary pointed at the demon pony: “You shalt not commit wanton violence. You are in violation of the dogma. Cease and desist this instant”

The Emmisary’s voice sounded weird in Speaker’s head. It wasn’t spoken – there was no sound from under the feature-less silver mask – but there was a voice inside his head… it was quite strange, for the voice still came with a sense of direction towards the Emmisary who said it, plus it had absolutely no gender-intonation what so ever.

The demon pony roared incoherently for a moment, and just as it seemed out of hellish heat-breath – which kept trying to ignite the floating Emmisary’s cloak, but every tiny emerald flame that sprung up seemed to choke and die instantly – he spoke, with a shrill voice that sounded quite weird compared to his absurdly overgrown body: “I bow to no authority in Creation – I will kill you all, in his name!”

Responding to what was clearly non-compliance from the sculptor turned demon-pony, the Emissary swiftly turned from floating in the air to careening towards the demon pony, clearly trying to strike the fiend with its pale hooves – which it did, with a resounding thunderclap as it made contact. Every window in ear-shot instantly shattered and a thick layer of black basalt shattered off the demon-pony’s body in awave pattern centered on the point of impact, revealing a blazing hot brass sub-dermis and bone-structure. Beyond that ‘mere’ physical  response to being struck, strange prismatic crystals began to coalesce in the air around the demon-stallion, crystals that in a flash grew out as long spikes that stabbed into the Emmisary’s cloak.

Speaker had always heard stories of the terrible might of the Emissary. How every imperial legion that had occupied Nexus always found its senior officers turned inside out or eerily dead by mass suicide – all thanks to the strange powers of the Emmisary, but now he was seeing the Emmisary bleed… and the blood was just ordinary red blood. On some level Speaker felt disappointed: He had always pegged the Emissary as a powerful, if not misguided, guardian spirit or something similar. No, this was a pony of some sort, probably an exalt if nothing else… although Speaker couldn’t feel any measure of power or essence coming from the Emmisary – but that was probably hidden or veiled, because normal ponies didn’t float in the air.
As the crystal spikes were broken off with a twist of the Emmisary’s body, scarlet drops leaking through the holes in the cloak where the spikes penetrated, the demon-pony laughed heartedly: “Ah, so the illustrious Emmisary does bleed! I will paint all of Nexus with your corpse!”

With a furious flurry of blows that looked less like a martial onslaught and more like a completely maddened and unrestrained flailing of log-thick limbs of stone and metal, the demon-pony threw all of his weight at the Emissary – who somehow managed to parry most of the blows as if they were nothing, despite each blocked blow shaking the ground so that the ruined townhouse they were fighting in front kept groaning and disgorging a few more bits of rubble that tumbled down into the pile of loose bricks, broken timbers and furniture on the ground. Well, the Emmisary managed to block most of them – for the demon-pony, despite his grotesque bulk, moved his striking hooves with a speed that even Red would find it difficult to match… and so the Emissary was unceremoniously swung around a few times as a rag-dool, then launched into another building with a resounding crash and more screams from mortal ponies that tried to flee the seemingly expanding war zone.

The Emissary once again out of commission – at least for a short while – Speaker found himself and Shimmer once again targeted by the demon-pony… although Shimmer seemed to have made good use of her shapeshifting powers to regenerate her wounds, leaving her more than ready to once again engage her foe – even more so now that speaker was there.

As Shimmer let out a decidedly bird-like shriek of a battle cry to get the demon pony’s attention away from Speaker, the Twilight caste solar quickly began to think up a possible way to actually hurt this monster – so no more buildings would be torn down… because there were clearly innocents trapped in all that rubble, both in the buildings wrecked by having the Emissary impact them, but also the sculptor’s own town house, as Speaker spotted several horrified servants trying to dig out their friends and co-workers, while throwing horrified glances up at their now decidedly demonic master every now and then to see if it was safe to keep going.

While Shimmer wrestled with the demon-pony, trying to match her wits and now disturbingly elastic body with the raw and unbridled might of her hell-infused foe, Speaker bounced Gift off the sculptor’s basalt-sculpted body a few times – it truly did seem as if the stallion’s skin and coat had become as stone, making it decidedly difficult to break through… but he had seen Shimmer do it a little, and the Emissary even more so – so a plan started to come together, but it would require that the Emissary cooperated, something the Emissary wasn’t know to do… at all.

“Shimmer, keep him tied up – when I say so, try to make an opening for the Emissary to hit!” Speaker shouted as he ran towards the pile of rubble that the Emissary was buried in.

Shimmer didn’t acknowledge the command with words, but a brief flaring of a crest of feathers did communicate an understanding and compliance – while Shimmer’s bird-limbs and claws elongated like snakes or squid tentacles to further wrap around the demon-pony who’s body seemed ablaze with fury over being prevented from moving freely.

Speaker, upon arriving at the pile of rubble where the Emissary was buried, was met by three dozen mercenaries already working frantically to peel away rocks, bricks and wooden beams to unearth their lord – for the Emmisary was nothing if not the head of the council of entities.

Calling on his singing staff, again a process that took far too long – all the while Shimmer found her snake-vice grip on the demon pony not just broken, but reversed as the demon-pony lit himself aflame with hellfire that burned so hot it melted part of her feather-carapace and face. Speaker played a quickened tune of the unearthed treasure as Shimmer was swung around like a meat popsicle at the hapless mercenaries which tried to reign in the demon-pony before being flung into the air – a mistake some might argue, as Shimmer quickly used her wings to gain control of her trajectory and swoop around for a new assault.

As the music of the singing staff spread through the pile of rubble, every stone in the pile melting away into the ground, the Emissary exploded out of the pile now that there was much less debris holding it down.

“Emissary, the lunar will try to make an opening for you – you have to break the monster’s stone shell, then I’ll come in with a blow towards its innards!” Speaker shouted as the Emissary’s dust-covered cloak seemed to clean itself in the sunlight. The Emissary briefly turned towards Speaker and nodded, then rushed towards the demon fiend with Speaker finding himself grabbed by an invisible force and spirited towards the demon pony as well.

Seeing that the Emissary wasn’t wasting any time setting up an attack, Speaker quickly shouted: “Shimmer, now!”

In the first age the lunars most loyal to their solar mates had found ways to exploit that bond, to briefly use it to guide their hooves, claws or whatever other limbs they were sporting – to relinquish control of their minds to a greater power and to have it strike with a certainty and a precision that conscious thought could not afford. It was a method inspired by the very first eclipse, when Luna had sheltered Creation from Celestia’s scorching radiance as Celestia gave part of her infinite light to the solar shards that the Great Maker was bringing into existence, on the eve of the primordial war.

To onlookers it simply appeared as if Shimmer’s limbs became as motile silver as she ‘splashed’ into the demon pony, her limbs reforming with an iron grib as spinning silver vortexes  around her spat eerily familiar iridescent white string out at the demon pony who was shrouded in emerald-green fire… the bloody thing had an anima!

Completely tied down  - at least for a few precious seconds – the Emissary appeared above the monster and raised a hoof in a strange and arcane gesture of martial prowess and magical skill that not even Speaker could identify – it then used the fine opportunity given to strike at the monster pony with all of its mystic might, a kaleidoscopic fracturing of the light around the monstrous stallion who appeared so attuned to malfean brass and stone. This was followed by a resounding and booming crackling noise, like a mountain snapping in half (A sound Speaker only recalled from the First Age) with a shower of black stone shards erupting from the demonic stallion a split second later.

This was it. Speaker had silently positioned himself on top of the rubble pile of the sculptor’s collapsed house, using his balancing charm to easily scale the many loose bricks and rickety timbers without knocking anything loose or making a sound – it hadn’t hurt that his intended target was distracted by the Emissary. His singing staff had been stashed in elsewhere, and now with the demon-stallion he could see that the time was right!  From his vantage point he leapt at the demon-pony, Gift on his right hoof and held back for a might blow. Using everything he knew about the Thousand Wounds Gear style he revved Gift using essence and thought, the golden blades around the rim of the disc not just sputtering to life with a puff of steam and whir of primordial engine design, but also with elongated cutting edges of essence reminiscent of what Speaker had used to scale the abyssal manse back in Chung Do appeared as well – and anyone familiar with the usual engine noise of Gift would have easily recognized that it sounded louder, stronger, as if in a different gear for more torque. Trailing just behind gift were equally two phantom images of gilded light and white glow, as Speaker’s very anime – his soul – attempted to follow the path cut through the by the disc with the rotating blades.

Speaker had cut metal before with Gift – not often, but he had done so. Cutting spears in half, chewing through armor, so this shouldn’t be any different. It was deadly intent, but it was also meant to save lives: This monster clearly didn’t care about collateral damage or hurting others.

The demon stallion’s  ears fluttered for a brief moment as silent wind told him of battle and carnage yet unseen – and so, with the layers of rock still ablating from his body in response to the Emissary’s undoubtedly magical hoof strike, the monster spun around and reared for an impossibly mighty buck as Speaker closed in for the kill against exposed brass flesh and bone…

Shimmer couldn’t cry out loudly enough as she saw Speaker be struck – or Gift and its two after-images striking the monster-pony’s legs and sending out showers of hot sparks, metal shavings and stone shards. The monster-pony’s absolutely massive legs rippled as they impacted Speaker as if growing stronger yet again, with Speaker barely having time to register what had happened before he blacked out… the force of the mighty buck knocking him out cold, even with the advanced shield charm he knew active, it briefly shattering like a sheath of golden glass before reforming around him.

When Speaker came to he found himself in terrible pain – his right foreleg and shoulder had been absolutely destroyed, leaving but a bloody crumbled stump behind. An anesthetic charm, a very conscious effort not to let his mind dull by the feeling of euphoria, and finally lots of medical charms fixed that up in no time at all – although the new limb did feel a bit sore…

It was then that Speaker noticed that he wasn’t really touching the ground. He was up in the air.

> Chapter 48: Stranger Tides and Tidings
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Having been struck by the demon-rapist of Harlotry, Speaker found himself sailing through the air in an arch that didn’t seem to want to let him fall any time soon. Essence sight confirmed that his continued acceleration forward and upwards was quite unnatural… and Nexus was nowhere to be seen. Only Speaker’s geographic knowledge of the east and the hundred kingdoms told him where he was: Somewhere over the mighty Yanaze river, going west at incredible speed. As he tried to spot landmarks to judge his speed he saw the approach of the inland sea in his direction of aerial travel – that would mean that he was going well over six hundred miles in mere… well, he had no idea how long he’d been unconscious. It was then that Speaker realized that he had also activated his elemental immunity charm without really thinking about it back during the fight, to counter the demon-pony’s hellfire breath. That charm was now shielding him against wind-speeds that would likely shred mortal ponies – so that was nice too.

Still, going at such a speed… yup, there was Lookshy looming on the horizon. It looked so small from so far up in the sky – only the Deheleshen lighthouse and the skyship aerie reached far enough into the sky for Speaker to definitively identify them… but he only had a few brief minutes to look down at his old home, as the demon-pony’s wrath carried him onwards. It was a strange feeling, especially as his old memories harkened of a time when the city of Lookshy was not called by that name, and where he had been the glorious and beloved lord of that old place.

It occurred to Speaker that at his current speed and trajectory he might slam into Mount Meru at the center of the blessed isle if he wasn’t careful – and he wasn’t really sure if his shield charms could save him from the impact… indeed, a few boring hours later, Speaker had crossed the Inland Sea that separated the Blessed Isle from the rest of Creation, with Speaker passing over the largely still functional first age splendor of the imperial city of Canterlot – but he couldn’t really see anything specific, beyond getting the by now familiar impression of having probably helmed some of the city planning originally done for the place.

A while later later a very large mountain crept up from the horizon. Speaker knew exactly what it was – and he was quite pleased when he could see that he’d be passing just south of it in a couple of hours. Mount Meru, the sacred mountain, the mountain on top of the elemental pole of earth which gave the blessed isle its incredible stability of essence, weather and fertile soil conditions had in the first age been the center of Solar civilization. The grand city of Meru had covered most of the mountain, but all Speaker could see was very tiny bits of ruins as he passed by the titanic peak – the highest point in creation, so high that in the first age Solars could leap from its peak into heaven if they fancied doing so, an act that Speaker recalled endlessly annoyed the gods.

By the time Speaker passed south of mount Meru the sun had set – and by dawn he could see Blessed Isle fade into the horizon to the east, leaving only endless water in his flight path. He also felt really hungry at this point. Sure, he could probably use essence to stave off the feeling of hunger and thirst for a day or two, but Speaker knew from experience back in Lookshy that unicorns who did that for too long would ultimately stop respiring essence until they had a proper meal – and Speaker really didn’t fancy running out of essence in the middle of nowhere – it might interfere with his elemental immunity charm.

It suddenly occurred to Speaker how odd he probably looked: His perfect balance charm allowed him to flip himself around quite effortlessly, so he didn’t tumble around in the air – instead he just hung in the air, waiting for the essence holding him up to dissipate. Because of his elemental immunity charm then his admittedly scorched and raged military uniform didn’t even flutter in the wind, neither did his long braid or beard.

As Speaker passed over the seemingly endless open ocean completely without any noticeable decrease in altitude, Speaker began to worry that he might be heading for the wyld beyond the west. That would be… bad. Sunrise might have been able to survive the trek back, due to her seemingly vast knowledge of shield and protection charms – but Speaker was reasonably sure that his one advanced shielding charm and chaos ward would not be enough to save him, not by a long-shot, if he ended up in the western wyld.

It was a curious thought though: How would the western wyld be? In the east the elemental pole of wood colored the surrounding wyld – making for the seemingly endless Everfree Forest that stretched beyond reality and reason. The barbarian pony tribes that lived near the edge of reality were known to have vegetable or plantlike features and growths, such as manes of vines or leaves, or hooves of wood – basically they weren’t that much different than ponies who lived near wood-aspected demenses. How would western barbarian ponies be? Like Shimmer? Well, she did say she was originally a tribal… but she’d never really talked about how her pre-exalted life had been – of course, she had mentioned that her tribe got wiped out by changelings, so it was likely a touchy subject.

Anywho, the western wyld. It would probably involve variations of the theme ‘water’. Perhaps there would be dry water? The wyld was known to feature strange interpretations of Creations, weird mockeries that demonstrated a very alien or just wrong understanding of how Creation worked. The best example Speaker knew of that was the fabled story of No-Lion, a changeling warlord that had assaulted Lookshy about three hundred years earlier. It wasn’t a pleasant story, for quite a lot of ponies died to No-Lion’s hollow fangs and faceless nightmare legions before Lookshy struck down the monster, but Speaker recalled that No-Lion looked just as its name would suggest: A lion, but not. It had four limbs, like a pony, but strode around on its two hind-legs – like ponies in martial stances – and its body was a hollow structure of blades and jagged teeth, with a face that was like a lion’s, only turned inwards. Speaker had seen murals of the changeling at memorials and read texts on battle strategy against changelings that mentioned No-Lion in detail… So while No-Lion appeared like a warped eastern jungle predator, such as the jaguars, then it stood to reason that western changelings would have aquatic features? Giant fish ponies perhaps? Who knew.

Ultimately Speaker concluded that his worries about reaching the wyld were unfounded – for the sea looked perfectly normal and quite imposing - and his altitude had started to decrease. Speaker could feel the air rushing past him no longer being mostly horizontal in its path – and there was a lot of water down there.

Looking around frantically for an island Speaker quickly found himself with nowhere to aim for, or swim towards. Of course, that first required that he actually survived splashing down. This part didn’t worry him that much: As he decreased in altitude enough to see the foamy tips of the waves underneath, Speaker rearranged himself so he was head first and assumed a diving position. Between his elemental immunity charm and shield charm he hoped he’d be able to survive the landing.

Despite his preparations then Speaker’s impact with the western waves was hard, unforgiving , and excruciatingly cold – if only for a split scond until his elemental immunity charm managed to compensate, at least to the  point that it didn’t bother him that much. The real problem was that between the speed he was going – which he’d figured to at least two or three hundred miles an hour, with him having been airborne for almost twenty or so hours – and his diving posture as he pierced the surface of the endless western ocean, meant that Speaker found himself plowing so deeply into the water, that before he could even feel himself begin to slow down from the water resisting and zapping his great speed, then the light from the surface had complete faded into pitch black.

Finally coming to a halt, sinking ever so slowly towards what was possibly an ocean floor several miles beneath him, Speaker took stock of his situation. By his calculations, and his understanding of Creation’s geography – something he’d most recently brushed up on back when he had done his thing at the Great Forks house of knowledge, plus his estimate of his speed, he figured that he was probably somewhere east of the great western archipelago – the long scattering of islands that dotted the western fringe of Creation – and he honestly didn’t fancy swimming that long… mainly because he hadn’t really slept for almost two days at this point, and right now he was gods knew how deep underwater.

Taking a deep breath – something his elemental immunity charm afforded him – Speaker felt himself begin to float up… a wonderfully relaxing feeling, compared to the rather intense mode of travel he’d experienced just earlier.

Surfacing Speaker found himself almost panicking: There truly were no islands in sight – nothing. It was water in every direction, as far as the eye could see: “Fuck…”

Floating on the surface, Speaker took stock of his situation again: His Lookshyan special forces training came to mind, chiefly because he couldn’t think ofanything useful on his own. He needed safe and dry shelter, food, and he needed to re-establish contact with his circle for extraction. There weren’t any islands around, so shelter didn’t seem like much of an option – and Speaker knew full well, as did any unicorn, that when you went to sleep one automatically powered down any charms that you had been fueling – and the prospect of falling asleep and drowning didn’t sound very nice, especially as Speaker keenly remembered the water torture resistance training he’d undergone as part of his special forces training as being anything but fun.

It was strange for Speaker that he was recalling all these memories of hoof camp and subsequent first field force training – but at the same time it made sense. His first age memories were of great feats or grand projects and neat ideas to curious problems, like how to bottle the silence of a cat’s paw so you could pump it into an orichalcum and steel alloy for blades that would cut through the air silently – but none of that seemed very relevant at the moment. Hoof camp training on the other hoof seemed oddly pertinent:

“If you find yourself lost at sea, attempt to float – and either try to wait it out while praying to local water spirits for aid, as they might be able to grant you passage to a safe harbor in exchange for prayer and sacrifices, or if you’re feeling up for it, swim towards the nearest safe harbor until you’re too tired, then start floating” Speaker recalled a unicorn explaining to a group of young colts, a group of recruits that Speaker had been part of oh so many years ago. Of course, that had been followed by the grim fact that finding someone lost at sea like that was very unlikely… unless you found yourself floating among flotsam, in which case you should make a raft.

Speaker didn’t have anything to make a raft from – in fact, all he had stored elsewhere was his old medical bag which he hadn’t used ever since mastering all his neat medical charms, Gift, his Singing staff and a rosined bow to play the staff. Sure, the staff could play up a hut in no time – but it’d need materials – and the nearest rock or perhaps even just sand was probably down at the… bottom.

An idea started to form in Speaker’s head. Under any other circumstances it would have been considered madness – but Speaker was a solar, a solar of the twilight caste no less! Exhaling, Speaker let himself begin to sink.

Only about a dozen yards down into the quite possibly bottomless western ocean did light yield to darkness, forcing Speaker to ignite his anima – shining the golden glow of his soul into the depths. It honestly didn’t help much, seeing that there was nothing for the light to shine on… only the odd curious fish who quickly darted away came to light.

After having sunk some more – it being exceedingly difficult to get any sense of time when the sun wasn’t visible – Speaker found himself hungry. He had seen curious fish pass by him, but hadn’t done anything to them, chiefly because he wasn’t sure what would happen if he spilled blood while in the water: Shimmer had told some rather frightening stories of the great western ‘siaka’ – the western giant sharks, large enough to gobble up ponies in one bite, and they could smell a single drop of blood miles away. It also didn’t help that Speaker figured that he couldn’t really cook a fish underwater, he certainly didn’t want to try considering the dinner guests he might attract.

By the time Speaker reached the bottom he was finding it difficult to stay awake. He had no idea how long he’d been underwater, hours, days? – but he knew that if his elemental immunity charm lapsed for just a second the pressure would squash him like a bug under a very heavy hoof… and of course the bottom was littered with large fish and marine animal skeletons: how lovely and macabre.

Half-swimming half drifting along the bottom of the endless ocean, fighting to stay awake, Speaker suddenly found himself feeling strange currents rush around him – but the light from his anima revealed nothing. A tiny smidge of essence later for his essence sight charm and Speaker saw that he was being circled by water spirits!

Calling out to the spirits proved futile, since Speaker had no means of actually speaking underwater – so how to ask for a dry and safe place to sleep? It was then that Speaker found himself suddenly almost rotating, having bumped into a solid object – probably just another whale bon- nope, that was rock! Yes!

Summoning his singing staff, which felt really weird due to forcing it into the water, Speaker began raising the rock towards the surface. To Speaker’s absolute delight he realized that water carried sound so much better than air that he was able to extend the staff’s power to raise not just a small pillar of rock – but a large enough mesa that he could form a small island at the surface!

Feeling surprisingly energetic all of a sudden, Speaker got a bright idea by which he played the rock to form an enormous bowl, filling the large bowl with sand while still at the bottom of the ocean – then sealing the sand in with a layer of rock. Playing an ancient tune once known as “Earth dragon rising” the enormous cone of stone began to rise out of the depth.
It took forever – or at least felt so, especially since Speaker’s ascent was much slower than his previous descent, but as the sudden new island rose out of the water Speaker cried out with such joy… then he very quickly played himself up a simple shelter and fell asleep on the cold, wet stone.

Waking up a good while later, having no idea what so ever how long he’d slept, Speaker felt his stomach grumble in ways it hadn’t done for quite a long time – not since his special forces training when he’d been forced to go for days without solid food… which made sense, since it was probably a few days since he’d been bucked out of Nexus, out of the east. He also felt like crap, having slept on rough and wet stone, but that was a minor inconvenience to the thoughts that came next…

A terrible thought occurred to Speaker: What about the rest of the circle? He had no idea – and especially Shimmer who’d been left fighting that monster pony! But first food, then worry – right.

Without anything to make a fishing rod out of then it seemed impossible to get any food – and indeed, Speaker didn’t expect there to be many fish around the fish since there weren’t any vegetation or food sources visible at the surface. With essence sight he tried to see the local ebb and flow of essence, to perhaps spot any really large schools of fish as they might give off enough ambient essence to be visible – but that didn’t work either.

Wait a second… sharks! They could smell a single drop of blood miles away, right? Using his medical charms to safely extract a small amount of blood from himself, Speaker began dripping it into the water so the current would take it away. It took very little time before something large and shadowy seemed to prowl under the surface... after that it was just a matter of fetching Gift, which took far too long, and the nail the shark – which worked fine – and then the dead shark sank into the depths.

Great.

Trying again, Speaker this time had a trident wrought of stone ready – first through Gift to hit and kill the shark, then having at it the trident to pull it out of the water – success!

Sullen Hoof would probably have slapped Speaker for making a shark fin soup that tasteless and boring – but when all you had was a shark, sea water and stone… at least it was filling.

Having now both slept and eaten, plus filled himself up on sea water he’d purified with his essence, Speaker took stock of his situation once more. He quickly came to the uncomfortable realization that he couldn’t just sit and worry about the rest of his circle: he had no means do anything for them in his current situation, so instead he turned to his own situation.

Looking at Gift Speaker sighed: Maybe if he’d been able to summon it faster, throw it a few more times, maybe then they could have whittled down the demon pony’s defences? Either way then he found himself increasingly frustrated with constantly having to retrieve his singing staff whenever he wanted to open the hatch in his shelter to get inside or out.
This frustration gave Speaker his first goal: Learn the elsewhere retrieval technique that Red always used to quickly fetch her weapons. She’d spoken many times of teaching it to Speaker, but they had never gotten around to it. Oh well, now he had all the time in the world.

Before starting any charm practice Speaker played open the rock holding the soggy sand – it turned out that there was a slight pressure difference, resulting in a small geyser of sand and sea-water erupting for a brief moment. Now the island was covered in sand, lovely. Acting quickly, Speaker used his essence to gather up the sand and heat it before it washed away – melting it into glass. In a few hours he had made a large and spacious – and very open-looking – house of thick glass, reinforced with stone buttresses and other reinforcements to help withstand the occasional massive tidal wave rolling over the island. 

With his glass house built, Speaker began throwing stones – the simplest of thrown projectiles – rehearsing his retrieval charm… the simple exercise, mentally locking on to something he’d chuck, then yanking it back to him with essence. This part was easy, since Red had already taught him that little trick – but she’s also told him what the next step was: To maintain that link, that locked on mote of essence, as you stashed the rock elsewhere… this was very difficult, as maintaining that tether and then yanking it gently to pull something back into physical space was…. Well… really hard.

It ended up taking Speaker a little over five days, but at the end he found that he could store and retrieve even his singing staff instantly and with effortless ease. This breakthrough also marked the end of his first week on the island. Speaker began to genuinely fear that he’d end up with some kind of western island cabin fever…

With that fear in mine, while peering out into the watery horizon, Speaker decided to put a little more effort into being found. With essence he melted down and reshaped the glass of his house and using his singing staff made a tower. The glass came on top, making for a nice little light-house – but the glass had been wrought into lenses, allowing the light Speaker’s anima to reach far longer via concentrated cones. A ball bearing, albeit one of stone and greased with bits of ground up shark fat, allowed the whole little light-house to rotate, albeit it slowly, using ingeniously designed stone wave-generators to power the whole setup. This left Speaker sitting, every night, for as long as he could before falling asleep, with his anima fully flared…

It was about another week into his involuntary island exile that Speaker received a very welcome message: A magical messenger conjured by Shimmer, giving him a grim update of the fight he was so abruptly forced out of – plus it was in Shimmer’s voice:

“Hey Speaker, I know you’ll get this – because I can feel that you’re still alive. After you got bucked really far away the emissary managed to get a blow in that flung the demon pony high into the air, then another blow that sent the monster flying off into the Yanase river. It didn’t look like the stone and brass flesh the monster had let it float, so we haven’t seen it return since. Didn’t get the bounty though, but Sully got the hearthstones and the rewards from the Bodhisattva. I got beat up real bad, that’s why this message is late – had to regenerate a few limbs first after stony had his way with me. Also the immaculates are all up in arms over this. It wasn’t my tattoos that the unicorn at the crime scene saw, it was your cutie mark, but they saw me fighting so I’m now a known target as well. They’re barricading the clinic and have spies keeping tabs on the townhouse. Oh, and after the battle Red came back with Sunrise… she… she needs your help; it’s really bad. You need to find a way to get a message to us so we can come and pick you up. Love you”

Having heard Shimmer’s voice as the first break in the boredom that was the endlessly repetitive wash of waves on his stone island made for, Speaker sighed deeply and smiled. Sure, he knew well enough to get a message to the circle – but first he had to find some civilization with a sorcerer for that. Plus, eating essence-roasted shark, or essence-cooked shark soup, or whatever other bland variation Speaker could think of with his food was getting really old – especially compared to the rich and wondrous flavors that Sullen Hoof usually came up with. At least he was able to siphon off salt from the ocean water when he purified that into drinking water to spice things up with – but still.

It was five more days of solitude before Speaker one night, just as he was nodding off to sleep, saw faint lights on the horizon… hold on, what did that mean? Oh of course, ships!

Flaring his anima to its fullest, enveloping his glass lighthouse in a brilliantly shining golden gear and three pairs of wings as the light of his soul manifest its true form, Speaker could see more lights appearing – and after a while some of the lights started to approach…

The light that approached was from a small ship with triangular sails. Cash or Shimmer would probably have known exactly what kind of ship it was – even with the only source of light being a few lanterns. As the ship came closer it became clear that it was being powered chiefly by a large paddle-wheel in the back of the ship – a paddlewheel that somehow stopped as the ship got close to the island, with several small boats being lowered into the water full of ponies… ponies with spears. Oh well, Speaker had hoped for a peaceful rescue – but he’d accept having to fight his way back to civilization too.

Summoning gift with a blissfully quick motion, it appearing instantly on the side of Speaker’s right forehoof in its inert state, the solar awaited the ponies from the boat – maintaining his anima’s light through conscious effort, but keeping it at a much calmer glow instead of it being fully totemic.

The ponies in the boats seemed surprised as their boats banged up against the rock of the island pillar – but they quickly swarmed the place, their metal barding ringing and jingling clearly in the night. When they finally reached the lighthouse top, via the glass and stone stairwell that led down to the ground level of the island, they found Speaker waiting for them.

At first the ponies in their oddly rusty barding and spears made of – hold on, that was iron! Had they thought that Speaker’s light had been a changeling lure? It certainly looked like it. One soldier took a bold hoof-step forth and poked Speaker with the flat side of his spear-tip. Since neither the iron spear-head nor Speaker burst  into rainbow flame, as changelings and their glamour always  did when in contact with iron, the ponies cheered and began trying to talk to Speaker, and of course none of them spoke the rivertongue. Great.

With basic gestures as their only means of communications – and indeed, it seemed that not even hoof-gestures were entirely the same between the east and where-ever these ponies were from – Speaker ultimately managed to get a boat-ride back to the ship the iron-barded ponies were from.

Looking at the torchlight that flickered on his rescuers or quite possibly captors as they rowed him back to their ship, Speaker noted that under their iron barding they all wore brightly colored clothing – where they mercenaries? Pirates? Traveling minstrels?

Aboard the ship there was little improvement in communication. Speaker picked up a few words here and there, but he couldn’t be sure that it made sense – something about fire, but that really didn’t make sense.

The ship started its paddlewheel, which made Speaker wonder how that was powered – but there was no wind for the triangular sail spread across the mast to pick up, so if nothing else then it made sense to use something like that – and not that long after did the ship approach what looked like a lot of ships. Had some kind of fleet come across Speaker’s island? Getting closer the lanterns on each ship revealed most of the fleet ships to be broad barges… and good grief were there many: Speaker could see at least three dozen barges just making up the ‘outer’ edge of what looked like far more. What in Celestia’s name was this??

As the ship he was on matched course and heading with the barge-fleet, slowly inching up to one barge that ultimately extended a gangway, Speaker found himself – again through simple gestures and curious looks – ushered onto the barge. There, among other very colorfully dressed ponies, stood a mare with a black mane tied up in many braids, each adorned with beads that gleamed in the flickering lights of the many lanterns around her. Her clothes were even more outlandishly showy than those around her, probably indicating some measure of status and wealth. As Speaker was made to approach, other ponies from the ship stepped ahead and whispered in the mare’s ear. At first she looked disappointed, speaking in a language that Speaker couldn’t recognize, but then she looked up at Speaker and tried addressing him in various languages. First one was the same she had spoken before. Second one sounded even weirder, third one Speaker recognized as northern ice-tongue from his brief visit with the Bull. Not having responded to any of her statements, the mare gave Speaker a quizzical look: “Do you speak the merchant tongue by any chance?”

Sighing with relief, Speaker nodded so his beard jiggled: “Yes I do – finally something I understand”

“Well then, might I then ask you who you are? Around here visiting ponies introduce themselves first, especially unexpected visitors” the mare stated, an infectious smile creeper over her face.

Looking around at the many curious ponies looking at him, Speaker nodded: “I am Bright Machine Speaker, born of Lookshy – but currently… or well, previously living in Nexus”

Having said the word Nexus seemed to trigger something among the ponies around him – with many expressions turning into stern and mistrusting ones.

“You’re not a guild spy, are you?” the mare wondered with a coy smile.

Speaker quickly sensed that the guild wasn’t a popular topic on the barge-fleet, seeing how the faces of the other ponies present soured, so he wasn’t slow to exclaim his disdain for the guild and their economic warfare strategies. This seemed to calm the ponies around him.

“Well then, Bright Machine Speaker, I am Denzik Hala – and this is the Denzik city-ship… now how about a cup of tea and you tell me how you ended up in a lighthouse on an island we’ve never seen before?” the colorfully clothed mare said, gesturing for the ponies around her to return to their jobs and duties.

> Chapter 49: Uglier On The Inside
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the Teak-and-Cotton’s oddly perfumed tea ‘house’ – Teak-and-Cotton being the name of the barge they were on, supposedly derived from the materials most often used to maintain the barge – Speaker found himself entertained by curious ponies who wanted to know how Speaker had survived at sea.

Speaker also quickly learned that the Denzik, the fleet of well over a hundred huge barges, was populated by merchants, their families and other ponies who supported the merchants via fishery, craftsponyship or transport of goods.

“So… some monster pony in Nexus bucked you all across Creation… and you just happened to land near a lighthouse, and survive for how long?” another merchant said, trying to wrap his head around the impossible story that Speaker had told. The merchant, an old stallion with a short beard that Speaker was certain had been dyed black, had a strange accent – as had everyone on the ship. It took Speaker a while to figure it out, but ultimately he recognized the use of colorful and thin silks from how many young unicorns dressed in Lookshy, for there it had once been popular to emulate southern fashion: The Denzik was from the south of creation, so the strange language that his ‘rescue’ party had been talking had been firetongue…

Since he didn’t know whether he could trust his gracious rescuers not to slice his throat in his sleep to collect his Singing Staff, Speaker chose not to reveal it – instead claiming that he’d used his crafting charms to simply reshape the stone island and the sand on it into the lighthouse. Sure, it wasn’t the truth, but given time he could have done it, plus nobody was going back to check the place out. 

The question of the nature of Speaker’s power quickly arose – to which end Speaker found that while the Denzik apparently maintained very close ties with the Realm, chiefly because their annual trade route was basically a big circle around the Blessed Isle, plus they benefited greatly from the protection that the Realm’s fleets, then they weren’t particularly devout… which made him feel safe to reveal the true nature of his powers.

To Speaker’s surprise the Denzik merchants seemed to care very little of what divinity that had granted Speaker his powers – but they were very curios about what he could do. To this end, under the guise of making Speaker earn his stay on the Denzik until he could get home, Speaker found himself on the Denzik’s primary medical barge the next day. What happened next was fairly predictable: Speaker cleared the place out in under an hour, to great applause and loud cheers as otherwise terminal or crippled ponies found themselves healed completely.

By the end of the day Speaker’s reputation as a miraculous healer had been firmly established across the Denzik, but that also began to attract critics.

Staying in a guest room on Denzik Hala’s private barge meant that Speaker didn’t get any unwanted guests – but after a few days he did manage to overhear an eerily familiar sound during a muffled argument: The sputtering of elemental flame, typically produced by fire-aspected unicorns, especially when they were angry…

Stepping out of his cabin and up on deck, Speaker found Denzik Hala and her entourage arguing with a very annoyed unicorn: “I will not accept any more delays – I want a straight answer! If the Denzik is housing anathema I will inform the Fire Fleet, and they will search every barge from stern to mast once the Denzik comes to An-Teng!”

Now, Speaker had discovered a few curious things about how the Denzik merchants operated in the days he had been on board – things that told him that the unicorn’s threats were to be taken seriously, but that Hala wasn’t likely to just give him up either:

It had come via a tour of one of the other merchant’s private barges the day before. It was the old stallion from the tea-barge, showing Speaker his ‘hold out stores’. It was apparently common practice, unlike the guild – something the old merchant took pride in pointing out – to go for the long gambles on the Denzik: “See this fun little thing here Ifendi? I bought this fifteen years ago at a port in the north for barely a hoof-ful of silver. I have no idea what it is, but you said you remember things from the first age… so… if you could tell me what it is, I might be able to compensate you for your troubles”

Looking at the broche-looking device, a perfectly clear large hoof-sized square amethyst crystal fixed in a blue jade and orichalcum setting – the crystal had two holes drilled in it at opposite ends, with leather string strung through them, to make the thing into a necklace… unfortunately Speaker recognized it as a translation crystal, a device that could read anything by being placed over a written text – be it wyrd changeling poetry, demonically coded messages, or just texts written in foreign languages – and it would then display what it was currently held over in perfectly translated, decoded and meaningful Old Realm glyphs.

Speaker quickly pointed out that the holes drilled in the thing made it largely useless – the crystal had to be intact. The old merchant nodded: “Ah yes Ifendi – I figured that the damage to the crystal had something to do with it… but can you do anything about it? I’ve seen you regrow a pony’s lost limb, so perhaps… heal this gem Ifendi?”

Ifendi – an evidently southern word often used on the Denzik about foreign business partners. Speaker had been told that it was a very respectful term by Denzik Hala, although she had also warned Speaker that among the other merchants on the Denzik there were lively discussions on how to best exploit Speaker for financial gain. In this way the Denzik wasn’t that much different from the guild – but, as he had very clearly gotten explained – then the Denzik had far higher morals when it came to doing business, plus they were by no means in the habit of going for the quickest and easiest sale. This translation gem was a perfect example of this: Any guild merchant would have recognized that the thing wasn’t working and ordered it dismantled, for the blue jade and orichalcum in the setting was still worth quite a lot of money. This merchant had recognized that holding on to it might earn him more… and judging from the host of other strange assortment of goods that the merchant had stashed away, waiting for a buyer. It was also a testament to the Denzik’s unofficial disregard to the Realm, for anything with orichalcum in it was considered heretical by the immaculates.

“I can fix it, sure – let me have a look here…” Speaker said, floating up the gem and using his essence to patch the gem seamlessly. What couldn’t be seen was the immense amount of essence used, only Speaker’s caste mark flaring and his entire body briefly glowing.

It was so quick, the merchant not even getting a chance to offer Speaker access to a box full of amethyst crystals to carve a replacement gem from… instead Speaker simply mending the gem with pure essence. The merchant was at a loss for words: “Ifendi, that… my….”

Speaker quickly slapped the gem up against a nearby crate and its tacked on cargo manifest written in that strangely swirly fire-tongue, activating the gem. Old Realm glyphs flashed across the purple surface of the gem as Speaker moved it over the text: “Contains: Four mist-water wood vases, bought for 300 silver dinars during calibration at the end of year seven-hundred and three”

“I think it works now” Speaker proudly declared, floating the gem over to the merchant.

Upon returning to his cabin, Speaker found a small chest full of small silver bars on his bed. He quickly hid it elsewhere. The merchant could no doubt sell the gem as a tool for decoding coded military messages, or guild trade secrets, for a fortune far greater that what Speaker had gotten.

Back on the deck of barge a few days later, the shouting unicorn appeared to be getting on Denzik Hala’s nerves. Speaker didn’t want a fight to break out, especially since he knew how destructive a dragonblooded unicorn could be to a wooden environment from his many years in Lookshy – hence why Lookshy built almost all their buildings in stone.

“My dear Ever-Ember, do keep in mind that doing anything that disrupts the Denzik’s business will reflect very poorly on any future employment opportunities you might have here. Please keep that in mind. I am quite aware that the Immaculate Order enjoys getting intelligence from faithful unicorns around Creation, but I doubt that they’ll pay you your usual fee for magical messaging” Denzik Hala noted, her polite if not forced smile never faltering.

The unicorn hesitated for a moment. Denzik Hala was extremely well spoken for a mortal pony – Cash Charmer would probably have loved to mince words with her, as well as other things – but it was clear the unicorn, in its evidently religious fervor, hadn’t considered how his current plan of action might affect any future employment he might get on the Denzik.

Speaker chose this very moment to strike, stepping up the group: “I am the one you’re calling such nasty names – and I must say, I find it in poor taste to criticize a charitable doctor for merely helping those in need”

The unicorn turned to Speaker with a look of righteous indignation in his slitted eyes. The unicorn was clearly of quite good dragonblooded breeding, for he had many draconic features: Around the edges of his hooves were red scales, plus his black mane smoldered at its tips, giving off ever so slight whiffs of smoke in the breeze. Beyond that the unicorn stallion looked more or less normal, as far as fire-aspected unicorns were concerned: A crimson horn and coat, quite typical, and given that the unicorn supposedly was a sorcerer specializing in messaging services, he wore robes embroidered with elemental fire dragons racing around him. Of course, Speaker also knew from Lookshy that fire aspected unicorns were the ones with the fireiest temper… it was a natural part of their magical lineage.

To this end it didn’t really surprise him that much that the unicorn, instead of saying anything to Speaker, simply attempted to blast Speaker with a gout of elemental flame from the tip of his horn. The jet of fire was precisely aimed, perfectly controlled and didn’t even appear to give off any heat to those not in the line of fire – Speaker was impressed. Speaker was also quite unharmed, as his advanced shield charm, what was it Sunrise had called it, the “Iron Kettle Body” technique, sheathed Speaker in a dim but noticeable golden shell that the fire simply harmlessly licked at.

“Ok, nice to meet you to. Would you care to talk about apparently dogmatic differences?” Speaker inquired while being bathed in flames, having to very much stop himself from smirking at the unicorn again and again tries to burn him to cinders.

Denzik Hala and all the ponies around the two seemed well aware that Speaker and the unicorn’s fight was not one to be interfered with – although it was also quite evident that none of the viewers were particularly pleased with the unicorn’s actions.

Speaker, reasonably safe if not a bit sweaty at this point, sized his opponent up: He had no desire to actually hurt the unicorn – mainly because that unicorn was how he wanted to get a message to Shimmer so Cash could come and pick him up, so hurting the unicorn would only make that even less likely, but also because it was clear that this unicorn was no warrior. In Lookshy all ponies who were graced by the dragons were, as a bare minimum, taught to fight well enough that they could match any mortal champion blow for blow. He had no idea how the realm worked in that respect – of course, he couldn’t even be sure that this unicorn was part of a realm noble house: He could be an outcaste, a ‘lost egg’ as unicorns who exalt outside of noble houses were known, or perhaps exiled because of that temper of his? Either way Speaker didn’t feel threatened: The unicorn had a slim physique, that of a scholar, not a warrior – and from having participated in many drills back home in Lookshy, Speaker had a very good idea of how limited the essence reserves of unicorns were, especially compared to that of Solars.

It took just over a minute of non-stop fire blasts for the unicorn to tire spiritually – his body completely drained of essence, to the point that his smoldering mane even appeared to have gone out: “What kind of anathema are you? Why won’t you burn!?”

“I’m the fire-proof sort. Now please, let’s be civil about this – I mean you no harm, I just want to get home to Nexus – and if you will let me, I would like to buy your services to send a message to my business partners to arrange a pickup” Speaker calmly suggested, again fighting the urge to appear smug and rub it into the idiot unicorn just how much more powerful he was. It was a strong urge, that of any victor in a fight, but also compounded by Speaker’s first age memories of unicorns destroying all he held dear. Oh it would be so easy, to just pull Gift out of elsewhere and lob the damn dragonblooded fool’s head off… but no, Shimmer and the circle was waiting for signs of life.

Speaker’s unabashed politeness and calm demeanor both frightened and relieved the unicorn. The dragonblood knew that he was basically defenseless at this point, so this polite cessation of hostilities was far more desirable – plus it allowed the unicorn to save face ever so slightly.

Denzik Hala, seeing that the fight was over, quickly stepped up and ushered the two ponies under deck into a private meeting room – noting to the unicorn in passing, in high realm: “You will be billed for new deck planking to replace the scorched ones” in a very sharp and disapproving tone. 

It turned out that the unicorn was a scholar, not born in the realm – and thus an outcaste, but none the less a fervent believer in the immaculate faith. This made conversation tricky, not but not impossible – as Speaker was quickly able to convince the unicorn that, even if they did disagree on the source of Speaker’s powers, then they afforded many positive and good uses – just like the gifts that the dragons bestowed upon unicorns allowed for both good and bad demonstrations of power.

It wasn’t easy for Speaker to control the conversation and steer clear of hazardous topics – but he was mindful of what Cash had said in trying to identify the likes and dislikes of the ponies he spoke to, which was fairly easy for Speaker at least with regards to the Realm and the Immaculate Faith.

The unicorn stallion, Ever-Ember, while a self-proclaimed scholar – turned out to be a bit of an amateur at the trade, or more like a hobbyist. He earned his pay via magical messaging from the Denzik merchants and buying and reselling artifacts to Realm noble houses, as well as occasionally helping out testing or using artifacts brought on board. After a few bottles of southern fruit liquor, which left the unicorn far more sauced than the hardy Lookshyan veteran, Ever-Ember even confided that one of his occasional tasks was to power the special essence-fueled paddle-wheels that some of the barges were outfitted with, which ensured that the Denzik maintained top speed between ports even if the winds and currents were unfavorable.

Speaker in turn wasn’t immune to the creamy drinks either, although he maintained himself far better, joking about the many strange concierge medicine offers that his circle-mate Cash Charmer had lined up – everything from vain guild merchants who wanted miniscule warts removed, to what had proved to be hypochondriacs with far too much money to throw around who probably just needed a servant to follow them around with a constant supply of clean napkins to wipe their noses: “…and maybe change their diapers if the really wanted to be babied, but I think you go to the Harlotry for that”

“Well, Denzik merchants aren’t that different – though being at sea so much makes everyone a bit more humble: You can’t waste too much storage space on personal luxuries… a shame really, but it’s the price you pay for going beyond the Immaculate’s censorship” Ever-Ember noted.

Neither Speaker nor his drinking buddy noticed, but Denzik Hala as well as some of her servants kept mindful tabs on the two – and to the great relief of the Denzik merchants, then the fact that the two seemed to have buried the hatchet (or fermented it…) pleased them to no end.

It amused Speaker that Ever-Ember seemed aware – even if he wouldn’t admit it directly – that working outside of the jurisdiction of the Immaculates gave him access to ancient manuscripts and artifacts that wouldn’t be available to collectors and scholars on the blessed isle. Ever-Ember in turn apparently made good business by selling copies and transcribed versions of the otherwise heretical documents. If it was something written in eternally shiny orichalcum inks on strange never-aging paper the Immaculates would probably just burn it as anathema scribbles, but if a copy was made on ordinary perishable paper with normal inks then there was no problem.

“Hmm… tell you what, I know the Chief Librarian in the Great Forks House of Learning – He pays well for first age manuscripts. If you ever want to cash in old scrolls that you’ve already transcribed then that’s not a bad place to sell them” Speaker noted, trying to recall the library god’s name… not remembering that the indexing-obsessed library god’s name simply was that very label “Library God”.

The unicorn gave Speaker a stern look, as if trying to gauge whether Speaker was pulling his leg or not: “Any idea how much he’ll pay?”

Speaker couldn’t tell – but told Ever-Ember how much he’d been paid for simply helping to verify some of the library’s oldest texts. The unicorn’s smile reminded Speaker of how Cash would smile from time to time.

Considering the unicorn’s apparent willingness to cash in on his old texts, Speaker got an idea: “Say friend, I understand that you send sorcerous messages around here – right? Well, I have a friend back east I need to contact so he can come and pick me up before we get too close to Realm waters. If you could send him a message I’m sure you could come along for the ride as well, with all the scrolls you’d want to sell in Great Forks”

Ever-Ember eyed Speaker incredulously: “There’s a long way between Nexus and Great Forks you know… longer yet to the Denzik from Nexus”

“And my friend can cover that distance in just under four hours – he could probably be here in… hmmm… I’m guessing three days?” Speaker reasoned, figuring that with a flight speed of around a hundred and fifty miles an hour from Cash on Nah, with Speaker himself having cleared at least seven thousand five five-hundred miles, if he was supposed to be somewhere in the waters between the western archipelago and An-Teng.

The unicorn looked at what he’d been drinking, then at Speaker: “How much of this have you had?”

“Just humor me – tell you what, I have this nice little chest full of silver here  - if you send the message to my friends and my pickup isn’t here in a week it’s your – but if he does show up you double what’s in the chest” Speaker said, retrieving the small chest from elsewhere with surprising ease – to the point that it even surprised Speaker a little bit, having expected to have to wait the usual half a minute or so for non-weapons stored elsewhere to appear… in retrospect he figured that, well, he could have thrown the chest and the small silver bars inside. Of course, if that was the case then nearly anything could be used as a weapon… hmmm… that would require experimentation later on.

After having shaken off the shock of Speaker having suddenly made a small wooden chest full of silver appear, Ever-Ember nodded fervently: “Sure, your loss – who do you want the message sent to?”

“A mare by the name of Last Shimmer, she should be somewhere in Nexus if that’s any help” Speaker noted, folding the chest back into elsewhere with the unicorn gawking at him.

Blinking a few times and waving a hoof where the chest had just been, Ever-Ember shook his head ever so slightly: “Nah, just a name will do – the spell seeks out the intended recipient, not just any random pony with the same name. So, what’s the message?”

“Dearest Shimmer. It has been far too long since I’ve heard your voice, so be a dear and send Cash on Nah to the Denzik city-ship to come and pick me up as soon as possible. The Denzik is somewhere between Abalone on Wavecrest and An-Teng, but it shouldn’t be difficult to spot from the air, especially during the day. Perhaps bring Sully to scout for it. Also, I’ve wagered a rather large sum of silver I’ve earned that Cash can be here within a week – I don’t want to lose that bet… love you, Speaker”

A few hours later, in Nexus, amidst the muffled cacophony of a million ponies and the pervasive noise of a thousand industries, a single mare cried out in joy. A yeddim flew off into the sky not much later, much to those who saw it’s confusion and disbelief.

Back on the Denzik, after Speaker had his message sent, the Solar and the unicorn parted ways but agreed to meet in a week – if not sooner – to settle the bet. The return message Speaker got just as he got back to his cabin assured him that he’d win.

Taking it easy the next few days, healing the few remaining sick and injured who came to him, plus earning a bit more silver by taking a look at and repairing a few other strange gadgets and artifacts that the various Denzik merchants came to him with, some overtly and others covertly, Speaker found himself spending his nights quite comfortably in tea barges, or at lavish parties held in his honor – either because of all the money he’d make the host for having fixed something valuable, or because he’d healed someone rich’s son, daughter, uncle, brother or what have you.

On the fourth day after the message had been Speaker began to get a little anxious. He hadn’t heard from the circle since the return message that simply told him that Shimmer, Cash and Sullen Hoof had left to get him – and the weather was taking a big turn for the worse…

In the west the oceanic storms were known among its sailor ponies to produce waves up to fifty yards high – enough to swallow and capsize almost any ship whole. As Speaker saw that the Denzik slowed down, with all the ponies returning to their own barges and battening down all the hatches, hoisting all the sails… it all looked fairly sensible, but there was something else: The ponies around him looked frightened.

Now, Speaker didn’t have the social observational skills of Cash, nor could he read others as effectively and methodically as Sullen Hoof and he didn’t have the many decades of practical experience with ponies that Shimmer had – but it was none the less clear as day that the ponies on the Denzik were afraid of the storm that loomed in the horizon… which really didn’t make sense to Speaker.

It was weird: The over one hundred barges that made up the denzik, each well over fifty yards wide and at least a hundred long, were all heavy and loaded with a multitude of goods as well as repair materials, so each barge seemed well equipped to hold its own against the storm – and together, with the way that the barges were chained and tethered to each other, it seemed even less likely that anything could go wrong since one barge could help another easily.

Then the grand visage of a huge water spout appeared before the Denzik – a continuous explosion of water, like a geyser, so big that despite Speaker being on one of the barges in the middle of the Denzik he could see and… hear it?

A grim face appeared on the geyser, chiefly just two foamy eyes and the occasional ‘falling’ of water that gave the rough image of a mouth. Its voice was like the bubbly screams of a hundred ponies struggling not to drown – yet as a grotesque chorus it was quite easy to understand the words it was saying, especially to Speaker since the thing spoke in Old Realm: “Ponies of the Denzik, the most beautiful and grand mistress and mother of storms, the heavenly and fair Soelot, demands tribute for all who pass through her waters lest they face her wrath”

Great, it was another god extorting ponies – now as a watery toll road. This enfuriated Speaker, especially because he faintly recalled how in the first age the eclipse caste solars brought all the storm mothers – the goddesses in charge of Creation’s oceanic storms – to heel quite effectively, so the fact that at least some of them were acting up like this now meant that they were ignoring past oaths and promises to simply live in peace and do their jobs.

The gigantic storm cloud moved closer to the Denzik while Speaker made his way to the barges at the front. Many ponies on the barges tried to stop Speaker, but they all spoke in one of those gobbledygook languages that he couldn’t understand – plus Speaker would just jump from rope to rope, balancing on otherwise impossibly thin or tiny flagpoles or ledges, much to the amazement of those in view thanks to his perfect balance charm. If only he’d learned that improved jumping technique that he’d seen Sullen Hoof use so often.

At the very front of the Denzik, where the great water-spout had emerged from the otherwise very calm waters, Speaker found Denzik Hala and a number of other exceedingly well dressed ponies – probably the rest of the bigwigs, majority shareholders and whatnot that owned the floating city. They appeared to be arguing who should present the tribute they had made ready, a large mahogany pail full of jade, gems and other valuables.

Seeing Speaker, Denzik Hala gestured for one of her servants to send him away. The young stallion that approached Speaker humbly requested that he leave: “Please good sir, it is not safe – you must return to your quarters”

“Not happening – I’m putting a stop to this shakedown” Speaker said, pushing the servant aside and approaching the ground of Denzik leaders.

Denzik Hala wasn’t particularly pleased. The messenger which had arrived the day before from Soelot’s court, specifying the exact amount of jade and gems that the storm mother wanted per each living pony on Denzik in order to let it pass had risen by quite a lot since last year – and now her illustrious anathema guest wanted to talk: “Yes what is it? I’m a little busy here”
It was easy enough to tell that Denzik Hala was stressed. She was usually so calm and collected, no matter what was going on, so Speaker found her behavior quite odd in this way – none the less he stated his intentions with a stern face: “This shakedown is a farce. I will not stand for it – me and my friends have already disciplined a river god back east for doing something similar to this, so if you and your fellow merchants would step aside... then I will make this storm bitch go away”
There was a moment of calm. A team of hauler-ponies arrived and asked if they should load up the pail into the sacrificial boat – but ultimately Denzik Hala waved them off: “Are you sure you can do this? You are aware what will happen to us if you fail?”

“Oh I’m well aware of that – but the thing is, in ancient times the god of gods, Celestia the Unconquered Sun, gave us Solars the mandate of heaven to rule all of Creation as we saw fit… so if I say stop this god has to, for I have friends in Heaven who can see her demoted to the goddess of a puddle if she doesn’t – plus I can very much hold my own against things of water” Speaker said confidently.

The other majority shareholders in their brightly colored clothing and rather expensive looking jewelry looked weary – Speaker understood their hesitation. Summoning forth Gift, much to the surprise of everyone as they all took a step or two back, Speaker exhaled slowly and took a deep breath: “I am the reincarnation of an ancient divine weapon meant to slay demons by the millions, slay the masters of demons by their thousands, and slay their makers again by the dozen – and I tell you, we did so quite well. A little upstart god is no match for me”

Revving Gift for added effect, the ponies around him still looked hesitant. Speaker had seen such hesitation among many ponies before when he had served under Lookshy’s banners – frightened civilian ponies who had no stomach for battle, who worried more about short term collateral damage rather than the long term gains of fending off raiders that would simply come back for more if not permanently taken care of. This was no different.

Quickly going through the magical kata that was the Thousand Wounds Gear form, Speaker flung Gift into the plume of water – it racing up the column, faintly trailing golden light with it. The elemental voice that had spoken previously shrieked momentarily – then the water geyser exploded and collapsed, quite a lot of water raining down over the Denzik.

In an impressive scramble, servants managed to whip out bamboo and wax paper umbrellas to cover the important looking ponies around Speaker before the water hit. Still, between the massive cascades of water that came down on them all it was Speaker who remained standing afterwards thanks to his elemental immunity and perfect balance charms, while almost everyone else were at least knocked over.

It pleased Speaker to no end to see that the few ponies who had been washed overboard were quickly rescued via wooden flotation devices tied to ropes, allowing for those still on the barges to quickly pull those in the water up.

Suddenly a decidedly ugly voice boomed out from the storm cloud. It was loud and felt a good deal like churning broken glass in Speaker’s ears – and everyone elses on the Denzik as it spoke in Old Realm: “Who dares strike at Soelot the magnificent’s servants? Who wishes for a watery grave?”

The storm cloud bulged and moved at supernatural speeds to cover all of the Denzik in its shadow – which suited Speaker just fine… for he knew quite well that his light would shine all the brighter under the shadow of the corrupt and villainous: “I strike at you Soelot, now show yourself and stop hiding behind clouds!”

A tornado-like swirl of black storm-cloud descended from the main storm cell, stopping about ten yards above and in front of Speaker. Under it the waters churned as at least two or three dozen elementals vied to be nearest to their cruel mistress, while around it elementals of wind in the form of giant translucent birds formed a throne out of their shimmering wings. The goddess herself, Soelot, was… well… ugly. Her body of water vapor condensed into a grey form, similar to a pony, but lumpy and misshapen, with a skin that seemed slick and constantly moist. Instead of a mane she had lone scraggly strands of thick hairs hanging from her head, and not even her eyes were equal in size or color. It was as if this goddess had been made to be has hideous as possible to all sensible eyes. Speaker was certain that the reason for this storm mother’s ugliness was somewhere to be found – but right now it was her behavior which was most reprehensible.

The storm mother’s elemental throne floated nearer Speaker: “You dare strike at my servants? Why shouldn’t I strike you down with lightning right now?”

“Oh I would like to see you try…” Speaker mused, his mind fully alert in case he needed to raise his shield charm.

A split second later thunder cracked the skies, hitting Speaker perfectly – and as the bright light subsided Speaker still stood, even if a bit singed and coughing ever so slightly… shield charm or not: “Right, like I said: I would like to see you try”

The goddess gave Speaker a very careful look. Among those who knew spirits and gods they would describe it as the spirit or god ‘measuring the wind’ – a divine ability quite commonplace among heavenly beings, as it allowed them a heavenly sense of what was around them and in their domain. Soelot did not look happy about what she found, indeed she looked frightened: “No…”

“Oh yes – and we’re all coming back” Speaker said, flaring his anima. The bright golden gear around him, and the six golden wings in three pairs that unfolded from it were clearly visible from almost every barge on the Denzik, or at least from up in the masts of the barges furthest back.

Speaker couldn’t hear the scattered cries of “Anathema!” around on the barge, but Denzik Hala knew that if this didn’t end well she would have to deal with detractors accusing her of colluding with dark forces to ruin the Denzik – of course, if things didn’t end well here there probably wouldn’t be a Denzik…

“Impossible – you were all gone! These seas are mine now!” Soelot shrieked, appearing to climb up behind her throne to hide herself.

Unimpressed with the sudden change of tone from the goddess, Speaker decided to push on as his anima faded: “Well you’re wrong on both counts now. The Denzik is under my protection, and I know a western Lunar who would probably love to hear that a local corrupt god has been brought to heel”

Lightning once again cracked the sky, striking Speaker multiple times. His shield charm held, for the most part, but there was a lot more juice put into these thunderbolts that the previous ones – leaving Speaker a good deal worse for wear and the part of the barge he was standing on slightly charred. Ponies around him were quick to toss buckets of water at Speaker and the planks he stood on to put out any fires as the lightning abated.

Using his anesthetic charm on himself and steeling himself, Speaker ignored what damages the lightning might have done to him – even if his left forehoof felt sluggish on account of it: “You dare attack me? A solar? I can’t even begin to count how many heavenly edicts and laws you’ve broken doing that, not to mention the Maritime Harmony Act that I remember the solar admiralty having all oceanic gods swear to back in the first age. I believe the punishment of that alone is at least three hundred years as a starmetal bedpan”

Soelot, peeking out from behind her ironically transparent throne, smirked – revealing crooked and filthy teeth: “Dead ponies don’t complain!”

Finally looking down at his left forehoof and seeing how much it was bleeding – plus the color of his flesh looked… cooked, Speaker frowned. He could fix that up in no time, but he knew the limits of his healing charms as well: His wound-mending care technique could mend his flesh quite well, but it would flood his system with its powers, leaving him unable to apply it again on himself for a whole day, so he didn’t want to use it yet. It was time to get offensive.

Rearing up and retrieving Gift from elsewhere in a single swift motion, Speaker pointed Gift at Soelot: “Begone storm mother. My mandate of heaven trumps your petty lightning – and I don’t ever want to hear of you exacting tolls and tribute from ships moving through your territory!”

More lightning, but this time Speaker acted quickly, using Gift and the defensive techniques afforded by the Thousand Wounds Gear style – blocking the lightning bolts as they came. To onlookers it seemed as if Speaker moved with impossible clockwork precision, him actually catching the forking lightning not on the flat of the golden disk, but between the bladed teeth that spun around it – holding the lightning in place!

Having caught the lightning, each jagged fork of hot essence leading right up to Soelot’s raised and misshapen hoof, Speaker grabbed hold and heaved…

> Chapter 50: Going Native
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The strange and disgusting creature that was Soelot landed on the barge with a dull thud, tumbling to a halt next to Speaker. The storm goddess looked far more pathetic now than intimidating.

“Yield, or I will cut you into pieces and feed you to the sharks” Speaker sternly demanded.

The goddess looked up, her two eyes blinking out of unison – indeed they weren’t even the same size or color, or looking exactly in the same direction: “Please… have mercy…”

“If I had an eclipse caste Solar here I would have you bound to never stray from your official duties, condemning you to an eternity of work in order for you to redeem yourself – but I don’t have that… and considering how many times you’ve tried to roast me so far, then I honestly do not trust you to honor your word without that” Speaker sneered. He had seen realm unicorns behave just like this: when powerless and without the ability to posture and stomp around they were all so pathetic… but they would horn you in the back the moment they had the opportunity, no doubt about it, and Speaker knew that it would probably be a while before he’d return to this place to check up on the goddess’s behavior.

Soelot, seeing the writing on the wall – and knowing full well that it actually required willing worship for a god to regenerate from having been physically slain, something she couldn’t really boast of – offered Speaker untold bounties, all the money and jade he could want… for it was all she had left to offer.

Unimpressed with the goddess’ promises of wealth, but seeing how the ponies around him looked quite eager for it – indeed, it seemed that quite a few were mouthing “take the offer” to him – but Speaker had no need for watery wealth, for he knew he had far more waiting for him in Nexus.

“Soelot, here’s what’s going to happen: You’re going to give the Denzik one dozen air and one dozen water elementals to service them in any way they see fit for one hundred years – and they will message me if you recall them after I leave, also if they hear any stories of you extorting tribute from others following this. These terms are not up for negotiation” Speaker said, his caste mark shining demonstratively.

The goddess writhed about on the deck of the barge, like a foal told to give up her bag of candy: “No… not my servants, I need them for my storms”

“Then you will have to make smaller storms – I doubt that the ponies who have to weather them will complain” Speaker said, finding it difficult to keep up his tough façade – it was just so tempting to try to sit down and talk to Soelot, to work out the true reasons for her behavior and come up with a better solution.

Soelot staggered up, her hooves making nasty squelching noises as she gingerly padded about. Her half-bloated form made Speaker wonder if her condition was due to the goddess over-indulging in something, which raised a curious question: Could gods become fat? Either way Soelot gave Speaker an ugly glare then called for two dozen elementals, then again turned to Speaker: “Who do I give command of them? You?”

“Denzik Hala, to begin with – make sure your instruct them to obey both her and her chain of command. I’m sure she can give more detailed instructions” Speaker said, gesturing towards the illustriously dressed, albeit quite soaked, mare peeking out from a half-opened hatch on the barge deck.

“So be it” Soelot said, gesturing for her elementals to stay and do as told while she jetted off into her storm cloud on a trail of hot steam, the cloud pulling away from the Denzik very quickly, although it began to thunder and rain quite loudly the moment it had cleared away from the Denzik.

The celebration held in Speaker’s honor was apparently the biggest festivity that had graced the city-ship in a very long time. Speaker didn’t complain, especially since Ever-Ember was able to inform him that among the adherents of the immaculate faith on the ship their attitude towards anathema had taken a big shift from “hostile” to a more neutral “maybe they’re not so bad?” This pleased Speaker to no end, although there were also a number of merchants who maintained that Speaker had been foolish not to take the offer of wealth from the goddess – but Denzik Hala was quick to silence such critics, explaining that the service of two dozen elementals for a hundred years would mean that the Denzik could travel much faster and much safer: “…so we’ll waste less time in transit, allowing us to visit more ports and do even more business”
The festivities lasted well into the wee hours of the next day, at which points shouts of alarm rang out across the Denzik – something in the sky had been spotted, and many feared that it was something that Soelot had sent to destroy the Denzik.

At Denzik Hala’s request, Speaker stepped forth to defend the Denzik – but the Solar had a fairly good idea about what the flying thing in the sky was… and indeed, after a short while it became apparent that it was a flying Yeddim. Speaker called for Ever-Ember. The unicorn almost refused to believe what his eyes showed him – although he cheerfully honored his side of the bet, doubling the amount of silver that Speaker had earned while on the Denzik in a heartbeat.

Cash Charmer hadn’t even managed to land the yeddim when Shimmer dove from the howdah, tackling Speaker with a power hug and showering him with kisses: “I was so worried!”

Denzik Hala and the rest of the ponies on the city ship, or at least those on the surrounding barges, watched with great curiosity as Speaker greeted his old friends with heartfelt hugs. As Speaker introduced his circle, sans Red and Sunrise, he noted that Nah was laden with not just chests, but entire barrels full of silver and jade…

“Cash, how much money did you bring?” Speaker quietly asked, sounding just slightly concerned.

Cash threw Speaker the most pleased grin ever: “All of it”

“All of it?” Speaker inquired, sounding a lot more worried all of a sudden.

Cash charmer leaned over towards Speaker, his eyes as big as saucers, slowly saying: “All of the money…”

It turned out that Cash, upon hearing of Speaker’s predicament and location, had sold off pretty much everything he’d accumulated in the month or so the circle had been in Nexus – even Sullen Hoof and Shimmer had replaced everything they had stored elsewhere with chests and sacks of money… at Cash’s request.

Apparently then the Denzik was a slightly bigger deal – business-wise – than Speaker had figured, especially for someone doing business in Nexus. Since it couldn’t make port in the hundred kingdoms without upsetting the realm, but at the same time effectively functioning as the maritime equivalent of the guild in terms of large scale mercantile operations in the west, then there was a huge unsatisfied demand for the things they dealt with in the hundred kingdoms. Cash was absolutely certain that for every silver dinnar and jade bit he would spend at the Denzik buying exotic western tribal art, realm pottery, and all kinds of other things that just weren’t normally available in the east, he could at least triple his investments once it was sold off in Nexus. Denzik Hala seemed convinced that Cash’s estimates were off: “Are you kidding? Realm china sells for at least ten times it purchase value in the east if you buy it directly from realm potters”

Cash soon disappeared along with a throng of the most colorfully and wealthily dressed merchants, including Denzik Hala.
Shimmer and Sullen Hoof, after they had ‘unloaded’ all the wealth they had transported via elsewhere, finally greeted properly Speaker under slightly more private conditions, in his cabin.

“Oh Speaker, I was… I thought you were gone forever when that monster hit you” Shimmer said as tears of joy trickled down her face, all the while snuggling up next to Speaker.

Sullen Hoof on the other hoof was more calm and collected, but none the less expressed that he had just arrived at the battle after having stashed the hearthstones when he saw Speaker get bucked out of the city: “I tried to track in from the rooftops, using sight enhancing charms… but you moved so fast… and you honestly looked dead”

“Ya, my leg was in a real bad shape when I came to – but my elemental immunity charm protected me from the wind. Took me almost two days to land in the water between Wavecrest and An-Teng…” Speaker said, retelling the story of how he fought drowsiness and hunger while walking along the western ocean floor.

Shimmer was quite impressed with Speaker’s resourcefulness: “Raising an island from the ocean… hmm…  I’m surprised you didn’t run into an sea-ponies while down there. Maybe you just missed one of their enclaves”

“Sea-ponies?” Sullen Hoof inquired, never having heard of such a thing.

Nodding, Speaker hmmmm’d for a moment: “Do they still exist? I thought they were wiped out along with the Pegasus ponies after the usurpation”

“No, they were ordered to the western ocean floor – they’ve been there in complete darkness, with annoyingly specific orders to only reconnect to the surface world when a solar comes and tells them to. My elders are certain that they have kept mining black jade from the ocean floor ever since the usurpation… if that’s true they should have more jade than the realm waiting for us to use” Shimmer regaled, but also adding that the few encounters she had experienced with the sea-ponies had been very hostile ones… they really didn’t want anything but Solars to come near them.

“Hey, sea-ponies, what are they?” Sullen Hoof again asked, looking intently at Speaker through his golden helmet-mask.

Speaker explained that the sea-ponies were created during the first age, similarly to how the Pegasus ponies had been created – only these were ponies who’s bottom halves were like that of fish or dolphins, and their lungs allowed for breathing underwater. They had fought the more aquatic primordials and their ilk, like the Sea that Marched Against The Flame, or The Herald of Liquid Breath Who Speaks Poison, led by water aspected unicorn officers and celestial exalted generals.
“So… the army we’ve been looking for to take Denansdor…” Sullen Hoof wondered.

Speaker shook his head: “No, I like how you think – but we need an army that can trot on land. Sea-ponies don’t have the legs to walk on land…”

“Fair enough – either way it’s great to have you back, I thought I had lost you, sensei” Sullen Hoof said, his true expression hidden by his mask.

“Sensei? Oh come on, you’re as much a master as me – just in different fields” Speaker said, humbled by Sullen Hoof’s words.

A few days later Cash assembled the circle, Nah having been loaded to the brim with his purchases from the various Denzik merchants – he had a few extra crates he needed Shimmer to stash elsewhere, but beyond that he was ready to leave.

Denzik Hala was not sad to see Speaker leave – apparently the Denzik’s current course would have it in An-Teng waters, a realm Satrapi, in a few weeks, so being rid of anathema passangers would be good for business – but it was clear that the entire population of the Denzik had gotten a far kinder view of Solar anathema while Speaker had stayed with them.

Speaker said his goodbyes and promised to return in a year’s time to check on Seolot. Ever-Ember also showed up with a chest full of scrolls, eager to travel. The circle was a bit surprised to see that they had another passenger, but accepted Speaker’s explanation.

As Cash made Nah fly them back towards Nexus Speaker filled them in on what he had done with the storm mother, all the while Ever-Ember quickly concluded that travel by air was not something his stomach agreed to. This also conveniently enough rendered the unicorn indisposed for most of the trip, allowing the rest of the circle to speak freely.

Cash had already been told the story of Speaker and the Storm mother, and both Shimmer and Sully had figured that something big had happened the day before they had arrived – but besting a storm mother? That was apparently a big deal, especially for Shimmer: “Do you have any idea how trouble you’ll be in if you ever show yourself here in the west again – at least if the local gods find out?”

“Well I dealt with one of them, so I think I can take anything else they throw at me – no god has the right to exact tolls from peaceful ponies simply passing through their territory” Speaker calmly and confidently stated.

Smiling at Speakers statement, Shimmer noted that she liked how confident Speaker seemed to have become from this whole ordeal. Speaker insisted that he hadn’t changed, but in his mind he had to concede that he had been far less disturbed by the notion of striking down a defeated god…

“Hey don’t fret – I know that feeling well. Sometimes you meet ponies and spirits who are just beyond parlay. They only respond to actual shows of strength, not just the threat of it” Sullen Hoof said, adding that such ponies were actually annoyingly common to see in Nexus.

Sighing, Speaker simply stated that he still found it regrettable that things so often had to come down to who was willing kill the other pony first: “It just shouldn’t be like that… Creation has enough space, food and resources for all ponies and spirits to live in peace”

“I know…” Shimmer comforted.

Changing the subject, Speaker asked why Red and Sunrise hadn’t come along. The circle was oddly quiet about this… it was first when he asked again that Cash simply said “It would be better if Red told you when we get back, she’s keeping watch over Sunrise”

Speaker didn’t like the sound of that one bit.

Five days of evading realm patrol fleets, finding small islands and other places to rest Nah for the night, and lots and lots of flying later the circle crossed the shores of the scavenger lands, leaving the inland sea in favor of following the Yanaze river for a couple of hours, ultimately arriving in Nexus by nightfall, with Cash dropping off the circle first and then returning a bit later after having set Ever-Ember off in Great-Forks – with the promise that he’d be back for Ever-Ember in a week or so to return the unicorn scholar to the Denzik.

As they trotted the brief distance from the caravansary just outside of Nexus to the city gates the circle filled Speaker in on what had happened since the fight. Apparently Speaker’s face and cutie mark had been spread across the city on warning posters, alerting anyone who could read (which weren’t that many in Nexus outside of its merchant elite, but most ponies recognized a poster warning of dangerous anathema) that Speaker was indeed a dangerous and demon-dealing anathema. He was even being blamed for having corrupted the stone sculptor who thus became be the demon rapist of Harlotry – although there was no proof of this the circle assured Speaker. Beyond that Shimmer reported that there had been several attacks on the clinic following the smear campaign, leaving it a bit of a mess: “…and I have no doubt that it’ll look like hell when we check on it, having been away for over a week and all”

“Great… anything else?” Speaker asked sarcastically, already remembering quite well why he disliked Nexus so much.
Cash sighed: “Two things: There’s a price on your head, courtesy of the immaculates – combined with the warning posters they’ve put up all over the city you should be prepared to fend off attacks, often”

“I’ve already helped you on that front – I’ve spoken to most of the gangs and mercenaries around where we live and where you work, made it clear that it’s not in their best interested to hunt for you” Sullen Hoof noted, making Speaker wonder just how Sullen Hoof ‘made it clear’, but choosing not to ask.

“And secondly, the Council of Entities has requested that we appear before them – we have twenty-four hours now that we’re all back in Nexus… so you have to fix Sunrise real quick” Cash noted, only catching himself on having hinted of Sunrise’s condition after the words had slipped his mouth.

Shimmer and Sullen Hoof gave Cash mean glares – Speaker only became more worried.

At the townhouse, which bore many dozens of marks from posters having been plastered all over the façade – and having had posters from all over the façade removed again, Speaker was finally reunited with Red and Sunrise… or, he met Red, for Sunrise didn’t really seem to be talking.

The warrior pony didn’t give Speaker much in the way of a warm welcome back – she seemed worried, as if her frown had been permanently etched onto her forehead.

“Ok, the others wouldn’t say what happened to Sunrise – talk to me” Speaker implored, as Red opened the door to Sunrise’s room.

The inside of Sunrise’s room was… oh boy. The room smelled like month old bloody murder – the floor and lower parts of the walls looked the parts too, with enough dried bloodstains to make even the hardiest god of soap wish for oblivion. Beyond that the floor was strewn with clumps of bloodied fabric and hair… and in the corner sat Sunrise, shivering, staring into nothingness – the crusts around her eyes seemed to indicate that she wasn’t even blinking. Her mane appeared to have, once again, been roughly sheared if not torn off,  and the usual off-white cloak she wore in a shredded  and bloodied mess around her. The spiked flail next to her seemed to explain the cloak and the bloodstains… Sunrise had been flagellating herself. 

Backing out and closing the door to the room, Speaker turned to Red with a very stern face – his professionalism as a healer masking his absolute horror: “Explain”

Red said that a few weeks before Speaker got bucked to the west she had last seen Sunrise trying to reassemble the local Cult of the Illuminated. It hadn’t been easy, as the local immaculates had picked up on her activities very quickly, trying to stop her at every turn by buying off city officials to deny her permits – or by intimidating former cult members into rejecting her. This had apparently come to head when Red much later found Sunrise in the Harlotry, where she had spent nearly all the money that Cash had given her – a fortune large enough to comfortably raise and equip an army – on prostitutes, drugs and orgies that the ponies in Harlotry were still talking about to this day: “They’re calling it the biggest fuckfest since the unicorn Cynis Pearl-heart held his cutesenara in the Harlotry more than two hundred years ago…”

Speaker’s frown began rivaling the one adorning Red’s forehead: “And this lasted… how long?”

“Days, at least. I had to drag her back here, kicking and screaming. She coated from tail to snout in… hell, I think she a Harlotry bath” Red despaired, sinking to the floor as she regaled the quite sticky situation that she had originally found Sunrise in.

It didn’t take that big a leap of imagination to figure out what a Harlotry bath was – well, there were a few options, but none of them were particularly savory. The real mystery was what had driven Sunrise to such acts of debauchery…

“And she secluded herself after that?” the Solar healer wondered, stroking his beard again to seem more professional than frightened at the prospect of having to actually try to ‘fix’ his friend…

Red shrugged and looked at Speaker with bloodshot eyes: “She didn’t say much… but after I got her home she screamed for a good day or so, just… non-stop screaming. No idea how she managed to breathe during all that – and I don’t know where she got that fucked up whip either, but up until about a week ago she was going at it with that thing, on herself, almost constantly… even at night”

Speaker didn’t try to pretend that he could relate to how it must have been to have been kept awake with worries and the sound of Sunrise flagellating herself bloody: “Fair enough – you go rest. I’ll take it from here…”

It took the rest of the day with careful observation, and some help from Sullen Hoof and Cash in collecting an accurate retelling of what had exactly transpired in the Harlotry, before Speaker dared make any kind of diagnosis. The conclusion he came to wasn’t a pretty one – but if nothing else it made some semblance of sense…

At dinner, with everyone sans Sunrise present, Speaker presented his findings: “Ok, so we all know that Sunrise has always forgone worldly pleasures in favor of spiritual enlightenment, right? Back in Chung Do she went overboard with that, but here… I think it finally got to her. Sully, you had an interesting theory on that, why don’t you tell it?”

“Ok, so, Sunrise bases her lifestyle and the restrictions she’s put on herself on the idea that doing so is the only way to get and maintain spiritual purity… right? Makes sense by most accounts. A happy life and whatnot – but from what I heard, she’d tracked down a couple of former illuminate cultists to a shrine of Burning Feather, the god of intoxicants. I couldn’t get much out of the opium-heads who saw the confrontation, but I think Sunrise was shocked to see the cultists being able to maintain their spiritual connection while also being stoned out of their minds” Sullen Hoof explained, his orichalcum helmet-mask hiding Sully’s confusion on the matter.

Nodding, Speaker added that it was probably a mix of that experience, and the general stress from all the counter-efforts that the immaculates had been running against her, which got to her – necessitating a need to unwind quite fiercely: “…and we are nothing if not exalted, so the scale of her debauchery really shouldn’t come as that big of a surprise. Like Cash said, then the locals are comparing what she did to something a realm unicorn did a few centuries ago”

“Right, but how will you fix her?” Shimmer wondered, not particularly curious about the nitty-gritty details of what Sunrise had actually done – chiefly because it reminded her of her own past full-moon escapades.

For his actual medical diagnosis Speaker said that it seemed that Sunrise had been in seclusion and performed her self-flagelation chiefly as a means to ‘regain control’ of her own body and to detox herself from all the drugs she’d taken. The fact that she hadn’t eaten for weeks – and remained alive – was likely due to charms. Beyond that the primary medical challenge was chiefly a psychological one: “We simply need to make her accept what happened and somehow make her move on in life – she can’t be stuck focusing on that one event”

“Oh there was more than one event – I’ve the rosters of rent-colts assembled for her, she took them on in shifts!” Cash humorously quipped.

The rest of the circle didn’t seem amused.

“Cash, I need you to talk her out of this fugue – I can probably quell madness, not pent up lust and frustration, that’s your area” Speaker implored, having ignored Cash’s previous utterance.

“And you think she’ll let me even come near her?” the merchant stallion said, sounding very much as if Sunrise had already more than once rejected speaking to him.

Smiling, Speaker said that he had that part figured out – with the help of Shimmer: “You just need to drink a little bit of her blood… come on”

Cash was less than enthusiastic about the execution of Speaker’s scheme to fix Sunrise up mentally – but ultimately it resulted in a pony who looked and sounded like Speaker walking into Sunrise’s room… while the real Speaker waited downstairs.

While waiting Speaker tried to busy himself. Looking up at the ceiling under Sunrise’s room it was clear some of the blood had seeped through ever so slightly – it’d be bothersome if nothing else to clean that up. Then the shouting up in the room began, followed by muffled crying. Things were being thrown around, followed by more shouting. This continued for what felt like far too long, but ultimately the rest of the circle couldn’t hear what was being said – meaning that neither of the ponies were shouting anymore, which was probably good.

The sound of hooves coming down the stairs to the tea lounge where the circle was waiting signaled that Cash was – if nothing else – done. The second pair of hooves on the stairs indicated that Cash had been successful, eliciting a collective sigh of relief. 

With not that  long left from the Council of Entities’s deadline to meet with them, the circle worked quickly to clean up their zenith caste Solar. Shimmer used her charms to make Sunrise’s mane grow out again, while Cash quickly sent a runner to buy a new cloak for the young mare. Speaker and Sully helmed the clean-up, Speaker patching up Sunrise’s wounds while Sully cooked up the most powerful soap he had ever made…

With only three hours until they stood to become wanted for questioning by the Council of Entities, a dubious honor that would mean that the Emissary itself would come after them, the circle assembled before the Council Tower – the highest and most awe-inspiring first age tower in Nexus. It stood at the top of Sentinel Hell, its seamless cream stone façade with its writhing floral murals looking quite alive.

The inside of the Council Tower was no less magnificent. The walls were replete with water murals, the source of the water most likely being some form of first age artifice higher up in the building. The first dozen floors was all office space, the heart of the city’s administration – despite there being plenty of other council offices elsewhere in the city. 

To Speaker the sight of a still working first age office building was quite amazing. He doubted that he had been the architect behind it – too many floral motifs – but it was quite wonderful none the less. The central floating platform, akin to the cargo platform in the Denansdor manse, which zoomed up with the circle towards the highest levels, the supposedly infamous Council chambers, seemed to run on by simple automated pattern: Going from top floor to bottom floor and then back again, stopping on each floor for about ten seconds – meaning that each stop was brief and full of occasionally frantic commotion as meek officeworker-ponies tried to make sure that they got off on the right floor.

The rest of the circle seemed… less enthused.

Cash looked oddly worried. Speaker guessed that Cash had probably heard too many tall tales of what the Council did and didn’t do. Sullen Hoof looked similarly apprehensive, while Shimmer seemed somewhat neutral about the whole deal: She had voiced her opinioned of the council’s allowing of the exploitation of the ponies that worked in Nexus, of how she didn’t like the fact that if you got fired you could technically be enslaved on the spot since citizenship was a very ephemeral thing in Nexus, awarded automatically but only to those gainfully employed or otherwise doing profitable business… and by Council civility no citizen of Nexus could be enslaved.

Of course, at the same time she was undeniably impressed that mere mortal ponies could establish such a powerful financial entity without supernatural aid. 

Sunrise looked like she should probably have stayed at home in bed - or have been left at a restaurant

Only Red, with her mercenary spirit, appeared to look happy about meeting the council – and seeing that they had at least another fifteen minutes of going up before they reached the floor with the council chamber Speaker inquired why she looked so pleased.

“Well, you got Sunrise talking again… that’s already amazing, but the real reason I’m happy is that the council probably wants to talk to us about my exploits” Red beamed.

Speaker reminded Red that it was technically Cash who talked Sunrise into rejoining civilization, but beyond that he hadn’t really heard much of Red’s exploits: “What exactly have you been doing?”

“Oh you haven’t heard? When we got here I poked around the fighting rings in the Bastion district, looking for some action. The old champion had up and disappeared – real shady sounding, so all the dojos were competing in the fighting arenas for who would produce the next champ, plus a lot of the mercenary companies were offering up challengers, as well as the walk-ins like me” Red happily said.

Nodding, Speaker recalled that a few of the ponies he’d healed at the clinic had said something about getting their injuries in the Bastion district arenas: “Maybe some of your handywork?”

“Who knows – but I doubt it. Once I joined the fray I was quickly moved up to the Magic League, with the blooded and unicorn ponies” Red explained, noting that her official story was that she was a god-blooded pony in order to explain why her martial techniques left glowing vapor trails or gave her shining hooves. 

To hear that Red had managed to never once spend enough essence to actually flare her anima or even reveal her caste mark thoroughly impressed Speaker. Red followed up by saying that after she had beaten the Iron Brotherhood’s prime contender, leaving that unicorn with a broken horn, she had started getting a lot offers – a lot of bookies and gambling houses that wanted her to either taking dives, or start winning in some very specific ways, which resulted in at least half a dozen attempted ambushes when she rejected them.

“I’m going to assume that since you’re whole and alive that you survived these ambushes?” Speaker joked, trying to see if he could spot any hidden injuries on Red under her casual clothes – but they were too baggy to reveal anything.

Craning her neck and smiling in a very pleased fashion, Red noted that not only did she handle herself quite well – she also made the ambushes stop shortly after they began: “Word spread fairly quickly after I wrapped the ponies from the third ambush around the ones from the fourth and left them in the middle of the street, outside the Bloodhoof arena – of course, then I started getting offers to become muscle for various even shadier jokers… plus offers from half a dozen mercenary outfits who wanted to hire me as champion”

Speaker was about to ask what Red had said to the mercenary outfit offers, even if the answer was a given, when the floating platform came to a halt at the highest level of the Council Tower – the level of the Council chamber.

> Chapter 51: Underhoofed Business
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Ok now, please – let me do the talking. In fact, don’t speak unless spoken to, and even then do not say anything before conferring with me” Cash implored to the rest of the circle, communicating without words that defying or upsetting the councilors was usually the same signing your own death sentence in Nexus, even among unicorns, god-blooded and the occasional local god that came before the council 

“Hold on, how would the council kill gods?” Red wondered.

Sullen Hoof pointed towards a large painting of the Emissary. The date on the plaque under the old and somewhat faded painting claimed that the painting itself was over five hundred years old – but the cloaked and masked pony in the picture looked exactly like the Emissary that Speaker had seen several weeks while fighting the demon pony. 

The chamber that the circle was ushered into by oddly pale ponies who did not speak was cavernous, if judging from the echoes that the circle’s hoof-steps made on the stone tiled floor – for the room was shrouded in darkness, with nine alcoves encircling the center chamber in which  the circle stood only dimly lit by what seemed to be a lone flickering candle at the very back of each alcove.

Once the circle was in the center of the chamber a ring of light came to be around them – and eight silhouettes of ponies stepped forth in the alcoves, leaving only the middle one empty… because that was the seat of the Emissary, who was well known to only rarely join actual council meetings. To the circle on the silhouette of each councilor could be seen, cast up on the alcove wall by the dim light source – making each councilor’s shadow look ten feet tall… a very imposing sight
“Does this gathering before us have a name?” one voice, an elderly female pony’s voice, called out.

Cash Charmer stepped forth and cleared his throat: “Honorable council, if it pleases: Our circle has no formal name”
Speaker found Cash’s quite cautious and meek behavior very weird.

“Very well. Sunrise Glow, you have been attempting to re-establish a presence in Nexus for the Cult of the Illuminates. What is your intentions regarding this effort” another voice, a grown stallion’s deep voice, inquired.

Sunrise stepped forth with short hesitant steps after Cash briefly whispered in her ear: “I… I wanted restore the cults presence here and spread the worship of Celestia”

Many pony voices mumbled for a brief moment, but it wasn’t possible to hear what was being said, before a single adult mare’s voice declared that Sunrise’s answer was acceptable.

“Bright Machine Speaker. We have seen the results of you medical practice. You will become the council’s private physician and surgeon” a young mare’s voice announced.

Cash quickly whispered to Speaker: “Say that you’ve already declined multiple concierge medicine contracts, and that if they want to enslave you as doctor it would mean revoking the civility forbidding the taking slavery of citizen ponies in Nexus… add that if that is done then the rest of us will demonstrate how that can same enslavement practice can be used against the councilors”

“Uhm, Cash – you sure it’s a good idea to threaten them?” Speaker wondered, especially considered how Cash had been so fearful of the council before the meeting.

The merchant pony gave Speaker a stern look: “Yes I am sure – you have to be absolutely clear that you won’t let them dictate how and where you do business”

Turning to the councilors – at least the ones in the direction were the voice requesting Speaker’s services had originated – Speaker cleared his throat: “You can’t tell me how to do business. I’m not a guild toady you can order around. If you try to enslave me I will fight for my freedom – and between me and my friends here you will all suffer endlessly on that account, both financially and physically, Celestia as my witness”

There was a strange garbeled murmuring among the council members – clearly some kind of sound distorting device was in use to allow the council members to speak without the ponies in the center of room hearing it properly. Given the brief reprieve Cash nodded to Speaker: “Not what I wanted you to say, but I think it got the message across none the less”

“They’re arguing whether to kill you or ‘one of his friends’ to make you cooperate Speaker” Sullen Hoof noted, his perception-enhancing charms allowing him to hear through the scrambled noise presented to the circle. A split second later he added that the councilors had stopped talking, indeed the noise died away just then.

“It is both unwise and unhealthy to make enemies of this council” another voice stated, a mare’s voice.

Cash perked up, turning around as he spoke so as to in theory face all the councilors at least once: “So I’ve been told – indeed before I came in here I was quite afraid of you all, but this? I’ve seen more skillful intimation from the foals I get gossip from about my neighbors”

There was more scrambled murmuring. Sullen Hoof noted that they were talking about whether or not to send the circle away while they deliberated since Sully could clearly pierce their ‘privacy veil’.

Ultimately the murmuring ended and an old stallion’s voice spoke: “We find your presence in Nexus a liability. We do not want worker riots when they hear of anathema operating in the city, nor more realm hostilities no matter what your intentions are – and the immaculate will instigate such riots if they run out of ways to kill you. That said, then your abilities are undeniably useful, and thus potentially profitable… and we will find a way to profit from your presence here, no matter what – how that will happen depends in part on what you as a group choose to do”

“What do they mean by what we choose?” Red wondered, not liking the sound of the councilor’s statement… nor the fact that she couldn’t see who was saying what.

Cash took a deep breath and exhaled partially, addressing the council: “Ok, what do we have to choose between then?”

“We are aware that quite a few solars emerge with grave goods in the form of valuable first age artifacts – along with their powers. Thus, we’re giving you the choice to help form our civilities on that subject: You, as a circle, will grant Nexus a service – and continue to do so once per annual calibration cycle. If you do well we shall decree by civility that all other anathema groupings who wish to operate in and out of Nexus shall perform similarly for the council. If you fail us we issue a different civility: Ownership and use of orichalcum artifacts will incur a seasonal tax to the value of eight hundred pounds of guild standard silver or equally valuable currency” The same stallion voice announced.

Cash nearly tripped over his own hooves at the mention of such a large amount of money . Speaker took this as eight hundred pounds being a lot of money – After steadying himself Cash explained that it wasn’t that it wasn’t so much, but that it was a seasonal tax… that you’d have to pay it once every three months, which made it a ludicruis amount of money per year, far more than any newly exalted Solar could ever hope to muster – unless they were all as business-minded as Cash Charmer himself: “…also, that much money would roughly be the going rate of an orichalcum daiklaive among artifact dealers… so it’ll be an effective way to disarm solars coming into Nexus”

“Will we have time to choose?” Shimmer asked out loud.

A resounding “No” from several of the councilors boomed out around the room, echoing slightly.

The assembled exalted ponies fidgeted uncomfortably in the silence that followed. None wanted to speak up in a way that could be construed as an answer to the councilors.

“What kind of ‘service’ do you want from us?” Sullen Hoof inquired.

There was a silence. It lasted just long enough for the circle to feel quite an amount of unease.

“The season of air has ended. Spring is coming. The spring floods will come soon, which disrupt trade and sicken the workers, which impacts production. You will solve this issue and prevent further floods from happening. Your solution may not violate the dogma” a mare’s voice bellowed. It was loud and forceful, and sounded very much like she was reading from a script – which sort of made sense, if the councilors had debated possible tasks for the circle in advance…

Cash Charmer nodded as he gestured for the circle to huddle together: “Ok, we have to choose now – and depending on what we pick we can end up screwing over a lot of other solars that might come here seeking refuge”

“I know – and doing the job sounds like the best solution, but that would also mean agreeing to basically putting ourselves and all other solar circles up for annual servitude. I really don’t like that” Shimmer noted.

His forehead a sea of frowny wrinkles, Speaker wondered: “Is the tax they’re proposing really that bad? We could just pay them for me having Gift and then be out of here”

“We could, but right now I don’t have the money for that and I don’t know how much time they’ll give us to pay it – I still haven’t sold any of the merchandize I bought on the Denzik, but that would more than cover the tax. The real problem would be that its due once every three months, and that will bleed us dry in less than a year… assuming that we stay here that long, especially if we pick up more artifacts along the way” Cash countered.

“You’re assuming that these flankhats are going to stay in power much longer with all the solars they seem to think are running around” Red said with no small amount of suppressed hostility in her voice directed towards the councilors.

Cash nodded to Red’s point. It wasn’t something he’d speak up about, at least not considering who was listening, but it was a very valid point: “True, and since we’ve seen the Emissary bleed… it might only take one determined solar to down that thing, and then all bets are off”

“You have seen the Emissary bleed?” One of the councilors rumbled, interrupting the circle’s little chat.

Cash turned around and nodded: “Yes indeed – during our fight with the demon rapist of Harlotry the Emissary was injured. I doubt anyone beyond us saw it, especially with how much Shimmer bled after being dismembered towards the end of it – but it happened. Say, how much are you willing to pay for that piece of information to remain just between us? I mean, it’s not like we would have any reason to speak ill of you – not like you’re basically trying to either enslave or extort us…”

Speaker wasn’t sure what he was most surprised of: Cash suddenly turning the situation into the circle blackmailing the council, or hearing that Shimmer had been dismembered. Well, Shimmer didn’t seem to be missing anything right now – but this was definitely something he’d have to ask about later.

“You will not mention any such thing to the public!” A young stallion’s voice roared.

Cash shot a bemused look in the direction of the voice: “Or what? You’ll issue a civility saying that I can’t talk about how I’ve seen the Emissary bleed? No, here’s what’s going to happen: If you want us to fix your flooding, fine – that sounds like a fun challenge, but you will pay us accordingly, and you will levy no tax on orichalcum or moonsilver artifacts what so ever. Those are our terms, and they are not up for discussion”

The scrambled muttering began once more. Sullen Hoof again relayed what he could hear, although he noted that this time the councilors seemed to be whispering as well, making it really hard for him to hear anything meaningful: “…but it is clear that they’re discussing Cash’s proposal – some of them want to just kill us all, but apparently Red’s reputation precedes her, plus Speaker and Shimmer being able to hold their own against something that even the Emissary had trouble defeating, so that’s off the table… for now…”

A moment later a mare’s voice announced: “If you can solve the issue of the flooding before the flooding sets in you will receive payment out of our annual flood containment and repair budget equal to how much damage you manage to prevent – that is your deadline. The waters have already begun to rise, but flooding of the lower parts of the city usually doesn’t occur for another three to four weeks. As for payment, what did you have in mind?”

“How about those eight hundred pounds worth of silver you were talking about? I’ll be generous and even let it be a one-time lump sum payment, in silver or jade” Cash smilingly suggested.

To Speaker’s surprise the council accepted Cash’s payment instantly – but again noted that the circle only had about three weeks before the waters rose above the lowest piers. The circle was then quite unceremonicously told to leave, the platform sending to the bottom level waiting for them – and dropping at a very rapid speed, much faster than it had gone up, and almost going so fast that it was uncomfortable.

Back at the town house the circle debated just how you could stop flooding – and Speaker inquired into Shimmer’s injuries…  It turned out that the demon pony had ripped Shimmer’s wings off after Speaker had been bucked off into the distance – but then the Emissary finally managed to end the fight: “I just had to wait a few feeks in my war form for my wings to grow back… that’s why it took so long before I could send you a message”

“Makes sense… I guess – but ok, so what are going to do about this flood thing?” Speaker wondered.

Cash pointed out a very quick solution to at least half the problem – except it would violate the dogma, which wouldn’t work: “The yellow river bridge, I mean dam – it’s the biggest and sturdiest bridge crossing the yellow river, about twenty miles east of Nexus…”

“Well that’s great – lets pop it and be halfway done” Red urged on.

Speaker shook his head: “No, I’m familiar with that dam, we used it in the first age for this – it would mean forming a lake that would span hundreds of miles, and drown out Great Forks… so using that ‘solution’ would only create a ton more problems”
“Not to mention it would kill half the river traffic in creation! The council would never accept a solution that would disrupt trade that badly” Cash noted.

With that quick and ‘easy’ solution out of the way, the circle began discussing in earnest the source of the problem: What exactly caused the flooding in the first place… which really wasn’t hard to pinpoint, considering the driving monsoon rains that had started up while Speaker had been gone.

“We can’t stop the rain – and Nexus sits where the Grey and Yellow rivers meet, so all that excess water has to go somewhere… so it goes up” Speaker thought out loud, looking exceedingly pensive.

Sullen Hoof, his knowledge of geography chiefly limited to his very intimate and detailed knowledge of Nexus’s districts and neighborhoods, couldn’t really see why water would even do that: “Shouldn’t it all just flow down the Yanaze river? I mean, that river is huge…”

“Well the Yanaze has to be able to put that water somewhere too – and the inland sea is already full of water. Say, Speaker, why not just use your singing staff and raise the city up a bit?” Shimmer suggested, her knowledge of how water worked and flowed coming from having spent quite a few years as a fish back west.

Sunrise advocated against using the singing staff in public, at least in Nexus – there would be far too many who would recognize it for how much it would be worth, and try to steal it, even if it means trying to kill Speaker for it. A tool like that would land you a king’s ransom if you sold it to the guild or the realm”

Speaker nodded, but not because of what Sunrise had said – but because of what Sullen Hoof had said: “You know… that might actually work – getting the Yanaze to take the excess water. We would just have to work together with the god of the river to find somewhere to put the water, and I think that’d be a lot easier and faster than having to raise the city up above the flood line”

For the lack of any better ideas, the circle adjourned. Cash and Sunrise went out to learn about the god of the Yanaze river, while Speaker and Shimmer visited the clinic to see how it looked. It didn’t look good – but thank’s to Speaker having made the whole building out of seamless ‘played stone’ then it at the very least hadn’t been burned to the ground – and that wasn’t for a  lack of trying.

Having spent the rest of the day cleaning up the muck and remains of broken furniture strewn around inside the obviously ransacked clinic, and cleaning off the very nasty slurs that had been painted on the walls both inside and outside, the two returned to the townhouse finding that Cash and Sunrise had been very successful… and again not so successful… in their search.

It turned out that the god of the Yanaze river was missing – sort of.

“How?” was all Speaker could manage to think of asking considering how odd that sounded. Gods didn’t go missing… they just didn’t work like that.

The circle quickly agreed that contacting Heath Rose in Yu-Shan was the soundest idea. One magical message later and the circle found themselves surprised by a sudden knock on the door. It was a messenger, with a package for Shimmer – a package ordered delivered about a week ago… and it was from Heath Rose.
“Sidereals…” Red said with a bemused look.

The package contained most of everything the circle had just asked for in the message… which made Sullen Hoof wonder just how much the gold faction had the circle under surveillance, but his worries were easily ignored as the others perused the copies of official Yu-Shan documents and notes Heath Rose had scribbled.

Apparently the missing river god was part of one of many bronze faction plots to weaken the guild. The god, whose name was Water Strider, like the insect, (which  you apparently shouldn’t make fun of with the god in earshot) had been assigned as overseer on an impossible mission. The task was simple enough: Bring a monk, who had received a heavenly revelation – which was apparently a common way that the heavens sent messages to terrestrial spirits, by having some random mortal get a vision to go somewhere specific and say some particular prayer, with the prayer being the message from heaven to the local spirits – via the waterways from his monestary to a location on the southern coast, not far from the Lap. The problem was that the two other gods he was overseeing – for Water Strider was only in charge of providing transportation and oversight – were quite uncooperative, and thus Water Strider had been stuck at the monestary for almost five hundred years (The god couldn’t leave the place due to the heavenly assignment, so Water Strider hadn’t been able to govern his river properly, causing the annual floods around Nexus to go from around three feet to ten…) 

“Ok, am I the only one, or does Heath Rose jam way to many notes into her stuff?” Red said, quite put off by the strange way that notes and other commentary seemed to quite literally have been jammed into the various documents, leaping out and displacing the regular text when you looked at that via some unknown magical method.

Cash nodded. He’d been forced to use quite a few linguistic charms to keep head and tails of the seemingly animated letters and symbols: “You’re not the only one, but I’m more worried that even if we get this Water Strider back, that it won’t make the flooding go away entirely”

“Dealing with three feet of flooding is a lot easier than ten – with three you can at least still trot on the ground, with ten you drown” Sullen Hoof noted, sounding ever so much as if he spoke from experience.

Thinking furiously, Speaker proclaimed that needed topographical maps of the grey river and the lands around it. Cash was quick to point out that asking for something like that was basically impossible: “You want a comprehensive map that shows the height differences in the lands around the grey river?”

“Yes, because I think I… No, I remember something about there being some kind of other flood control system for the grey river, but I cannot remember what exactly it was, or where – but if I get a proper map, or maybe a map of the river’s essence flows, then I should be able to find it” Speaker enthusiastically explained, his head aching with calculations of water flow, depth and other geomantic variables.

Sighing, Shimmer poked Speaker hard enough with a hoof to his right shoulder than he almost fell over: “Sweety, please be realistic – you’re asking for maps of a river almost five thosuand miles long… complex, detailed and I’m assuming up to date maps of that”

Hearing the actual number, even if just a rough estimate, Speaker paused as if to Speak, holding a hoof up in the air as if to rebut Shimmer: “Oh… right… ok – but with a map like that we could find the thing… I just, I don’t  know what kind of thing it is”
“We could do a fly-over on Nah, you using essence-sight to look for anything interesting?” Cash suggested, figuring that with Nah’s top speeds and five thousand miles of river it’d take maybe four or five days.

Sighing audibly so as to draw attention to herself, Sunrise pointed out that even if they did that and found whatever mystery device Speaker was talking about then there was no guarantee that it was still there, still working, or within the realms of possibility to repair if broken: “I would have spoken out sooner against doing this for the council, but you were all very quick to agree to do this after Cash started blackmailing them”

“Sunrise, doing this – even if it’s not by the exact terms that the council wanted, this will still earn us a lot of goodwill with them. You want your cult back? They can issue civilities protecting the illuminated from harassment and persecution” Cash replied, his voice calm but hinting of displeasure at Sunrise’s naysayer attitude.

Sunrise’s face grew a mean scowl: “I am simply trying to save us the embarrassment of not being able to prevent the flooding fully – the wording of our agreement didn’t say anything about the council not being able to punish us if we fail to deliver everything we promised”

“True but come on – don’t be such a grouch” Cash retorted, with a forced smile.

Red stepped up between the two: “Knock it off, both of you – Cash, why don’t you go sell some of the loot from the Denzik. Sully, Sunrise hasn’t eaten anything proper in almost a week, take her to the kitchen and give her something good”.

“Yes maam!” Cash said while making a mock salute, quickly heading off while shouting for barkers and messengers as he went out the door.

Looking at Red, who looked oddly tired, Speaker nodded: “Right, you go get some rest – tomorrow we’ll try looking for this Water Strider fellow”

The next day the circle reassembled, Cash looking quite pleased, Red looking very well rested, and Sunrise looking not starved half to death. The circle agreed to go and help Water Strider out first, as that would make the most headway with preventing the flooding. The location of the monastery was somewhere near Lanting, one of many guild mining towns west of the rock river. It was there the guild dug the ore which they sent by barges to Nexus, fueling Nexus’s iron and steel industry – and it was apparently a retired mining pony turned monk who had received a revelation.

“Hold on, didn’t the stuff Heath Rose send say that Water Strider had been stuck at the place for like five hundred years?” Sullen Hoof quickly pointed out.

Checking the paperwork their sidereal friend had sent, an explanation had been found: The monk’s life was apparently tied with delivering the message – the monk could not die of old age until the message was delivered.

“So… us doing this will kill him?” Shimmer said, sounding quite uncomfortable with the thought of doing so.

Sunrise dug through the files: “Yes and no, but I doubt it’s that cruel a fate – this stallion might not have been able to die from old age in five hundred years, but the files say nothing about him not aging. I can’t imagine that there’s that much left him at this point… if he can even speak the prayer he must upon arrival”

The whole circle looked at Speaker: “Ok, sure – I’ll try to liven the pony up, but let’s go there first and survey the damages”
Cash having secured enough funds to keep things running in Nexus from his initial sales of Denzik wares, the circle flew westward.

Almost three thousand miles and week or so later, the circle arrived at the monastery. It was a situated at the edge of a rather plain village near one of the many mines that dotted the landscape. A nearby guild caravan was being loaded with iron ore, while farmers tended to their fields to feed the hardworking ponies that struck at the earth deep underground.

Water Strider was finally spotted twenty miles from the monastery, where he sat in a field – looking rather dejected if not downright depressed – while another god was egging on a third god who seemed to be eating a tree, taking big bites of the half-yard in diameter tree trunk mighty bites. It was a weird sight, made no less odd by the flying yeddim landing next to Water Strider.

The river god thankfully didn’t look insect-like at all – so Cash lost that best. The god appeared to be a pony wrought of swirling waters, cloaked in a soft cloak of water plants. Its mane was of beautiful white and pink water lilies, but the frown on the god’s face revealed the god’s less than serene state of mind.

“Water Strider, god of the Yanaze” Sunrise called out officiously. The god quickly snapped to attention.

Standing up and having a look at the yeddim which he had neither heard nor felt approach – meaning that it startled him a great deal when he turned and saw Nah – Water Strider gave the circle a confused look: “What in the… what do you want?”

Jumping down and landing quite graciously on the moist grass near the god, Cash bowed and introduced himself: “I am Cash Charmer, chosen of Celestia and Solar of the Eclipse Caste – me and my circlemates here are here to help you finish your long overdue mission…”

It was if the water in the god’s body cleared up and even brightened up as the god regained some measure of hope – hope of ever returning to his river: “Oh heaven’s be praised! I thought I’d never get my hooves wet again!”

Looking over at the two other divinities, one appearing as a giant black-coated pig or boar-looking pony in stylish armor who was eating the tree-trunk, and the long-limbed monkey spirit next to him, with its bright red bandana, and oddly banana-themed lamellar armor… well… it was a monkey in armor. It looked hilarious.

“Oh gods no, not him” Speaker said, as if having bumped into an estranged relative that he didn’t want to meet.

Cash shot a few glances back and forth between the monkey spirit and Speaker: “You know that thing?”

Sighing, Speaker nodded slowly: “I remember the solar who made it… the Monkey King. Originally meant as a court jester, it turned out to be a little too good at its job, because it drove its maker nuts. It escaped all attempts to catch and kill it, then took to roaming Creation while playing pranks and spreading misery…”

Looking at the monkey in its bright yellow and stylishly curly armor, Cash smirked: “Really, that thing evaded first age solars?”

“Heavens no, unicorns. Monkey King’s makers was above cleaning up her own messes… plus she taught it Celestial Monkey style, a martial art that suits it painfully well” Speaker said dejectedly, recalling more of the quagmires that the Monkey King’s solar creator left for others to clean up.

The other god, some kind of pig-like spirit – seemed to have a voracious appetite. Water Strider explained that it was the god of pigs quite simply: “His proper title and name is the Bodhisattva of Earthly Hunger. He was assigned this mission to get him out of heaven – he apparently made a big mess at some point, even got himself banned from the Jade Kitchen”

“So now he’s eating trees?” Shimmer wondered with a bemused look.

Water Strider shook his head: “He’s eternally hungry. He’s also very strong and not very picky about what he eats, which is the official reason he was assigned to this mission – he’s security”

“And Monkey King?”  Red inquired, wondering if there was any official reason for such a supposed annoyance to be with the two other gods.

The river god shrugged: “Well, he was originally the god of some kind of monkey, but I think they went extinct during the Great Contagion – still, he’s used his title to get into Yu-Shan enough time to piss everyone up there off, so he was assigned this mission as well just to get rid of him”

“Why have you not simply left with the monk if your two co-workers are so easily distracted” Sunrise asked in an accusatory tone.

Again the river god sighed, looking almost as if wrought of tears: “I can’t. Dirt-muncher can touch and monve the monk, I can provide transportation and direction – and both of them refuse to obey me, since they both know they’re here as punishment. I told you this whole missing was set up to tie us all up for eternity…”

Sullen Hoof gestured for the circle to step away from the weeping river god and gather round for a quick discussion: “So… what do we do here?”

“Well, if porky likes to eat – You could probably get him to cooperate if you promised to cook for him” Cash suggested to Sullen Hoof.

Nodding, Sullen Hoof asked about this Monkey King spirit. Shimmer gestured that she had something to say on the subject: “I’ve heard of him, the monkey king. He’s taught his martial style to a number of lunar pranksters, provided that they could impress him with their own tricks done on others. Did Heath Rose’s files say anything about what the monkey is supposed to do for the mission?”

Sunrise noted that the monkey king was barely even mentioned in the papers, only that he’d been attached ‘to help’.
“Ok, tell you what – Sully, go talk to porky, give him your offer and see if that can get the ball rolling here – the rest of us will try to distract the  monkey. If nothing else we can just try to leave monkey-boy behind” Cash finally suggested.

It took a bit of shouting to get the pig god’s attention, but Sullen Hoof did manage to present his offer. This was done while the rest of the circle chased the monkey king around, a surprisingly futile effort – despite Shimmer using all of her various charms to try to snare or bind the spirit as it darted around.

“How can that thing keep evading us? I’ve chased monkeys around before, and they usually tire long before this” Shimmer lamented as she caught her breath while looking up at the monkey king, who sat up in a peach tree eating said fruits… and spitting peach nuts down on her.

Speaker reminded Shimmer that the Monkey King had been made as a spirit, not as a mortal animal: “He’s born of stone, through some process I don’t remember – and he was made to be a ceaseless prankster and joker… it’s his nature, he can’t avoid it”

Shimmer frowned: “Go chase it some more, try to get it over to that meadow over there…”

Red, Cash and Speaker gave chase – Red leaping up into the tree, only for the monkey spirit to jump out, with Cash and Speaker running after it. It was if chasing a playful foal that just wouldn’t stop, even if yelled at, who moved too fast to be caught…

As the three solars managed to chase the gleeful monkey to the meadow, the monkey made a beeline to the lone peach tree there – climbing it and effortlessly putting itself out of reach of its solar chasers by sitting among dense branches where no pony could fit in.

Looking up at the monkey, Red swore loudly: “Damnit, now we’re just back to where we were a few minutes ago”

“Uhm… I don’t think so” Speaker said, looking a little confused as he peeked back at the other peach tree. That one and the one they were at now looked oddly identical… and Speaker didn’t remember there being any peach tree on this meadow when he had looked at it earlier… and the tree had slightly pink-tinted leaves… and now it was ensaring the monkey in its branches… and now it was cocooning it in iridescent silvery spider web.

> Chapter 52: Journey to the West
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With the Monkey King at least temporarily wrapped up – indeed it seems pretty much impossible to keep its prehensile tail tied up – and Sullen Hoof having at least gotten the pig god’s cooperation for the time being, the whole operation got underway.

Water Strider wove the water of a nearby stream into an impressive yacht, while the pig god raised quite a lot of hell as it ate about a third of the monastery and basically kidnapped the extremely old-looking monk pony. It turned out that the seemingly immortal monk was revered as a local living saint, although when the pig god returned with the monk the circle quickly agreed that there wasn’t much left in the poor soul.

The five hundred year old pony was so wrinkly and pruny that it defied all logic. Of course, no mortal pony was meant to live for so long either – the few unicorns that got to die of old age rarely getting more than three hundred years old. The other monks in the monastery had kept the old soul fed, but through the centuries of waiting the old pony’s sanity and wits had slowly faded, for he had not enjoyed the same longevity of mind that exaltation afforded. The bald old monk could seemingly do nothing but sit and mutter, Cash Charmer concluding via his linguistic charms that the monk was reciting some kind of prayer: “It’s the only thing keeping him alive, his curse… all he can say now”

“Poor soul, to have been sacrificed for some petty political plot among gods” Speaker noted, trying his best to cure what few physical ailments the pony had, for of the few things that were beyond Speaker to undo was the results of aging.

Aboard the river god’s yacht wrought of water, which was quite roomy but had no visible sails, the circle finally managed to introduce themselves to the pig god and the monkey spirit. The pig god in return said that the circle could call him ‘Hunger’

“Very well – good to meet you Hunger. Let’s hope this trip is brief” Sunrise noted.

As everyone braced themselves, upon Water Strider’s request, the river god applied its powers and made the magical yacht of water move at a mindblowing pace. It certainly made Nah seem slow… which reminded Cash that they had ‘parked’ Nah at a caravansary near the iron mines: “Uhm… how are we going to get back to that?”

“Oh don’t worry about that – I can return you after this is done” Water Strider promised, amid water sprays and what looked like swimming up into the boat itself.

It turned out that one of Water Striders powers was influencing the speed of boats – thus his own conjuration was imbued with an impossible speed that would break any wooden hull against the force of oncoming waves or shallows. By nightfall the yacht had reached the misty isles that were at the merging of the Rock river and the Meander river, forming the yellow river… and that meant trouble.

“Everyone, under deck now!” Water Strider commanded as they approached the misty waters.

Speaker couldn’ see the problem, but obeyed none the less as Shimmer rolled the screeching Monkey King in its ball cocoon down into the yacht’s quite damp and moist hold. The only two who remained above deck were Water Strider and Hunger… and when the hatch closed Speaker saw that it sealed itself completely, so that neither air nor sound could reach them from the outside…

“Shimmer, what’s going on?” the Lookshyan veteran inquired. He wasn’t familiar with the misty isles, but neither was Shimmer. Cash on the other hoof did know:

“There is a changeling colony on the isles. The hide themselves in the mist and lure in sailors with magic song, so hiding us down here makes sense really” Cash explained, adding that he’d traveled on a few merchant ships going past the isles. Usually they’d have a deaf sailor pony helm the ship during that part of the passage.

Accepting the explanation, Speaker wondered how Hunger and Water Strider would hold out against the changelings. Red said that this was part of why Hunger had been brought along, to fight any changelings and whatnot that tried something like this.

“Do you see anything?” Sunrise asked Sullen Hoof, seeing that the night caste solar appeared to be gazing out through the watery ship.

At first only shaking his head ever so slightly, Sullen Hoof eventually turned to Sunrise: “No, I can’t see anything through the ship – there’s too much muck clouding the water”

A short while later Hunger opened the hatch to the hold and let the ponies out. The pig god seemed a good deal worse for wear, with many cuts and gashes over his thick brown skin – but he seemed in a good mood none the less. The half eaten remains of four changelings up on deck seemed to explain why.

“Looks like you had fun” Cash quipped. The pig god nodded in a most pleased fashion.

Looking for Water Strider, the circle made a more grim discovery: “Speaker, over here!” Sunrise called, having found the river god lying behind the wheel, bleeding luminous but clear fluids from multiple head wounds.

Speaker tried his best, stabilizing the injured god – but it was clear that the water god was too injured to helm the ship.
“Cash Charmer, please take the helm” the wounded god pleaded, the eclipse caste pony stepping up without any objections, although it did take a bit of experimentation to figure out how to control the yacht.

As the daystar sailed into the western wyld a short while later, disappearing from creation and ushering in the night, another issue presented itself to the circle and three gods: Food.

Hunger was – oddly enough – quite hungry, but he could sate himself by consuming dredged up river plants. The pony passangers on the other hoof found the slimy river plants that the pig god gorged itself on fairly unappetizing, but thankfully Water Strider had a solution: He caused the fish that had swum up into the boat to be ejected up onto the deck. Sullen Hoof made short work of them, having apparently stored a good amount of rice elsewhere – thus the circle dined on sushi that evening.

The next morning Water Strider had recovered ever so slightly, but it seemed that last night’s trick with the fish had drained the god. Speaker infused the god with essence, which helped, but ultimately what the god needed was to be returned to his river so that he could govern it – for by doing ones divine duty a god recovered and revitalized itself in the same way a pony did when sleeping… and Water Strider had not been within his domain for over five hundred years.

“Damn, and I thought I’d gotten sleep deprived back when Sunrise was acting up” Red commented, suddenly feeling that her own experience wasn’t nearly as traumatic.

Water Strider, resting in a bed of the same solid water material that the yacht was made of, choked out of a small laugh: “Noh, that’s not how gods work. Remember, we don’t need sleep – and I would only tire myself by using my powers. Making the boat and granting you a small bounty of the waters have been the first uses of my powers in centuries… it’s just been so long since I’ve done my job”

“This does make the Great Forks cults a bit more sensible, since their worship has the same effect on their respective divine patrons – even if I do not condone how they attract members” Sunrise noted, never before having seen a god in such a weakened state.

Around noon Cash charmer slowed the yacht down, the passing river banks no longer appearing as horizontal flickers of light. Of course, this was a bit too early stop, but Cash gave the circle and the two gods two good reasons: “First of all we need some proper provisions, and secondly we have a unicorn who needs to be shipped back to the Denzik – and if we’re going all the way to the Lap, then that should put us fairly close to the Denzik”

“The Denzik… oh I’ve seen it pass my waters by so many times… such a grand gathering of ships – I would love to have them on my river” Water Strider groaned.

Hunger wasn’t much for the unscheduled stop, since he wanted to finish the journey as quickly as possible – so that Sullen Hoof would cook for him – but Sullen Hoof simply pointed out that he needed to get some local ingredients from one of the Great Forks bazaars.

The water elemental that was the Great Forks harbormaster was at first quite angry Cash anchored the yacht at a spot that had apparently been booked in advance by some other ship – but when the water elemental recognized Cash her tone changed… and she invited Cash into her office. Speaker only shook his head, but remembered that this hadn’t been the first time that Cash had slept his way out of paying a docking fee with that very same water elemental.

The rest of the circle rounded up supplies and provisions fairly quickly – so by the time a rather soaked Cash Charmer returned then the extra passenger and about a weeks worth of dried foodstuff had been brought on board.

Ever-Ember had been quite surprised when he saw how the circle planned to return him to the Denzik, but was also quite thankful – since he really had dreaded the prospect of flying on a yeddim once more. As for his business with the god of libraries at the Great Forks house of learning, then Ever-Ember had managed to sell most of his manuscripts and scrolls, apparently earning him quite a nice amount of money that he brought along in a decent sized oaken chest with bronze fittings and a fancy lock.

Now, while the unicorn was surprised about the strange magical made-of-water boat, he was even more surprised to see who he was traveling with: “Holy dragons… are you traveling with gods?”

“That and a kind of cursed immortal pony who’s not in a very good condition – but when we complete this journey he will be freed” Sunrise added.

The unicorn shook his head in a mix of awe and disbelief, all the while scribbling down a lot of notes in a blank book he’d acquired. Seeing Ever-Ember with his journal reminded Speaker of an old idea he hadn’t touched upon since before he came to Chung Do – and thus he retrieved a by now somewhat worn looking collection of scrolls from elsewhere and began writing in earnest in them as well, his scroll of exalted power, detailing the nature and powers of the Solars… it wasn’t as if he had anything else to do.

By evening Cash made another stop, this time at Water Strider’s request. They had reached the rough mid-point between Nexus and Lookshy, the middle of the Yanaze river. The god sank through the boat into the watery depths after telling the circle and his other passangers that he would return in the morning.

By dawns light Speaker awoke as the yacht suddenly tilted heavely, its front rising up so that Speaker and everyone else slid to the back of the ship – Red even fell in the water. Shimmer barely managed to get Red back on board when the boat accelerated wildly, forcing everyone, even the pig god, to hold on tight lest they fly off the ship!

At the helm stood a fuming Water Strider, his watery body boiling with rage, ripping in the wheel as the yacht weaved through the dense Yanaze river traffic at breakneck speeds.

“What’s going on?!” Speaker shouted, his perfect balance charm barely allowing him to stagger up to the river god.
His eyes roiling like raging rapids, the river god roared: “Those lazy fools! My river is flowing at nearly half the speed it should be because my elemental minions haven’t lifted a fin to do their job while I’ve been gone – this is a disgrace! I’ve told them  all that if my river isn’t up to snuff when I get back I’ll have every one of them churning mud for a year!”

“Well… about that, did you know the the slow waters of the Yanaze makes a lot of the annual river flooding a lot worse than it has to be?” Speaker tentatively asked, not sure how much he could push the circle’s agenda, especially with Water Strider being that angry.

The river god didn’t seem surprised, saying of course slow waters would back up: “…but that should be a thing of the past when I return! That much I promise you!”

What followed was a slightly more mathetical discussion as Speaker asked whether the Yanaze could even move so much more water – but Water Strider was adamant that his river, the mightiest river in Creation, could shift any volume of water, all the their talking also seemed to help calm the god down so the rest of the yacht’s passangers found themselves on a more level boat: “The oceanic water gods love it – most of them prefer my fresh water to their own salty brine any day, and if they do have too much they can just shove it into the wyld”

As the yacht reached the mouth of the Yanaze river the yacht slowed down. Water Strider explained that his powers were over waters in rivers and close to shore – so they couldn’t more too far into open waters: “This won’t lengthen our journey by much  - but by nightfall we will be passing by Thorns, and tomorrow morning we’ll cross into the Bayou of Endless Regret… Hunger, I need you on guard by then!”

“The what of endless regret?” the geographically challenged Sullen Hoof inquired.

Shuffling about in her deck chair, Shimmer look to the east. They were just passing outside of Lookshy’s heavily fortified harbor. Speaker had been so excited to see his home once more, but the yacht was going much too fast for it to be possible to see anything specific as more than a motion blur, so it was with a sigh that Shimmer told Sullen Hoof that the Bayou was a very large shadowland south-west of thorns: “It’s a huge expanse of watery swamp land. It’s right between the elemental poles of earth, wood and fire, so its hot, good soil conditions, and fairly geomantically stable… but if what my elders said is right, then it’s also where a primordial fell, so what could be enough land to grow rice and veggies for all of Nexus is instead an eternally rotting swamp – and don’t even get started on the kind of things that flow out of the place at night into the inland sea”

Having already tangled with a shadowland once before, Sullen Hoof was not so enthusiastic about going through another one – but at least he didn’t have to trot on the ground of it. Ever-Ember was less pleased still, but at least they would be passing through the shadowland during the daytime: “…the dead only really come out during the nighttime, right?”

“That depends on what disturbs them…” Sunrise noted. The unicorn retreated below deck.

Water Strider’s yacht made very good speed down the eastern coast of the inland sea – though it was only going a third of the speed it had moved at back when on the rivers. They passed the colorful tent city of Cellery, where the nomadic Mareukan lords held their moots, and several hours later came in sight of what had once been a grand and reasonably powerful realm satrapi: Thorns.

At first Speaker found himself quite confused, for according the maps he remembered then there shouldn’t be any mountains in and around Thorns. As they got closer they found the gigantic shape loomed over Thorns was not a mountain, but a giant… something… with a palace built on top of it.

“What in the sweet greasy nipples of Celestia is that” Red exclaimed, earning a disapproving but ignored glare from Sunrise.

Speaker had on clue – this was all new to him. Shimmer hadn’t been this close to Thorns in over half a century, and none of the gods present seemed to know either. It was when Sullen Hoof and his sight enhancing charms told Speaker that the colossal figure had what looked like stumpy limbs jutting out of it, along with a very strange looking twisted head that Speaker began to recognize the impossibly huge figure: “No way…”

“Speaker, just tell me what I’m looking at please” Sullen Hoof implored. The bizarre and horrible nature of what he was looking at very much making the night caste solar wish that he could pry his eyes away… but his curiosity bid him otherwise.

It was a primordial being from before the first age, a thing spawned by The Black Boar That Cracked The Skies to be an unstoppable force: “I think it’s Juggernaut, but the way you describe it makes it sound injured, or sick. It should have several smaller limbs in front of it, with giant shovel claws to dig through mountains, not stumps with bone sticking out... and it was bright orange, not pale yellow, plus those ashen waterfalls you describe sound like its bleeding. In the first age whenever we killed it, it would just reappear a century later to wreak more havoc – it couldn’t be killed by any known means”

“So this is the power of Typhon’s master” Sunrise pointed out, looking steely-eyed towards the looming figure on the coastline.

The grim reminder that it was from Thorns that Typhon had come – and of his powers – gave a slightly more understandable perspective to the scene before the circle, but at the same time it wasn’t exactly a pleasant connection to make. Cash Charmer was quick to do a little math based on what he knew as a merchant: “Thorns had a population of well over eighty thousand ponies – and that was just in the city, not counting the surrounding farmlands and villages. If Typhon’s master… what was his name, The Mask of Winters? If he can do that to an unkillable primordial titan… I don’t want to know what he’s doing to the ponies he lords over”

“Let’s hope that Lookshy is aware of how bad it is in Thorns, I’m sure they would be able to oust this deathlord” Speaker confidently spoke, looking towards the coast with a heavy heart – there was no doubt a lot of ponies in Thorns he could help.

Sunrise trotted up to Speaker: “If not Lookshy, then other solars will surely attempt to liberate Thorns, or perhaps a realm legion”

The circle debated whether it would be a good thing or not if it was the realm which took back Thorns. They all agreed that it was probably a better alternative to being ruled over by some necromancer-sounding pony who went with a title of Deathlord – but then again, with the realm out of Thorns the realm’s influence in the hundred kingdoms had been weakened greatly, and pushed all the way back south to Harborhead. The only real realm satrap (Satelite nation ruled by a realm-controled puppet leader) was in Grey Falls, and they were already quite isolated by virtue of being located all the way up one of the forks in the Rock river, so anyone going there would have to travel past Lookshy, Nexus, Great Forks and a slew of lesser countries, none of which particularly liked the realm.

“I think ultimately the big problem would be if a circle of solars or lunars liberated Thorns, what the ponies there would do. They’d probably hate their new masters just as much” Shimmer noted, aware that Thorns having been a realm satrap meant that all the ponies there were indoctrinated into the immaculate faith and nothing else… because in the realm any other kind of worship is heresy and punishable by death.

“I’m sure I could talk some sense into them” Cash quipped, assuring Shimmer that if he could, then other solars could as well.

Ever-Ember noted that he honestly preferred to see Thorns returned to the realm, explained that as is right now, or if taken by other non-realm forces, it would remain off-limits to the Denzik, which closed on of the two only ports they were allowed to stop at that was in any way tied into the hundred kingdom trade routes: “Right now they can only stop at Port Calin, and that’s already outside of a lot of the regular merchant routes in the hundred kingdoms”

The day turn to night with idle chatter on the topic of politics and trade, Ever-Ember finding himself talking in increasingly accepting terms about both Solars and Lunars – and yet remaining aware enough of this change that he would need to hold his tongue about such topics once back in realm-controlled territories.

As the daystar disappeared into the western wyld Water Strider’s yacht crossed into a stretch of coastline that seemed to very much be a particularly fetid swamp… the river god grew uneasy, calling for Hunger to rouse himself and prepare for battle: “We just crossed into the Bayou of Endless Regret, this is a shadowland – and we have to get through it before dawn”

“You saying something here will stop us?” Hunger rumbled, looking quite hungry and discontent.

As the two gods talked, Speaker found himself reminiscing of the creation of the shadowland they had crossed into. It had been a terrible battle, during the primordial war, culminating in a primordial slain and its corpse falling through creation… not a pretty sight, especially since the area had been fairly densely populated at the time, with a lot of river fisheries and reed farms for paper making situated at the river deltas there which formed the now deadened swampland.
The howling of undead broke his line of thought…

Water Strider called for Cash to helm the ship, while the river god assumed a meditative sitting posture and said that he would be focusing on guiding the waters around the ship, so they wouldn’t slow down: “The rest of you, take out anything that my ship scoops up!”

Red, Speaker and Shimmer girded themselves for possible combat when Sunrise bid them to stand down: “I will handle this”

Carrefully sitting herself down in a meditative pose similar to Water Walkers at the very front of the ship, Sunrise flared her anima to the point that anything with eyes would have been able to spot the ship and its strange golden light-source from several miles away – especially in the darkness of the shadowland.

Under a baleful red moon, with waters that were changing from brackish swamp-waters to blood from the underworld, Shimmer’s light at first revealed a multitude of bloated corpses hiding under the surface of the water – but attracted by her brightness they rose from the water… and burst into holy flame, as Sunrise sat in an almost trance-like state, praying continuously for safe passage, her piety smiting anything unliving that her light shined upon.

Thanks to Sunrise’s actions Water Walker was able to make incredibly good speed through the shadowland swamp, Cash helping by using his sailing charms to navigate expertly around any terrain obstacles – be they giant pale skeletal remains jutting out of the bloody waters, or jagged cliffs of black rock. Before midnight they all saw the moon return to its normal silvery white color, indicating that they were free of the shadowland.

The only one not happy from all of this was Hunger, for he felt that he had been denied a good fight… and the option to eat the things he slew – but Cash managed to talk him out of jumping ship to gorge himself: “Do you really want to eat rotten things, when you know that at the end of this trip you stand to get a heavenly feast – why settle for moldy old crumbs when the baker stands at the end of the road?”

By dawn the yacht had crossed into coastal territory that was noticeably different from the jungles of the east – for during the night they had passed the summer mountains – the yacht was now in the south.

“Speaker, forgive me for asking, but why do the ponies on the coast look so weird?” Sullen Hoof inquired, having spent a good half hour looking quite intently towards land with his sight enhancing charms.

Thinking for a moment, Speaker chuckled as he realized Sullen Hoof’s confusion: “Tell me Sully, before you Exalted, did you ever travel outside of Nexus?”

The night caste solar shook his head. Speaker smiled: “What you’re looking at is the Kingdom of Harborhead if I’m not wrong – and what you’re seeing are zebra ponies, that’s what the locals look like here. Once we pass Harborhead and get to the… Shimmer, do you know if Chiaroscuro or the Varang city states come next?”
“Varang City states” Shimmer chimed in.

Nodding, Speaker was about to say something when Monkey King burst up from below deck, having evidently shed his bonds: “Varang? Oh please don’t tell me we’re going there… it’s so boring!”

“You been there?” Sullen Hoof asked.

Speaker sighed, recalling from the first age how the monkey spirit’s rants could last for hours… and indeed, the thing raved on about how Varang ponies had no sense of humor, and always just chased him away – continuing until the shining multi-colored glass towers of Chiaroscuro came into sight, distracting the monkey spirit with how the merciless southern sunlight was reflected about, making the whole city a daytime kaleidoscope.

The sight of Chiaroscuro, despite its tongue-twister of a name, excited Speaker to no end. Almost all Lookshyan cooking made use of southern spices, and Chiaroscuro was the biggest port of call for the southern spice trade. What had gotten Speaker so excited was that with Ever-Ember having to get off so he could wait for the Denzik to come along a few months later, meant getting into port… and Speaker had always dreamt of visiting Chiaroscuro.

Unfortunately for Speaker, Water Strider didn’t want to stick around for too long. Ever-Ember and his money was off-loaded very quickly – goodbyes were said, along with Speaker again promising to come visit the Denzik in a year or so – the yacht pulling out as if heaved by magic the moment Ever-Ember turned to walk down the pier towards the city. Speaker looked on with a big pout and longing eyes as the glass towers of the city shrank into the horizon.

“Come on Speaker – we can visit your little glass house city on the way back” Cash said, trying to cheer his circlemate up.

It took the yacht another day of eventless travel along the fertile southern coast, past countless olive and date orchards. The only notable points of discussion was on why the southern coast wasn’t just all desert… to which Speaker noted that at the first fifty or hundred miles of coastal territory inland would be moist enough to allow for farming – but beyond that it would all be dry sand: “Only the few rivers that run inland extend this – and pretty much all southern pony cities and settlements cluster around the wet areas – or fight over it”

The other topic was that of the city of Paragon, for as they passed close by its harbor they saw a pony clutching its right hoof throwing itself off the harbor lighthouse, down into the rocks piled up around the harbor to break the waves. None in the circle were familiar enough with the city state of Paragon to explain why it had happened, although Sullen Hoof noted that it wasn’t entirely uncommon for ponies in Nexus who got hurt bad enough that they couldn’t work anymore to kill themselves, so they wouldn’t become a burden to their family.

It was afternoon when the mountainous shape of the Penitent appeared in the horizon: An entire mountain carved to look like a giant pony monk of some sort, setting in a meditative position. In its lap, as the yacht got nearer, it was clear that a city had been built – Speaker knew quite well what the place was: The Lap, aptly named, and well known for its exceedingly fertile surrounding farmlands: “…this realm satrap feeds two thirds of the south”

A bit beyond the lap, at a sandy beach, Water Strider drove his yacht up onto the sands. Hunger carried the monk down to the beach, where the circle watched as the monk recited his prayer one last time… a spirit appearing before him, bowing, then fading away. The monk took one final pained breath, then crumbled into dust.

“Water Strider, do you know the name of the god or sidereal who sent you, Hunger and Monkey King on this mission?” Speaker inquired.

The god shook his head. It had been so long, he couldn’t remember. Sunrise pointed out that they had copies of the assignment back in Nexus: “The perpetrator of this travesty will undoubtedly be named in those papers”

Breathing in the hot southern air, the mix of the strange scent of salty sea-water and dry desert air feeling quite strange to Speaker, the twilight caste solar bowed his head to the patch of dust that had been the old monk: “I will find whoever visited this abuse to you and I will punish them, this I swear by Celestia”

“We’ll have plenty of time for that later – right now we have to deal with that thing you said there is in the grey river” Cash reminded Speaker, looking around the empty beach for any sign of a path or something similar that might lead to a spot where a yeddim could be purchased.

Water Strider, looking pleased as punch that he could return home, gestured for the circle to assemble, all the while Hunger and Monkey King seemed to have disappeared, as gods and spirits had a tendency of doing: “Ponies, I am in a great dept to you – and my offer to return you home still stands, since you seem to be out of flying beasts of burden”

The circle gladly accepted the river god’s offer, but this time when the god made his water-ship move… well, there was motion, doubt about that, but it was much faster than when they had first traveled by boat. In the blink of an eye they found themselves on a river with banks replete with vegetation on either side, the air suddenly pleasantly humid and the sun no longer as hot upon their bodies – they were in the east.

“We’re between Lookshy and Nexus, near my home – I hope you can make your way from here noble ponies” Water said, guiding the yacht to shore.

As the yacht flowed up onto the nearest river bank, Red briefly explained to the river god what they were doing to begin with. Water Strider understood their plight, and agreed: “When I get my lazy elementals up to speed the flooding in the Nexus basin should be much less – if you can ease the flow of water from the Grey river that should help even more so, although how much it will help I can’t tell”

“I was more hoping if you knew where the thing Speaker mentioned is” Red noted, looking hopeful.

The river good shook his head, his water-lily mane flowing about on his head: “Sorry, that’s beyond my domain, but what I can do is tell you the name of the god of the grey river…”

The entire circle looked at Water Strider with great attention.

“Her name is ‘Mud of the Lotus’, and she likes to pick fights – gets a lot worship from river pirates, since she likes to battle done on her waters” Water Strider explained.

Shimmer gave the river god a quizzical look: “A river god that likes to play war-god? Really?”

“The east is full of rivers, and many battles are fought on them. Lotus works with Sunipa as the arbiter of eastern naval warfare, a powerful position… but that also means that she doesn’t have that much time to manage her own river’s waters, hence its muddy and grey appearance” The aqueous god noting.

The circle thanked Water strider for the information and the ride as they disembarked. The ship and river god sank into the river almost instantly as soon as the last goodbye had been said.

“Ok, so… get a ride back to Nexus, then head down the Grey river?” Sullen Hoof thought out loud.

“I want to pick up Nah, but that’ll require a ride to the rock river… we should have asked to be let off there” Cash said, looking displeased with his limited options.

Shimmer shrugged but with a smile on her face: “Yeddim are cheap – well, with the kind of money we have they are, and Speaker can always make another high-speed howdah. Right now I can smell a pig-pen over that ridge there, which means a farm, which means civilization, which means directions towards Nexus”

The circle agreed that with no other means of expediting swift travel they might as well go visit whatever farm was over yonder…

> Chapter 53: Might Makes Right
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As the circle crossed the ridge they were met with the generic and familiar sight of open farmland interspaced between patches of trees, small huts and houses. It was a farming community like so many others that took up most of the space in the east that wasn’t jungle and forrest, and Cash was quick to point out what that meant: “There’s be a noble ruling this place, which means a proper city, which means merchants, which means us getting a yeddim out of here”

Approaching the farming community, it took the circle no time at all to sense that something was off. Sullen Hoof was the first to point out that all the ponies working the fields and muddy rice-paddies we wearing what looked like hoof-carved charms and idols – not something out of the ordinary at all, given how supersticious most mortal ponies were (and rightfully so) but here the iconography of the charms were… off.

“Uhm, correct me if I’m wrong here, but idols that look like large red horned dogs aren’t usual farmer fare, right?” Sullen Hoof wondered, recalling only ever having seen similar things outside the Nexus immaculate temples, in paintings of unicorn monks smiting demons…

Both Sunrise and Shimmer were quick to agree, with Speaker saying that Sully’s description sounded like Erymanthoi demons: “But why would these farmers be running around with idols for bloodhound demons displayed openly? Isn’t that asking for trouble from any itinerant immaculate monk?”

Cash wasn’t impressed: “I’ve been through places in the hundred kingdoms where local warlords demanded that all serfs and peasants shear off their manes, or always sing praises to them, or even one place that worshiped their lord like some kind of demon king because of his bloodthirsty nature. This is nothing, trust me. At worst the local ruler here likes to play right, in which case Red just gets to have fun, but likely its nothing worth our time”
Speaker couldn’t help but nod. He had heard of plenty of stories from other Lookshyan officers who’d been around the hundred kingdoms far more than he ever had, of strange local costums and bizarre worship of local deities – and Cash was right: They had more important things to do, like getting this flooding business over with and returning to their work in Nexus.

Passing a field, Cash hailed one of the peasant ponies in it for directions. The brown-coated pony mare, with a cutie mark in the form of a sheaf of grain, was so startled by Cash calling out to her that she dropped her broad-brimmed straw hat – a hat similar to the sort Sullen Hoof always wore.

“Skittish, maybe its tax season?” Sullen Hoof theorized.

Speaker disagreed, although he couldn’t give any other reason why the farmer should be so frightened: “Farmers are usually only taxed come summer or fall, once they’ve harvested – this early in spring they don’t have anything worth collecting, aside from their own ability to work”

Cash didn’t seem to mind, waving at the mare to come over – which she did, although she kept looking over her shoulders: “Greetings. We’re a group of travelers who, due to unfortunate circumstances, had to get off our boat here while underway to Nexus. Could you tell us where the nearest market or caravansary is?” 

The mare gulped, then nodded to show that she’d understood Cash’s question: “You shouldn’t be here – cross the river, just get away – if they catch you you’re all dead!”

“If who or what catches us?” Cash wondered, looking not frightened, but more annoyed that the mare hadn’t answered his question, as well as concerned that the territory they were in was a lot less friendly than anticipated.

The mare didn’t seem able to speak the words. It was obvious that she was terrified, with her constantly looking about for things that the circle evidently couldn’t see: “No, nothing – nothing at all – now please leave us alone”

Looking back at the circle with a shrug, while the mare ran back into the field to yank up more weeds, Cash sighed: “Shimmer, why not have a look from up above – see if you can spot any larger city or village around here”

Giving Speaker a brief look, Shimmer shifted into her seagull form and flew up into the air, circling overhead for a brief moment. After a few minutes she landed on Speaker’s shoulder and told him that she had spotted a watchtower further in land, away from the river and at the edge of a forest – the kind of watchtower usually employed by local militia for border protection and toll collection. The circle agreed that the ponies there should know better directions – or at least be willing to part with such information for a small fee.
The circle found the tower abandoned. The wooden construction also bore signs of battle, with its door smashed in – an iron-reinforced thick oaken door, completely battered in and ripped off its hinges. Inside Sullen Hoof and Shimmer were able to find a few very old bloodstains – not enough for a pony to have died from bloodloss, but more like signs of hoof to hoof combat. There were also quite a lot of shattered remnants of chairs, tables – the whole place was trashed.

“Well that explains why the locals are so jumpy – if there’s raiders and slavers about they would be understandably frightened” Sullen Hoof noted, pointing out dusty drag-marks on the dirt flood.

Shimmer frowned, not sure if she agreed: “The hoof-prints don’t add up for slavers. I’m only seeing hoof-prints from the ponies who worked here – and there’s a really faint smell in the air… I can’t put my hoof on it, but it doesn’t smell like pony”

“Changeling raiders? That would spook the locals real good” Red suggested, unsure of whether she should power up her sword-shaping charm.

The lunar mare agreed that changelings might well explain how the door was smashed in – but if it was eastern changelings the smell was still wrong: “Eastern changelings tend to smell like thorny bushes or predator animals, especially if they have warrior assumptions on”

Ultimately the watchtower proved useful enough: Cash found a wooden plate carved with a map of the local land, with the farming community, the Yanaze river and the tower all clearly marked – as well as a city not far from it, through the forest.

With the new directions, the circle made their way through the forest, following the small road which evidently connected the little farming community to a larger city – and indeed, a city they found… it just didn’t look like how they had imagined, or at least parts of it didn’t.

Like many smaller cities in the east, especially those without local access to stone quarries, the city’s walls were made of solid and talls timbers with blockhouses dotted along the city wall at reasonable intervals. The strange bit was that the towers and the walls were, in many places, covered in what looked like shiny brown substance – and the ground around the walls was covered in tiny but sharp shards of obsidian.

Even stranger was the fact that there were no ponies up on the walls – at all.

Upon closer inspection, as the circle trotted along the wall to find a gate, it turned out that it was lathered in some kind of brown amber which was without a doubt not just some local kind of mud – it looked like huge large-than pony sized wads of some kind of hardened resin, but unlike the amber one would get from tree-sap then this had a very different color.

“Perhaps the local trees just ooze a lot of the stuff, and in a weird color?” Shimmer suggested.

Speaker frowned: “Not possible. Resin from trees is always highly flammable – makes for good but short-lived torches, but definitely not something you would ever use to build anything with”

As the circle finally found a gate to pass through – which to their relief was open – they were greeted by a single young pony guarding it who, from how the colt was leaning suggestively against the inner wall of the gateway blockhouse, looked more like a prostitute than a guard. The very tight-fitting leather armor the pony wore didn’t help either as it left absolutely nothing to the imagination, and neither did his sultry voice: “Greetings strangers, may I welcome you all to the hold of the Great and Powerful Trixie. Enjoy your stay and don’t cause any trouble”

That the guard winked at Cash did little to convince Speaker of the guard’s suitability to protect the city, but at least the city itself looked reasonably normal: Wooden buildings, most with pagoda style roofs, tiled with ceramic tiles. The roads were replete with rough black stone. Many dozens of ponies were milling about doing their business, all wearing small idols that looked like small effigies of demons around their necks.

“Right, it’s official – this place is creeping me out. Cash, please find us a ride and quickly” Red implored.

Cash chuckled: “Oh come on, you, Red, afraid of strange jewelry fashions?”

Red gave Cash a disapproving glare and trotted over to look at a street vendor’s stall, buying some cooked tubers on a stick.

The circle looked about for a short while, trying to spot any merchants in town. Cash was about to give up, seeing as the city was apparently quite deserted of merchant interests – despite some of the local wood carvers making some rather nice decorative knickknack, when he was approached with a summons from the local lord of the land – he quickly caught up with the circle and relayed the summons.

“Hey friends – I just got the strangest summons from the local lord” Cash began, but quickly noticing that the rest of the circle seemed engrossed in discussing a different topic:

“I am certain – I have been feeling strange ever since we got here – and Speaker saw the same thing” Sunrise adamantly proclaimed.

Joining the debate, Cash found himself at first confused about what all the hubbub was about – the whole circle seemed on edge, except him, especially since it was down a one-way alloey. It was when Speaker finally explained what he’d seen that Cash got chills down his spine: “No Red, I’m sure – my spirit sight charm doesn’t lie about this kind stuff. This city is chock full of demons, but they seem either docile or busy”

It was strange to imagine for Cash, but apparently the city was full of dematerialized demons – much like how spirits and gods could move unseen through ponies and walls alike…

“Are they looking?” Red wondered, absolutely hating the fact that she never got around to having Speaker teach her that damnable spirit-seeing charm – let alone the one that let her strike dematerialized beings.

Speaker nodded, looking in no way pleased about being able to confirm Red’s inquiry.

“Well then, I just got summoned by a pony to appear before the court of this here Great and Powerful Trixie – by a pony who stammered and shook as if some invisible force was holding her holding her by the fun bits, with claws” Cash explained, suddenly not sounding very keen on meeting this demon lord if that was how ponies were treated in this place.

“Was that why the farmer pony was so frightened? Demons watching her?” Sullen Hoof suggested, the very thought of being lorded over by such a dark master making his stomach churn.

Red put a solid hoof on Cash’s right shoulder. It was slightly chipped, having clearly turned many a blade, but it was strong and firm like no other. She then spoke in High Realm, figuring that the demons couldn’t speak or understand it: “Let’s go visit this lord and demand an explanation – and if nothing else, we can free these ponies”

Cash nodded, then looked at the rest of the circle: “Let’s go answer our summons then”

The castle of the lord of… whatever the city’s name was, had similar shiny brown patches, supposedly covering up holes in the wooden structure – holes that Speaker and Shimmer both figured were the size of bloodhounds, demon warriors quite aptly named for their bloodlust and singular obsession with lapping the blood of the things they killed.

“How lovely… what about the brown resin stuff then, what’s that from?” Red wondered, hoping that whatever demon had womited up such reasonably useful building materials were a bit less deadly.

Shimmer were familiar with such demons it turned out, having encountered realm unicorn sorcerers who had summoned some to produce weapons out of their resin back west: “They’re called Needlemakers, of Firmin. They’re not much smarter than animals, but if bound by a summoner you can make them stop making nests out of resin needles and instead make more useful things, like weapons or simple buildings”

“Well that doesn’t sound too bad” Red said, bobbing her head side to side, trying to imagine what such a fiend would look like.
Shimmer frowned: “They like to decorate their nests with dead animals and ponies…”

“Lovely – say, are there any demons which aren’t just straight up murderous?” Red wondered out loud, well aware that there were likely invisible demon spies listening in on her.

Cash pushed open a heavy wooden door, letting strangely beautiful lyre-music seep into the hallway the circle was in. Speaker quickly wiped a tear from his eye: “Oh there are Red, and you’re hearing one now – the Harpists of hell play the most beautiful music…”

Red found herself almost assaulted by feelings of guilt and vivid memories of when she accidentally caused the injuries which led to her older brother’s death. Staggered for a moment in surprise, she looked pleading to Speaker: “What the – what’s happening!?”

“It’s the harpist music – it makes you keenly aware of who you are. If you’re happy with yourself it makes you feel good, if you’re burdened by memories it will make you recall them” Speaker mused, his gaze idle as memories of the first age washed over him as the faint music seeped through the slight opening from the ajar door.

Cash pushed the door wide open, looking confident as ever – and led the circle into the court of the demon lord… who turned out to be a pale unicorn mare with a really big pointy hat. About her sat the very harpist demons that Speaker had mentioned, along with strange ponies wrought of silver that danced about beautifully.

“The Great and Powerful Trixie demands to know who stand before her” the mare on the throne said form under her hat. With a light skyblue coat, and a mane with an even lighter shade of blue, there was little doubt as the unicorn mare’s aspect: She was clearly an air-aspected unicorn…

Cash charmed quickly bowed and motioned for the rest of the circle to bow as well: “We are but travelers, seeking to buy means of passage to Nexus after our ship to Nexus unfortunately dropped us off near here”

Trixie gave Cash a distrusting glare: “The Great and Powerful Trixie knows that you lie. Tell her exactly why you are here, I shall let my construction workers use you for home decoraton to warn others!” 

Cash looked back at the rest of the circle. He seemed, if nothing else, a tad confused –if not at the very least unsure of what to say next…

“Speak! The Great and Powerful Trixie demands that you explain yourselves!” the unicorn mare stood and decreed.

Sullen Hoof quickly stepped up, his golden helmet and mask having faded long before the circle had entered the town in lieu of his usual ‘unremarkable and plain looking servant face’ disguise, coupled with his heavenly chef uniform also having been replaced with something decidedly more fitting for a serf: “Milady, I beg of you – my masters are but awestruck at the magnificence of your court – we have never heard such beautiful music, or seen such splendid dance…”

The mare smiled at Sullen Hoof’s humble words: “The Great and Powerful Trixie is… satisfied with your explanation. Now, tell Trixie who you are that I may judge what to do with you”

Cash straightened up, and having picked up on Sullen Hoof’s successful appeal to the clearly quite thin-blooded unicorn mare’s ego, introduced the circle in the same faked humble tone: “I am Cash Charmer, business manager to Bright Machine Speaker here’s medical services. The mare you see is Last Shimmer, his nurse, with Sullen Hoof as our servant. Red over here is our bodyguard, for Nexus can be a dangerous place”

Trixie nodded idly, as if not paying that much attention to what Cash said: “Very well. The Great and Powerful Trixie decrees that you, business pony, you shall remain here as her treasurer – healer, you and your nurse can tend to her serfs, the rest can join the others in the mines or on the fields”

Speaker shook his head: Even if this dragonblooded pony – of unknown origins – wasn’t from the realm, then she sure acted the part. A brief glance at Red told him all he needed – it was now time to fight: “Red, the demons have to materialize to attack you – and watch out for the Saigoth Dancers if they start do the dance of extinguishment we’re all dead!”

“Don’t have to tell me twice” Red roared, a great blade half against as long as Red was from nose to the tip of her tail materializing out of her furious essence – mid-swing no less, cleaving the first four red-furred demon warriors which had popped into existence the moment Red had executed her blade-creating charm.

The two dozen giant red-furred demons – four of which Red had just cut in half – howled at their sight of their slain kin. True to what Speaker had described earlier, then each of them were twice the height of a pony and with muscles on their forelimbs that were truly hulking. Their large crimson claws and fangs didn’t look very kind either, and their canine features and crest of red horns rounded out their appearance perfectly as the demon dogs of hell: The Erymanthoi bloodhounds.

Speaker didn’t even have to think before he felt the familiar cares of Gift on his right forehoof, and while Shimmer dissolved into silver fluid that quickly rebuilt her into her slightly more avian monster-pony warform, he sent Gift sailing through the air, clipping the silvery figures of the dancing demons which shattered like shrieking glass thanks to his spirit (and demon) slaying charm – but the fighting had barely managed to begin before it, sort of, ended:

With a single knife, expertly balanced, Sullen Hoof aimed to kill the sorcerers and thus break the control she had over the demons – but being a sorceress Trixie spoke the first word of the Word of Ten Thousand Birds, activating the spell that exploded her into a large flock of many colorful eastern birds, and along with the explosion of birds came a burst of air essence which shattered the amber windows of the throne room.

“Counterspell!” Sullen Hoof barely managed to shout before Shimmer aimed a taloned limb towards the flock of birds and unleashed a torrent of disruptive essence, ending the spell quite spectactularly: The flock of birds seemed to implode in on itself, and amidst the cloud of feathers compressing in on themselves a unicorn dropped down, her pointy hat and cape floating down next her.
With a well-timed leap assisted by her wings Shimmer caught Trixie mid-fall, twisting mid-flight so they both faced the mass of demons and the rest of the circle: “Order them to stop or your head comes off!”

Looking a lot less cocksure and mighty, as she dangled under Shimmer’s clawed grip around her neck, Trixie barely managed to squeak out a “Stand down!”

The demons all turned to face her, many of the bloodhounds looking decidedly disappointed – although not many, for of the two dozen that had originally appeared only three remained, after Red had executed a dazzling cleaving kata with her blade, liberating every bloodhound in range of its head, although one particularly runty bloodhound had ‘only’ lost the top half of its head and somehow still remained standing. Demons were weird like that. 

Sunrise, who in the brief seconds since the fighting began, had barely begun to draw breath in order to bring to bear her creature of darkness-smiting declarations, merely exhaled by kept eyeing the demons suspiciously. 

Still holding Trixie aloft, Shimmer walked over to the circle – the demons parting way dutifully.

“We don’t take particularly nicely to others trying to enslave us. A few days age the Council of Entities in Nexus tried it, and failed – now tread very carefully around us. What are you going to do?” Cash wondered out loud, the gloating in his voice unmistakable.

Relaxing her grip ever so slightly, allowing Trixie to draw breath more comfortably, Shimmer voiced her opinion: “A unicorn that summons an army of demons to conquer some part of the hundred  kingdoms? If this was back west she’d be fed to the sharks, one piece at a time”

“Shimmer, put her down. Now, where are you from?” Speaker inquired, withholding his judgment until he knew exactly what he was dealing with.

Back on the ground, the unicorn mare gathered up her hat and dusted it off. It had splatters of demon blood on it – nothing that a bit of elemental water couldn’t fix… there. Turning to face her captors, Trixie inhaled deeply: “The great and powerful Trixie is of an equally great and powerful noble house of the realm, schooled in the finest of magical and sorcerous arts at the most prestigious of academies”

Cash didn’t even have to blink before shooting that one down: “No you’re not”

“You dare accuse the great and powerful Trixie of lying? Uncivilized brute! Show respect to your betters” retorted the air-aspected unicorn.

Looking back at the rest of the circle with a bemused smirk, of which Speaker was shaking his head, then at Trixie, Cash explained: “You don’t talk with an islander accent – and every member of a realm noble house I’ve ever met always introduced themselves with their house name first, then their own name – not just some glorifying title”

“Perhaps the great and powerful Trixie prefers to keep familiar matters private – and how she speaks is none of your business” the dragonblooded mare sneered.

With a brief glance at Speaker, who was still shaking his head, Cash shook his head at the unicorn mare: “My bearded friend back here knows this little trick – it lets him tell if others are lying. Now, let’s try this again: Where are you from?”

Trixie’s gaze turned into a worried one, which shifted back and forth between Cash and Speaker, and Red with her great glowing blade, and to the bird-monster behind her: “I… The great and powerful Trixie refuses to answer such questions to.. to ruffians! You barge in here, kill my guards, and hold me prisoner! How dare you!”

“You did try to enslave us… we just defended ourselves” Red casually remarked, shifting her golden reaver daiklaive about as it floated above herself. The four foot long, one foot wide cleaver-like sword had little elegance, but was unmistakably a weapon that could chop through even the ugliest of demons… or uppity unicorns, and that less than subtle message was not lost on the great and powerful Trixie.

“I… very well – if you absolutely must know, then the great and powerful Trixie hails from th-“ the unicorn mare began, but stopped mid sentence. She nodded, then floated off her hat and sighed: “The great and powerful Trixie exalted to mortal ponies of the earth, here in the hundred kingdoms. She then wandered for a few years, learning, gaining power, and then with that power summoned an army and took control of this pitiful place”

While Trixie’s story was essentially one of brutal conquest – then it wasn’t outside of the norm for the hundred kingdoms. Every day warlords across the east laid siege to weaker city states and noble holds, and a pony who randomly exalted into a unicorn who used that power to gain power over others? There were at least two dozen other unicorn kings and queens across the hundred kingdoms who could tell the same story – although whether any of them had done the same with an army of demons… but it had most likely been done before.

“Fair enough, but that doesn’t mean it’s ok for her to try to enslave us” Red quickly noted, seeing that the faces on her circlemates seemed to indicate understanding and fading hostility.

Nodding, Cash agreed: “You’re absolutely right Red. And if our lady Trixie here so readily believes that might makes right, then she has no choice but to submit to our judgment”

“Hey now, if I… if the great and powerful Trixie had known that you had powers she wouldn’t have ordered so” the unicorn half-heartedly apologized.

Speaker wasn’t impressed: “You know, in Lookshy I was always told that the chosen of the elemental air dragon Mela were thinkers – who always thought their actions through in great detail, leaving them prone to getting their head stuck in the clouds – but this? You seem oddly rash for a chosen of the air”

Cash found Speaker’s observations amusing – but also lacking in know-how regarding administrative screwups: “Oh it fits – think about it: She’s so focused on her greater goal of power and might that minor distractions like us don’t warrant greater thought”

This alternate elemental interpretation of Trixie’s behavior did match what Speaker had grown to expect from unicorns. What Speaker didn’t catch on to was that by such logic nearly any behavior could be excused to the impulses of a dragonblooded exaltation. Either way, Trixie seemed perfectly willing to agree to Cash’s statement.

“So… what are we going to do with her? With this place?” Sullen Hoof inquired. It was clear from the sound of his voice that he shared Red’s sentiment of punishing Trixie somehow… but he wasn’t sure how.

Sunrise cleared her throat, to signal that she wished to speak: “As exalt she has the right to rule, but as unicorn she should not be allowed to exercise power over her betters. I suggest that Cash swear her to fealty and order her to slowly banish her demon army in favor of a militia of mortal ponies”

“No! That would make the great and powerful Tri- oww” Trixie began, as Shimmer finally swatted her over the back of her head: “Talk normally or I’ll hit harder”

Trixie drew a sharp breath, with equally sharp winds briefly coursing around her – the air even abuzz with the kind of strange feeling some got just before thunder storms – but it all faded again as Trixie managed to control her anger of being forced to talk like a commoner: “Very well. Banishing my demons? Not an option: When I scattered the forces of the former lord of this land, they fled into the forests and have been harassing me ever since – preventing merchants from coming and every week stealing away more ponies from the city here. If I give up my demon army they’ll all come back and buck me out!”

“And letting you keep them will change that? If the ponies you rule keeping running away you’ll end up ruling nothing but an empty city full of demons – Lookshy will not let that stand” Speaker noted, referring to the fact that Lookshy was well known for stomping out rogue demons and the likes whenever they appeared in the hundred kingdoms, as well as any ponies who actively supported them.

The look on the unicorn mare’s face soured, as did her entire body language. It seemed clear that she had not considered how the greater powers of the hundred kingdoms might respond to her particular style of gaining and maintaining power. Still, she was smart enough to spot a solution: “What if I only send back part of my forces? The firmin and those infernal hopping puppeteers have been nothing but trouble”

“Hopping puppeteers?” Sullen Hoof whispered to Speaker quizzically.

As Cash, Sunrise and Shimmer proceeded to negotiate with Trixie on how she could step down her forces and possibly bring back the ponies she was trying to rule, Speaker quickly explained: “Think a living ball of demon yarn, with string-legs up to a hundred yard long – think living ropes and pulleys. I can understand why they would be trouble though, they like to play with foals… and the foals rarely survive the encounter”

Sullen Hoof found the idea of a sentient ball of demon yarn somehow ‘playing’ with a foal to the extent that it would kill the foal absolutely horrifying. Even the fact that the firmin would decorate their nests of needles with dead ponies paled in comparison, at least to Sully.

Having come to a reasonably amicable agreement, Trixie invited the circle to dine with her – that they might come to slightly more friendly terms with one another. Speaker found this offer a bit odd, but figured that Trixie had probably just decided to make friends with what she couldn’t defeat – an overall wise choice.

As servants zipped back and forth to prepare a late lunch, Shimmer pulled Speaker aside…

“Can you see any demons or spirits around here?” she hurridly asked, the mare’s eyes and ears darting all over the place – unsure if invisible demons might be observing the two.

Speaker looked around, seeing nothing, even with his spirit-seeing charm on: “Nope, we’re clear”

“The demons here – they’re not acting right. I’ve seen dozens of demons bound by realm unicorns. They all act funny, since their minds are slaved to their summoners – but these demons… they’re not acting like that at all” Shimmer said in a most worried tone.
The behavior of summoned demons was not a topic that Speaker recalled much of from the first age. He remembered something about plates of some kind, of how they would put a shape to the minds of demon slaves: “Couldn’t it just be that Trixie is using a binding you don’t know of?”

“I think it’s more likely that there’s little or no binding at all – Trixie said herself that she has no formal schooling in sorcery… which makes me really curious about who or what she learned sorcery from to begin with” The lunar stated, looking out of a window that overlooked the city. The string-legged marotes, the hopping puppeteers, were leaping about with lumber and blocks of firmin resin, building strange monuments while demolishing other structures…
> Chapter 54: The Great and Powerful Deciever
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The dinner that Trixie’s servants had prepared were clearly marked by her lordship’s own personal preferences: Baked pinecones from the local forests, apple cider, and some kind of ground up creamy nut spread on dry biscuits. That Sullen Hoof was able to hold his tongue as he nibbled this abomination of cuisine was a testament to the Orichalcum Chef’s resolve, but at the same time Sullen Hoof had promised the rest of the circle that he would only speak up about the food itself if his expert taste-buds detected poison or other things in the food that just should be there… and seeing Trixie lather up the nut spread on the baked pinecones was certainly getting close to that.

While pretending to enjoy the meal – knowing all too well that Sullen Hoof could undoubtedly have made something far more interested with a bowl of mud and moldy rice – Cash politely followed up on the previous concessions that Trixie had agreed to: “So, regarding the dismissal and banishment of the marottes and firmin, when will that be possible?”

The Great and Powerful Trixie looked pensive for a moment, then began: “The Great and po-“ but started over after Red sent her a particularly nasty glare: “I should be able to begin the ritual after dinner”

“Good, the sooner the better. Say, what kind of ritual are we talking about? I’ve seen dozens of marottes and firmin here – the usual demon banishment spell only works on one at a time” Shimmer noted, also pondering if she could subtly shapeshift her jaw and teeth to easier eat the baked pine cones.

Trixie reassured Shimmer that such wouldn’t be necessary: “The terms of their summoning state that they are to stay until such a time that they are not needed. I simply have to order them gathered up and then make the proper announcement”

Shimmer gave Speaker a very worried look – but Sunrise spoke first: “No dismissal spell? No spreading of sands? How do you expect them to return to the demon realm?”

Despite his memories of sorcery being more of a ‘I recall having done this and that’ sort, then Speaker knew enough that sands were an integral part of summoning and peaceful banishment… it had something to do with the demon realm being surrounded by an infinite border of sandy desert as part of the prison nature of the demon realm, so to summon demons or send them back peaceably you needed to cover an area of ground in sand so it stretch beyond the summoners line of sight. It didn’t have to be much, it could just be a patch of sand that stretched around a corner, or a vast swath of desert that stretched beyond the horizon – demons could use both to appear and leave… and Trixie was using none of it.

The unicorn looked unperturbed: “Sand? What? No, I just have to tell them to go home”

“No, that’s not demon banishment works!” Shimmer shouted, her purple dreadlocks bobbing up and down as she reared up and stomped in the ground demonstratively. The mere thought of thusly releasing a swarm of demons into creation horrified Shimmer.

Between with everyone in the circle looking at her in a very “if you keep doing what you’re doing we’ll hurt you” – Cash and Sullen hoof subtly communicated their dismay, while Red and Shimmer were very direct in expressing their dismay.

Looking between Sunrise and Shimmer, Trixie took a series of slow but deep breaths, evaluating her options. She had little love for her demon minions, but they were HER minions – and the only reason she was doing as these other ponies ‘had suggested’ was because… well… they were evidently greater and more powerful than her.

This did not sit well with Trixie – but by her own adminision she was tirred of having tearful mares taking up her time when she was holding court, requesting that their foals be returned to them after those bundles of demon yarn stole them. Why couldn’t they see that those demons were needed to build Trixie a magnificent palace? The locals certainly couldn’t provide such craftsponyship, but still... it would be nice to have less complaints. Perhaps there was a way to keep at least some of them in a more disciplined form, while banishing or sacrificing the rest?

Turning to the assembled pile of wiggling string demons and overgrown infernal hedgehogs, Trixie flared her anima – swirling wind and slight crackles of lightning appearing around her, making for an awe-inspiring display of power: “Demon minions, hear your mistress! The Great and Powerful Trixie tires of the complains she constantly receives of missing pets and kidnapped foals, so… something has to change”

Looking at the circle, Trixie smiled: “These fine ponies will arrange for the banishment ritual – and will pick out those among you who are to be sent back to the dark place from whence you came”

As Trixie trotted over to the circle, Speaker couldn’t help but think wether this was a good idea. She could at least have told the circle if she’d planned on having them do the banishing… but none of them had known that she didn’t really know to banish demons.

Damnit. Even without his first age memories, then Speaker knew that the very few sorcerers in Lookshy schooled in summoning were first taught how to banish demons – just like Shimmer and Sunrise had done back in Sully’s old manse.

Cash sighed, looking at Red and Sunrise: “How quickly can you two do away with all of them?”

Sunrise hadn’t really exhibited any happy or cheerful emotions since… well… she’d brainwashed herself back in Chung Do – and that had been a kind of manic and crazed kind of happy. With what Cash had just said to her and Red, Sunrise smiled… a lot. It was a menacing smile, one of great zeal that yearned to smite demons – especially considering what Trixie had just said about missing pets and foals. The firmin, their minds little more than that of dogs, sensed her righteous fury and became unseasy.

“We could probably do away with them fairly quickly...” Red said confidently.

It was then that Trixie fell over as she was sauntering away from the circle… and then she started wiggling around, as if going through spasms or having a seizure of some kind. Speaker rushed over to her and fired off his medical diagnostic charm – in an instant he knew everything there was to know about Trixie’s body – but… what he learned made him recoil in horror…

Shimmer, sensing Speaker’s distress as he stumbled backwards away, ran up to him: “What’s wrong?”

“Trixie… she’s – that’s not a pony” Speaker said, not knowing what to think.

Raising a hoof to strike down at Trixie, Shimmer’s hoof dissolved into protean moonsilver then reformed as a metallic clawed… thing. With these claws she ripped Trixie’s spar-spangled cloak from the unicorn mare’s body, revealing a strangely pale form underneath. It looked lumpy, wrong, misshapen – not like that of a pony… but a quick glance with essence sight explained it all: “She’s got a perronele on her – it’s choking her!”

Shimmer knew well how to deal with a perronele. She’d fought plenty of realm unicorns outfitted with living demon armor, for such was the nature of the slimy creatures – they would adhere to their master, or those they were ordered to slither up on – and since they would bond seamlessly with their ‘wearers’ flesh, they could be worn underneath regular armor… which made for really tough foes – unless you knew charms that would specifically harm demons and the like…

Slashing with her claws at Trixie’s flanks and ribs, the misshapen form jiggled unnaturally and bled a milky white kind of puss – then about three dozen shrieking mouths formed on Trixie’s body, all hollering at Shimmer to stop like a choir of raspy voices: “Stop or she dies!”

“I don’t have to fiend, you’re going back to malfeas!” Shimmer called out, focusing on the now revealed demon as she willed into function the ancient spell simply known as ‘first circle demon banishment’ – probably because it was less  a spell and more an ancient invocation of the primordial surrender oaths. Trixie’s flesh seemed to twist and turn from light blue to murky white, but then the perronele was ejected from the unicorn’s body as the banishment spell took hold of the demon and in a silvery flash. Trixie instantly sucked in a heavy breath of air – her demon armor no longer trying to suffocate her, but as she staggered to her feet, looking at the tangled mass of marrotes who appeared to be weaving themselves together to form tightly wound rolls, while the firmin seemed to be mindlessly making piles of oddly shaped needles.

It was at that moment that Trixie looked back at Speaker, her coat still ruffled and wet from the slime demon that had been covering her, with an absolutely horrified look in her eyes. Then her gut burst open, but not in any ordinary way, as a large beetle with far more legs than were normal leapt out of Trixie. The ‘wound’ it left was unlike anything Speaker had ever seen, and while Shimmer seemed to tangle with the demonic insect, the solar healer despaired as he tried to make sense of it: Trixie’s flesh was not torn, it was simply… open, and there were ‘droplets’ of it on the ground, with even her organs having been ‘parted’, and much of her insides had been muddled together, like how a shallow puddle after a foal had jumped around in it.

The commotion with Trixie and the demons inside and on her had not gone un-noticed, but without any definitive orders to go ahead and banish all the assembled demons Red hesitated – and she held Sunrise back as well, unsure whether the holy mare’s voice would be able to handle that many demons at once before they would overwhelm her and then them. Sure, Red knew that she could hold her own no problem against the bloodhounds and whatnot, but how would use a blade to turn away a magic dance from living silver flames? And did that bug just swim out of the unicorn?

Red longed for the fighting pits of Nexus – life in those were so much simpler, and they came applause as well.

Despite Speaker’s supernatural healing powers then it was clear to him that pretty much everything inside of Trixie’s chest and stomach was blurred together – as if all of her organs and most of her bowels had been dissolved and mixed together. Her face was less tortured now that he’d managed to use his anesthetic charm, but the only way he could see fixing her would be removing all of her organs, then using his charms to regenerate them all – and anesthetic or not, that wouldn’t be a pleasant experience. It would also be troublesome, since it meant removing Trixie’s ability to breathe while doing it all. The only upside that Speaker could think of would be that with his instant treatment metholody charm, then this could all be over quickly.

Cash, having looked back and forth between the demon string bundles, the needle demons and Trixie, wasn’t really sure what to do. Shimmer seemed to have de-legged the demon beetle, and Speaker was gutting the unicorn – Sullen Hoof was nowhere to be seen, probably using stealth charms to sneak away and get an overview of the situation… and what were those marrotes building? They were stringing their legs together into thick rolls, or like logs, and they were building them together. Oh well, Speaker and Shimmer seemed to have their end under control – and Trixie didn’t look gutted anymore: “You lot ok?”

“She’ll live – but I have no idea why her demon armor and stomach bottle bug suddenly tried to kill her. No demon bound properly should be able to suddenly do that” Shimmer noted, Speaker giving her a nod about Trixie’s condition now that he’d basically regrown everything he’d removed, leaving a very ugly looking pile of organ and bowel tissue to spread an expanding puddle around it. Not even flies seemed to want to go near it.

“Trixie, what’s going on?” Speaker asked, the unicorn mare finally having drawn enough breath to speak again.
The horrified look on the dragonblooded Trixie’s face – even before she spoke – told Speaker that something was wrong, but he couldn’t tell what: “They… Fluvio said they didn’t need me anymore”

“Shimmer, does that mean what I think it means?” Speaker tentatively asked, knowing all too well what the answer most likely was – and what the implications of it was…

The lunar wasted no time answering, instead shifting into her beast-pony war-form and taking to the skies. She was quickly interrupted, as the marrotes – who had built themselves into a series of ballistas, fired several of their own as living munitions at her, entangling her.

“Sunrise, sing!” Speaker barely managed to shout before the pain of silver fire eating at his soul wracked him with torment – silver flame demons dancing their dance of extinguishment from somewhere unseen, targeting him. In what few moments of clarity Speaker he could muster, he was able to piece together that this meant that there was something or someone coordinating the demons.

Sunrise quickly inhaled to bring her smiting words to bear, but found her and Red bombarded by the firmin demons who threw shuriken-like sharp flat disks at them with surprising speed and force. Red was able to parry most of them, and the rest didn’t harm Sunrise thanks to her advanced defensive charms, but they were all targeting her head – making concentrating for the verbal smiting charm rather impossible.

Suddenly the marrote balistas collapsed, their draw-strings of extremely taught inter-woven marrote legs snaping as cleavers sailed through the air around them in a tornado of cooking equipment and surprisingly sharp or pointy vegetables, all hardened by the essence of one Orichalcum Chef – who in turn quickly found himself dodging dozens of string-thin but demonically strong legs that were trying to kick him to death.

Shimmer found herself torn as she looked at Speaker, silver flames bursting from his eyes, ears, nostrils and mouth – and then Red and Sunrise. She knew quite well that if Sunrise could get a moment of uninterrupted peace she could smite all these damnable creatures of darkness around them, but she so wanted to help Speaker as well by getting him away from whatever was hurting him.
Ultimately it turned out to be a moot point: The firmin and marrotes suddenly disengaged their targets and slinked away, and the flames that assailed Speaker died down – but in return the ground rumbled, loudly.

The castle courtyard quickly became a very perilously place to be, as the walls began to crumble – and moments later the main keep collapsed as well, revealing that most of the city, built with timbers as opposed to the stone brick castle, was holding up a lot better… but there was also a clamoring of panicking ponies coming from the city.

“What’s happening? Why did the demons retreat?” Red shouted as she turned around, trying to spot whatever the source of the tremors could be, as well as keeping an eye out for demons.

To Speaker the quaking of the ground was a lesser threat compared to the demon issue, and Trixie had yet to explain what this ‘Fluvio’ had meant by not needing her anymore – but before such questions could be asked the answer to both the quakes and the demon retreat reared its head at the center of the city, as a giant demon reared it head… and its crown of broken teeth.

From the crumbled castle walls the circle watched in horror as a stone-skinned demon, with boulders as muscles and dragon-legs beneath its bulk laughed heartedly – with a deep and menacing voice. As it took its first few steps the ground quaked ever so slight, and its head reached just above most of the one-story houses it passed, making the demon far bigger than anything the circle had so far tangled with.

“What is that thing? Trixie, is this something you’ve summoned?” Shimmer angrily shouted, her war-form’s beak clacking together as she rapidly spoke.

The unicorn took one brief look, then hid behind rubble as her voice quivered: “No, never seen it before”

The look on unicorn said it all: She clearly knew that she was way in over her head – and that it was probably her fault somehow… even if it wasn’t entirely apparent how at the moment. When Speaker had a look at the thing he found that he recognized it, for he had known one of the two Solars who had defeated the demon during the primordial war: “That’s Octavian, defining soul of the Ravine of whispers – a second circle demon”

“Can we kill it?” Red wondered.

Speaker shrugged and stated: “You don’t kill a second circle demon, they come back to life a year and a day after falling in battle...”  but after seeing Red’s expression change from eagerness to despair, he quickly added that the demon would respawn in the demon realm: “So killing him here will work – yes – but he’s tough as hell, one of the most powerful second circle demons”

“A worthy opponent then” Red cheerfully stated, her grin saying all that needed to be said of her martial intent.

Sunrise was less eager to engage the demon directly, being more worried about how such a thing could have appeared in the first place: “Wait, unicorn’s can’t summon second circle demons – can they?”

“Not even in the realm – you’re right, so how did ugly down there appear?” Shimmer wondered, feeling reasonably apprehensive about fighting such a thing consider what happened the last few times she engaged a big muscly monster… mainly that she usually ended up with a limb missing or being bisected.
“Trixie, how many demons did you summon in total?” Speaker inquired, having observed the city with essence sight and not liking what he was seeing…

The unicorn looked up at the old stallion and shrugged: “I stopped counting. One per day – for about half a year”

Shimmer quickly half-stepped half-flew over to Trixie and began shouting: “One per day? That’s not how you summon an army of demons – you summon that in one sitting. What kind of half-flanked ritual did you use for this?”

Trixie looked up at Shimmer with tears in her eyes. This so wasn’t what she’d wanted – and her belly still hurt a little from having been disemboveled and then ‘fixed’ again – and everything was falling apart – and now the western mare was a monster! It was just too much: “I… I don’t know, I just did what Fluvio told me to do, like, draw some marks in the ground and do some weird chants”

The unicorn floated up a rock shard and traced a few sigils in the ground and recited a bit of what she remembered from the words that her demon-armor/advisor had instructed her in… and Sunrise quickly face-hoofed upon realizing what Trixie had done, for she had been taught in Great Words that what Trixie had done was very much forbidden: “That’s the ritual of spirit beckoning – for summoning unbound demons…”

“But why would they obey her then?” Cash wondered, not seeing how that would make sense at all.

Shimmer shook her head with all three eyes closed: “It’s obvious: So she would summon more demons – and be a front to whatever they were doing in summoning their true master”

“Perhaps, but demons cannot summon other demons – this Octavian demon shouldn’t have been able to appear” Sunrise insisted.
Speaker took a deep breath: “The marrotes and firmin – that’s why they were summoned too. Trixie, they’ve been rebuilding the city, haven’t they?”

“Yes, they said it would be more grand and worthy of their great and power mistress… but they lied” Trixie said in between sobs and sniffles.

Raising an eyebrow at Trixie’s wording, Speaker shook his head: “No, they weren’t lying – they just didn’t mean you. Shimmer, check out the geomancy of the city – it’s all wrong for a terrestrial city, but you know what looks like? A tiny piece of Malfeas”
Shimmer gasped as she peeked over the rubble down at the city with her third eye: “Crap… so that’s how they did it”

Red and Sullen Hoof both expressed confusion over how corrupting local essence flows would allow for a demon lord to appear in creation. Speaker quickly explained that in the first age some Solars, including himself, built several spots around Creation that uniquely identical geomancy: “Because if it matches perfectly then… well… those places literally become the same place – the demons have done the same, making the center of the city into a part of hell, allowing their lord, the master of that bit of hell, to pass through… as well as any number of other demons”

“Well that’s bad” Red glumly said, not enjoying the prospect of fighting an endless tide of demons.

Shimmer laughed as she began to shapeshift her war-form’s feathers into a carapace of essence-hardened bone: “No it’s not – because its real ease to mess up geomancy! We just need to wreck all the things the firmin and puppeteers have built, or enough of it, and Octavian will be sucked back into hell!”

Red and Sullen Hoof both looked at Speaker as if asking whether Shimmer was right. Speaker nodded: “Well she’s sort of right – but I’m not sure if wrecking the city will be enough. Malfeas is a chaotic place, often ruined when the demons fight among each other… so I think the best thing would be to rebuild the city in a different geomantic pattern”

“And how long will it take you to build a few buildings to do that?” Red asked, as if also asking “How long do I need to hold the demons at bay?”

Shaking his head, Speaker sighed deeply and willed forth Gift: “Not an option – too much of the city is built out of wood. Even Shimmer had to summon elementals to bring in stone for the Chung Do reconstruction. Our best bet is getting Sunrise in the middle of them and her singing them into oblivion”

“Then get on, the lunar express is going straight there” Shimmer said, extending a bone-plated wing for the circle as a gang-way for them to get up on her via.

As the rest of the circle crowded up on Shimmer’s back in her huge beast-pony form, Speaker and Red talked tactics. Sullen Hoof insisted that he had a quick way of dealing with the demon lord, while Speaker was more worried about the Saigoth dancers, the demonic silver flames, since they would be able to attack the circle from hidden locations with their dances.

“Deadling… seriously, these demons are fucked up” Red sighed, forming a new shimering grand daiklaive out of her own essence. It floated above the circle and was almost longer than Shimmer was in her war-form.

Cash, having remained fairly quiet during the in-flight tactics discussion, nodded while looking rather thoughtful.

“Just stay out of trouble Cash – I don’t think these demons are willing to stop and chat once we get there” Red mused.

Shimmer hadn’t been kidding when she had said that she planned to fly into the thick of the demon infestation. As she rose from the ruined castle courtyard she dove straight for the demon lord, plowing through  several webs of raised marrote legs – but her bone-armor sliced through them with ease.

The circle disembarked and enganged their targets as Shimmer passed them, Cash getting off early as they passed through the outer perimeter of demon leg-string webs, while the rest got closer to the demon lord itself.

As planned Sunrise remained on Shimmer’s back, releasing a righteous aria that trailed an ashen howl on pain from the demons in range of her holy smiting. Shimmer in turn shielded Sunrise from the hail of firmin needles flung at them, while Red and Speaker engaged whatever demons they could spot.

Sullen Hoof had leapt off Shimmer so that he would land very close to the demon lord. Retrieving from elsewhere a hoof-full of small and delicate looking crystal vials, Sullen Hoof tumbled to a halt in front of the grand demon…

It had looked big from up at the castle. Up close it looked grotesque, like a living statue of roughly hewn dirty brown rock, all covered in black oil that kept dripping from its body… it also had a shrunken pony head hanging by its belt, how lovely. To Sullen Hoof it mattered little, for  it was about to perish by its own might.

With no fanfare or dramatic gestures the night caste Solar pony emptied the contents of the vials into the air before him, it floating like a slightly opaque sphere of liquid before him. With a furious thought the sphere was jettisoned towards the demon lord as a fine misty spray, covering most of the demon’s stony bulk.

The demon lord smacked its lips, its broad mouth extending far beyond what a normal pony mouth would on a face, making Octavian’s head look oddly tiny compared to its cavernous maw full of sharp white jade teeth: “What is this? An attempt to flavor me?”

With lightning speed the demon reached for Sullen Hoof, who adroitly dodged and leapt up Octavion’s outstretched arm, pots and pans appearing from elsewhere and quickly picking up speed as Sullen Hoof brought forth his tornado of cooking implements – pummeling the demon who only smiled at the seemingly feeble dents made on its stony exterior.

“Foolish pony, I am the living tower! No food can tempt me, for my oil is all I can ever taste!” the demon lord rumbled, Sullen Hoof suddenly finding his hooves slipping – despite his supernatural balance charms being in effect.

With a surprisingly nimble twist the demon shook Sullen Hoof of himself and caught him mid-air, ignoring the cast-iron cookware that spun around the pony, as Octavian brought the solar up to his face: “Did the idiot sorceress send her chef to battle me? Bring your mistress before me, that I may claim this place as my own by right of bloody conquest”

It never struck Sullen Hoof as odd that a demon lord spoke the river tongue, but he wasn’t in much of a position to indulge in intellectual or linguistic pursuits. With a trick of the tail Sullen Hoof briefly dissolved into multiple shadows that each leapt in a different direction, with the real Sullen Hoof appearing up on Octavian’s head. He gave no retort to the demon’s demands, merely dodging and striking over and over as demon lord tried to swat him.

With the demon lord suitably distracted, albeit not eating himself as was planned, Shimmer swooped in from above with Sunrise on her back, having left a trail of smoldering demon husks in their wake from Sunrise’s furious oratorical smiting. Like a golden comet they came around a clock-tower and were almost instantly in range for Sunrise to give Octavian a word or two on holy fire – but as they approached the demon lord, in a brief moment of surprisingly situational awareness spun around a flung an arm in Shimmer’s direction. The lunar and solar were very much out of reach of the demon lord, but that didn’t seem to bother Octavian, as the oil on his arm and stone-clawed fist were propelled further beyond, splattering across the two… and thus Shimmer quickly plummeted from the sky, shrieking like a large bird. Sunrise on the other hoof didn’t speak a word as she fell, probably because she either expected Shimmer right herself and carry her on, or because she had survived worse falls thanks to her shield charms.

Speaker heard Shimmer cry out and saw the lunar and Sunrise plummet. It was a short fall, Shimmer having come in low to buzz Octavian with a verbal barrage from her passenger – but why would Shimmer fall from the sky? He’d never seen that happen before. Moving away from the firmin he was exchanging volleys with, alternately flinging Gift and firmin needle-spears that he’d parried and caught back at the demons, augmented by his spirit/demon slaying charm, Speaker quickly found Shimmer writhing around on the ground in her animal form in the middle of the thatched house she had crashed into…

“What’s wrong Shimmer, speak to me!” Speaker inquired, trying to do a quick diagnosis of the war-formed Lunar – but there seemed to be something interfering with usual instant diagnosis charm.

As he tried to poke and prod Shimmer to get a sense of what was wrong, aside from most of her being covered in black demon oil – which while sticky didn’t seem to adversely affect Speaker at all as he cleared most of the stuff away from Shimmer’s face – he suddenly felt a hoof on his shoulder. Turning, he saw that it was Sunrise… who was trying to mouth something, but not saying a word. It looked almost as if she was drunk, but it quickly became apparent that she was more distressed than intoxicated.

“I… cangt heer” Sunrise finally managed to say, clearly sounding very uncertain as to whether what she wanted to say was what she was actually saying – for by her own testimony, then she had been struck deaf, and Speaker quickly spotted the culprit: Demon oil had splattered on her left ear. This quickly explained why Shimmer hadn’t responded to Speaker at all: Her entire face had been covered in oil… she couldn’t hear him – and perhaps the oil had affected other bits of her as well! 

Quickly examining the lunar’s eyes, Speaker saw that they had turned completely black. Blindness. No wonder Shimmer had found herself unable to fly properly... she hadn’t been able to see where she was going anymore!

“Red, can you hear me? We need to end this, now!” Speaker shouted.

With a little bit of quick tactical thinking, Speaker quickly wrote a few words on the ground and pointed Sunrise at them: “Guard Shimmer, your smiting charm works by holy intent, don’t need words, keep going”

Sunrise nodded as Speaker ran off to find Red – he had to, for they were the two only capable warriors left in the circle who could take on Octavian, assuming that Sullen Hoof had managed to soften the demon lord up as planned, because judging from the noise in the demon lord’s direction then Sully hadn’t managed to get the demon lord to eat himself to death. Oh this was bad… with Shimmer out of the picture, and Sunrise looking unsure of how to use her smiting charm without her voice, this wasn’t plan B anymore. Plan C was right out, and plan D wouldn’t work without Shimmer being able to turn into fish.

As he galloped towards the spot where Red was supposed to be thinning out the demons, Speaker couldn’t help but spot the absolutely terrified pony citizens that peered out from their homes with fear in their eyes. Taking a deep breath Speaker steeled himself, knowing full well that all of the ponies in the city were doomed if him and Red didn’t stop Octavian. A stray thought occurred to Speaker: He had never learned the name of the city… he had no idea what the name of the place he was defending was.

“Red, where are you?” Speaker shouted, as Octavian suddenly tumbled through a half-timbered building, the thatch clinging to his oil form as the structure collapsed around him in a plume of dust and horrid shrieks from the ponies that had been hiding inside. It was like the original fight with the Bodhisattva in that village north of Chung Do… also Red was apparently the reason that Octavian had toppled over.

With a battle fury that creation had not seen for over three thousand years, Red had struck at the demon lord with her blade forged of her own golden essence. Sure, the demon lord had parried the blow effortlessly with his giant staff of strangely discolored and most likely demonic iron, but the force of the impact had sent Octavian reeling, despite being many times larger than Red, which had allowed Sullen Hoof to pummel him even more, and at this point the demon lord did look a bit worse for wear thanks to the masterful strikes from the most blessed culinarian: Sullen Hoof had literally been tenderizing the demon lord stone-wrought flesh, making it so much easier for Red to cleave it with her grand daiklaive, which meant that Octavian did have several lacerations which bled more of the black oil that coated his form… black oil that stained the dirt it landed on white.

The fight between Octavian and the two solars might even have been won by the two exalts, had Octavian not already struck his fair share of blows against Sullen Hoof and Red. Speaker could tell that the night caste solar wasn’t using his left fore-leg at all, and while Red was wearing her armor then quite a lot that armor was broken and shattered from repeated blows from the demon lord – and her injuries underneath left a constant trail of blood that made Speaker wonder how Red was even still conscious.

With a final twirl of his mighty staff Octavian struck Red down while mid-leap before Speaker could even think about joining the fight, impacting with such a force that the ground shook once more – and again when Red impacted the ground, her blade of essence exploding in a puff of white and golden sparkles as Red was rendered unconscious… or worse – it wasn’t exactly easy to tell from the dust and debris of the house she had been whacked into.

Speaker rushed to Red’s aid, but before he could get to her they were joined by Sullen Hoof as he was flung into the building – and without even the broken armor that Red had been wearing, then Sullen Hoof was much worse for wear.

Spending far too much essence, Speaker pumped life back into the two ponies – bringing them back from the very brink of death in but a heartbeat – but at the price of leaving his back turned to Octavian, the demon lord, who raised his mighty staff of malfean iron for a final blow to finish all three solars in one blow. This would be Octavian’s greatest victory! Killing three solars in one blow would cement his reputation in Malfeas… and with any luck there would be at least enough remains of their skulls, that they might join the shrunken head of the solar that Octavian already wore around his belt.

Speaker only managed to turn in time to see the towering demon lord begin his strike. The motion was so swift, and with a strength that had conquered the single largest hold within the demon realm – an entire quarter of one of the many shells of malfeas’s twisted and surreal geography, giving Octavian the grand title of “The Quarter Prince” among other demons.

The staff of malfean iron, tempered with acid from the Sea that Marched Against the Flame, flew through the air – leaving mournful gasps from the few air elementals that were in the area – and Speaker wished in that split second that he had made another deal with Lytek to not remove any memories, next time he was to reincarnate… In fact, that should totally be on his to-do list if he ever got the chance. Of course, he wouldn’t, now that Octavian had killed him.

Wait… hold on. He hadn’t been killed yet.

Looking up, Speaker saw the demon lord howling a scream that could not be heard by pony ears, as the demon lord faded from the reality that was Creation. Perplexed, Speaker looked around to find a reason for Octavian’s sudden disappearance… 
> Chapter 55: The Rise of The Knights Hospitaler
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shaking his head at the sudden disappearance of the demon lord Octavian, the Living Tower, the Quarter Prince, the defining soul of the Ravine of Whispers, Bright Machine Speaker looked to the heavens in confusion… and saw that the sun was no longer green with emerald fire. Of course, the city’s geomancy!

With essence sight Speaker instantly confirmed his theory: While still horribly muddled, then there was enough natural elemental essence flowing through the city again the demonic geomancy had been disrupted to the point that it couldn’t allow for Octavian to be there. But how? Speaker hadn’t had time to build anything…

Turning his confusion and curiosity aside, Speaker turned to Red and Sullen Hoof. They were both stabilized, but still in very bad shape. Plus there was the blind and deaf Shimmer, and deaf Sunrise… oh this was such a mess… literally – since Speaker was still standing in the ruble and ruins of the house that Red had originally been smashed into.

“Hey, did you like my trick?” Cash shouted from out in the street.

Speaker peeked out into the street… and saw a sea of bouncing puppeteer demons – with Cash at the forefront. After doing a double take, Speaker finally simply asked, in bewilderment: “What…”

Beaming with pride, Cash explained that he found a large number of Marrotes and used his charms on them: “They’re completely under my control. I figured that since they weren’t really bound to our incompetent unicorn sorceress here, then I might as well take the reins…”

“Ok… makes sense, but how did you restore the geomancy of the city? You don’t know anything about geomancy!?” Speaker wondered.

Cash casually craned his head back at the tangle of demons behind him: “I just told them to do it – they didn’t need instructions… “

Shaking his head in disbelief, Speaker face-hoofed at the brilliance of Cash’s actions: “Why didn’t I think of that? That kind of plan is so…” 

“Not you?” Cash mused: “You prefer to do most of the work yourself. I thought more along the lines of brainwashing the demons so they would protect me, then I figured I could make them do stuff”

Cash ordered the demons to continue restoring and repairing the city and report back when done – with the added orders of not to harm or interact with the ponies of the city while doing so - then he helped Speaker get Red and Sullen Hoof out of the building ruins.

The four solars turned to look for Sunrise and Shimmer, with Speaker’s news of their condition worrying all of them greatly. Shimmer would have been pretty much completely incapable of defending herself, being unable to neither see or hear approaching demons – and Sunrise… well… without being able to hear what she said herself then how could she speak words of smiting?

They found Shimmer and Sunrise where Speaker had left them – surrounded by smoking husks of bloodhound demons. Shimmer was in her usual pony form again, with Sunrise sitting next to her, gently stroking her mane in a calming manner, as Shimmer wept. Around them the hopping puppeteers were already starting to pick apart the ruined house so it could be rebuilt, their hundred-yard long legs of string wound around roof fixtures and other buildings, making for complicated rope and pulley systems as they flung bits of broken timber and bundles of new thatch around like it was a game to them – one certainly wasn't in doubt why they were called hopping puppeteers with such a show… but there was one in the circle who couldn't appreciate the on-goings… 

“So… she can’t see or hear us? Damn…” Cash said, as they approached. Sunrise looked up, appearing tired enough not to question the actions of the demons around her but also elated that the battle had been won.

Shimmer turned around and sniffed the air, quickly honing in on Speaker’s scent, leaving her to sob on his shoulder. It was then Cash floated up a stick and began to poke Shimmer, which seemed to calm her down somehow… also his caste mark was glowing.
“Cash, what are you doing?” Red groaned, resisting the urge to pick at her wounds.

Watching as Shimmer seemed to slide down Speaker and settle on the ground – smiling for some reason – Cash chuckled: “I just used the stick to ‘write’ on her that even if the effect is permanent all Speaker as to do is remove the bad eyes and ears and regrow new ones – but to be perfectly honest, I don’t think this will be permanent”

“What makes you think that?” Sullen Hoof said very quietly, his breathing labored.

Cash explained that he faintly seemed to recall having ‘used’ Octavian’s oil in the first era – namely because his oil had the power to temporarily disable senses, but most importantly also wipe memories if applied properly: “Mind you, I can’t remember how long the effect is… or why I used it back then, but does this ring any bells Speaker?”

“If it works like a magical poison then it probably won’t last more than a day or two – especially for something only applied forcefully to the skin. Come on, let’s get them back to the castle and survey the damages” Speaker said hopefully.

At the castle of the city, which Cash noted was called Six-Leaves – the circle found a very distraught unicorn sorceress. Cash urged Speaker to go tend to the rest of the circle, to speed up their recovery for their eventual continued journey to the god of the grey river “Mud of the Lotus”, while Cash walked off with Trixie for what Speaker assumed would a stern talking to on the art of governance and how not to fuck up summoning demons.

By nightfall, thanks to Speaker’s healing charms and supernatural medical insights, Red and Sullen Hoof were up and about once more. Sunrise and Shimmer didn’t show any immediate signs of improvement, but based on what Cash had said earlier then Speaker didn’t want to start amputating eyes and ears just yet – mainly because the time it would take to reacquaint one-self with re-grown body parts would mean even longer downtime before the circle was fully up to snuff again.

Cash in turn expressed that he was pleased with the headway he’d made on Trixie: “I think she’ll be a far more suitable ruler now”

“We’re still just going to leave her in charge here?” Red said, sounding eager to dish out at least a bare minimum of punishment for having unwittingly summoned an army of demons into Creation – a few of which had fled into the surrounding forests at this point, while most they had been sucked back into Malfeas along with their master from what Speaker called a ‘geomantic backdraft’.

It was with an oddly tired look that Cash explained to Red, in front of the rest of the circle, that if they had to stay in Six-Leaves to fix everything – which now once again flew its own yellow and green flags, instead of Trixie’s personal banners – then they would be there for too long to complete their task for the council of entities: “And honestly, I do want to make a good impression with them – even with the threat of blackmail I gave, they can still screw us and every other Solar that comes to Nexus over royally. They hold a lot of sway with the Guild high council, and if they desire it then the wyld hunt might start to see big discounts on weapons, mercenaries and information on Solar activity… we don’t want that”

Red conceded that Six-Leaves was just too small to be important enough to shore up – and indeed, Speaker too seemed eager to get back to his clinic in Firewander and finally push through the expansion he’d planned.

By noon the following day the sound of joyous cries resounded around the Six-Leaf castle, as Shimmer’s hearing and vision return – Sunrise equally relieved that she could hear hers and the voice of others again.

The day after that, in a completely repaired castle courtyard that showed no repairs wrought of demon resin, Trixie thought long and hard of how to bid the circle farewell, right after Cash had given his final orders to the bouncing puppeteer demons under his control: They were to wrap up the reconstruction of the city as per his previous orders, then return to the demon realm post haste.

Looking at the circle, the unicorn bowed her head. It was not easy for her to admit her mistake, but if not for the actions she would undoubtedly have died… or worse: “Thank you. I can’t imagine how this place would have looked by now if not for the six of you. I can only hope to achieve your levels of wisdom and power”

Trixie continued on for a while, with Shimmer whispering to Cash: “Just how much mind-control did you have to put on her to be this… nice?”

“Hardly any – I just convinced her to own up to her own faults, not pretend to be all-powerful, and then inspired her to work on what she wasn’t’ good at. She still wants to be great and powerful, but now she won’t claim to be already” Cash noted quietly.

With the kind words from the unicorn still fresh, Shimmer conjured a cloud for the circle to fly off on – since there were no yeddim in the city for Cash to do his thing on, and the rest of the circle refused to hunt down another bear for Cash to experiment with. As they flew off they could see the many ponies still flooding in through the city gates, Cash having sent out messengers to spread the news of the demons being gone.

“You lot think that they’ll let Trixie remain in charge?”  Sullen Hoof wondered out to the rest of the circle as he looked east.
Cash seemed certain that she could if she didn’t screw up again, noting that the few records he’d found of the previous ruler indicated that it was some run of the mill warlord who hadn’t been that popular either.

Several hours of cloud-powered east-bound flight later the circle approached Nexus and the end of the Yanaze river, or rather the beginning of it, as it was the merging of the grey and yellow river which formed. Flying south down the grey river for a bit, Shimmer landed and Sunrise sent a powerful essence-fueled prayer to Mud of the Lotus.

At first the circle was uncertain of what to expect: A martially inclined river god that counciled the eastern god of war on matters such as the battles that river pirates fight with their victims? Suddenly a water elemental in the form of a geyser with a watery pony face rose from the water, introducing itself as a representative of Mud of the Lotus’ court, adding that Water Strider had already notified its mistress of their plan and that measures had been taken to restore proper flow: “If you would allow me to transport you, then I would take your artificer to a set of black and red jade runes set into the river bottom about one and a half thousand miles south of here. They require an activation procedure we are not familiar with, but are critical to what you wish to achieve”

The direct and even blunt nature of the water elemental surprised everyone, but Speaker – eager to get all of this over with - said nothing. Like Water Strider, the elemental had a power that allowed it to move itself and others around on the river at supernatural speeds, meaning that Speaker found himself floating just above the silty and murky river bed in the blink of an eye. Elemental immunity charm on, he swam after the elemental as it guided him to a huge slab of black and red jade covered in runic etchings – it was at least twenty by thirty yards, with it being impossible gauge how thick it was. Up on the surface, where Speaker could talk amidst the mild background noise of nearby birds squawking, Speaker instructed the elemental to clear any sediments and silt away from the rune platform. The elemental disappeared underwater, while Speaker made his way to shore and bucked a tree.

The thick tree Speaker had struck, easily two meters in diameter, groaned for a moment then fell over as if having been cut in an instant – making for an awful lot of noise, but leaving behind a  very clean cut. Speaker  then used his essence to quickly fashion a very simple boat out of a section of the trunk, which he maneuvered out into the river over the jade device.

The song that was meant to activate the jade doohickey was difficult for Speaker to sing. First of all he couldn’t really remember it, but secondly then it was meant to be sung by mares… luckily Speaker knew more than enough about eastern jungle herbs to spot a patch of Tongue-Twister lilies growing on the bank. The parasitic flowers were growing off the side of a very tall tree, but Speaker cared little for their aesthetic value, instead utilizing them as he had once done with his buddies in the seventh legion when pulling pranks on uppity junior officers: The purple petals of the lilly, when ground into a paste and diluted in water – and then imbibed – would make one’s voice sound like a little filly.

It also tasted like rancid piss.

All the while spitting profucely and trying to rinse the foul taste out of his mouth with essence-purified river water, Speaker tried again to recall the ancient song he was meant to sing. The tune came to him first, but the lyrics eluded him.

Sitting in his little makeshift boat, in the middle of the river, humming the tune, Speaker looked around with essence sight. The subtle ripples that his humming was made was having an effect. Humming the tune louder, Speaker saw how the waters around him began moving faster: The few plants along the banks that floated on the surface of the water but had roots anchoring them began to drag and struggle to stay put.

The elemental appeared moments later, saying that the rune had gone active. Speaker sighed in relief and asked to be taken back to his friends.

After the elemental had stopped laughing at Speaker’s filly voice it complied, saying that it looked forward to seeing the river a bit more active.

“It’s not a permanent measure – The rune will only work for a month or so, then it should deactivate, but I can teach you the song that you need to get a mare or filly in a boat above the run to sing. Only use it here during the spring thaw and oncoming rainy season” Speaker explained, the elemental evidently having a hard time not giggling while the filly-voiced Solar spoke.

Upon returning to the circle, Speaker made an effort of not saying anything. He knew that the lilly-juice would wear off in a day or two – but then again, the mix he’d taken had been made with fresh petals in a very concentrated doze, instead of dried leaves with a dilution so thin that you couldn’t taste it. This… might be a problem, but Speaker got little time to think of that, as Shimmer quickly whisked the circle back to Nexus, sans Cash who’d apparently already been dropped off there to go and fetch Nah.

Apparently Cash didn’t want to get another yeddim to fly around him – and had thusly purchased another yeddim to fly up and fetch Nah on, with the intention to sell the new one. Speaker found this quite silly, but Shimmer was quick to point out that her and Speaker had a clinic to properly upgrade. Nodding in agreement, the two made their way to Firewander.

At first Speaker found it a bit worrying that he could sense the exact same ambient levels of wyld energy around the clinic via essence sight since he had last been there – despite having previously drained the local levels using his wyld shaping technique. For it to recover so quickly… that wasn’t good – but why didn’t that mean a larger overall ambient buildup?

Shimmer seemed more focused – and riled up – by the fact that someone had written “Anathema” on the clinic storefront in what looked like dried blood. She quickly concluded, by smell, that it was pigs blood. Speaker sighed in relief. It was then that the two heard a rustling inside the clinic.

There had never been a lock on the front door, only a wooden latch that any pony could open. Of course, there hadn’t been anything of value to steal inside ever since the last break-in, since most of the furniture was extruded from the same stone that the floor and walls were made of.

Speaker was about to casually go inside and check, but Speaker held him back and said that she would go first – it could be immaculate assassins lying in wait.

“Then there’s not very subtle assassins” Speaker said quietly, peeking inside.

Shimmer bobbed her head from side to side: “Some immaculates also think that their bright blue banners can’t be looked at by demons and heretics. That just means that they’re likely zealots we can’t reason with, as opposed to skilled killers who know to keep quiet… oh, and cute voice”

Speaker sighed, explaining that the effect should hopefully wear off in a few days… or weeks… hopefully – then marched inside the clinic with Shimmer.

It turned out to be a family of three squatter ponies that had taken up residence in the clinic. They weren’t really sick, but weren’t exactly shining examples of good health either. They were surprised that the landlords showed up – and made a quick scramble for the door, but Shimmer was quick to block their way. Speaker wasn’t sure if it was a territorial thing for Lunars, but he certainly saw no reason to punish the ponies for seeking refuge in his clinic.

“Listen, we’re actually looking to hire some ponies here to help out – yes I have a funny voice, that’ll wear off” Speaker said to the family.

The mother of the bunch, holding what looked to be a fairly baby foal in her hooves, with a young filly hiding behind her, looked wearily at Speaker: “Wha… What kind of work?”

“Nurses, that would be for you and your oldest daughter there – we’ll need a few more of course, and some orderlies – but I’m sure that it won’t be difficult to find unemployed ponies around here” Speaker explained.

The mare and her daughter thanked Speaker profusely, the filly saying “Thank you doctor Filly-voice”

By the end of the day word had spread that Speaker had returned and reopened the clinic – and that he was hiring. By recruiting from the patients that came in, Speaker found himself solving three problems at once, pleasing himself and Shimmer to no end: He made sure that the ponies he hired were in good health, that they genuinely liked him – which lessened the chance that they were immaculate spies, and in quite a few cases it meant that they could quit their far more dangerous jobs… jobs that in many cases had landed them in the clinic to begin with.

With a staff of two dozen nurses and half a dozen orderlies, certain logicistal challenges reared their ugly heads – but talking with the rest of the circle that evening back in the town house, Cash reassured Speaker that everything would be taken care of: “I’ll get you some nice cheap uniforms, no sense in giving your employees something that’s too valuable to begin with – and Sully, can you find them a reliable cook who won’t poison their patients?”

“What about that Grey Collection Agency? I remember we talked a while back that they might come at you again when we start showing that you can afford to pay staff” Red noted, adding that she wasn’t much for fighting urban guerrilla warfare – she had other more interesting fights to get into back at the fighting rings in Bastion district.

Cash made a dismissive gesture: “I wouldn’t worry – once I start selling off the stuff I brought back from the Denzik I’ll make them an offer they can’t refuse. With ponies like that you don’t win with hoofy-cuffs, but with economic warfare”

By noon the next day a cream-coated delivery pony with a stutter – which Speaker fixed up in no time – delivered four dozen off-white uniforms.

“Well, now we’ll have some spares – should be handy, especially until we find a laundry service to handle any dirty ones” Shimmer noted.

Assembling his staff in front of the clinic, Speaker told his employees in no uncertain terms what his plans were and more importantly what he and Shimmer was: “My name is Bright Machine Speaker, to you I will simply be Doctor while you work for me. As you all undoubtedly know, then I am a pony blessed with healing powers, among other things. The immaculates have decried me as anathema for that reason – but I can assure you that the source of my powers is as benign as the light of day, for I am exalted by the might of Celestia, the Unconquered Sun. My head nurse, Last Shimmer, is similarly blessed by the argent mare Luna, while my business partner and financial manager Cash Charmer whom I’m sure you’ll all meet at some point is equally blessed like me, by the same source. If you have any problem with that you should say so now, and do know that one of my powers is the ability to detect lies quite well, which I mostly use to tell if my patients are honest about the cause of their injuries”

There was some murmuring among the ponies. One of them, a young colt hired on as orderly, raised a hoof saying that he had a question: “So, uhm… you’re not evil?”

“I help ponies free of charge. Please tell me how that is evil” Speaker retorted.

Another asked how Speaker could afford to pay them, considering that he wasn’t charging for his services in the clinic. Speaker was about to say that Cash handled that, but Shimmer spoke first: “The clinic allows Speaker to help those truly in need which makes him happy, while rich ponies discreetly approach us for house-calls… which we charge quite handsomely for, allowing us to pay you and keep you happy”

The clinic staff all nodded, all of them apparently seeing the logic of such a business model right off the bat. Speaker whispered: “That’s not true, I told Cash I wouldn’t do concierge medicine”

“I never said you accepted those requests for housecalls – and trust me, you have gotten offers, I’ve just never relayed them to you” Shimmer said, someone whispering her reply without really moving her mouth.

Frowning, Speaker said that he’d like to at least know what the house-call requests were in the future for before having them turned down. Shimmer nodded.

“Ok, now, do you all promise to work diligently and honestly – and to accept my tutelage so I can ensure that all of you at least know the basics of healthcare for this job?” Speaker asked his employees, his lie-detector charm on.

All of the ponies said yes  - and about eight of them read as lying to Speaker. Sighing, Speaker directed Shimmer to distribute the uniforms inside the clinic, while he told the eight ponies who had read as lying to remain outside…

“You lot – you weren’t honest there. I told you I can sense lies” Speaker tried to say sternly. The filly voice didn’t help.

Sighing, Speaker sternly asked: “Were you planning on just trying to rip me off by doing nothing, or simply stealing whatever you could get your hooves on and then running off in the night? If so, just leave and don’t show your faces again”
Four of the ponies stepped back and quickly ran off.

Of the four remaining, a few more questions revealed that one of the others was a GCA spy – he was sent away just as quickly, although not before the pony had reiterated the GCA’s old threat to Speaker: “You just said you got money to spend – you’ll have to pay up now!” 

Of the three remaining ponies, two quickly spoke to their defence, saying that they weren’t all that keen on working for anathema, to which Speaked asked why in heavens they wanted to work for him to begin with. They said that it was for the money, which Speaker accepted and said that he had nothing against their personal convictions as long as they would agree to him teaching them to be proper nurses and orderlies, but the third one… a mare with an unkempt mane and muddied unshorn fetlocks, remained silent.

As the two other ponies walked into the clinic, leaving the last liar to stand before Speaker all alone, Shimmer came out to tell Speaker that all the others were ready for their first lesson. Seeing that Speaker wasn’t done with his interrogation, Shimmer strode up to the Solar: “Trouble?”

“She’s not saying anything…” Speaker said, sighing.

The mare, who looked fairly non-descript with her light-brown mane and coat, remained silent as Speaker once more tried to ask exactly what part of his previously stated job-requirements she didn’t agree to – and without Cash’s charms to allow him to directly compel the pony to speak, it seemed as if they at an impasse.

Sniffing around the mare, Shimmer scrunched her nose and gave a derisive snort: “She’s an immaciulate spy. She might have taken a dive in the river and rolled in mud to disguise herself, but I can still smell the incense and scented oils from their temple on her”

Her cover blown, the mare quickly took a step back, seemingly unsure whether Speaker and Shimmer would give chase. Speaker simply shook his head: “You just run along and tell you masters that if they leave us alone, then we’ll leave them alone”

As the mare ran off, Shimmer frowned: “We should have interrogated her further, with Cash. We need to know if they’re planning something”

“They wouldn’t tell a spy that. But tell me, what made you suspicious enough to sniff her out? You didn’t do that to any of the others” Speaker wondered.

With a hoof Shimmer stroked one of her purple mane’s dreadlocks: “Her mane. Even the poorest ponies here know to keep up a bare minimum of appearances. The only ones who allow themselves to be caked in mud are either addicts or mad-ponies who can’t take care of themselves anymore. The ones who have nothing but themselves still take pride in their own appearance”

“Very well” Speaker said, instructing Shimmer to get find replacements for the ponies that had failed the final job examination. It didn’t take many minutes for Shimmer to rustle up a hoof-ful of other wretches, although this time Speaker made sure to use his lie-detector charm sooner rather than later.

Finally fully staffed, Speaker used his educational charm on newly recruited staff to teach them the fundamentals of medicine and healthcare. Things like how to stitch up a shallow wound, administer creams and ointments, brew medicinal herbal teas. Once the initial lesson was over Speaker dismissed most of the staff, ordering them to go home and meditate on what they had been shown – explaining that the true impact of the lesson wouldn’t kick in until week later.

The few nurses who remained were the ones who, either from trial and error, or from their own families, had learned the basics of healthcare – and with them Speaker re-opened the clinic.

Over the next week the clinic began seeing a steady flow of costumers. Since last time the clinic was open word had evidently spread beyond Firewander, since now poor ponies from across Nexus began appearing.

When the rest of the staff returned, many of them truly surprised of the revelations they had experienced from Speaker’s lesson finally kicking in, Speaker finally changed the clinic’s sign to “Sun and Moon Hospital”, opening up for the upper floors and furnishing them with beds, chairs, small tables and even magic glow-stone lamps.

As part of the upgrade to hospital Cash also revealed part of what he’d been doing. He had bought up most of the buildings around the hospital – setting up a series of small businesses in one to help service the hospital, such as a laundry service, as well as a kitchen to feed the hospital staff and patients where Sullen Hoof found an acquaintance in the form of a skilled chef who seemed relieved to be making good food for ponies who genuinely hadn’t tried such things before.

With full staff, Speaker was able to re-prioritize his use of medical charms, since he no longer needed to use essence to speed up treatment due to having recovery rooms in his hospital. This allowed him to treat far more ponies every day.

It was a week later when the Grey Collection Agency showed up again.

Five ponies this time, a lead mare in a nicely embroidered grey jacket, flanked by four burly stallions with thick muscular legs and strong backs, clad in mercenary-grade lamellar armor, with thick iron horseshoes that clunked loudly against the stone cobble outside and stone floor inside the clinic.

Just after the white-coated mare that was helming the front desk stammered out a call for Speaker that there were ponies to see him, Speaker emerged to the sight of a somewhat familiar looking mare in a nice grey coat, along with her four bodyguards who were menacing the other ponies waiting in the lobby for diagnosis and treatment.

Sighing, Speaker walked past the mare with the grey jacket and stepped up to one of the bodyguards who were glowering at the sickly ponies sitting on the benches: “If you touch them, I will amputate whatever limb you do so with”

The mare was about to raise her voice and likely say something about Speaker having no right to intimidate her bodyguards, but as she drew breath to speak Speaker cleared his throat and pointed to a sign on the wall. It was a sign that Cash had put there, which had already entirely eliminated all the panhandlers, unsolicited petty merchants and scam artists that wanted to sell useless things to or con the hospital. Speaker had at first not entirely agreed with the wording of the sign, but after adding the fine print, he found that it worked remarkably well.

The sign read: “Any and all unsolicited attempts at selling the hospital or its working staff anything will result in unnecessary and un-anesthetized dental surgery” The fine print read: “For legitimate business offers sent inquiries to Cash Charmer” followed by the address of Cash’s office down the street.

The grey-jacketed mare cautiously ran her tongue over her teeth. As she motioned for her goons to leave, Speaker sighed in relief and returned to business as usual.

Over the next few days word spread further of the hospital, and its recovery wards were soon at full capacity. At the same it also became clear that the Grey Collection Agency wasn’t about to let up, as began to shake down Speaker’s employees when they returned to their homes. Only the homeless ponies that Speaker had employed and now also housed in a, all things conserved very nice, barracks-like tenement adjacent to the hospital that he’d had Cash set up, were able to dodge the shakedown.

This ended up with Speaker having to build two more apartment buildings, which took a few days, allowing him to house all of his employees and their extended families. Cash oversaw the management, via more sworn in goons.

Everything seemed good until a few days later when a unicorn monk and several dozen ponies with anti-anathema banners, torches and chants showed up...
> Chapter 56: Into Rainbow Flames
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The immaculate blockade of the Sun and Moon hospital was sudden and very noisy, as the crowd of ponies sang surprisingly creative but also nasty chants about dragons and unicorns killing anathema in all kinds of gory ways.

“With much scorn and horn, anathema limbs are torn – they blast their twisted bellies so their spawn is never born!” the crowd bellowed, among other nasty lyrics. Speaker and Shimmer both agreed that the foal-killing bits of their songs were particularly disgusting, but they were helpless to stop the event…

Cash had checked at the council offices, and apparently the immaculates had bribed the councilor in charge of day-time non-business on-goings for permission to harass Speaker’s business to their hearts content. This also meant that Speaker and Shimmer might face the wrath of the Emissary if they attacked the protest, so while Cash worked to sell enough western art pieces to be able to afford the astronomical bribe needed to influence a councilor to reverse the protest permission.

One option that Speaker and Shimmer discussed, as a means to end the protest, was to allow the ambient wyld energies to build up in the area again… but that would put the hospital, its patients, and its staff, at risk. Of course, the four hour ritual atop the hospital where Speaker did his daily wyld-shapping technique wasn’t easy when the protesters below were throwing rotten fruit up at him – the unicorns in particular had a very good aim thanks for their charms and excellencies. 

It turned out that Sullen Hoof was able to get results far sooner. He local knowledge of Nexus allowed him to spot the ponies that were sneaking in supplies to the protesters, supplies that he… tainted.

“Ok, and what exactly did you  do with those supplies?” Speaker inquired, peering out from within the hospital lobby.

Sullen Hoof reminded Speaker of blue mushrooms that the two had used to brew up part of the cure for the plague in Chung Do: “I found a merchant who’d arrived from Chung Do there with a barrel full of those – made the same constipative drug we used, put that in the protestor's supplies”

“But the council civility protecting the protest, wont you got in trouble for violating that?” Shimmer wondered.

Tipping his straw hat, Sullen Hoof smiled from under his orichalcum mask: “I didn’t do anything to the protest, I did something to the cargo that a currier was bringing from A to B – that wasn’t covered by the civility. It only protects the protest outside the hospital”

“Cash would be proud. But being constipated isn’t nearly as life-threatening as, well… anything else you could have put into the food” Speaker noted, suggesting that a laxative would have had a far quicker effect.

Sullen Hoof agreed, but noted that a powerful laxative would have been far more messy: “And honestly, these ponies are already willing to throw mud at us… I don’t want them throwing anything else”

A day or so later the protest began to thin out, Sullen Hoof drugging every supply run that came to feed the protesters, even spiking the barrels of prune juice they brought in with the mushroom extract.

With the battle won, Shimmer waved off the last of the prostestors as she spotted what would turn out to be the next ‘assualt’ on the hospital: Ponies setting up stalls at the end of the street with small five-pointed leaves and smears of white powder on their signs – the drug-dealers had moved in.

Next to their massive slave trade, the soft trade, then the drug trade – the hard trade – was the second most lucrative business that the guild had an almost creation-wide monopoly on. Most hashish farmers around Great Forks had exclusive deals with guild buyers, the coca-leaf plantations dotted generously around the east were pretty much all guild owned, and in most of the rest of creation then at least nine of out ten drug dealer was ultimately supplied by guild-trained and paid alchemists and merchants, who in turn used guild raw materials for their products. Woe betide the king or noble who tried to quell guild drug trade, for their enemies would soon find the guild giving their enemies discounts on weapons and mercenaries.

In short, this was just as much trouble as it was a deliberate attempt by whoever paid for the dealers to set up, to make Brookside choke on the wave of petty crime and misery that the subsequent addicts would entail.

As the dealers began setting up shop around the hospital their clients began to shuffle into the neighborhood from all over Nexus, as the word of discounted heroin, opium and hashish spread from one opium-den to the other across the vast city. To Cash, this confirmed that it was a deliberate 'attack' on Brookside and the hospital, since no dealers ever discounted their drugs and then advertised it on this scale unless the idea was to lure in addicts to a specific area.

What the dealers hadn’t counted on was two things: Cash expanding his businesses around Brookside, which meant that he needed more employees, and Speaker who – back in Chung Do, had learnt a charm that allowed him to cure mental illness, including such things as addiction. To this end the attempt at fouling up Brookside with a surge of addicts and the crime that such would inevitably bring only allowed Cash to set up several workshops that did in wares or services for the growing number apartment buildings him and Speaker erected in the district.

Whatever pony had masterminded the influx of dealers and sponsored their generously discounted narcotics clearly hadn’t expected this turn of events, as the dealers up and left Brookside a week later  since no pony was buying, at which point Cash commanded well over three thousand workers which he and Speaker set about renovating Brookside.

“Good to see you for once Cash, has my cooking not been to your liking?” Sullen Hoof inquired, as he served the circle an evening meal in their Nexus district town house.

Cash sampled the absolutely delicious combination of rice, some kind of butter sauce and steamed flower petals, after which he flashed Sullen Hoof a disarmed smile: “My friend, I would not miss your cooking for all the jade in Creation – but the nature of my business forces me to attend a lot of evening events, which sadly has yet to hire you as their caterer. Really, you should let me set up some deals, you’ll be the toast of the flaky-most upper crust of Nexus”

“Flaky-most?” Red said with a cocked eye-brow and a bemused smiled. Cash shrugged back at her with a bemused smile: "I know..."

Sullen Hoof floated away his pots and bamboo serving trays, saying only that he didn’t want to see the rich elite of Nexus in bidding wars over his services, as much as he wanted to see them kill each other over who got to eat the last scrap of a mud and urine soufflé.

“How… colorful – but fair enough, I won’t claim that the ponies I sell art pieces to are saints. Hell, most of them think that simply by virtue of having such ungodly wealth that they can get away with pretty much anything - that's the whole point of Nexus honestly” Cash noted.

Having finally managed to round up most of the city’s old cult of the illuminated and opened up a new temple to Celestia in Brookside, built by Speaker and funded by Cash, Sunrise Glow explained that back in Great Forks ponies with power tended to rationalize their abuses and excesses quite effortlessly, citing a case where the son of a high priest got away with murdering a young mare he had fancied on the grounds of ‘affluenza’ – that he had grown up so rich and wealthy that he knew not the concept of not getting what he wanted, as thus was unable to handle rejection.

“Oh I think most of the factors and merchant princes here in Nexus suffer from that, at the very least all the ones born into wealth. A few days ago I witnessed a factor ruin a lesser merchant through some rather underhoof’d means, followed by the merchant going ‘you won’t get away with this’ – want to know what the factor said?” Cash said as he looked dreamy eyed into his food.

The rest of the circle looked at Cash in silence as they awaited his punchline.

“Well, the factor turned to his seneschal and said ‘Get me away with this’ and then left” Cash said, evidently finding the story far more amusing than the rest of the circle.

“That’s terrible – All ponies should be held responsible for their actions” Shimmer blurted out, hosing down half the table with chewed rise and steamed flower petals.

Floating down his chopsticks, Cash nodded: “Oh I agree that Nexus needs more oversight – the blind race to simply accrue and spend wealth here means that so much potential is wasted. But that’s part of what I plan to use Brookside for, as an example in just how powerful and useful a well-paid workforce can be”

The circle continued to discuss their various experiences with the less savory sides of Nexus, with Sullen Hoof for example telling of how he’d recently invited all of the high-priced chef’s he had conned his way into working under before meeting the circle to a great feast – and how they had at first scoffed at him, but after sampling his cooking they had all begged him to come work for them. He retold with great joy at how he had them sent away with the knowledge that the greatest chef in Nexus, no, in Creation had so demonstratively refused them, as well as perplexed them with flavors and textures of food they clearly had no chance of replicating.

Red was about to talk about something regarding fixed fights in the Bastion district pit fighting circuit when a loud knocking on their front door alerted the whole circle.

Outside was a messenger with ragged breath, having arrived straight from Brookside: Someone had torn a hole in the wyld defenses that had been set up around the neighborhood.

The circle quickly gathered out in the street where Shimmer spun up a sorcerous cloud in no time at all. First stop was Bastion district where Cash threw money around like it was going out of fashion, quickly buying the services of a little over four hundred mercenaries for the evening to fight changelings. With well-oiled iron weapons such as spiked shoes and quite a lot of spears, the mercenaries were – after convincing them that flight by cloud was perfectly safe – flown down to Brookside where all hell had broken loose.

Thanks to Speaker using his wyld-shaping technique on a daily basis on strategic spots around Brookside ever since opening the hospital, nearly the whole area had been free of wyld energy – which had drastically reduced the frequency of changeling incursions into the area, since low levels of ambient wyld energy, such as it is in most of creation, was toxic to most changelings. 

To prevent the wyld energies from flooding back in from the central square of Firewander Speaker and Shimmer had set up a system of iron wards around Brookside, basically a small hollow wooden wall no more than shoulder height for the average pony, filled with oil and iron plates. The oil was there to prevent the raw iron plates from rusting, as alloyed steel which rusted far less had no effect against wyld energies. The torches along the wall quickly showed where the damage had been done: A stretch of about three hundred yards of wall had been broken down, with the iron plates removed – allowing a deluge of changelings to pour into the area along with a tide of invisible wyld energies which had already begun to warp the immediate surroundings, turning brick houses into living things that jiggled and danced, making wooden buildings bloom with carnivorous flowers, or grow fruits that exploded if you picked them which screamed madness for all to hear.

The changelings themselves were standard fare compared to what the circle had seen so far in Nexus: Like most eastern changelings they were heavily influenced by the elemental pole of wood, making many of them look like large pony-sized carnivorous fruits, or grotesque horned insects or similar predator animals. The only common theme for them was that they looked menacing, often had thick growth that functioned as armor, and either fangs, claws or other things that allowed them grab or bite on to ponies to haul them back to their masters…

The mercenaries were dropped down right on top of the breach along with Red, their iron shoes and spears wreaking havoc on the changelings caught underneath. In the first few moments it looked as if the mercenaries were chopping up salad – but it was salad that bled many different colors of blood or other strange fluids. With the breach plugged almost instantly thanks to Red’s fury and the hundreds of mercs the flow of captive ponies being dragged deeper into Firewander was quickly ended, with Shimmer giving chase for the ponies that had already been hauled off.

Speaker landed on the inside of the breach, surveying how much wyld energy had poured through. It was… a lot – in fact, it was more than just ambient build-up could explain: It looked like the changelings had been planning this for a while. They probably didn’t like being denied even a small part of their hunting grounds.

Ordering the mercenaries to hold the line just short of where the wall had fallen Speaker began to use his wyld shaping technique to draw in all the wyld energies that had flooded into Brookside. It was a lot to handle, but Speaker had already spotted a few unlucky ponies that had been caught in the tide of mutagenic energy and as a result become… something not entirely pony. He had a few of the mercenaries detain and bring any mutant spotted to his hospital for treatment. He had already reduced the population of mutated ponies in Brookside and the surrounding areas to nearly zero, so he wasn’t afraid that the mercs might pick up any ponies who had chosen to live with their mutations, as a blessed few actually benefited from their mutations in various ways.

The changelings quickly stopped trying to attack once the wall of iron spears and iron barding that was the mercenaries stood before them. Their own lances of nightmares and gossamer armor would burst and fail at the touch of such iron things, and so the changeling attack ended seemingly as quickly as it had started. With this little bit of breathing room Speaker managed to shape into being a good deal of timber, iron and oil – and by the power of his essence he set about rebuilding the wall at a speed that simply marveled the mercenaries.

Just as the last few sections of wall were about to be sealed off Red and Shimmer returned, followed by several dozen ponies that were still covered in various shades and flavors of the changeling slime or webbing originally used to ensnare and trap them.

Cash and Sunrise also appeared, having spent his time organizing a ‘brookwide’ repair effort for all the doors and windows that the changelings had broken down, since buying such things in bulk was a lot cheaper for all concerned, while Sunrise had calmed everyone and prevented any undue panic.

“Well that’s one way to spend your evening” Red said, sounding rather satisfied. The golden reaver dailklaive wrought of her own essence was still dripping with whatever foul mockery of blood the last changeling she had cut down had possessed.

Speaker was less impressed, having carefully examined the downed wall sections during his repairs of them: “Don’t get too cocky Red, or we might have to do this more often than not”

Showing the circle a piece of wood from the old wall, Speaker showed how it had been bucked into pieces in one end, and not by the clawed hoof-approximations of the changelings.

“So the wall was broken down by ponies? Who would do that?” Sunrise inquired in a most indignant tone.

Shimmer sniffed around, her face turning grim: “I can’t separate the scent of the perps from the mercenaries – there’s  been too many ponies here. Hell, for all we know it might have been done by mercs”

“Oh I know who did this – they’re the only ones who stand to benefit from terrorizing Brookside: The Greycoats” Cash stated confidently, looking as if he was already planning on how to both prove his case and sue the GCA.

With Speaker’s help as a living lie-detector, Cash was quickly able to find a few nearby ponies who lived in apartments facing the stretch of wall that had been dismantled and then identify the ones who weren’t truthful when asked if they had seen anyone tamper with the wall. From there Cash simply bribed the ponies more to counter the GCA's bribes originally meant to buy their silence.  This quickly netted them a positive ID, which he them took to a rather sleepy but very outraged judge along with a couple of the mercs as witnesses to attest to the fact that there truly had been a changeling raid.

Leaving the judges office and stepping into the dark of the night in the Sentinel Hill district, where the council tower piercing the night at the top of the hill with its height and glowing magic crystal lights, Speaker looked at Cash. The eclipse caste stallion was positively beaming – literally – the golden glow was undeniable, as Cash had used his charms to further enrage the council adjudicator. It was at the same time impressive and a little spooky, having seen how well Cash had wound the judge around his hoof.

“So, what happens now?” Speaker wondered. Cash had explained, using the witnesses, how GCA ponies had dismantled part of the iron wall around Brookside – and how that had endangered hundreds of his employees and a lot of his business holdings due to the resulting changeling assault, described in turn by the mercs.

Cash gazed up at the council tower: “The councilor known as the mistress of the night, the one in charge of day-do-day dealings after dark, will be notified. She’ll likely decree that the GCA has violated the dogma by trying to impede trade – plus violating dozens of civilities regarding changeling defences. The Emmisary will handle the rest. By morning all active GCA members should have been turned inside out, or worse”

“I doubt that all of them were involved in this – is getting them all killed not a bit extreme?” Speaker wondered. He would much rather prefer a non-lethal solution instead of another Water Walker massacre.

The cobble sparked ever so slightly as Cash put his magical-shod hoof down hard: “Speaker, this is how business is done in Nexus. You’ve had GCA visits, you know how they operate – or, think of it this way: I guarantee you that every member of the GCA knew what kind of dirty business they got into when they joined, and has partaken in it themselves. Gangs like that have initiation rites that usually involve beating another pony senseless, or even committing outright murder, to show your willingness to do anything you’re told. This is the kind of ponies who are never innocent, they merely have dubious alibis”

Nodding, Speaker sighed deeply. The cool evening air did little to alleviate the fact that other gangs would likely move in and take over the GCA territory – but Cash noted that he was thinking of setting up his own private security firm to guard Brookside: “It’ll be a lot cheaper than buying mercs to do rounds”

“We could get Red to train them, like she did the guards in Chung Do?” Speaker suggested.

Cash wasn’t sure if Red was the one to do that: “She never got far with that. She’s a warrior, not a drill sergeant”

The two chatted about future business plans as they returned to the townhouse in Nexus district.

It wasn’t until three days later, when most of the repairs were done in Brookside, that the circle began to suspect that something was wrong – for Sullen Hoof hadn’t been heard or seen since the changeling attack.

“Well, we are talking about Sullen Hoof – if he doesn’t want to be found…” Red noted as she sat and fidgeted with her hooves at the large wooden meeting table in what was now one of the meeting rooms in Cash’s business headquarters. The quiet bustle of office clerks going to and fro outside the meeting, messengers coming and going, was easy enough to ignore – but it also made it something of a boring meeting for this warrior mare of action.

Cash had a theory: “Perhaps he’s trying to track down who ordered the GCA to sabotage the iron wall? Would make sense, could get some more heads rolling”

“You think it wasn’t just retaliation for us throwing them out of Brookside?” Shimmer wondered.

Cash was certain that someone else had hired the GCA to enable the changelings to attack Brookside. He explained that the GCA simply didn’t do things like that normally – their business was extortion and protection rackets under the guise of being an insurance provider: “Letting changelings gobble up the ponies you want money from is not a good long term business practice”

“Well, I’m not sure how much there is to investigate with the GCA – the building they used as headquarters imploded the morning after we reported them to council authorities, with most of the GCA members inside” Speaker recalled, having heard from some of the ponies who’d subsequently come to his hospital with bleeding ears as the implosion had happened with such speed and force that the hearing of many nearby ponies had been damaged. 

Sunrise Glow cleared her throat to signal that she had something to say. The rest of the circle looked at her.

After a moment Sunrise spoke: “Some of my cultists might have seen something – if we’re looking for signs of Sullen Hoof’s handy-work”

“Go on” Red beckoned, missing Sullen Hoof’s amazing cooking.

Sunrise explained that the last few days, while doing rounds outside of Brookside to spread the good word, some of her cultists came across areas with, as Sunrise explained it, strange and invisible vapors in the air: “I haven’t seen it myself, but my acolytes said that there were whole blocks devoid of ponies – and that there was a most alluring scent hanging in the air, like the smell of a most irresistible meal being waved in front of you. I thought it just another changeling trick, but now…”

“Why would Sullen Hoof be clearing entire blocks? Like, had the ponies there just up and left their homes, or were they gathered somewhere?” Speaker inquired. Sunrise elaborated that the blocks appeared to have been abandon, completely – and even the usual looters that would follow in the wake of such an event seemed to have been drawn in by the smell.

“How come your cultists didn’t get sucked in as well?” Cash wondered.

Sunrise Hoof pointed out that she only sent out the most steadfast and disciplined of her flock to proselytize: “They know how to resist temptation. I've trained them well”

The circle agreed that this warranted more investigation. With the addresses Sunrise had Shimmer quickly flew out and sniffed around, tracking the scent. She returned a few hours later, with grim news: “I tracked the scent back to the old Hollow capitol building in the middle of Firewander – and there were scores of ponies being drawn in, like if they were hypnotized”

“Gods… did the changelings get Sully when the iron wall was down?” Speaker blurted out in a very worried tone.

Shimmer frowned: “I’m not sure – I tried tracking Sully’s scent as well, and it did lead towards that place as well, but not with any changelings. I think he tried to track the changelings, probably got into trouble that way instead”

“Who cares – we need to rescue Sully and stop this before all of Firewander gets the munchies and trots up to the changelings!” Red said, plonking down her essence-forged reaver daiklaive on the table. Cash winced as the daiklaive scratched the varnish.

The circle agreed that something had to be done – and quickly, but storming a changeling hold did require some preparation.

Cash quickly sent out a swarm of messengers, both to alert the rest of Firewander’s ponies of the new changeling threat, but also to notify any patrolling mercs and gangs to stop any ponies they see who have been ensnared by the ‘changeling smell’ – Sullen Hoof’s involvement wasn’t mentioned.

Sunrise left to assemble her following – they might not be warriors, but they could help corral mesmerized ponies. Red with her to provide security in case the changelings objected to their mesmerized victims being diverted back home.

Shimmer had a different idea, but it did require a bit of cooperation with the mercenaries in and around Firewander: She wanted to shapeshift into a giant seagull – as big as when the circle had fought the Water Walkers – so she could blow the ill winds of the changelings away from the city. Cash advised against the plan: “It’d take way too long to convince all those mercs not to shoot at you once they see a giant gull appear above them”

Shimmer frowned, but Speaker comforted her: “It’s ok sweety, I have something I’ll need your help with anyway – first I need you to make as much room as possible elsewhere…”

Speaker and Shimmer moments later for a nearby warehouse Cash owned where Shimmer recalled all the things Shimmer held elsewhere – the stack of jade talents from Denansdor, a big sack of gold, gems and jewelry also from Denansdor, a catapult, a small wooden hut, a fishing boat and several other things – most of which either mystified Speaker or just made him wonder why Shimmer had such things stored elsewhere…

With lots of room elsewhere Speaker and Shimmer quickly flew over to the Nighthammer district where they hit up several foundries, buying up quite a lot of iron. Shimmer stashed several piles of iron bars elsewhere, while Speaker also bought a big sack full of cast iron pots and pans that Shimmer equally put elsewhere.

As they returned to Brookside to gather for a final pre-assault briefing, Shimmer marveled as Speaker used his essence all the way there to reduce several large iron bars into razor sharp throwing stars and chakrams. The Iron bars simply fell apart around him into small shuriken or bits of metal rings that seemed to assemble themselves in the air around him, all the while Speaker gazed at them with furious concentration.

As Shimmer’s cloud approached the rendezvous point Speaker instructed her not to dissipate the cloud. The rest of the circle, sans the missing Sullen Hoof, got on and then Shimmer guided the cloud up and towards the center of Firewander, towards the source of the wyld energies that plagued the district.

Just like when they had first approached the city from the air, the capitol building of ancient Hollow stood ablaze with rainbow flame. It was impossible to see any actual features of the building as the brightly colored wyld flames that had given Firewander its name were quite opaque… plus looking directly at the flames wasn’t healthy, since it could sear your mind with wyld chaos if you looked for too long.

Around the massive capitol building swarmed thousands of small pony-sized changelings like a cloud of greens, brown and colors that just weren't natural, flying on wings that weren’t really wings, but merely imagined things that sort of looked like wings… so some looked like large leaves attached to bodies of fanged fruit, or wings of bark sheets for wolves of timber and so on – the only common theme among the changelings visible was that they were clearly predatory, having either claws, hook-limbs, large fangs or strange combinations of them all... well, that was all the circle bothered to spot, for they had more important things to do now!

Shimmer dove with her cloud from high above, the swarm spreading momentarily as one of Shimmer’s piles of elsewhere-stored iron was dumped ahead of the cloud. The few changelings caught under the falling iron debris howled and screamed in pain as their fake bodies were unmade.

As they reached the ground, Shimmer set the cloud down the circle quickly disembarked, the changeling swarm reforming instantly above them - almost as if nothing had happened, though a few dozen nearby changelings did appear to be approaching in a decidedly hostile maner.

“Ok… surrounded by changelings, now what?” Cash asked out loud.

Speaker raised his right forehoof and slowly lowered it to the ground.. From elsewhere he drew his mechanical shoe, with its multiple tiny pistons and tubes of iridescent fluid that sloshed around – which then burst forth with solar essence that projected the very law of creation around Speaker, purging a sphere about eight yards in diameter centered on him: “Now we gallop in through the rainbow flames!”

The changeling swarm came at the circle from all directions – some even seeping up from the warped remains of what had once been the mosaic tiles covering the vast square around the ancient capitol building, but the circle gave no quarter and didn’t stick around to be properly engaged.

As the circle got close to the wall of fire that was the outside of the old capitol building Speaker found the ‘heat’ emitted from the fire to be… strange. It wasn’t hot, but it was none the less very intense, though not to the body. This was wyld fire, and it would sear your very soul for it was a concentrated emission of wyld energy. The few ponies in sight, mesmerized by the smell of Sullen Hoof’s cooking, who got close to the fire only lasted for a few seconds before twisting and warping. Some vaporized, some turned to liquid, some fell as their limbs turned into something other than flesh – and yet they pushed on, trying to reach that which had so taken control of their senses by inching along on the ground in a grotesque and pathetic display.

Beyond the ponies drawn in by the smells of wonder the square was devoid of mortal life, with only changelings swarming around – with some trying to attack the circle. When Speaker’s sphere of normalcy brushed up against the wyldfire a strange thing happened: The fire disappeared, much in the same way that putting up an umbrella would make rain go away underneath it. The circle, walking close to Speaker, thus passed through the corrupting flames that wreathed the grand palatial building.

Inside the firewall the ‘weather’ was surprisingly calm… there was no sign of any kind of fire – and Speaker quickly concluded via essence sight that the wyldfire indeed seemed to be an ‘outer’ thing only. The ancient first age palace still stood resplendent, though with many a claw mark and other bits and pieces of refuse scattered around it and its broken mosaic windows. From ground level the palace seemed towering beyond measure, though from their flights the circle knew that it wasn’t as tall as the council tower.

“That doesn’t make sense – if a building is burning with flames all around it there should be fire inside” Cash said as the confusion levels for the whole circle rose.

Speaker’s essence sight gave little in the way of clues, neither did Shimmer’s third eye as she shifted into her warform – but they didn’t get all that much time to think as five rather familiar-looking and larger than average changelings stepped forth from stilled shadows…

The Lookshyan twilight caste Solar had only seen these cataphractoi changelings a few times before, but he recalled them well: They had assaulted him and Shimmer repeatedly back when he had been practicing his wyld shaping technique – indeed, if not for the timely intervention of their friendly deathknight the Bodhisatva Shimmer would likely have been killed by them.

It was well known among nearly ponies across creation that some changelings were more dangerous than others. Generic minion changelings could, if caught alone, be defeated with only moderate risk to life and limb if one had access to iron tools or weapons – but they were usually imagined into being by the hundreds or even thousands, and such acts of literally ‘creative thinking’ was usually done by the officers of a truly powerful changeling’s court. These five changelings were such warrior generals, cataphracts each in their own rights, lesser nobles among the changeling courts with bodies larger and more martially ornate than that of the changelings in the swarm outside.

The five cataphracts approached the circle slowly with a light canter. Their bodies reflected the circumstances of their creation: Like the changelings swarming outside, these greater changelings had bodies that looked like vicious predatory plants and beasts, but they didn’t have the purely feral look that their lesser kin on the outside had. There was a cruel and driven fury in their eyes – even if their eyes seemed to be orbs of black ebony wood inlaid with glowing yellow gems.

Red readied herself with her essence-shaped blade in front of the circle, though still within the safe zone that Speaker’s ‘normalcy’ charm provided. Indeed, around the sphere that Speaker was forcing to obey the natural and divine laws of creations the ground seemed more… alive. The tiles that seemed cover the particular lobby they were in appeared to have ‘sprouted’ roots and intertwined with each other – and where the cataphracts stomped with their clawed hooves the tiles bled various green and yellow ichors, as if slain by their very presence.

Worst was the cataphract who seemed to  be a strange mix of pony, feline and metallic features. It was impossible to see where its armor began and its flesh stopped, and the tiles it heavy steel hooves smashed down on unwound their sprouted roots and at the same time somehow submitting to the changeling lording over them, but also stabbing their little roots at the circle…

Shimmer unfurled her wings to leap at the changelings when Speaker shouted for her to stay with the circle: “If we get separated they can pick us off one by one – you know how it went last time you tangled with those things” - Shimmer did not listen, her hate of chanelings overpowering her senses.

The metal and cat-like cataphract stepped forth and opened its mouth, which revealed a second head covered in teeth which snarled menacingly. As Shimmer impacted from her sudden charge she somehow flipped herself around, grabbing hold of each of the five cataphracts at the neck or throat – one with each taloned limb and pinning the metal feline one by biting around its head with her strong beak. It was clear that she wouldn’t be able to maintain her holds for very long, but a few split seconds was all the circle needed:

Red and Speaker needed no encouragement to exploit the situation. Speaker threw a hoof-full of iron chakrams at the changelings, which exploded into brilliant bursts of gossamer vapors and impossible howls of pain. When the dust had settled the changeling cataphracts all bore great holes in their bodies, as if they were broken porcelain, revealing the true nature of their false forms.

A split second later Red swung her mighty blade and shot molten sunlight from it, aimed at these exposed weaknesses. Of the five cataphracts three fell as the lie they had told creation regarding the truth of their existence was undone, their false reality shattered. The steel lion cataphract roared at the sight of its kin’s broken shards dissolving into essence, curling around Shimmer’s as if its body was less cat and more a squid or snake. Shimmer’s hold on the other remaining cataphract failed as she could not breathe… or hear Speaker shouting, or see Red blasting at her foe with bolts of molten sunlight from the edge of her blade.

For the rest of the circle the situation seemed absurd: Shimmer’s entire front half appeared encased in a constricting steel ball – and unlike the other cataphracts who all burned at the touch of iron, then this one… all the iron chakrams that Speaker had flung at it simply bounced off its metal hide.
> Chapter 57: The Riddle of Steel
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It took only a few seconds from the circle standing idly by, confused about what to do. Shimmer, in her half-bird hardly-pony monsterpony warform had her head and neck encased in a sphere of steel, the apparent body of a changeling cataphract.

When blood began leaking from the sphere despair truly set in, and being predators that fed of emotions and dreams this lured in dozens of lesser changelings from the outside… all of them grotesque mockeries of insects or plants in rough facsimiles of ponies, but with fangs and claws of emerald leaves that were hard as jade.

Red quickly took to defending the circle, darting to and fro within the sphere of enforced normalcy that was emitted from Speaker. Around the sphere even the artful mosaic tiles on the floor seemed to menace, with every light fixture on the wall hissing or scowling at the circle, while throwing off nightmarish shadows all around.

Shimmer began to stagger, more blood spilling from around the heavy steel sphere which encased her - so much so that she began to slip around on the floor. Without being able to see, hear or speak she couldn’t communicate with the circle – or that would be the case if the circle hadn’t had a highly perceptive eclipse caste member, for while dodging clawed swipes from grotesque spider-pony changelings with he noticed that Shimmer’s feathers were emitting shimmering albeit faint pulses of light. Thanks to Cash Charmer’s linguistic charms he was to recognize the signals as a cry for help.

With his seemingly invincible ego-shield allowing him to act largely unaffected by the swarming changelings, Cash took aim and fired a shoe-claw at the steel sphere which encased Shimmer’s head, using a bit of essence to improve his aim even further. Unlike the much softer iron, or purely righteous bolts of molten sunlight, then the claw embedded itself into the sphere perfectly.

“Red, Speaker – help!” Cash called out, trying to pull at the unbreakable chain which now linked his shoe to the claw embedded in the steel sphere.

Speaker turned to see the development, quickly disengaging from the changeling he was fighting wit to go pull on the chain: “Sunrise, now would be a good time!”

Sunrise frowned. She had hoped to hold off her participation until the circle encountered more powerful foes, but if it couldn’t be helped: “Begone you foul creatures, back to the madness that spawned you!”

The combination of Sunrise’s charms and her righteous fury caused her words to boom out quite loudly, the impact of the sound burning and shattering almost all the lesser changelings in the lobby the circle was in. Among the ashes and shards Cash, Red and Speaker yanked at the chain which managed to pull Shimmer towards the circle and soon inside the protective sphere afforded by Speaker’s chaos repelling pattern.

Speaker quickly examined the steel sphere, both as a craftspony and with essence sight: “This thing is real… its not a glamour or a changeling assumption – Red, I need your help to break this thing open!”

“I’ve got it” Cash noted, rearing back to deliver a mighty clawed blow towards the sphere.

As Cash’s blow connected, he powered up a series of charms that greatly increased how much damage he would do against inanimate objects. In the first age these charms had seen mountains shattered, and horrid temples dedicated to primordial worship reduced to dust. Here the steel sphere shattered, pelting the rest of the circle in sharp and jagged shrapnel for a brief moment.

Red ignored the shrapnel thanks to her armor, Speaker parrying the few bits that came at him with Gift, and Sunrise was to heavily wreathed in charm-wrought essence shields to be hurt by such simple things. Shimmer on the other hoof was a lot worse for wear…

Aside from her head, then the rest of her body was covered in a thick layer of bone-feather armor, like a shell of thick scales. When the steel sphere became undone the circle could see that Shimmer’s birdlike face appeared flayed, with every feather plucked and her skin pulled away – it wasn’t pretty, it was very bloody, and Shimmer didn’t exactly seem to have enjoyed the process either…

Speaker quickly rushed to her aid, using his anesthetic charm and washing off Shimmer’s face with essence. As Shimmer's one good eye peeked open and her bloodied beak cracked a tiny smile she pulled away from Speaker. Before the circle’s eyes Shimmer’s own regenerative charms made her whole again… well almost: It was clear to see that most of the regrown skin was knotted up with scar tissue, which in turn made her facial feathers a tad irregular and unseemly.
“I’ll fix you up once this is over, ok?” Speaker half-offered, half-pleaded. Shimmer nodded: “Thanks”

The circle readied itself to continue further inside the ancient palatial structure, when Red noted that the lobby now smelled of food…

“You’re right – it does… Speaker, do you remember if there’s any kitchens or anything near the lobby?” Cash wondered.

His forehead creasing as Speaker thought furiously of what little he remembered of the city of Hollow during the first age, the old Lookshyan pony ultimately shook his head: “No, the kitchens are much further inside”

“It was the changelings that came in from outside that smelled of food” Shimmer noted, sniffing the air.

Looking outside through shattered windows and doorways where the doors had long since been broken down, Speaker frowned: “Why would they… oh of course”

Speaker explained that the changeling swarm outside the building was probably somehow laced with the scent used to lure in ponies, then made to fly around the building to spread it through Firewander – like how hunters could attract prey by hanging a dead rabbit from a tree.

This made destroying the swarm a slightly more important priority, at least as far as Shimmer and Speaker was concerned. Sunrise objected: “We are here to save our friend. Additionally, when we get Sullen Hoof out of here the changelings will be without the source of their entrancing odors, so the swarm will be useless”

Begrudgingly Speaker and Shimmer accepted that cutting off the Changelings at their source would be better – but the swarm would ultimately need to be dealt with: "Also Sunrise, what's to stop the swarm from coming after us when we try to leave?"

As the circle made their way deeper into the old capitol building, its partially ruined halls clad in strange inorganic growths, tumors and bizarre decorations – beautiful only to the alien mindset of the changelings, and much of not even real, being but illusory glamours – they ultimately found their way to what Speaker was sure had been banquet halls in the first age.

“Right, the kitchens should be around here somewhere” Speaker said, his brows furrowed. He was trying hard to recall what few parties he had attended at the place many thousands of years ago – but it was difficult to match the now alien decorations of glassy gossamer decorations and wooden tumor-like ornaments that had been smeared over ancient murals and bright leaf-like stone carvings.

From a door in the back of the banquet hall, as Red and Shimmer put the last few changelings they had caught dancing to horrid screeching songs to death, the clatter of pots and pans suddenly rang out – along with a familiar voice swearing loudly and most creatively.

Turning towards the door, Speaker called out: “Sully!”

The kitchens that the circle entered into were a sight no mortal soul had any business seeing. Decaying corpses were strewn among piles of rotten fruits and vegetables, grey and hairy blobs of meat so utterly putrid that they were more mold than flesh were stacked to the ceiling – and Sullen Hoof was laboring feverishly to turn it all into what looked like some kind of broth in a big vat of glassy gossamer. The really scary thing was that it smelled really good…

Before anyone in the circle could say anything to get Sully’s attention the metal-jaguar cataphract from earlier appeared – and with it all the kitchenware that Sully wasn’t using sprung to life, with snarling and fanged mavs, far too many cutting edges and other things that likely weren’t that healthy to tangle with.

“Focus on the cataphract!” Shimmer barely managed to howl before she launched herself at the thing, dedicating her beak to biting at the steel-jaguar’s neck, flecks and chips of metal flying everywhere as she bit with a force great enough to snap ponies in half.

The cataphract snarled and flipped around itself, throwing Shimmer off into a pile of knives that tried quite hard to jab themselves into every exposed join in her carapace-like bone-feather armor.

It was then that Speaker noticed that Red wasn’t attacking… she was just standing idly by, the many animated bloodthirsty pieces of kitchenware ignoring her in turn.  It was quite odd to see – of what little Speaker could see, for he was busy defending himself from animated cleavers that were flying around him, and forks that kept trying to stab at his hooves. Red looked completely oblivious, even as Cash called on her to help him against the cataphract.

Drawing a deep breath, Sunrise sat down demonstratively, ignoring whatever razor sharp spoons and living shards of porcelain was trying to cut her and assumed a meditative stance. The moment her hooves came to rest in a meditative position Speaker would later come to know as the Contemplative Seeker Divining the Heavens, Sunrise’s body pulsed out a wave of righteous essence, scorching almost all the animated kitchenware and reducing most of it to fine crystalline dust with the might of her righteousness. A few fanged pots, pans and cleavers survived the experience, but all remaining changeling cook-wear was too damaged to pose a threat.

With the sudden reprieve, Speaker was able to throw Gift at the steel-jaguar which seemed to have been having a jolly time slashing at Cash. Cash looked surprisingly whole and uninjured, but that was only until Speaker saw the changeling slash into the stallion with long and jagged claws – Cash’s heavenly clothing mending itself as quickly as the creature could rend it, and Cash’s collar of dawn’s cleansing did away with any blood gushing from his wounds just as quickly as it could exit his body. 

Before Speaker could react Shimmer tackled the cataphract and struck it in rapid succession with her claws… not in any slashing motion, but more like poking the thing in a weird but undoubtedly purposeful pattern. The strangest thing happened next: The cataphract with its seemingly impenetrable steel hide emitted a soul-chilling shriek, one that rung out inside everyone’s head in a most pitiful fashion… which then faded into eerie echoes, as the steel jaguar equally faded from existence, or rather, the insides of the steel jaguar cataphract faded away, for its steel hide simply dropped to the ground like a solid chunk of metal, cracking the beautiful tile mosaic underneath.

Catching his breath as he rushed to a rather wobbly and pale Cash Charmer, who seemed very close to passing out from blood loss despite his clothes showing no stains, Speaker felt himself conflicted whether whatever strange means of killing Shimmer had used was something he felt okay about. Something that made you simply fade into oblivion? It didn’t look like a terribly nice way to die… of course, it could be a specialized means to destroy changelings, which was perfectly ok.

Just as the dust settled from Sunrise’s meditative smiting, and Cash had stopped bleeding thanks to Speaker’s essence-spun stitches, Red’s shouting pierced the room. She was shaking Sullen Hoof who seemed quite oblivious to Red’s attempts at her calling her his attention, Red herself having evidently been released from whatever cataphracts mental illusion that had trapped her when the cataphract had been destroyed: “Sully, snap out of it!”

“Red, you have to use your mind-cleansing technique” Shimmer noted. Red nodded and swatted Sully across the head with an iron-shod hoof – not in any way hard enough to hurt him, but just enough to make contact. Sullen Hoof dropped to the ground like a sack of potatoes as golden flames in the form and sound of hissing snakes shot out of his mouth and eyes. Speaker rushed over and concluded that Sullen Hoof was sleep-deprived.

“So they’ve been working him day and night… the monsters” Red said furiously. Sunrise came over and asked what they should do with him, pointing out that Sullen Hoof was the reason that the circle had made the incursion into the old capital building to begin with – thus, asking without saying so whether they should push on towards whatever monstrous changeling that commanded the lesser beings they had been fighting, or simply retreat.

Red stomped a hoof hard: “I didn’t come this far to run away – and if this could happen to one of us, then it could happen to any of us: We must kill whatever is causing this”

“Shimmer, fly Sully back to the townhouse – we’ll meet up on the roof” Speaker said, Shimmer quickly snatching the unconscious and overworked Orichalcum chef up and running off from whence the circle had come.

Looking at Speaker, Red wondered just how they were going to get to the roof: “This place is huge… I don’t even know how many stories there are here?”

“Cash, are you feeling well enough to use your magic shoes?” Speaker wondered, while looking at the large chimney above the huge fireplace that Sullen Hoof had been slaving away at.

The remainder of the circle quickly cleared away the ever-hot fire crystals that made up the fireplace. It looked like all the fire-gems that Sullen Hoof had looted from Denansdor. Speaker quickly made a storage bin for them out of fire-hardened bricks, hiding it in a corner with the help of Cash and Red.

With the chimney now easily accessible, Cash fired a hooked claw from one of his shoes up to the top. With a slightly daisy-chain setup, Red, Speaker and even Sunrise were all able to hang on to Cash as he willed the shoe to winch itself up to the claw stuck further up the chimney. This process was repeated a few times over, Cash winching the circle up a good twenty yards a pop.

At the top of the chimney the circle surveyed the area while Speaker’s chaos repelling pattern kept them safe from the wyld-fire that would otherwise have swallowed them, now that they were on the outside of the building. Through the rainbow haze of the wyld-fire one could almost see to the far edge of the Nighthammer district at the other end of the city – but what was more pertinent was the swarm of changelings flying around above them.

The thousands of changelings seemed to only have two things in common: They all had something that enabled them to fly somehow – some had swollen gas-bags, or  wings, or oversized fluffy growths that looked akin to dandelions, or swirling hazes of fungal spores which somehow buoyed them. Secondly, they all had some feature that denoted the  ability to spread or inject toxins. Growths and organs which released fungal spores, or insect-like proboscis protrusions that sprayed out a fine mist. Some had bee-like stingers that seemed to constantly drip fluid… but the circle knew it wasn’t poison the changelings were spreading: It was Sullen Hoof’s alluring brew they were disseminating – and that had to be stopped lest more mortals were lured to their doom.

Speaker let loose the first volley: His Gift cutting a swathe through the swarm, many of the changelings rupturing like bloated corpses filled with pus-like fluid, which in turn rained down on the roof of the old capital building. This sent a shockwave through the swarm, which caused the nearest few hundred changelings to make a beeline towards the circle.

Red stood ready to defend – her anima flaring to its totemic level and bathing Speaker, Cash and Sunrise in all her glory as she reached for the glowing bow of golden essence with her will: The arrows she fired were conjured of burning white essence, and they each multiplied again and again as they raced towards the changelings, all of which burst with sickening crackling noises when their bodies ruptured. This in turn made more and more changelings charge towards them.

“Don’t let them get near us – Sunrise is probably the only one of us who can resist a direct dose of whatever Sully cooked up to entrance ponies” Speaker called out, parrying a glob of hypno-soup that had been spat at him by a changeling.

The circle ended up huddling together close. Cash was still too wounded to fight properly and Sunrise was saving her breath and essence until all of the swarm was in range for her righteous fury. In a matter of seconds Red began to find it difficult to hold off the tornado of changelings coming at the circle – Speaker even stopped attacking, his Thousand Wounds Gear style of martial arts being far more suited for attacking single targets or small groups and his supply of iron weapons exhausted, so instead he began pouring his essence into Red so she keep up her defences.

Like throwing sticks at a tidal wave, Red’s torrent of essence-spun arrows, wreathed in holy flame, skewered and smote well over a thousand changelings over the course of but a few minutes, but it was not enough to stem the tide. In the end she discarded her glowing bow and drew a knife from under her armor, her last weapon, for she had thrown everything else she had at the swarm.

Cutting an ancient symbol in the air that she could not read – yet knew perfectly, Red enacted an even older principle that made both the Mare of Endings and the Mare of Battles up in Yu-Shan shudder with a mix of ecstasy and horror. It was one of the first powers that Autochton had made possible as he had created the solar exaltations, exemplifying their role as not just slayers of Primordials, but saviors of Creation. It had gone under many names in the past, but to Red it had but one, and as the tide of ten thousand changelings laden with poison, claws and entrancing fluids crashed into the circle they battered themselves against the heavenly guardian defence – just long enough for the swarm to lose its initial momentum and allow Red to force it back with a wave of mighty essence. 

Speaker beamed with pride. He had not seen that charm used in such a way – in such a truly heroic way – since the primordial war: “That was a amazing” he managed to say, his breath ragged and his own personal essence reserves all gone, given into Red.

“Great, because it was my last – I’m out” Red said, her body just as worn out as her spirit, both drained of power.

As Red collapsed up against Cash, who groaned as the added weight put pressure on his stitches, Sunrise looked at Speaker with asking eyes – wordlessly inquiring if now might be a good time for her to use her powers.

Looking skywards and seeing nothing but a seemingly endless mélange of leaves in every color imaginable (and a few unimaginable), twigs, fungal pods and fluttering insect parts, Speaker shook his head: “Most of the swarm is too far from us – if you destroy what’s near us now the rest might scatter across the city… there’s no telling how many hundreds of thousands of ponies will suffer because of that”

Cash held Red tight, closing his eyes as the sky darkened for what seemed to the last time as far as he was concerned…

It was then that an ear-piercing shriek, like that of a bird of prey, rolled across the rooftop like a bolt of thunder. It was Shimmer.

Trailing an enormous shimmering web of iridescent string, Shimmer flew much faster than any of the changelings in the swarm –  catching the entire swarm like a school of fish in a net. Banking to slow her speed, Shimmer howled: “Throw her!”

His mind taking a moment to understanding what his Lunar mate had meant, Speaker quickly barked an order at Red, who’s many years of mercenary service made her snap to attention as a matter of instinct: “Red, up! Grab Sunrise, throw her on three!”

With a great heave from both of them, the old soldier and tired mercenary flung Sunrise into the air – into the middle of the ensnared swarm. 

To the mortal ponies that eked out a living in Firewander the battle above the old capital building seemed wondrous. Above the rainbow flames the giant swarm of changelings – which had only appeared not a week ago – was suddenly caught in a shimmering net – and moments later a great flash of golden sunlight from within in burned the swarm to ashes.

On the rooftop of the old palatial structure, the rest of the circle breathed a sigh of relief – and coughed – as the ashes and burnt leaves that constituted the remains of the changeling swarm…

Having caught Sunrise on her way down, Shimmer landed elegantly next to the circle: “Sorry I’m late – the mercs that police around the town house had to be ‘convinced’ that I was a resident, not a monster”

Cash forced a vindictive smile and groaned: “I’ll have their commanding officer fired… hehe” then he coughed up blood and had to be steadied by Speaker.

“Can you get us home?” Sunrise asked, her voice as tired as her body and soul.

Red, although wounded, had stemmed most of her bleeding by sheer force of will and thus didn’t feel the need to run away just yet: “Oh come on – we need to seize the moment here! Charge in and kill the changeling lord in charge of this, so no more swarms are made!”

“Red, the only one of us not injures is Shimmer – and I need to tend to Sully to see if he can even be saved” Speaker implored.
Red seemed to grow an inch or two as she turned her head in righteous indignation: “They hurt my friend! Are you saying we shouldn’t avenge him?! Are you saying I can’t?!””

Surprised by Red’s frustration, Speaker took a step back and tried to calmly state his case: “No, I’m saying that charging blindly into a changeling hold is suicide, especially when your only backup is wounded and you are out of essence. Stop and think for a moment Red”

“I just... we could still do some damage before we leave” Red said begrudgingly, looking and sounding less hostile and more insulted.

Not wanting to wait that much longer for proper treatment of his wounds, which were still bleeding – even if his magic thingies were cleaning the bloodstains just as quickly as they appeared – Cash interrupted Red: “He’s saying its suicide, he’s saying it’s stupid to go in unprepared – he’s saying we got really lucky here, with saving Sully. Now let’s go home and recover, then plan what to do next”

Speaker couldn’t tell if Cash had used mind control charms on Red, for he had spent all his essence to the point that he couldn’t even activate his essence sight to check, but she acquiesced – In the end it didn’t matter. He was tired, he was hurt, and he needed to tend to Sully who was hurt even more.

As the circle flew off on Shimmer’s back, it became clear that whatever changeling ruled the old capitol building wasn’t happy to learn that it had its latest and greatest asset for luring in ponies: The very rainbow fire that engulfed the grand mile-long palace rose up and roared, howling in fury before it shattered into a million pieces which rained down over the surrounding neighborhoods, wreaking chaos and destruction. This was bound to be noticed by someone – but then again, the giant swarm of changelings getting reduced to ash by a flash of golden light had probably been seen by thousands already…

Back at the town house, Speaker tended to Cash and Red’s wounds, before turning to Sullen Hoof. When he came out from Sullen Hoof’s bedroom Speaker didn’t look as much sad as he appeared conflicted – the others took this as a good sign – but when he explained to the others what the problem was, 

“Red’s mind-cleansing blow ended the compulsion to cook until he dropped – but the changelings have done a lot more damage than that…” Speaker said with a heavy heart.

Shimmer had already sensed the damage when she had flown Sullen Hoof back: “Dream-eaten?”

Speaker nodded. Red, Cash and Sunrise all reacted with a mix of gasps and horror… a solar, dream-eaten. Just as the others began to process this terrible bit of news Speaker spoke up: “Oh it’s not that bad – I can fix him – the question is just the timing”
In split moment Red switched from grief to anger, stomping her hooves hard into the wooden floor: “Timing? If you can fix him, why are you even here? Just do it!”

Straightening out his uniform and taking a deep breath, Speaker tried his hardest to maintain his professional doctor appearance: “Red, calm down. I mean that to fix Sully I’d have to use the unshaping gun – and that thing takes a whole day to recharge, so if the changeling lord who’s new favorite toy we just stole makes a move… we won’t have a weapon to defeat it, or undo any more damage of this severity”

“Hey, me and Shimmer can still fight these things” Red said, sounding insulted at Speaker‘s implication that it was only the unshaping device that was any good against changelings.

Speaker apologized for the misunderstanding – but he also pointed out that so far they had only fought cataphracts: “…and a proper changeling lord can have legions of cataphracts at its command – and it alone is far more dangerous than all of them combined”

Red didn’t look particularly daunted by Speaker’s assessment of changeling lords, remaining adamant that Speaker should use the unshaping device to fix Sully this instant. Cash and Sunrise agreed, Cash noting that the sooner Speaker did so, the sooner the device could begin to recharge. Ultimately Speaker caved to the peer pressure and left to zap Sully.

One flash of light from Sullen Hoof’s room later and both Speaker and the solar culinarian rejoined their friends.

The next two days proved delightfully uneventful. Cash quickly organized the reconstruction effort of Brookside and several of the surrounding neighborhoods, buying up a lot damaged property while at it. Speaker and Shimmer aided in the reconstruction in a more direct fashion, with Speaker also checking in at the hospital whenever a messenger would arrive to inform him of a patient that his by now exceedingly well-trained staff couldn’t help.

It was three days after Sullen Hoof’s rescue that Cash gathered the circle at the town house for dinner and dire news:

“Shimmer, do you remember that you told us that the local mercs policing the area around our house had given you trouble?” Cash began, while everyone enjoyed Sullen Hoof’s latest culinary masterpiece.

Shimmer nodded with a surly look on her face, noting that if it hadn’t been for them she would have been able to return to the others much sooner: “…and then Red and Cash wouldn’t still have be recovering from their wounds”

Cash nodded in turn, looking somewhat conflicted about what he was about to say next: “Well… I have good and bad news on that front: The good news is that I got the commanding officer of the squad that gave you grief fired… but the bad news is that because of that, he's no longer bound by the clause in his contract that prevented him from ratting us out to the immaculates, which he did – so now they know where we live”

“Will this be a problem?” Shimmer asked, her tone sounding anything but pleased.

Red smirked: “Bah – if they come for I’ll kick their flanks from here to Blessed Isle!”

It was clear that Cash wasn’t comfortable admitting that his actions might put them all in danger, but in no uncertain terms he explained that at the very least it would allow the immaculates and any other enemies the circle have might have to start sending assassins after them, or thugs to kidnap them: “And Red, that’s not something you can fight head on – they’ll come when we sleep, when we’re tired, when we’re not on guard”. Worse yet was that their servants could very well also become targets, since kidnapping a servant’s foal is a well known ‘trick’ to get said servant to… say, poison his master – or let assassins in at night.

“We don’t have servants here…” Red said, sounding somewhat confused about Cash’s line of reasoning – as well as deeply annoyed to have a foe that couldn’t be fought head on.

Sunrise shook her head: “Really Red? Have you ever seen Sullen Hoof do the dishes after we’re done eating? Or Shimmer sweep the floors? Clearly Cash has servants come and go as needed”

“The simplest solution to the servant issue is to make room and get some live-in servants, obviously – but without additional security…” Cash began, when Sullen Hoof gestured to speak.

Having been born and raised on the mean streets of Nexus, Sullen Hoof knew well of the tactics that Cash spoke of – indeed, his own past as a poisoner was a testament to this, but it also meant that he knew how to avoid these issues: “Cash, you’re not thinking about handling this problem properly”

“I’m all ears if you have a better way to ensure that the immaculates don’t get us in our sleep” Cash said, not sounding as if Sullen Hoof could convince him that there was anything else to do…

Sullen Hoof craned his neck and removed his orichalcum helmet-mask. As he put it gently on the table, everyone trying to not stare as his gruesome burn-scars that covered most of his face, he explained that the immaculates were many things in Nexus – to the legions of workers they were hope, and to the rich merchants and factory owners they were a means of control: “Now, there are brothels in Harlotry – Houses of Binding – where sorcerers summon demons for ponies to have sex with… a practice that I can assure you is not in any way in line with the immaculate faith, but do the monks say anything? No they don't. Not a single word”

Cash nodded with rapt attention. Speaker wasn’t sure where Sullen Hoof was going, but listened on none the less, as did everyone else: “Places like the houses of binding, or that brothel where the workers dress up in gold and silver paint to pretend to be ‘evil anathema’ that horny costumers can 'conquer', are left alone because they have friends in high places. They have wealthy patrons who prefer their entertainment left alone, and these wealthy patrons are the same merchants and factory owners who fund the immaculates via donations, so the immaculates in turn can convince all their workers and slaves that they just need to suck it up, accept their piss-poor pay and hope for a better gig in the next life”

“So… we should just bribe the immaculates with donations?” Cash wondered out loud.

Sullen Hoof chuckled – an act that really looked quite unnerving due to his thoroughly messed up face: “No, we make friends with the ponies who donate to the immaculates. If the monks then screw with us, it will upset our friends… who might then stop donating. Trust me Cash, we can’t hope to match the fortune that everyone else is giving to the immaculate temple, but if we can threaten that fortune – then we will be left alone”

“Fair enough – but how to make that kind of friends, and fast?” Speaker wondered. He liked Sullen Hoof’s strategy, but he couldn’t see any quick way of executing it, especially not with Cash making more rivals than buddies in how he was buying up property in Firewander.

“Well that’s easy – we already know how to do that!” Cash suddenly blurted out. He then reminded Speaker of the idea of the concierge medicine… and added that this time it wouldn’t be to raise money, but to make friends: “So hey, we can just tell whoever you pop by that if they like your work, they can donate to your hospital – that’s even better actually, because nobody wants to hear about the immaculates closing down whatever they’ve been giving money to”

Shimmer seemed all aboard the idea, but Cash’s last remark about charity confused her: “Hold on Cash, didn’t you say back when me and Speaker opened up the clinic that charity isn’t really allowed here in Nexus?”

“Well…” Cash began, lingering on the word for a good couple of seconds before trying to explain the impressive lack of logic and brazen double-standard behind the civilities in Nexus that governed charities. Apparently charities were legal – but only in certain ways – and even more so only when someone really wealthy and powerful funded the operation as a means to legitimize it. Indeed, apparently there were a number of such charity organizations in Nexus, all run by wealthy ponies to make them feel better about working their slaves and workers to death every day.

“Right – it’s said that for every barge full of dead slaves the sijaneese sail off with, a soup kitchen is opened for a month somewhere in Nighthammer or the south-side of Sentinel Hill” Sullen Hoof chimed in.

Speaker would have asked what exactly his clinic then had counted as – but didn’t bother. It was clear that in Nexus that having and spending lots of money simply made things permissible, or at the very least meant that you wouldn’t have to answer for your actions, no matter how cruel they were.

The next day Cash gave Speaker and Shimmer a list of addresses and a large pouch of money, with instructions to get some much finer clothes: “Where you’re going, wearing that old faded uniform of yours will not get you through the door – I know you like it, and you can always put it back on when you get home, but not while working for this kind of clientele”

After a brief shopping trip Speaker and Shimmer began hitting up the addresses on the list. Most of the places had apparently been messages by Cash to expect Speaker, though a few simply turned them away – some rudely so – at the door or gate to their various mansions and estates.

It quickly became apparent that the most common thing among the ludicrously wealthy ponies that Speaker visited were demands that he and Shimmer swear themselves to total and complete secrecy about whatever they were about to cure. This didn’t surprise Speaker, as it also quickly became apparent that many of the illnesses he had been summoned to cure were not as much lethal ones – as they were socially embarrassing ones, though they were all quite serious: These ponies had plenty of skilled doctors, even dragonblooded unicorn healers, on call, but even the ponies gifted with the powers of the dragons couldn’t cure everything.
- or if they could, they didn't seem to trust them not to blab about it.

After undoing a particularly nasty infection on a wealthy merchant’s nutsack – an infection evidently caused by a lover having bitten him there a little too hard – Speaker and Shimmer found themselves in the situation that the merchant refused to let them leave without them accepting some kind of payment – the idea of him giving to a charity hospital for the poor was apparently far too disgusting a thought for him.

Ultimately Shimmer sensed something familiar with an ancient ceramic vase painted in blue and silver that the merchant had. Speaker’s essence sight confirmed her suspicion: The silver paint was actually moonsilver. It took a little haggling from Shimmer’s side, but ultimately the Solar and Lunar left the residence – though through the sewers  – with the vase tucked away elsewhere.

During their subsequent house-calls, Speaker found himself increasingly faced with a concept that he wasn’t that familiar with – indeed, if it wasn’t for Shimmer’s respectable business savvy (A skill mostly developed via arranging trade agreements between western island tribes) then Speaker might well have found himself in a lot of trouble, for a lot of the clients they visited offered him various contracts and retainer fees, and most of them were quite insisting. The catch was that a lot of the contracts had tricky wording that Speaker, as smart as he was, simply couldn’t make heads or tails of. Now, give him a construction diagram for a manse with all its intricate essence flow diagrams – that he could work with, but wording like non-competition clauses and exclusive treatment arrangements just didn't make sense to him. So while Shimmer allowed Speaker to sign the more harmless retainer contracts, she noted that for the others they would have to consult their business partner first before being able to consider signing anything that binding.

In the end, after a few days of making the fat and bloated thin and pretty, the weak and old into vigorous and old, and even at one point undoing a young mare’s brain-damage caused by having choked on her own umbilical cord at birth, Cash reported that the hospital had gotten five separate cash donations, the largest of which was a literal cart full of silver bars – plus a number of large donations of used but clean linens of various colors as well as a host of other things, some with names of the donators, some without. All in all, Cash was quite certain that once these rich ponies started talking about Speaker as their private miracle worker they would never allow him or his housemates to be touched by the immaculates.

Red found this news quite pleasing, as she had evidently spent her time since the rescue mission into the old capitol building making plans to purge it of changelings, once and for all…
> Chapter 58: Break Your Shell
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Having spent most of her life as a mercenary, Red knew the ins and outs of battle well: Pointy bits go in the other pony, you get out alive. That said, she could not be accused of being a great strategist. Her straightforwardness in battle had worked well while serving under others – you just waited for them to sound the horn and then you charge, killing anyone who is coming at you.  Sadly, this was also her plan to deal with the changelings: Run in and ‘just’ kill them.

“Red, you do realize that we don’t really know where the changeling lord is?” Shimmer noted.

Red didn’t appear to see the problem.

“I was taken down to the changeling lord, once… just when I’d been captured” Sullen Hoof began.

All of the circle around the dining table listen with rapt attention, while occasionally also sampling some of the stir fried fish and veg that Sully had whipped up for the occasion. Apparently the old capital building… changed… once you got deeper down. Sullen Hoof didn’t have words for it, but said that he was put before a master of the changelings – the one who forced the idea into his head that he should cook for until he died from exhaustion.

“Hold on – how did they catch you to begin with? You took out a sidereal up in the Jade Kitchen” Red objected, sounding very much as if she found it difficult to fathom that Sullen Hoof had been in any way defeated by anything less powerful than such a foe.
Sullen Hoof shook his head. It was difficult to for him to explain how he was defeated, for he didn’t understand it that well: “It was like…  I faced a cataphract that had a body unlike the ones with vegetable or wooden shapes, it was black, and shiny. It said that all who stood before him could no longer fight and… I don’t know how, but that was suddenly true”

“I don’t get it – he spooked you or what?” Shimmer inquired, trying to pinpoint what splinter of wyld taint had been lodged in Sully’s mind to convince him of such a thing.

Sullen Hoof couldn’t really answer. It was clear that it had been difficult for him to come to terms with – suddenly being robbed of the ability to fight. He then explained that after that the cataphract took his bravery, so he would cower, and then his conviction, so he wouldn’t object.

“That’s what changelings do – they eat your mind, and make your offer it up willingly” Shimmer said, with such venom in her voice that none could mistake her hatred of changelings.

Sunrise cleared her throat, indicating to the others that she wished to speak. Shimmer and Sully both gestured for her to say her word: “I think what Sullen Hoof was subjected to was a curse of definition”

Shimmer mulled over the suggestion for a few moments, then she nodded: “Sounds about right. It’s a powerful changeling ‘attack’ – more a narrative assault, rewriting your fate so you can’t do certain things, like fight”.

The obvious question to follow up with was how to avoid such wyld magic being  forced upon oneself. Sunrise had a simple answer to this, in the form of an at the same time basic and advanced meditative koan, which would invoke what Sunrise called integrity-protecting prana: “Speaker, do you know any meditative techniques?” Sunrise asked.

Speaker couldn’t say that he knew much, only what little basic after-battle contemplations that the seventh legion had taught him, as means to mentally deal with the horrors of war.

“Good enough – use your teaching charm, teach the others – in a week I’lll teach you all this charm, then we will be safe from the viles of the changelings” Sunrise calmy noted.

From the look on her face, it was  clear that Red didn’t want to wait a week – but it was also readily apparent that she didn’t want to become victim of some curse that would leave her unable to fight.

Speaker did as Sunrise suggested, Cash adding that with a week to prepare he could buy up even more iron for the assault. Shimmer said that she’d keep tabs on the square around the capitol building, to see if the changelings reformed the swarm. Speaker wasn’t sure what to spend the time doing, but Shimmer said that she was sure that he’d find something worthwhile to do.
“I’ll keep tabs on the immaculates… if they do anything now it’ll jeopardize our attack” Sullen Hoof noted, as he put his orichalcum helmet-mask on again and activated its power, altering his appearance into that of a quite forgettable ordinary-looking brown-coated stallion with a black mane.

The next day the circle adjourned and everyone parted for whatever tasks they had chosen to occupy themselves with before the attack on the changelings.

Speaker returned to the hospital, helping where needed, while contemplating the very real probability that the changelings might put similar curses of definition on the rest of the circle during the planned attack. The unshaping gun could only help one. This was unacceptable!

Pacing about his office in the hospital, barely even paying attention to the old mare with scrapes on her knees and bruises on her as he let his essence treat her joint pains from a life of carrying loads that were too heavy, Speaker thought furiously about how such a curse of definition even worked. He knew how to reshape wyld energy into things of creation, which a curse of definition basically also did – only altering a thing of creation to have slightly different parameters of function.

The old mare left, happy that her back and legs no longer ached, a young colt replacing her on the the examination table without Speaker even noticing.

His staff quickly figured out that they  might as well not to try to talk to Speaker as he powered through half a dozen more patients, mumbling to himself as he pondered the secrets of changeling  powers based on what he remembered from wyld safaris in the first age and his experiences from this lifetime. In the afternoon he ordered messengers be sent throughout Nexus, calling for mutants who sought a cure to their inhuman abnormalities, as well as a promise of pay if they would submit to medical experiments that might ultimately fix them.

The next morning three dozen mutants arrived at the hospital, many of them very much worse for wear – the common pony of Nexus, or most of Creation for that matter, fearing and hating mutants, with the usual predictable violence to follow. Speaker cared little for their sob-stories. Oh sure, he listened, but his attention was elsewhere: He was trying to get a feel via essence sight of the secret patterns of the pony soul and its mystic essence flows – for the true root of most mutations were alterations to these flows.
A week later, when the circle reconvened at the town house, Speaker showed up with a great smile on his face. He reported that he had rediscovered the ancient solar Order Affirming technique, which he simply explained by saying that it did exactly the same as the unshaping device.

“Sweet – I guess that means that we’re safe if things go wrong. Shimmer, anything new from the capitol square?” Red said, looking confident as ever.

Shimmer’s brows furrowed as she pursed her lips. She appeared lost in thought for a moment, then said: “Hard to tell. The wyld fire surrounding the building makes it difficult to tell what’s going on inside – so they could be massing troops for all we know – but I have noticed a change in some of the drones and figments that go out to raid for new victims… they don’t look nearly as much like plants or fruits anymore, they look more like pony-sized insects now”

“A change in appearance… hmm – have you ever seen changelings do that before?” Sunrise wondered.

Shimmer nodded, but look concerned: “I have – but that’s what worries me. It could mean a change in leadership among the changelings. Getting Sully out probably upset the power balance, but it could also just mean that whatever changeling noble was in charge of perimeter security has been swapped out”

“The changeling lord I faced looked like a… a nightmare tree – but they had bug-like drones too, I’m sure” Sullen Hoof noted.
Shimmer agreed, but said that these were different: “The few bug-like drones we saw while getting you looked like pony-sized beetles and roaches – they were small servant drones. The ones I saw were warrior drones, and the cataphracts we faced coming in were mostly shaped like plant-based wolves and tigers”

The circle didn’t really know what to make of this, but Cash argued that it was a moot point. He’d been buying up iron by the pram-load, filing with warehouse with iron rods and bars so much so that at Big Market the iron mongers were all on a first name basis with him.

Satisfied that they had a suitable arsenal to engage the changelings, Red turned to Sullen Hoof: “What about the immaculates? Have they been up to anything?”

Nodding slowly, Sullen Hoof regaled how he’d intercepted several messages going out of the grand immaculate temple up on sentinel hill to various killers for hire and other ne’er-do-wells. While this did prevent any immediate attack, it was a short term solution: “…so I spiked their food with a powerful aphrodisiac. They’ll be busy dealing with the scandals of most of their monks and priests breaking their celibacy wows quite wantonly to do much about us…”

Sunrise didn’t appear all that pleased with Sully’s choice of distraction for the immaculates, but she couldn’t deny that it had been effective: “So that’s why I heard about impromptu orgies in the temple…”

The rest of the circle found Sullen Hoof’s trick fairly amusing, though Red had to admit that she had never really understood why the immaculates had to take wows of celibacy anyway – it seemed silly for a unicorn to waste their opportunity to create a bloodline of their own.

“It’s politics my good Red. Realm politics: If immaculates were allowed to have foals then their entire organization would likely devolve into a series of dynasties of hereditary positions. That would put the immaculate order on par with the other realm houses. By enforcing celibacy they distance themselves from enough of the usual political humdrum that most of the houses see them as a stabilizing influence, rather than another competitor – plus it makes for a ‘safe’ place to send unicorns who aren’t worth marrying and breeding” Cash eloquently and concisely explained.

Sunrise blinked for a moment, the quick lesson in Realm politics sinking in. As she nodded Cash added that Sully’s little trick with the afrodiciacs specifically targeted that political neutrality – which meant that the immaculates would be having all kinds of fun the next few months tracking down any pregnancies that came out of whatever unholy orgies that Sully’s trickery caused.

“Remind me to tell my elders that trick next time I meet them – they’ll love to hear about this” Shimmer chimed in, looking decidedly mischievous.

With the circle having had their laughs, Sunrise got down to business: For those had needed it – namely Red, Cash and Sullen Hoof – the basic lesson in meditation and inner calm, via his educational charm, had worked its magic. This meant that now Sunrise could teach them all a simple but obscenely powerful self defence charm: The invocation of the integrity-protecting prana, or how to expand that inner calm and certainty of self, via essence, to ones whole body. The result would be simple: It would make it impossible for any force to reshape the solar into anything one didn’t want – which would mean that no changeling would ever be able to subtle alter Sullen Hoof again so that he’d think he couldn’t fight, or turn your bowels into snakes, or worse.

To aid in this, Sunrise requested Shimmer to help her – since they had all seen back in Birdstone what Shimmer could with her mutation-inducing charm… and suddenly learning a shaping-defence charm became very both very frightening and quite amusing.
Over the next two days Shimmer had the whole circle, sans Sunrise, mutate into foals, turn pink, sprout flower petals instead of manes, get squeaky voices, plus all kinds of other fun things. Speaker, with his order-affirming charm was able to undo these mutations in turn, as Sunrise taught that integrity-protecting prana did not shield from existing mutations.

Ultimately Shimmer’s attempts at reshaping her friends into apple-sized micro-ponies stopped working as everyone got the hang of Sunrise’s technique – and so the circle felt ready to finally attack the changelings head on.

On the eve of battle Cash reported that he had notified the council of entities of the circle’s intentions – just to safe, in case they might object to it for some reason. He hadn’t heard anything from them, so by all standards of Nexus law and the lack thereof it was safe to proceed.

To most it was just another early morning in the month of Resplendant Water. As the name suggested, it was raining. In fact, it wasn’t just raining it was pouring. Thanks to the east being so mercilessly far from the west, the rainy season there was basically out of control, leading to torrential rainfall. The heavens above and the waters below were basically one.

In Nexus this had for the last many many years meant that the city would partially flood. This meant the death of thousands, a lot of property being destroyed, and of course countless business opertunities in rehousing, water damage repairs and all kinds of other fun and exploitative things. This time it was different: The waters hadn’t risen, and the city was buzzing with this revelation.

Sure, it had been raining for weeks now, and the waters did usually take a little while before it rose – but at this time for countless decades the lowest parts around the hills that made up Nexus was under water up to above the height of a grown pony.

Perhaps this was why the council of entities hadn’t objected to the circle of solars and one lunar to attack the changelings – perhaps they hoped that the circle might end that nuisance as well? This was a likely scenario, but in Creation – in Nexus – one never knew for certain. The only thing the council had done in the wake of the revelation that the changelings had been luring in more ponies than usual, which threatened the council and guild’s supply of cheap labor, was to increase mercenary patrols around the square… temporarily. Increased patrols in Firewander cost a lot more than getting new workers.

Either way five rain-soaked ponies stood at the west end of the palace square as the sun was setting, the area surrounding the wyld-burning capitol building, with the wyld-fire and dusk making everything throw off long flickering shadows that seemed to writhe by their own accord. Red was decked out in what could only be called ugly armor, for it was all iron and already starting to show rust. Shimmer was in her war-form, covered in her essence-grown bone armor. Speaker and Sunrise were both wreathed in thin shimmering shells of golden essence that sparkled as the raindrops hit them, their shield charms ready for anything. Sullen Hoof… was probably there, but you wouldn’t know if you looked – for he did not want you to see him. Cash Charmer on the other hoof was very difficult to miss, his caste mark burning bright on his forehead from the multitude of decidedly non-combat charms he had active…

The circle approached the wall of wyld fire, its brights lights giving off sensory stimuli across the board: The rain that fell into the flames seemed to either pass through it, or change into other similar-sized things as it entered into the wyld fire – making for a strange but noisy, smelly and colorful experience as pebbles, pearls, tiny gems, tiny flowers, bone splinters, dusts and wisps of air that smelled weird and other tiny things ‘rained’ down through the flames.

As Speaker powered up his mechanical hoof device, its many fluid-filled crystal cylinders pumping and hissing with steam every now and then, the flames yielded for several yards around him, giving the circle safe berth to enter through.

It took mere seconds before the now quite notably more insect-like changelings appeared, crawling out of spaces far too small for them to hide – but changelings weren’t known for obeying the laws of physics to begin with. This briefly made Speaker wonder how his order-affirming technique would work if used on a changelings… fixing and aligning the decidedly fluid and fleeting essence patterns of a changeling into something static and truly creation-born?

Speaker got a few minutes to contemplate this as Cash began the first part of the plan: He used charms to forcibly bring attention to himself – not in a fighting sense – but to make the surrounding changelings listen to him… and then he said: “I am Cash Speaker, solar eclipse caste and Lord of Brookside. I demand to see your lord and master”

The plan was simple and yet elegant: The circle would use Cash’s divine diplomatic status to get right up to the changeling lord.

There they would size up the changeling lord and see if they could defeat the bugger or not. If the odds looked good they would say  that they had a gift for the changeling lord, a gift that Shimmer had stored away elsewhere: Six large piles of several thousand iron swords and  cleavers, for Red and Sullen Hoof to have fun with. Sunrise was to use her smiting power freely and repeatedly, though as already seen the circle knew that the more powerful changelings would likely be immune to this power, but it would ideally clear out the drones and lesser figments. After that it would just be a matter of winning the fight and surviving to tell the tale.

Of course, Speaker knew well enough that the first casualty of any combat engagement was the battle plan – so as he curiously beheld the chitinous and segmented limbs of the pony-shaped changeling drones around him, as well as how the very insides of the capitol building looked different, he wondered just how many unexpected things the circle would encounter now.

The very layout of the capitol building appeared to have changed, as had the entire decorative theme: The rooms were all hexagonal, and the walls were clad in a faint green film of slime that only occationally yielded to reveal wax-covered walls. A quick sniff, lick and vomiting from Sully confirmed that the wax was made from pony fat rendered into this disgusting form – which explained the dozens of cocoon-like slime pod the circle passed, each with a silhouette of a non-moving pony inside, all evidently awaiting processing.

Speaker had to restrain himself not to act to help, but Cash noted that they could be released easily enough as part of the ‘negotiations’ they were about to have.

Deeper into the hive-like domain that now was the capitol building, for indeed with the insect-like drones and the hexagonal layout, the whole place felt very beehive like, the circle was ultimately led to what appeared to be the ‘bottom’ of the very hive structure – a feat that wouldn’t have been easy for mortal ponies, as at that depth the hexagonal nature of the hive didn’t just apply to the walls, but also the ceiling and the floors, making traversing the rooms an exercise in doorways with three yard sheer drops and other design features that only made sense to the changelings, in that the drones all had wings like wasps or hornets, and ‘hooves’ with hooks to hold on to the ceiling or walls when tending to their ‘pods’. Luckily most of the circle had their athletics charms, allowing them to balance and maneuver easily – though Sunrise had to cling to Shimmer’s back to safely get around.

At the very bottom the drone leading them to the changeling lord flew down a large hole in the ground that looked mostly like an old well. It was a vertical drop that just extended into darkness.

“Shimmer?” Red tentatively asked.

The lunar nodded and flew down the hole, Sunrise on her back. A few moments later the two came back up, Shimmer saying that a platform was coming up.

Indeed, half a minute later a platform of what appeared to be solid amber came out of the darkness and hovered in place just long enough for the circle to get on board.

As it descended into darkness a light become apparent at the bottom. As the platform passed into that, it instantly became clear that the circle was now in a vast cavern, lit by glowing lights that seemed to be stuck to the walls and ceilings. Flying high above the ground were also dozens of glowing creatures, evidently lesser changelings wrought only to be living light fixtures. They flew around in beautiful patterns, pulsing out light in many colors in a constant display of unreal entertainment.

The combined light shined off many a sleek and curved chitinous curve down on the floor, the shiny black carapace-like creations making for a strange but none the less majestic throne room for the changeling lord. The changeling lord itself a larger than normal changeling with a crown of black gems and a mane of iridescent green, twice the size of a normal pony.

The platform landed just in front of the changeling lord’s court.

The scene was at the same time familiar and yet undeniably bizarre. Around the changeling lord in the middle were dozen of strange and different looking courtiers, undoubtedly emissaries and visitors from other changeling holds in Creation, plus one particularly miserable looking writhing pile of tentacles, fur and eye-stalks that seemed to languish behind the throne in spiked chains of metal and bone.

The last creature seemed familiar to Shimmer, suddenly became very quiet and – somehow, despite her having a beak instead of a normal mouth – seemed to bare her fangs…

“Shimmer, what’s wrong?” Speaker whispered.

With all three of her eyes trained on the thing behind the changeling lord, Shimmer hizzed one word: “Chimera”

It was then that Cash Charmer began his main part of the ruse the circle had planned. Before the changeling master of ceremony could speak, Cash introduced the circle with bold words and a glorious golden aura, and bid the changeling lord introduce itself… basically a very rude stunt in a courtly setting, but it was a calculated risk: First of all this wasn’t a court of pony nobles, so the changelings might have procedures that were quite bizarre, and secondly it was meant to present the circle in an aggressive manner… this wasn’t a friendly visit, even if it might not result in battle.

The master of ceremonies, a very tall pony-shaped insect with almost comically long legs and neck, chittered for a moment – likely its way of clearing its throat – but a gesture from its lord made it go silent in an instant.

“Greetings mighty Exalted guests to my court. I am Queen Chrysalis, ruler of Nexus” the noble changeling on the throne declared, introducing herself in a surprisingly normal fashion compared to how changelings were often depicted in pony tales, where they often only spoke in riddles, or could only communicate via dream-eaten puppets.

Rising from her throne, an act that revealed the full might of her insectoid body, with its features wrought in the shape of a pony, only bigger, ‘better’ and ‘more beautiful’ (From the point of view of the changelings) – like her drones and figments she had wasp-like wings sprouting from her back, scaled up to her size, on her head above her slitted eyes was a great black horn. This ‘queen’ of Nexus didn’t just have a form that caricatured the mightiest aspects of ponies, no she was parodying the mightiest of gods! With a long and powerful, yet inexplicably elegant limb that terminated in a hoof of notable polished but alien beauty, Chrysalis haughtily gestured as she inquired: “To what do I owe the pleasure of such illustrious visitors to my court?”

From just behind his ear Speaker heard Sullen Hoof’s voice whisper to him: “That is not the nightmare king I saw… but this is the right place. I’m counting five dozen drones, a dozen bigger ones that I’m guessing are insect-shaped cataphracts and then ugly behind the throne. Did Shimmer say it was a chimera? What’s that?”

“No idea, but I like these numbers. Be ready for gifts” Speaker returned, speaking as quietly as possible. He couldn’t see where Sullen Hoof was, but assumed he was close enough to hear him. 

While it hadn’t been planned for that extensively, then during their planning Shimmer had noted that if Cash could at the very least tire the changeling ruler with droning rhetoric and attempts of mind-control, then that could greatly benefit the circle once the fighting began – and so, deploying his full array of social charms which caused his anima to flare up around him like golden fire, Cash proudly and loudly gave this changeling queen the circle’s ultimatum: “As stated, then I represent the leaders and owners of the Brookside neighborhood of the Firewander District. I am here to demand that you and your minions cease and desist any and all attacks on the ponies of Nexus! In return we offer a non-aggression pact to this court and its agents”

His words struck all who heard him with such force that it was impossible to simply ignore what he said, such was his terrifying apparition of glory, such was his majestic radiant presence as he stood in front of the changeling court clad in heavenly garb and speaking honeyed words so empowered by essence, so seductive, that it actually looked as if the queen was going to submit to his demands… but then again, Cash had hit the queen with everything he had, using charms to insert feelings of awe and dread to all who heard him, as well as igniting his own salesman spirit with furious essence.

About two thirds of the changeling queen’s court knelt down and wept, many crying out to beg for forgiveness for their transgressions against their visiotrs, as their feeble minds yielded to Cash’s potent mind control. In response to this Queen Crysalis stomped her hoof mightily, the very cavern shaking, as she shouting: “Silence! I shall determine whether this request is worthy…”

As if on cue, Cash threw Queen Crysalis a truly venomous grin: “Well before you pass judgement, let me sweeten the deal…”

Shimmer nodded, knowing that this was her signal. With a series of vigorous hops, skips and jumps, Shimmer retrieved the piles of pristine master-crafted iron swords that Speaker had fashioned from the tons of iron that Cash had bought earlier, which caused Sunrise fall off her back very quickly, her landing in one of the piles of swords and then scrambling back onto Shimmer’s back.
The Queen’s reaction to that much iron being dumped into her court… well it didn’t really sit that well with her. With a furious shriek she howled: “Iron!? In my court! Slave, kill them!”

From behind the throne, the pulsating mutation that Shimmer had noticed earlier sprung to life – its quivering flesh falling off in great slimy chunks as its body erupted into a sleeker but none the less disturbing form that seemed to sprout, shed and even eject various horns, insect limbs and eye-stalks in a continuous and nauseating display.

Shimmer and Red quickly stepped in to intercept the monster, the three colliding in a tangle of flailing tentacles that seemed to be unable to decide whether they should be scaled, or covered in suckers, or even be attached to the monster in the first place…
What Speaker found even more disturbing was the fact that at various points during this martial skirmish various lunar caste marks would briefly light up parts of the monster’s body… this thing was a lunar, or had been. Perhaps that was what Shimmer had meant by chimera?

“Why isn’t it dying!?!” Red shouted, her gleaming reaver daiklaive cutting multiple long gashes into the monster – but only pale semi-transparent green slime gushed out before the wounds closed seconds later.

Shimmer, her bone-armor similarly drenched in the slime, howled and squawked menacingly as she clawed away on the beast, apparently too busy to answer, assuming that she even knew how to slay the thing.

Looking at the fight, Speaker noticed that Sunrise wasn’t on Shimmer’s back anymore, instead over in a corner of the cavern looking rather distressed. Quickly moved over to her, all the while keeping an eye on the fight, and asked what was wrong.
“It’s this place… it’s a lie” Sunrise said in a rather despairing tone.

Speaker wasn’t sure what the Zenith caste Solar meant, but figured that she was referring to the inherently fake nature of the changelings: “I know – we’re here to stop that, but is that what’s got you so spooked?”

Sunrise shook her head, her beautiful orange mane bouncing effortlessly: “No it’s… it’s this cave, but don’t think about it! Don’t! When the fight is over we can talk”

“Ok…” Speaker said, really not liking how distraught Sunrise sounded. She was usually always a pillar of calm and collectedness.
As Speaker turned to check on the fight, Red, Shimmer and the monster turning out to be frighteningly evenly matched, Sunrise tugged on the back part of Speaker’s uniform: “Does changeling glamour persist after the changeling is destroyed?” 

“Yes, until you point out it’s an illusion it basically remains real as far as ordinary pony senses go” Speaker noted, oblivious to what Sunrise was hinting at.

Approaching Speaker and Shimmer, Cash inquired if Speaker had any clue as to how Red and Shimmer could defeat the monster: “The thing just… goops up whenever they cut into it. A moment ago Shimmer yanked off a head it had sprouted, but it just dissolved into goo as well”

“Maybe it’s a powerful regeneration charm? Hmm… perhaps if they cauterize the wounds before the close?” Speaker wondered, drawing on his medical knowledge to come up with an idea.

“Hey, Speaker says try to burn it!” Cash shouted, Red quickly leaping into the air and swinging her broad-bladed weapon around her as it began trailing bright droplets of molten sunlight. With a final twist of her body as she reached the peak of her leap she flung her blade towards the monster, the trailing arc of liquid righteous fury it trailed ripping away from the blade and launching itself like a glob of lava made of pure light.

The sound of the impact wasn’t much. It was liquid on liquid basically, but a split second later the hiss that came when the hot holiness began to explosively evaporate the horribly mutated pony exalt within…

A few seconds later the whole writhin mess exploded like a slimy balloon, coating everything in sight in a chunks of wiggly flesh and slime. It didn’t smell particularly bad, it felt quite weird. Suffice to say that the queen didn’t take well to having her slave destroyed:
“Kill them!” she roared, her mouth opening in a way that made it appear as if her lower jaw wasn’t really connected to her body – a truly unnerving sight.

Without anyone needing to tell her to, Sunrise rose from her corner and flared her anime, having had plenty of time to silently warm up for her grand performance: “In the name of the most high: Your aggression is denied!”

The pulse of light from her anima made deadly with her well-honed thoroughly practiced smiting charms reduced almost everything in the room to either ash or smoldering hollow carapaces – of course, there had been several hundred changelings in attendance at the court, so even with almost everything dead the survivors were quite numerous, though every changeling bore grevious burn marks from Sunrise’s smiting.

The no-surprise fight that ensued was fairly one-sided – it was a slaughter: Between Red’s and Sullen Hoof’s whirlwind of cleaver – Sully who revealed his presence by planting five iron cleavers into the heads of five strange looking changelings, likely emissaries or visitors from other courts – and Shimmer using her essence threads to blast a web at the ceiling exit to trap all the changelings in the cavern, Sunrise smiting anything that got close to her, and Speaker throwing iron chakrams left and right, everything went as planned.

Perhaps it was his inner glory-hog, perhaps it was because she hadn’t moved from her throne to engage any of the others, but Cash had moved to engage the very changeling Queen! It quickly proved to be a futile onslaught: Even with his charms of near peer-less martial proves with his Hoof the Daystar style of martial arts, further augmented by his fierce bladed shoes, then Cash found that he simply could not hurt this fiendish changeling.

When dust from the slaughter of the rest of the court settled the unnatural sounds of Cash’s bladed hooves merely scratching the changeling queen’s carapace body was all that remained,  the queen not appearing that worried or upset of the destruction of her court.

Indeed, when Red joined the fray with half a dozen iron swords floating about her the queen didn’t even flinch – the iron bouncing off her form just as much as Cash’s shoe-claws.

This perplexed Speaker, who observed the battle carefully: The queen bore the ‘holes’ and scorch-marks of prior exposure to iron, indeed her horn and limbs were riddled with them, a testament to many battles with iron-wielding ponies. The real question was why she she seemed so invincible now? Shimmer was quick to come up with an answer:

“She’s using gossamer shields!” the lunar howled, the rest of the circle looking mostly uncertain in how to respond to this information.

Speaker knew well enough what Shimmer meant: Gossamer was the stuff of dreams, literally. When a changelings ravages a pony, the material drawn forth from the pony’s mind is in the form of gossamer, which a changeling can then consume to fuel its powers in the same way a pony might eat a hay sandwich to fuel its body. Of course, knowing this didn’t inform a solution: Gossamer was inherently of creation, so cold iron and holy smiting had no effect against it – and this changeling queen seemed to have a limitless of the stuff…

Ultimately Cash stopped attacking the changeling queen. He gestured for Red to do the same. The clattering of iron swords on the ground did not sit well with the dawn caste Solar: Her scowl made that very clear.

“Foolish ponies – I am Queen Crysalis, of the shell never-broken! I can reform my court with but a thought – so everything you do here is a futile gesture” the changeling queen boasted.

Red fumed, stomping the ground hard. The delicate looking glass floor with its ever-changing mosaics that showed insect-like changelings doing all kinds of things neither cracked nor bulged – though it did make Speaker wonder if the floor had been a mosaic before Red had struck it. Either way this was a bad situation: The fight, while brief, had left everyone at least half-drained of essence, but then Cash strode up the queen at her throne and did something strange…

He tried to push her. She did not move – though she did spout a few additional bemused remarks about how feeble Solars clearly were.

“I wouldn’t say that…” Cash commented, sounding oddly confident, considering the situation.

Speaker couldn’t help but wonder what Cash was up to… Shimmer seemed quite intrigued as well.
Leaning in close to Crysalis, Cash whispered something.

The queen’s eyes bulged. She trembled, and nervously fidgeted with her hooves. She looked at Cash, then looked at the rest of the circle – then she snapped her mouth open and emitted an errily echoing howl as her hooves began to calcify into solid chunks of salt… and in a split second reaction she tore her legs off, stopping the calcification – but also evidently ripping a gory chunk of milky slime from her torso which seemed locked in place as she moved her body away.

With a speed that even Red or Sullen Hoof couldn’t match, Crysalis’s wings buzzed to life and zipped her up into the air, only for her to then slam down through the glass mosaic floor of her court and disappear into the darkness below, screaming: “I will get you for this Cash Charmer! I will have my revenge!”

The rest of the circle looked on in surprise. Red, still furious that for all her martial might she could do nothing, was the first to ask the obvious question: “The bloody hell did you just do!?”

“I just convinced her of a little something and said two words – and if you can guess them I’ll jump Big Market wearing nothing but pink body paint and rattle-bells” Cash beamed, looking very pleased with himself, as the lights above the court dimmed, with both the flying glow-changelings having been destroyed by Sunrise’s smiting, but now also the magical lights winked out. The only remaining light sources at this point was the circle itself, with everyone glowing brightly from massive essence expenditures.
Just as Shimmer was about to suggest that the circle leave chunk of slime that floated where Crysalis had stood on the throne began to evaporate. Red, Shimmer and Sunrise paid it no heed. Cash let out a small chuckle as he deftly trotted over the glass mosaic flooring – the mosaic figures under his hooves seemingly shying away from him, while also shying away from the hole the now thoroughly de-throned Crysalis had left.

It was Speaker stumbling over backwards and crying out “Gods no!” that got everyone’s attention.

When the slime had evaporated a single object was behind floating in mid air. As the circle turned, they saw it: Milky white, with ever so faint shapes and colors shifting around under its surface. It was no larger than a big apple, perfectly spherical and had a faint white vapor emitting from it – and Speaker knew what it was… and the mere sight of it, considering its condition, was draining the blood from his face.

Shimmer was the first to pick up on Speaker’s fearful reaction: “What is that thing?”

“It… it’s a...” Speaker began, finally taking a deep breath and composing himself: “It’s a protoshinmaic vortex!”

Now, with Speaker’s extensive and almost perfect recall of his past life memories he knew quite well what a protoshimnaic vortex was – the rest of the circle… not so much, so even with Speaker having said the thing’s name they couldn’t all see why they should fear it.

They didn’t know that it was an artifact thought into being mere centuries before the Usurpation, at the very peak of the first age. They didn’t know that to make one, a solar would have to go so far into the wyld that no shred of the stability or sanity of creation could be felt, then siphon all of that pure chaos into a single object of limitless potential… and that it should not be emitting anything without being hooked up to proper siphoning apparatuses, for that was a sign that it was breaking apart. They didn’t know that PSV ruptures were some of the most destructive events recorded in the first age outside of the atrocities committed in the primordial war as the primordials saw that they could not win. They didn’t know that a cracked PSV would reduce half of Nexus to a smoldering crater so large that it would likely drain both the grey and yellow river for months, just to fill the hole. They didn’t know that all the lands around the crater would be flooded with wyld energy to the point that it would likely be a deathblow to river commerce and travel all throughout the scavenger lands…

Worst of all: They didn’t know that you couldn’t fix a PSV once it started to fail… or that once the breakdown began, that you usually only had a few minutes to get as far away as possible!

Speaker tried to explain these concepts to the circle, though all he managed to say was that they had to get away – away from ‘that thing’, away from Nexus, right now!

Shimmer quickly recognized Speaker’s sense of urgency and fear and didn’t question it – but Red had never been one to ever show fear…

“So this is thing is the source of the changeling’s power here?”  Red said solemnly, gazing coldly at the white orb.
Speaker would have loved it if he had time to sit Red and the circle down to explain the situation in detail – hurried thinking wasn’t his style: “Yes, and it’s about to blow, so get on the lunar!”

The rest of the circle didn't hesitate long before making towards Shimmer, who was already over at Sunrise to pick her up. Red turned towards the circle, then looked back at the orb: “No! If this thing is why so many ponies have suffered from changeling attacks here, then we can’t just leave it for other changelings to draw power from!”

“Don’t be daft! You can’t fight a thing that’s about to blow up! This is out of our hooves, now let’s get out of here!” Shimmer called out – but Red didn't listen… for she was hearing something else.

Then the circle heard it as well: It quickly became loud and clear. It began as beautiful female singing in an alien language, like a choir, along with strange melodic clanging, like bits of metal being struck, plus an underlying distorted and pulsing sound that certainly weren't of any instrument that had ever existed joining in moments later. At the same time flurries of air gathered around Red and coalesced into her anima – but not in its usual totemic expression.

Red’s fiery golden aura spread outward, warping reality around her, all the while Red herself began to gallop towards the protoshinmaic vortex – the distance between her and the PSV stretching as well, despite Red galloping faster and faster.
Then the sound of a single flute joined the song, which despite being sung in a language that none in the circle knew, was perfectly clear in its message: It was a song of elated victory, joy and might.

The rest of the circle watched in a mix of awe and horror as the illusion which was the dark throne room yielded to a new reality – one of a seemingly endless sunlit field of grass on Red strode, followed by an equally endless legion of ponies in brilliant golden armor that had simply come into existence out of Red’s ever-expanding anima.

From high above, buoyed by Shimmer’s wing beats, the circle saw as Red herself changed as well, the intensity of the music increasing as impossibly beautiful armor of the purest orichalcum formed around her, armor that bore her cutie mark. Above her floated an orichalcum reaver daiklaive of such beauty and subtle elegance that it defied words.

As Red approached the PSV across her field of glory the music reached its mighty crescendo, Red leaping high into the air with her blade poised to strike… and then, in a act of martial serenity that ten thousands warrior poets would gladly drain their inkwells dry to describe, only to weep them full them again with their tears that they might write of it once more, Red struck the orb and the music ended.

> Chapter 59: Misery Loves Company
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was the dead of night, high above the crowded and rundown tenements of the Firewander district in Nexus that a cloud lifted from the center of the district, from the roof of the old capitol building of Hollow. On that cloud a bright golden light shined, illuminating the cloud as it quickly moved to the north-east.

Almost the whole circle was on the cloud, except Cash, who had been sent to fetch Nah and catch up with them, for Nah was faster and time was of the essence. The cloud had been conjured simply to get the damaged protoshinmaic vortex out of Nexus quickly.
It had all happened to so quickly: When Red had ‘struck’ the PSV a flash of searing light had pulsed out, and after that had faded all that was left was a slightly larger sphere with a decidedly golden surface. It was roughly the size of a small honey melon. It also wasn’t hovering in the air anymore, instead simply falling – and at that point there was much more room to fall in, for the illusion that had been the changeling court also began to fall apart, revealing that the cavern the circle was in was a seemingly bottomless chasm. Luckily everyone was up on Shimmer’s back and she managed to swoop down and gently catch the now contained PSV.
What exactly Red had managed to do was still a mystery to the circle, though both Shimmer and Speaker had theories. Of course, neither of them figured that they would ever know the exact truth, for Red wasn’t really  there to answer anymore…

Speaker and Shimmer both agreed that it appeared as if Red had somehow shaped the emissions of the PSV into a scene of glorious battle, with the PSV as the foe. She had then somehow reshaped herself, body and soul, into a runic orichalcum sphere that encased the PSV, containing it. The fact that the golden sphere occasionally jostled or rattled hinted that whatever was inside wasn’t dead nor simply static. Indeed, essence sight hinted that the sphere was somehow alive.

What little Speaker and Shimmer disagreed on mainly centered on exactly what the protoshinmaic vortex was. Speaker held that his first age memories matched exactly with how the thing had appeared and behaved, , making him stick to his claim that it indeed was a PSV, while Shimmer posited that it was some kind of ‘wyld seed’, or perhaps the grace of an unshaped changeling – but it was a minor point of contention: The main problem was how long Red would be able to contain the explosion of wyld energy the PSV would release.

Strangely enough, of the four ponies on the cloud, then it was Sunrise who seemed to have the most trouble holding back her tears: “Speaker, can we still save her… Red?”

Shimmer didn’t have to glance for more than a split second at Speaker to recognize the very telling expression of remorse and sorrow he displayed, Speaker simply shook his head. Whatever Red had done to herself had been both voluntary and intentional, and done in a way that - to the best of his ability – simply could not be undone. Indeed, knowing that Red had her shaping defence charm up at the time meant that only one kind of alterations could have been done to her: Shaping that was perfectly in line with how she herself wanted to be…

“The funny thing… I actually think this isn’t the first time she’s done something like this” Speaker mused.

Sunrise wiped her nose in the left sleeve of her robes: “Explain”

“Red died several dozen times in the first age – usually in glorious battle, to the point that her lunar mate at one point wrote a poem about her… how did it go…” Speaker said, his caste mark sparkling to life as he used a bit of essence to help his memories along: 
“The would-be prince, and his army of should-have-beens. Ever-seeking denied glory, ever-hunting that which they cannot defeat. Always hounded they be, by death and the grave-glory” 

Sullen Hoof, having remained quiet ever since they had left Nexus, wondered: “I thought poems should rhyme…”

Speaker shrugged, holding firmly on to the orb as it jostled again: “It’s a five thousand year old poem…”

“Prince? Red is a mare – I thought exaltations stuck to specific genders” Sunrise inquired.

“Don’t you remember what I discovered about your own past incarnation” Shimmer said: “Your last time around was as a stallion as well. Plus, I’ve seen enough lunars reincarnating to know that their exaltations don’t work that way. Heck, I’ve heard that Silverclaws has reincarnated as a mare…”

“Silverclaws?” Sullen Hoof asked, desperate to distract himself from the grim reality of the effective death of a dear friend, and failing at it, but in no way showing it thanks to his mask.

Shimmer explained that a according to lunar legends then he was lunar who, with every exaltation, would take on the surname of Silverclaws: “He was instrumental in rounding up the surviving lunars following the great contagion. Without him the lunar host wouldn’t be as organized as it is today, if at all”

The circle waxed nostalgic until Cash caught up with them, at which point Shimmer landed the cloud on Nah and the circle continued on towards a location just north of Great Forks, all according to Speaker’s directions.

“So what exactly are you going to do with that thing, with Red?” Cash asked bluntly. He knew quite well that it wasn’t a polite way to inquire, but his insight into how Speaker’s character told him that this was the best way to cut to the chase… and from Speaker’s worried look then there wasn’t time for lengthy explanations of the arcane science informing his no-doubt brilliant plan to dispose of the PSV.

Speaker looked at the orichalcum sphere. Over the last few hours he had, in the dim light of his caste mark via essence sight, seen the light of Red’s soul within begin to flicker and slowly diminish. Sighing and looking up at Cash, the old Lookshyan stallion furled his brows: “You remember that demesne we rescued that farm-mare from? The freaky food one?”

“That’s where we’re going? What good’ll that place do us?” Cash wondered, having earlier suggested that they instead fly west towards the Blessed Isle and drop the PSV on the imperial city… he figured that Red would have liked that.

Peering up at the starlit sky, Speaker took a deep breath: “When changelings alter a demesne to make a freehold, they basically turn it into a little wyld-zone. I think I can use my wyld shaping technique to turn the freehold’s inside into a huge void big enough to take the PSV explosion without anything spilling outside…”

Shimmer had to admit that considering what very few alternatives they had, then this was a brilliant plan, because they were far deep into Creation to get to the proper edges of reality within any foreseeable future.

The circle arrived shortly thereafter, Cash landing Nah in the clearing right in front of the eerily perfect grass-covered hemisphere they had visited… what, almost three seasons ago? On top of it wiggled and writhed a giant tree with a massive canopy that almost seemed to actively shift to catch as much moonlight as possible.

In the darkness of night, with the moon barely showing itself thanks to the giant tree’s strange behavior, Speaker made plans with the circle:

“Ok, I’ll make myself a tiny platform in the middle of the void I’m making. When I’m done I need you lot to get me out of there somehow… or before that, if the PSV starts its final rupture before I’m done – and… I have no idea how we’ll do that” the bearded solar stated plainly.

Shimmer smirked and flung a string of her spun essence webbing at Speaker. It stuck to his right flank: “Just give it a tug when you want out – I’ll rig up a little something to pull you out real quick”

Entering the demesne, Speaker shuddered as he quickly trotted over the muddy cavern floor. The whole place looked curiously… normal – but then again, there were no changelings in the freehold to warp its reality, so it was ‘merely’ a natural cave filled to the brim with raw unfiltered wood aspected essence.

Indeed, there wasn’t a trace of any freehold alterations… at all. There was no wyld energy to reshape.

Well so much for that plan.

Looking around for alternatives, beyond just dropping the PSV and running, Speaker beheld the demesne’s internal essence flows. The massive roots of the giant tree on top of the hill were everywhere, spreading down in a seemingly random but at the same time beautiful pattern to cover the inside of hill almost completely…

In fact, it seemed as if the essence that flowed into the demesne flowed into the tree – allowing it to grow so freakishly huge. Perhaps it would like to absorb a little more essence? Maybe a whole pocket reality’s worth?

A short time later outside Shimmer felt a tug in the essence string attached to Speaker: “Shit, this is way too early!”

Up on Nah and ready to get the hell out of there, Cash, Sunrise and Sullen Hoof quickly helped Shimmer tie her essence-spun string to the howdah – and then they sped off on the flying yeddim at speeds that would likely make the Mare of Journeys sport a wing-boner.

Speaker felt this sudden pull in the string tied around him as well – and barely managed to raise his body-shielding charms in time for the string to be pulled tight, which in turn pulled him out of the demesne at flesh-ripping speeds. Well, flesh-ripping in the sense that he was skidding along the dirt floor at well over a hundred and fifty miles an hour, only barely protected by his charms as layer upon layer of ablative essence tore away from him.

Clearing the demesne, Speaker found himself pulled up through the forest canopy. Limb-thick branches hurt even more than being dragged along the dirt – and indeed the impacts, on account of his speed, were too much for his shield charms. 

Thus, in the otherwise quiet of the nighty, a flying yeddim zipped across the sky, followed by a limp pony and a trail of blood that rained down on the forest canopy underneath them. The faint smell of spring flowers hung in the air, even thus far up in the sky, but so did the pained and unconcious groans of the old combat medic as he was reeled in…

It was then that the demesne exploded in a brilliant flash of light. It was as if the daystar itself had risen out of the ground – only brighter. The light hurt to gaze at directly, both physically and spiritually, not that Speaker was conscious to see it.

Speaker awoke in one of his hospital beds back in Nexus. Shimmer was by his side. Everything hurt… well, right until he used his anesthetic charm on himself – but even as the pain subsided it became clear that he was not able to move himself properly.

Shimmer quickly picked up on Speaker’s return to the land of the conscious, and in turn hugged him tightly – more than the anesthetic charm could compensate for. A miserable whimper from Speaker quickly made her stop.

“How are you feeling?” Shimmer tentatively asked. She knew the full extent of Speaker’s injuries – but she also knew that he would recover: It was only a matter of time before his bones knit themselves, on account of him being exalted.

Trying to move his head – and failing – Speaker instead simply tried to breathe. That worked, which in retrospect should have been obvious… he wouldn’t be alive if he couldn’t breather, so he managed to whisper: “Like shit”

Shimmer wiped a few tears from her eyes: “You’ll be fine… now what exactly did you do inside that demesne?”

Speaker groaned. He didn’t feel like talking – but thankfully he didn’t have to in order to explain what he had done. It took some effort, but effort that hurt, to shape wisps of essence around him into shapes of light and sound. It really wasn’t that different from playing the singing staff: A creative expression of essence and willful intent. What Shimmer saw looked like the ancient first age essence-flow diagrams of manses long lost to the ages. Then came Speaker’s disembodied voice explaining that he had attempted to ‘feed’ the PSV to the demesne, in order to not only contain the PSV explosion, but to turn it into something that wouldn’t blight most of the east for centuries to come… which led to him asking a quite poignant question: Had it worked?

Shimmer thought about Speaker’s question for a few tense moments. In her mind she compared what she had seen as they had flown away from the demesne to what Speaker had just illustrated. Sure, her knowledge of essence flows and arcane architecture paled to that of Speaker, but in turn she had a lunar’s expansive mind and flexible charms that allowed her to intuit insight in the most unexpected of places. To Speaker she simple nodded: “I think so – when we left the great tree above the manse erupted into a pillar of light. I also checked with essence sight: The whole demesne had increased in potency many times over, and changed aspect as well – but it appeared stabile”

Speaker didn’t say or do anything – only waiting for Shimmer to continue.

“It had changed from wood aspected to Solar aspected” Shimmer said, leaving Red’s sacrifice unsaid but implied and acknowledged.

Speaker closed his eyes and silently gave a tear to Red’s memory as well.

With Shimmer’s charms Speaker was quickly restored to a state where he was able to heal himself completely. All she really had to do was use her shapeshifting powers on him to the extent that his limbs weren’t bent ‘in the wrong way’. Ok, among mortal ponies that would have been a tall order on order requiring round the clock nurses and doctors – but thank to Shimmer’s shapeshifting charms she was able to let Speaker rest and recover, only altering and shifting his flesh and bones when need be... and while there was a lot of need, it was fairly easy.

Ultimately, three days after Speaker originally waking up in his hospital, the Lookshyan stallion was able to get out of bed and relieve himself in ways most urgent – very much on his own.

After this he left Brookside. He said nothing to the nurses or the doctors – indeed, knowing him they simply let him go.

With his mind a mess of sorrow and confusion Speaker fell back on the things he knew: He sought the Lookshyan apart of Nexus, also simply known as ‘Lookshy town’ in the northern end of the Firehammer district. It was an austere part of Nexus. The shops there weren’t flashy, not trying to show off their wares compared to  their competitors.

The whole place was mostly barracks and warehouses – and he wouldn’t let into either places. One locale Speaker did find hospitable: The Yellow Pepper, a Lookshyan restaurant.

Entering the place was like stepping into a place far from home, yet so very near to the heart. It had all the right field force sigils and banners hanging from the ceiling at various places. It was a shrine of remembrance, a place of reverence to the fallen. With this in mind Speaker strode confidently, yet with a noticeable limp, to the bar and demanded a proper Lookshyan candle-light dinner.

In many other places in Creation such a request would have hinted of romantic intents – but among Lookshyans such a request was less a time for merriment and more a time for somber reflection and introspection. The barman, a red-coated stallion with a black mane, looked at Speaker with disbelief: “You  know what you’re asking for?”

Speaker didn’t deign to reply, simply nodding solemnly, stomping him hoof into the floor.

This got the attention of the other ponies in the establishment.

As the barman and chef hesitantly brought Speaker the food he had ordered others began to gather around Speaker.

It was a scene Speaker had experience far too many times in his life. He hadn’t asked for this – indeed, he had hoped to avoid it seeing that this wasn’t Lookshy proper, but at the same time he would never deny any of them a seat at the table.

Many the green soldier and junior officer gathered around Speaker. They asked about his past, and where he had served. When he said that he had served with the 1st Gunsozsha medical support scale of the 1st field force, the very best of the very best, none rose their hooves and their cups for a cheer to the fallen. To do so would be beneath those who had fallen, for they could not join in, so in accordance with Lookshyan tradition the group of military ponies sat down in silence as servants brought out more small bowls with food similar to what Speaker was eating.

It was then that a disguised Sullen Hoof appeared, looking slightly out of breath and pleased to have found Speaker as he sat down next to him and caught his breath. In his current disguise Sully appeared as a bland light brown coated pony with a short-cropped black mane - like one of the thousands of other almost identical ponies in Nexus, and with his plain off-white clothes he looked like someone’s lowly servant, meaning that none of the other ponies at the table paid him any attention: “Speaker, we have to go, quickly”

“No. This is a time of mourning. Nothing is more important than this” Speaker replied, every word, every breath, a pain to force through his windpipe, be it in or out – but Speaker showed none of it, out of respect for the dead. A few of the other ponies even scoffed at Sully, reacting to what looked like a stupid servant acting disrespectfully towards his master, who clearly was busy with something far more important.

Sullen Hoof, the expert culinarian, beheld the fried noodles that Speaker was jostling around. With Speaker’s awakened essence he could float around the chopsticks quite freely – but he did not. Speaker was nibbling directly with his mouth at the bowl of sauce and fried meats, veggies and noodles before hi m – doing so with an almost ritual pace and calm – as were all the other ponies around him. It didn’t surprise Sully that Lookshyans had poor taste in food, but he had honestly hoped that he had taught Speaker better than this.

Sullen Hoof found this frustrating. There were more important things ahoof – no time for mourning. Pleading with Speaker, he was challenged to partake in the ritual: “Eat with us – and don’t rush this. Everyone here has bled for justice and what is right. We’re here to affirm that and honor those who fell doing so” Speaker said solemnly. The ponies at the table made room for Sully, though some didn’t look too happy about it – but they complied none the less.

Sullen Hoof had never heard Speaker talk in such a somber tone. Indeed, Sullen Hoof had witnessed Speaker at failed surgical procedures where good ponies had died despite the best of his ability – but this… this was different. This was truly a ritual of mourning, which was at least what his behavioral analysis charms told him. Were they all mourning Red?

His respect for Speaker bid Sullen Hoof to partake in the ritual – despite not knowing what he was getting in to. It seemed simple enough: Eat a meal in respect for respect of the dead. It looked like fried noodles and fried veggies with bits of cheap scraps of chicken. It basically looked the same fare you could anywhere else in Nexus at one of the tens of thousands of food stands and soba shops that dotted the cityscape.

Upon the food making contact with Sullen Hoof’s mouth the culinarian quickly confirmed that this fare was not ordinary food. Indeed, to call it food was an offence to food in general. This was pain manifest, fire and suffering distilled into a solid – and… Speaker was sitting at a table surrounded by other uniformed ponies, though theirs weren’t as faded or worn as Speaker’s, silently eating the same dish. Only a few of them even had tears in their eyes, including Speaker, though it was likely more for the loss of Red than the food.

Quickly swallowing and steeling himself for the mayhem that one mouthful would undoubtedly wreak upon his bowels later on, Sullen Hoof forgot all about why he had sought out Speaker to begin with – instead he asked the seemingly far more pertinent question of: “What in all the dragon buttholes of heaven is this?”

Speaker shook his head. He didn’t expect Sullen Hoof and his refined palate to understand – indeed none at the table probably expected a non-Lookshyan to be able to understand – but Sullen Hoof was a friend, and so he was owed an answer. Floating down his chopsticks and giving Sully a long sigh, Speaker asked: “What do you know about Lookshyan cooking?”

Sullen Hoof had to admit that he knew little of it directly – but he figured that much it would be heavily influenced by the kind of food one would feed an army with, which usually meant simple meals and lots of them, preferably with ingredients that could keep for a long time… and conversely you would spice up the food that had ingredients which would easily spoil, to hide any unsavory flavors: “…is that why this is so spicy? Did I just eat spoiled chicken?”

The ponies around the table chuckled, while Speaker merely smiled: “No – but the rest of your deduction was spot on, to the extent that that was how it used to be. These days we just spice up everything for fun, though I will give you that this, the penitent bowl, is not a normal dish: It’s usually reserved for prisoners - as a means of torture. They get milk if they talk”
Sullen Hoof nodded. This was definitely torture in food form.

“…but for the rest of us it’s also a reminder of the hardships we’ve faced, and the hardships we’ll face in times to come. It’s a rite of passage for new recruits in the 7th legion to eat a bowl of this, as well as a rite of mourning for those who’ve lost brothers and sisters in arms in battle” Speaker explained, floating up his chop-sticks again, along with a big helping of – to Sullen Hoof – chicken and noodles not fit for pony consumption.

The master culinarian looked around at the table full of ponies who silently ate. There wasn’t time for this. With his culinary martial arts, and expert use of subtlety Sully manipulated the food at the table: With only essence and will, not touch or taste, Sully ‘adjusted’ the dishes so that they would gained a new characteristic, in addition to its hellish level of spiciness and otherwise bland veggies and noodles: He made it forgettable.

The effect was immediate to see, but not for those under its spell: Even with each mouthful burning, none of those who ate took much notice of the food itself. It became like eating a bowl of the most dull and tasteless rice, simply something one scoffed down – albeit at a respectful but quick pace. No more mulling over each bite to torture one self, or distract oneself from the sorrow of lost friends. Speaker certainly didn’t seem to notice, and so a few short moments later he sat up and bowed to the ponies he had dined with, then turned to Sullen Hoof: “Alright, thank you for waiting, now what was so urgent?”

Sullen Hoof sighed and rolled his eyes, then took a deep breath: “While we raced to dispose of that thing Red was holding back, all the changelings we had passed on the way down to their queen broke loose – with no master they all went on a rampage. The council is pissed, and have blamed us for all the damage and dream-eaten ponies”

“I… we should have anticipated that… but I’m sure Cash can pay for the damages, and I can heal the ponies who were fed on by the changelings” Speaker said, feeling stupid that he hadn’t thought of this happening in advance.

Sullen Hoof shook his head and headed towards the door: “Not an option. The council put a civility into effect that confiscates all of Cash’s and your business and assets two days ago while you were still unconcious – Brookside is theirs now. They say it’s to cover for damages. Today they sent mercenaries to evict everyone and take control of the area”

Speaker ran after Sully, stopping him outside the Yellow pepper. Under the gaze of the large statue to Sunipa, the eastern goddess of war, which stood at the center of the largest square in Lookshy-town Speaker asked: “But Shimmer didn’t say anything about this when I woke up – why this kind of reaction?”

“Cash was trying to figure that out when I ran off to find you. You left without saying anything so we didn’t get a chance to tell you. Right now we need to get back to Brookside quickly and salvage what we can, then get the hell out of here before the council sends the emissary after us” Sullen Hoof said, his voice sounding quite bitter.

Speaker could tell, not just from Sully’s tone of voice, but his posture, that all of this was pissing off the master culinarian to no end. Being chased out of town meant that Sully wouldn’t be able to continue whatever shadowy projects he’d been working on at night – not that Speaker knew for certain what they were, but from what little Sully had said during the many times the circle had eaten together Speaker knew that it had something to do with using his divine cooking to manipulate the rich and powerful in Nexus into treating their thousands of employees better. Indeed, the number of ponies coming in from the Nighthammer district with burns from working in unsafe forges or foundries had dwindled over the last month or so thanks to Sully’s work.

“Hold on – the hospital doesn’t have anything of any real value. Almost everything in it is made of salvage or donated second-hoof materials. Only real asset there is the staff” Speaker said as he followed Sully as they made a bee-line to the nearest gate out of Lookshy-town, past the various warehouses and import-export shops that made up most of the small enclave.

Stopping , Sully turned to look at Speaker as his illusory disguise dropped – his appearance reverting to normal, revelaing his orichalcum helmet-mask and essence-spider silk first age chef uniform: “The property itself is valuable. With the wyld fire Brookside doesn’t need your weekly wyld energy cleansing, meaning that the whole place can be auctioned off lot by lot for a fortune – hell, once the wyld energy goes away all the poor ponies slumming in the rest of Firewander will likely get bucked out of their hovels to make room for new buildings that they definetly won’t be able to afford to live in”

“Gods… they’ll do that to all the ponies we have employed too, won’t they?” Speaker said in a startled tone, realizing that the spacious apartment buildings he’d made with his singing staff for the many ponies that he had Cash employed would probably usually cost a lot more than what Cash was charging in rent. It would render them all homeless!

Sullen Hoof nodded and said that this only made it all the more important for Speaker to get back: “Cash said that once’d he figured out who’s behind this he come back and organize a mass exodus. We’ll use Shimmer’s cloud and Nah to move all our employees out of the city so they won’t get shafted by the council and whoever takes over the places they work at”

“Where are we going to take thousands of ponies?” Speaker said confused, sitting down in the middle of the street.

Sully shrugged: “Chung Do? Who knows – but you have to come back and help pack – that’s our priority right now”

Looking around in the square, the sharp clangs and noises of several nearby smith and tinkerer shops, Speaker tried to spot any open sewer entrances. He had originally crossed half the city from Firewander to Lookshy-town the normal way, not taking any shortcuts through the dank undercity tunnels… He hadn’t been in any rush to get there. Then it occurred to him: “They bar the sewer access points here – Lookshy moves too many valuables through the warehouses here to allow uncontrolled access for ponies sneaking up here from the undercity”

Sullen Hoof nodded: “True, I came here via the roof-tops. Did I ever get around to showing you any jumping charms?”
“No… but I think it’s been on my to-do list to learn one of those for a while – but can’t we just take the undercity route back via some grate you can unlock if we’re in a hurry?” Speaker suggested.

Sullen Hoof shook his head – not in a mere ‘no I can’t do that’ fashion, but as a sign of frustration: “You don’t get it! The civility signing over all our property and business went into effect two days ago – when I left to find you Shimmer was delaying the mercs sent to clear everyone out, Cash was organizing the evacuation of the apartments and Sunrise was trying her damndest to prevent a riot from breaking out – we don’t have time to sneak through the tunnels!

“But… shouldn’t an evacuation have started earlier? It doesn’t make sense to first start that now…” Speaker mused, trying to make sense of the situation.

Sullen Hoof sighed deeply and stomped a hoof into the ground in frustration: “Me, Cash, Shimmer and Sunrise, we’ve spent the last two days trying to reverse the civility – to make deal or find a way out. We never considered evacuating until it was absolutely necessary, now we need to get back and help”

“Show me then” Speaker quickly suggested, looking at Sullen Hoof.

Giving Speaker a look that was a mix of confusion and uncertainty whether Speaker was taking the situation seriously or not, Sully said: “Show you what?”

“…You do realize that there’s more to jumping charms than just leaping into the air?” Sullen Hoof inquired, but Speaker would have none of it.

Taking a deep breath and steeling himself, Sullen Hoof demonstrated the most basic of solar jumping charms, the Monkey Leap Technique. It allowed for supernaturally high and long leaps, but most impressively it allowed Sully to leap great lengths straight up or horizontally from a still standing position, without having to get a running start first like normal ponies when having to make any kind of big jump. After a few quite impressive four yard straight vertical jumps, each allowing Sully to peek over most of the nearby rooftops, Speaker said that he’d seen enough…

To Sullen Hoof’s dismay Speaker then coiled essence around his hindlegs and took a running start, leaping hundreds of yards up into the air in a south-eastern direction towards Brookside. Sighing, Sully quickly followed suit, catching up to Speaker in a matter of seconds.

Soaring high above rooftops Speaker spun slightly in the air as Sullen Hoof caught up to him: “While I admire your enthusiasm, then I say again: There’s more to this than just jumping – though pulling off a mountain-crossing leap on your first try is rather impressive”
“Yes… now I just have to figure out how to survive the landing” Speaker mused, looking somewhat concerned, even with him trying to sound as if joking.

Happy that Speaker hadn’t completely overlooked that aspect of jumping, Sully said that he couldn’t really do much: “If I try to halt your spin I’ll just spin myself – will your shield charms be able to keep you alive when you hit the ground?”
“Let’s hope so” Speaker said, feeling his altitude diminish…

Sullen Hoof stuck his landing perfectly, which gave him a great view as Speaker – now wreathed in a thin and barely visible sheath of golden essence – slammed into the side of one of the Brookside apartment buildings. Looking down into the streets it quickly became clear from the lack of ponies streaming out of that building meant that it had already been emptied of residents… and two blocks down the road was a regiment of mercenaries just outside the gate into Brookside from Sentinel Hill.

Speaker quickly picked himself out of the rubble and stormed out of the building he’d crashed into. His entire right side ached and hurt as if he’d been bucked by the side of a mountain, but beyond that then his injuries weren’t any worse than some serious bruising and other minor injuries the impact, something he could suppress with a nice anesthetic application of his charm.

In the street Speaker was met by a sea of ponies with backpacks, saddlebags and carts full of personal possessions who all gave him desperate looks. Their cries for help quickly underlined the severity of the situation: “They can’t be doing this, can they?” “I don’t want to go back to living in the gutters again… I’d rather kill myself” “Please help us”

Speaker tried to calm those around him when Sunrise’s voice boomed out from a first floor window across the street: “Take hearth ponies of Brookside – the mercenaries sent by the council are only here to vacate you from your homes. They will not hurt you if you’ve already packed and are out in the street”

“Screw that!” A coarse voice shouted from the mercenaries down the street. Speaker just barely managed to get to the ‘front’ of the crowd facing the mercenaries when he saw the mare shouting. She was clad in a uniform identical to all the other mercenaries around her, dark grey lamellar armor and a black hood which denoted them as being from the mercenary outfit the Hooded Executioners, though she also had some golden insignia and decorations that showed that she was an officer: “We have to have to – arghbppbttb - check everyone to see if they’ve stolen any – phbththt - council property on their way out… nobody leaves until we say so” Like all the ponies around her she was ducking, weaving and waving her hooves around from some kind of unseen menace harassing her as she tried to address the crowd.

It was then that Speaker spotted what the mercenaries were fending off instead of emptying out apartments: Large silvery hornets with noticeably purple coloration on their heads and backs.  The swarm seemed to focus on the mercenaries up front facing Brookside, quite effectively preventing them from getting any closer.

Speaker saw this quite clearly as he recognized Shimmer’s handywork, but then one of them flew up and landed on Speaker’s nose and buzzed at him in… a strangely understandable fashion. Somehow it said “You’re here, great – you take over. Hold these idiots off until me and Cash have stashed all his silver elsewhere” Then the whole swarm of giant hornets flew off in through one of the open windows above Cash’s western art gallery’s storefront.

The three-hundred some mercenaries quickly regained their composure now that the hornets were gone – and began to march down towards Speaker – hundreds of steel-shod hooves ringing out in unison as they struck the coble lining the streets.

The ponies behind Speaker began to panic. Some shouted, some cried. Suddenly Speaker noticed that the ponies around him were all holding clubs and makeshift weapons in their mouths. He did so when one of them, a young colt with a dirty grey coat and a pale yellow mane asked: “What do we do sir?”

Looking around himself, Speaker realized that the armed ponies all wore the same blue bandana… a symbolic uniform, and blue at that: “That depends, who are you lot?”

The colt introduced himself as Stompy, saying that he and the others around him were the neighborhood watch – hired by Cash to keep the likes of the greycoats and other crooks out of Brookside. To Speaker they looked like poorly equipped and poorly trained militia…. And there were barely two dozen of them. If there were more Speaker figured that they were off trying to fetch their possessions before the mercs took control of the area.

The situation seemed hopeless. The mercenaries were barely sixty yards away, and many of them seemed to be readying sacks and saddlebags for whatever loot they would take from the poor ponies they were kicking out of their homes. Even the so-called neighborhood watch seemed to be little more than civilian ponies given sticks to fight with, judging from how they were trembling…

> Chapter 60: New Home and New Threats
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Speaker had seen fear many times.

He had witnessed it during his grueling special forces training while serving Lookshy and the seventh legion. There he had been trained to harness his fear and not let it control him. It had all been part of his albeit limited officer training – but that was then, and now he had centuries of memories of defending his kingdoms from hordes of demons or other primordial monstrosities. These memories hinted of more intelligent solutions to his current predicament: With essence sight he saw the mystic patterns that so clouded the mind with dread and terror in those around him – and having seen that he now knew how to block them.

“Stand fast – look at their weapons: They’re armed little better than yourself – only clubs for beating those who can’t fight back. You’re armed and you’re able. And now… they’re not” Speaker shouted, spinning around, pulling Gift from elsewhere and throwing it at the mercenaries in one smooth move.

The mercenaries were taken off guard by the sudden golden disc hurtling at them, it trailing golden light as it weaved in and out of their front ranks, cutting clubs and steel-banded battons in half by the dozen.

This demonstration of might shocked both the mercenaries – but also the neighborhood watch that stood beside Speaker, as their fears were suddenly if only momentarily abated. The mercenaries were not positive about how the situation was developing, but they weren’t stupid either.

The mare in charge had worked many times on crowd control, so she knew how a mob mentality worked quite well. She recognized that the situation needed firm action, less the ponies she was tasked with evicting were to become uncontrollable –especially with that damned anathema giving them ideas: “Draw blades! Charge!”

Around him Speaker saw with essence sight how the neighborhood watch’s courage faltered, as the mercenaries broke into a galloping charge. Honestly it was easy to understand – even without their battons and clubs the mercenaries had steel-shod hooves and apparently also hoof-mounted switch-blades, while the ponies of Firewander would be lucky if they could afford copper shoes, plus the mercenaries were in good armor.

While disheartening to see those around him flee, Speaker also learned something from the experience: He observed the essence pattern of a rout. Now, while in Lookshyan officer’s training had been basic, then Speaker understood that in a rout it wasn't always just a case of the individual soldier running away because it was afraid: It was a question of tactical analysis. If one didn't think you could win a battle, why not just run away to fight another day? In Lookshy it was taught to only ever commit to a fight if one was sure to win – and then always commit with a force guaranteed to win. It had been by this philosophy that Lookshy had kept the east out of the hooves of the Scarlet Empress for well over seven hundred years… and now Speaker knew how a rout looked essence-wise. With that knowledge it wasn’t difficult to use essence to counter and neutralize that pattern. At that point the only thing needed was to alert the fleeing crowd that it wasn’t scared yet, to push the realization that they weren’t afraid anymore into their consciousness.

A simple shout was enough. In the first age, the dawn caste solar who had first made this realization had been able to stem the routs of armies so vast that they stretched to the horizon in every direction with a mere gesture of the hoof. The neighborhood watch, and the other ponies in the crowd who had been close enough to the front to see what was happening to start running all stopped.

The mercenaries, surprised by this sudden turn of events, halted their advanced. This gave Speaker just enough time to call the neighbor watch ponies back to the front, where they bore witness to Speaker using the essence pattern of the rout once more, but this time offensively.

In the first age this had been called the Mob Dispersing Rebuke. A simple statement or utterance, assisted by essence, that put the same effect as before into the mercenaries, only here a rout wasn’t stopped: It was started. It was almost comical, as the mercenaries stumbled over each to run away. It was strange to see so many soldiers run away without there even having been sounded any kind of signal or call to retreat. Speaker made sure to remember that pattern of essence – it was bound to come in handy later.

The ponies of Brookside cheered as the mercenaries ran off, but Speaker quickly reminded them that even if this blatant attempt at plunder had been foiled, then it didn’’t change the fact that they had all been kicked out of their homes. The mist that suddenly began to spread around their hooves signaled to Speaker that Shimmer and Cash were done – and suddenly Sunrise’s voice boomed out across the roughly two or three thousand ponies that were now out in the main street of Brookside:

“Ponies, listen. The council has issued a civility that basically means that they now own everything we owed here – which means all of Brookside and most of Firewander. Your evictions and is only the first step: Only a small number of you stand a chance of keeping your jobs as is.  Some of you have only worked for us and lived here briefly, and some of you have worked for us for months. You all know that we pay and treat you far better than anything you can get elsewhere in Nexus. Come with us and you can continue that life, or stay and accept whatever fate the council of entities and the immaculates have in store for you”

A few minutes later the circle and just over two and half thousand ponies rose into the air, just as reinforcements to the previously routed mercenaries arrived. Using his mob-dispersing charm once more, Speaker ensured that none of their archers were able to harm the circle’s followers as they rose above the rooftops of Nexus and floated east.

It was about ten minutes later when Shimmer had Sunrise announce that the cloud they were all on was now outside of the borders of Nexus, as the cloud had just passed over the thirty-mile markers that encircled the territory around Nexus which the council of entities claimed dominion over. Speaker could tell that many of the ponies were scared, but Sunrise did a stellar job of keeping all the pones calm… and there were so many! It raised the question of what to do with them all.

Shimmer had the obvious solution in mind: “I’m planning on flying us all to Chung Do – all these ponies should be just what that place needs to fill in for those who died from the plague”

“Not an option – Since we arrived in Nexus I’ve heard about at least six prams and cargo ships full of immigrants leaving for Chung Do. That should about four thousand immigrants” Sullen Hoof quickly noted, looking very much as if he was scouting down at the ground for somewhere else to settle all the ponies.

Speaker nodded: “The housing capacity I built up was for a total of eight thousand, and I think Cash said that the post-plague census had the city down to three thousand from eight – we would need to expand the city walls to make room for that many ponies…”

“Moot point – the farmlands around Chung Do can’t support that many extra ponies on this short notice, not three months before the growing season” Shimmer argued, shooting down the idea of resettling the Brookside ponies in Chung Do definitively.

The list of possible places to go instead was a short one. Precariously landing Nah on the cloud, having not come along on the cloud but left for the yeddim stable Nah had been at when the rest of the circle had left Nexus, Cash pointed out their limited options: “Great Forks doesn’t have capacity for this many ponies, but we can probably buy sail cloth and supplies to set up a tent town somewhere. The city with that bragard unicorn mare isn’t big enough either. Honestly, I think our best bet is to simply build a whole new settlement somewhere”

The circle found Cash’s logic difficult to argue against. Shimmer said that she could summon up elementals to bring forth stone from deep underground, and Speaker could make some basic homes fairly quickly with his singing staff. The question was where to put that settlement… because very few places in the hundred kingdoms wasn’t under control of some pony warlord or city state, and few would likely want to just give up territory. Sure, fighting for some territory wouldn’t be that difficult, with Speaker’s new army-routing charm, and Shimmer using her shapeshifting charms to grow into a giant monster – but with several thousand ponies to keep safe, then…  what about Denansdor?

“Not possible. The bracelets that kept us safe are still drained of power. They’ll need another high power solar aspected manse to recharge at. We don’t give off enough ambient solar essence for them to do that – and we’ll need them working, plus access to solar circle sorcery to disable the miasma generator” Speaker reminded the circle. They all agreed that going back to Denansdor should be put off until both of those resources were available to them.

Time passed and the sun was setting when Sullen Hoof gazed to the north-west while the cloud flew in the same direction, following the curvature of the yellow river: “Why not just build a manse for the bracelets?”

“Sully, you don’t just build a manse that powerful. Rerouting and shoring up the natural essence flows of hundreds, if not thousands of miles of land to flow into a single point takes a lot of time, even with my singing staff. Just the measurements and surveying alone would probably take a year at least” Speaker in a disappointed tone. He knew that Sullen Hoof’s suggested was honest and well-meant, and it would solve so many problems – but it just wasn’t possible without a potent demesne to build such a manse on.
The rest of the circle all suddenly gave Speaker a funny look.
“What?” Speaker said, looking around at his friends in mild confusion.

Sullen Hoof, the eye-holes in his mask glowing brightly from his vision-enhancing charms, explained: “You were knocked unconscious when we pulled you out of the demesne we left Red and PSV in – you didn’t see what that did to the place”

“Gods… I almost forgot about that. What happened? Did the proto-shinmaic vortex rupture? Is it a wyld zone?” Speaker asked, his voice tinted with a sudden onset of great worry.

A flash of light from Shimmer pulled Speaker’s attention in her direction. She was pointing into the horizon: “Look for yourself”
It was majestic.

In the distance, emerging from the evening mists, a lance of bright light pierced shot up into the heavens. Around it was about three miles of blasted forest, all the trees knocked down and reduced to tooth-pick sized splinters – and in the center was a perfectly conical grass mound. From the tip, amidst grass bleached white from the intense light, shined forth the light that the circle was seeing miles away up in the air.

In essence sight is was even more beautiful. Speaker wept as he beheld the demesne, its essence flows shooting up into the sky along the column of light to form an ethereal after-image of Red, defiant and stoic as ever, her hoof raised towards the heavens.
“I think she did part of the work for you… I have never seen a demesne this powerful and yet so calm and stabile in over a hundred years” Shimmer said slowly, marveling at the sight through her third eye moments later after having shifted into her beast-pony form.

Setting the cloud down in the blasted forest around the newly formed demesne, the circle quickly confirmed that this was no ordinary demesne. Normally a natural conflux of dragon lines pooling together to form a demesne this potent would render everything within miles of the place a mess of saturated essence, mutating all life in the area, like the wood-hoof’d ponies who had lived near the old demesne… but this manse had no such ambient energies. Speaker figured that 

Recalling the presence of the wood-hoof’d mutants nearby, Cash said that he would like to take Nah out and scout the area – get some information from the locals on who actually controlled the territory and then fly to Great Forks for supplies: “We’ve got a lot of mouths to feed. Shimmer, I need you to come along to help with elsewhere-storage. Not even Nah can haul enough feed for three thousand ponies”

Shimmer declined, noting that she needed to get to summoning elementals post haste so Speaker could build a permanent settlement.

As Nah disappeared to the south, Sunrise began organizing the ponies into groups of ten. Some were charged with clearing ground around the conical mound to make shelters, other were to gather up piles of shattered wood so fires could be built.

Speaker recalled his old medical bag from elsewhere and rummaged through it, floating out a small notebook. Its last entries were from battlefield triage at Mishaka. It was tempting to rip out those pages, but he kept them in and started taking notes on the essence flows of the demesne. He could remember hundreds of demesnes from the first age, many of which he had later constructed miraculous temples, palaces and factory cathedrals upon – but this kind of demesne… one wrought of sacrifice and a touch of madness? This was new.

The night grew dark and the thousands of ponies were hungry and cold when the low rumble of Nah’s mindless grumbling in the distance signaled Cash’s return. Speaker could only smile and shake his head as Cash unloaded what must have been enough sail-cloth to cover all of Great Forks in a giant circus tent, along with barrels of nails and other construction materials. 

“We had hoped that you would be able to get some food – the ponies are getting hungry. Many of them haven’t eaten at all today” Sunrise said to Cash in a disappointed tone. It was clear that she was trying to maintain her usual calm and sanctimonious tone – but having ministered to these ponies for months on end, seeing them rise from the gutters to become productive and happy members of society, had endeared them to her in ways that the ponies of Chung Do had never been able to do, and there were limits to what even one such as Sullen Hoof could cook up with but dirt and broken twigs.

Cash tilted his head to the right and shot the beautiful holy mare a wide grin: “Oh they’re not here yet? Hold on?”

Cash leapt back up on Nah and flared his anima banner: “Forest king Hadar the thrice pine-scented, we had a deal! Deliver!”

From the edge of the blasted clearing, where the trees had finally been able to withstand the explosive rebirth of the demesne, a small tide of lesser spirits and elementals flooded out bearing mushrooms, fresh flowers, fresh shoots, nuts, berries and other produce of the surrounding woodlands. Standing at the forest edge stood a majestic figure wrought of leaves and roots, crowned in a green light and jade: the forest king, the god of the forest.

“Sullen Hoof, I think this is your cue” Speaker spoke out loud, unsure of where the culinarian was, but certain that he was within earshot. Walking up to Cash Speaker congratulated the eclipse caste Solar, and asked exactly what kind of deal Cash had struck with the god to make this happen, since the forest king didn’t exactly look that happy as it glared at them from the edge of the forest.

Cash shrugged and yawned: “I told him the truth. We are settling here. This means we’ll have to clear a lot of the surrounding land for farming and orchards. In fact, tomorrow I want to take you down to the yellow river and then I want you to use your singing staff to dig two wide canals up to this place, so we can connect to the river trade routes. My deal was that we would replant every acre of forest we cut down on the far side of the forest, and I’ve already brokered a deal with the cattle ranchers that used those plains and meadows, buying up that land on the condition that they plant it up with trees before they leave”

“You’ve been busy” Speaker said as he nodded approvingly.

Cash yawned again, but looked quite pleased: “I’ve had enough time to shag three mares, a sexy young colt and two exceedingly randy wood elementals – I had time to spare”

In addition to his sexcapades and forest dealings, Cash also noted that in four of the barrels still lashed to Nah’s sides were seeds for sowing rice, rye and barley. The forest king’s minions were also to supply the settlement with seeds and nuts for planting.

It was then that the ground quaked slightly, and Sunrise acted quickly to calm the thousands of ponies huddled around their campfires. Great pillars of dirty marble and other kinds of stone burst from the ground, though they did so slowly – more like a mole pushing up a mole hill, than a geyser shooting up into the air. Shimmer’s task was done.

Together with his Lunar mate, Speaker and Shimmer quickly worked the sail cloth and made crude tent coverings out of them. They were distributed as quickly as they could be fashioned. Between that, the campfires, and Sullen Hoof making delicious things out of the morsels brought by the forest spirits, the thousands of ponies of Nexus settled in for their first night under new stars, away from the whimsical tyranny of Nexus.

The next morning the circle held a council with the community leaders of the former Brookside ponies. There were many questions the circle had to answer, luckily there also answers ready for most of them, but not all:

For example there an old mare, wrinkly and gaunt, with a face that told of a one probably shouldn’t ask questions about and a mane looked as if it had given up long ago, who asked: “Now that we’re not in Brookside anymore – what do we call ourselves?”

Shimmer suggested that the ponies themselves figured that out. They could come up with suggestions and then narrow them down to a list, with the ‘council’ – meaning the circle and the community leaders currently present – then choosing from that list. The old mare seemed apprehensive, wishing for the circle to take charge more, but Cash argued against that: “Look, I am well aware that many of you are still frightened. You’re in unfamiliar surroundings, you’re uncertain of the future, so you look to us for decisive action to guide you. Trust me, we’ll be doing plenty of that, but at the same time we want you to be able to manage and govern yourselves as much as possible. We won’t be here all the time, for a lot of other places in Creation will need our guidance and help – and one of the best ways to ensure that you all feel responsible and proud of your new home, is having everyone get a say in naming it”
All the mortal ponies present agreed that this sounded quite reasonable. Speaker wasn’t sure what Cash’s deal was – but his lie detection charm hadn’t gone off, so it had all apparently been legit sentiments.

Of other topics the council covered was the issue of future food production, which Cash’s deal with the forest god cleared up fairly quickly, both for short and long term. Being this far to the east the growth rate of almost any plant was so fast that from planting a grain of rice to having a harvestable rice plant you didn’t need much more than a single month. The eastern growing season was one of near constant planting and harvesting – on the blessed isle this was almost a constant affair.

Another topic was what the circle planned to do with the manse. To this Speaker introduced the council to his preliminary ideas on what kind of manse he wanted to build: A hospital worthy of the first age – with office space for the city’s administration.
“That… sounds expensive” Cash noted.

Speaker agreed, noting that when Lookshy would mobilize workers and resources for manse construction it often involved large amounts of costly jade, four to five hundred highly trained laborerers, and sorcerer engineers who could take decades to educate: “….but we have all that already, plus with my singing staff the basic structure can be done in days instead of years, so this will be done in a few weeks”

With Speaker’s ambitious plans, the council seemed certain that this new community would do well. Only Cash was worried since Speaker insisted that the hospital remain free for ponies to receive services from… but Sullen Hoof noted that they could still charge outrageous sums for ‘housecalls’, only instead of Nexus merchant princes it’d be warlords and actual princes. Speaker agreed to this, adding that they could impose taxes on merchants who’d want to sell medicines to the hospital. Cash found this idea somewhat amusing, correcting Speaker: “I think the word you’re looking for is import tariffs and medicine vendor licenses – but ya, though I doubt they’ll cover for the actual prices of the medicine they’ll want to sell…”

Sunrise cleared her throat, having remained largely silent throughout the meeting: “We will need a revenue stream to fund the hospital. Taxation won’t cover this alone, at least not to begin with. We need something to export. What about making room in the hospital for training new doctors? We could charge for doctoral degrees”

“Still won’t be enough” Cash said, doing some quick number-crunching on the fly: “The amount of money I was spending weekly funding the hospital we…. Wait – what are we even talking about? Why not just send Speaker down to that tomb manse of his and have him shape up a fortune in silver and gold?”

That was an option nobody had considered.

“Won’t doing that eventually devalue the wealth Speaker could conjure up?” Sunrise asked.

Cash waggled a hoof at Sunrise: “No it will not. Hell, in Nexus there’s usually a new scavenger lord turning up two or three times a month after having cracked open some first age resource cache with a fortune in magical materials or other things. All we need is to have a guild assayer swing by and verify the metal purity of our coin, then we’re golden. We can just say we have some first age stash of the stuff”

Thus it came to be that Speaker spent the next week using his singing staff to first raise several stone apartment buildings for all the ponies to live in, as well as most of the manse. The layout of the apartment buildings, with the manse in the middle, made for a giant three-mile in diameter sunburst, for Speaker built the whole deal using a geomantic pattern in the same way he had rebuilt Chung Do, only this time it was a different geomantic pattern: It ensured that it was impossible to fatally screw up a medical procedure within the city. From putting on a simple bandage, to performing any kind of surgery, it would be impossible to botch the action – though making non-critical errors was still an option. During this time Speaker also learned to do a proper jumping charm from Sullen Hoof, a handy ability as Speaker had to scale the increasing tall manse structure often.

With most of the manse done in absolute record time, the only parts that were missing required materials that simply were not present. Speaker needed a lot of gemstones and amber for the control center of the manse, along with a large amount of gold and other precious metals to make the proper essence-conducting inlays and relays that would effectuate most of the manse’s powers. Most of these things Speaker could shape into existence at the Soulforge, though Cash was also itching for some on-hoof money so he could do some shopping in Great Forks for medicine and general advertising for the hospital. It also turned out that Cash needed money to officially purchase the land that the by now half-finished manse was on from that strange changeling that had originally sent them to the old demesne – though Cash was able to close that deal surprisingly easily.

As Speaker and Cash returned to Sunhill, as the ponies there had finally agreed upon calling the place, with Nah laden with freshly shaped gold ingots, silver by the talents and raw and uncut gemstones the size of melons a few days after setting out, they were greeted with a very different place than what they had left.

The ponies of Sunhill, under Sunrise, Sullen Hoof and Shimmer’s guidance, had begun clearing the forests around the place, the massive bitemarks on some of the logs and uprooted stumps hinting that some lunar shapeshifting might have been involved, as a first step towards establishing farmland. This led Speaker and Cash to make that canal Cash had talked about, since they would need irrigation for the farmland no matter what – and Cash was eerily deft at getting permission for Speaker to make the two parallel canals in every territory they passed through, mostly because Cash assured everyone concerned that Speaker could build a bridge over the canals wherever needed. This amounted to about eighteen stone bridges total.

Finally back on manse-construction, Speaker and Shimmer were helped by the roughly sixty ponies that Speaker had trained back in Nexus to craft and maintain delicate surgical tools and instruments, in making the gold inlays and finely cut gems needed to finish the manse. This final leg of the manse construction process took well over a month, as it involved lot of finicky fiddling around with very complicated and sensitive essence arrays made of sapphires and red jade. When finally finished the first crop from the surrounding fields was almost ready to be harvested, which made for a wonderful backdrop when the emissaries from Great Forks and Nexus arrived participate in the official opening of the grand Sunhill Hospital, with its magnificent white marble, gold and red jade state of Red standing at its top – its hoof raised to the heavens with a beam of white light emitting from it so bright that it was visible in the daylight.

The emissaries from Great Forks looked very impressed, the multi-tiered circular ziggurat shape of the hospital making the whole thing look like a giant temple, especially with the statue on top. They assured the circle that there would be medicine merchants arriving shortly to help stock and supply the facility, for it seemed that the circle’s hospital in Nexus had been known  to them – so they seemed to know what kind of services their new neighbor was going to offer.

The lone representative from Nexus was less enthusiastic. Indeed, the old stallion in his fine green robes seemed more interested in having his assistant take notes that he dictated in guild cant – and looked positively offended when Cash revealed that he spoke the secret trade language, when Cash openly informed the circle that the Nexus rep was appraising the manse and its component’s resale value.

“Good sir, I’m certain that if you’re that interested in buying our services we can quickly come to an agreement – no need that kind of behavior” Sunrise said calmly.

The old stallion merely sneered at Sunrise and went about having his assistant jot down more notes.

“I see… should have foreseen that the council would be angry with our escape, but this is a bit much…” Cash mused as he observed the old stallion.

With music and fanfare all around them, the Sunhill ponies celebrating their new home and work place, Speaker found it difficult to get away Shimmer’s insistant attempts at getting him to join her in dance – but right now he was more worried about what Nexus was up to and what Cash meant.

At the massive buffet table, where Sullen Hoof had truly outdone himself in making absolutely sinful morsels using berry juice, nut-pastes and plant starches, Speaker finally caught up with Cash who seemed somewhat amused: “What is that Nexus rep up to? He’s been going around looking like he owns the place all day?”

“Don’t worry. It’s the council of entities trying to send us a message, and failing. They’re pissed that we ran off with the hospital staff you trained. They had expected to be able to auction off the Sun and Moon hospital, with employees and all, to new owners for a hefty profit. We left them with nothing and then some. This joker is meant to present us with a bill for all the damages the remaining rampaging changelings did after we ‘fixed’ Firewander” Cash mused, looking strangely pleased and not at all worried.

Speaker knew well of stories of how pissing off the guild or Nexus could mean armies of mercenaries bearing down on ornery warlords or bandit kings who got too greedy. This only made Cash’s behavior even more confusing: “But even if we refuse to pay – what’s to stop them from sending mercenaries to raid us, to recoup their losses?”

“Sullen Hoof snuck in and took a copy of the bill and we had a look at it hours ago… they’re basically demanding that we enter into indentured servitude for an eternity to work off our ‘debt’ – this has nothing to do with the damage the changelings did. It’s a ploy to force us to work for them for free, because they’ve finally recognized the kind of miracles we can work. They know well enough from Chung Do and our fighting with the changelings in Firewander that no mercenary force they can send to Sunhill will ever do anything more than never come back and likely join us as a security force after me and Sunrise throw the right charms at them” Cash said with no small amount of confidence.

“It’s good to hear that you’ve all recovered from Red’s untimely demise and moved on like this” a familiar voice suddenly spoke out from across the buffet table. It was that dark-brown coated chosen of secrets sidereal, Heath Rose.

Speaker drew a deep breath and was about to say something when Shimmer appeared next to Heath Rose: “Oh you again – long time no see. I’d been so worried that we weren’t useful to you anymore and that you’d just discarded us…” she said, her tone unmistakably hostile and a reasonable amount of drunk at the same time.

Cash quickly seized the moment of speak before Shimmer could finish drawing breath: “I think what our lunar friend means is that we haven’t heard from you in a while. What brings you here?”

“Aside from admiring your record breaking manse construction time?” Heath Rose mused, beholding the grand arches covered in white marble. Speaker had gone to great lengths to have the load-bearing structure be made of sturdy and solid granite, while almost every wall and ceiling surface was covered in various colors of mirror-polished marble. The floors were covered in locally sourced hardwoods, and the manse itself provided essence lighting that automatically turned on when a pony would enter a room.
Speaker and Cash remained silent, waiting for the sidereal to get to her point.

Seeing that she expected to talk, Heath Rose quickly ate two of Sullen Hoof’s delicious berry and nut creations, then bluntly stated: “The largest wyld hunt in over seven hundred years just left the Pinnacle of the Eye of the Hunt. They’re going down the river of tears to the Avarice river, then they’ll go over land towards Chung Do. Their plan is to cleanse it of all anathema influence and taint”

All in earshot fell silent for a moment before Shimmer spoke: “They’re going to kill everyone…”
> Chapter 61: Before and After the Grave News
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The news of the wyld hunt moving towards Chung Do came like a hammer-blow to the circle. Sunhill didn’t have any defenses yet, not even city walls, and with the wealth of medicines and medical herbs that would soon be stocked inside the Sunhill hospital manse there was a dire need for protection against raiders – but with the wyld hunt moving towards Chung Do there wasn’t much time to set that up.
Well, that was until Heath Rose explained just how big and how slowly the wyld hunt was moving: “They have over seven hundred ashigaru and martial monks with them. It takes a long time and a lot of logistics to move that big a force. Gold faction projections and auguries put the hunt at Chung Do’s gates in three months – remember, they’re traveling all the way from Charak”

“Well that gives us plenty of time to plan and raise an army. Speaker, do you think Chung Do’s fortifications will be up for this?” Cash said with a much less unnerved smiled.

Heath Rose nodded in silence as Speaker reassured Cash that Chung Do’s city walls were plenty sturdy. Then she revealed why the walls wouldn’t matter: “This hunt is not a normal one. The bronze faction engineered the situation in such a way that Peleps Blueblood is leading it”

“Oh hell no!” Shimmer gasped, taking three hurried steps back, nearly tripping over two other ponies.

Speaker looked to Shimmer to see if she was ok. The clearly shaken Lunar in turn looked around at the rest of the circle: “Do you have any idea who Peleps blueblood is? That stallion is a mad-pony, a butcher”

“It’s true. Hell, Blueblood has killed fifty times more unicorns than anathema in his time in the hunt and that’s simply over dogmatic disputes, or disagreements over the proper translation of ancient immaculate texts” Heath Rose chimed in, shaking heard head as she recounted the grim statistics of the murderous unicorn.

Speaker had heard of Blueblood. So had Sully and Sunrise. Indeed, there probably wasn’t a pony in any part of civilized Creation who hadn’t heard of Blueblood – the butcher of the hunt. Rumor had it that he was so zealous that he would publicly outright murder other unicorns if they didn’t agree to his personal interpretations of scripture… and Heath Rose looked like she knew even more grim facts than that.

“Hold on, this doesn’t add up. From what I heard about Blueblood then he’s not that popular in Realm… him killing unicorns and whatnot – he shouldn’t have been to assemble a force like this – most hunts these days are fifty to a hundred ashigaru and maybe one or two unicrons” Shimmer noted.

Heath Rose nodded and took a deep sip from a drink glass that held some semi-transparent green liquor, her eyes brightening up as she relished in the delightfully fresh flavor. Giving the glass a look, then looking at Shimmer, she sighed: “It’s all because of the factional infighting up in heaven. We’ve kept you lot a secret from too many, so when the gold faction handlers in charge of keeping Blueblood alive found out that the Bronze faction had sent him to be killed by a group of Solars, he pulled some strings to get Blueblood some reinforcements, not knowing that it was you he’d be sending the grandmaster on” 

“The grand-who?” Sullen Hoof asked, knowing next to nothing about the Immaculate faith’s organization and clerical hierarchy.

Speaker on the other hoof was well aware of who the Grandmaster of the Immaculates were, so with a trembling voice he asked: “The grandmaster… holy hells, how did you get him to do that?”

“Hello, who is this pony?” Sullen Hoof stated again, keenly noticing the dread in Speaker’s voice and quickly deducing that if Speaker feared this pony, even with the powers that the circle could draw on, then this Grandmaster had to be a big threat.

Sunrise Glow explained: “I’m guessing that the sidereals have a lot of control over the immaculates, right?” Heath Rose nodded and looked to Sully and added: “He is the most powerful unicorn martial artist in existence. He has mastered over a dozen magical martial art styles. Hell, he’d give most elder sidereals a run for their money in a straight fight. Even if Red was still alive he would outclass her so much that it’s not even funny. Plus he’s bringing his Furious Five with him, and they’re each bringing a hundred or so martial monks and retainers”

“We’ll need a Lookshyan field force to counter this…” Speaker said as he despaired, hinting quite heavily that getting such assistance would be next to impossible to get in time.

Sullen Hoof nodded slowly. Sunrise was making a pained grimace, likely fearing for the lives of the ponies of Chung Do. Shimmer walked around the table and rested her head on Speaker’s shoulder. The whole circle was feeling Red’s absence quite heavily, for without her indomitable valor in this kind of moment of dread they had no-one to lean on to reassure them.

Ultimately Heath Rose reassured the circle that the massive wyld hunt, due to its size, was unable to journey straight to Chung Do. It would have to make its route via several dozen minor immaculate monasteries and temples to resupply, and considering that the grandmaster was along for the trip then each stop would likely last a few days so proper welcoming and departure ceremonies could be performed.

“Rememeber: Our fate augery shows their journey to Chung Do to take almost three months, and that’s from today – this should give you plenty of time to come up with a plan. They set off a few weeks ago, so there’s no rush” the sidereal explained, hoping to see some kind of improvement in the circle’s morale.

Even with the long time to prepare, the circle found it difficult to come up with any immediate solutions. Unlike the ponies from Brookside who had been sick of how the Council of Entities had treated them, then the ponies of Chung Do genuinely liked where they lived, so simply moving them all to a safe place – Sunhill for example – was out of the question.

Having remained largely silent during this revelation, Cash suggested that they put off any strategy meetings until the next day – or at the very least until after the party: “Come now, we have dignitaries to entertain and potential future business and trade partners to make nice with”

Despite their best attempts, only Cash was able to display what appeared as a genuine smile for the rest of the evening – and even that was only possible thanks to his charms and a healthy wad of essence veiling his otherwise worried looks.

That night, as they went to bed in their penthouse suite at the top of the Sunhill manse, Shimmer wept quietly into Speaker’s mane. She had seen scenarios like this unfold far too many times in her life: She would spend two or three years rebuilding an island tribe that had been decimated by changelings into a thriving and independent community – only for a couple of unicorns to come in and kill those they didn’t convert, and destroy everything they considered heretical… which usually meant ruining most of the shrines that worked as the cornerstone of the usual protection deals that Shimmer would set up with local spirits, as well as any kind of fishing boats and equipment that the wyld hunt deemed to be of anathema origins by virtue of being too advanced for the locals to have come up with themselves.

The next few days the circle dedicated themselves to pursuits of distraction, so they wouldn’t have to focus on the wyld hunt just yet. This bore fruit in several unexpected ways: Sullen Hoof’s walk through the surrounding forests resulted in him gathering an inordinate amount of rare seeds that would allow for a likely profitable orchard with rare herbs to be set up, while Shimmer found a large copse of completely untouched rubber trees. The rubber trees weren’t immediately identified as useful until Speaker noted that he knew a way to refine their sap into a sticky fluid that he knew that Lookshy prized in its manufacture and maintenance of its magitech arsenal, plus he recalled certain uses of the stuff for the production of first age medical equipment.

Efforts were quickly set up to build these two efforts into future production and export businesses, as well as setting up farmland for the ponies of Sunhill. The downside to getting all these things done was that now the only pressing issue at hoof was the wyld hunt...

As the circle gathered in one of the meeting rooms of the Sunhill manse Heath Rose appeared as well, this time looking somewhat pale and frightened. She was clutching a large pendant that Speaker identified as a Recorder of Everlasting glories, though it looked a bit different from the one he had. Heath Rose nodded: “Ya… and what I have on this is enough to get all of us killed, both in this life and the next couple ones”

With that ominous statement, the circle gathered around as Heath Rose displayed what she had recorded: Images of letters from the Immaculate grandmaster Ragara Bulk Biceps, addressed to someone he simply called Sifu. This instantly raised the question of who the grandmaster had as master… for the grandmaster was supposed to be the greatest master there was, at least in martial arts.

“Oh it gets better…” Heath Rose said, twisting a gemstone knob on the recorder so it displayed a brief recording of two ponies standing on a bridge in the middle of a large and beautifully arranged garden, with towering pagodas in the distance.

Zooming in enough to show the two ponies properly was difficult. The recording had been done from very far away – but it revealed a huge pony with enormous muscles, clad in the traditional immaculate light blue monk robes commonly seen everywhere in Creation. In front of him stood another pony clad in a mix of red and black, with a red and black mane and a cream-colored coat. It was difficult to see any distinct features on either of them.
“Wow… he’s big” Cash noted incredulously.
Heath Rose nodded, then drew in a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment, appearing to expect divine smiting or some kind of intervention to stop her from what she was about to say: “That other pony is one Anys Sunshine, chosen of battle. She’s the right-hoof pony of Ketchup Carjack, the leader of the bronze faction. The amount of power she wields makes her VERY dangerous”

There was a moment of silence as Heath Rose looked over her shoulder, scanning the white marble walls of the meeting room as if looking of unseen assailants that was leap out of the very stone itself. After steeling herself once more, she continued as she trembled: “Just getting this information will mean that I’ll become a wanted pony in heaven… when they find out  I’ve told you this… no, anyway: Sunshine is the elder who devised the five celestial dragon styles of martial arts that the immaculates use. She came up with them almost two and a half thousand years ago. She basically made the immacultes from scratch. From what I can tell then she’s now trying to initiate Grandmaster Bulk into sidereal martial arts… and heaven help us if she succeeds”

“But that shouldn’t be possible. It was tried in the first age. Not even lunar essence can work on that level of refinement” Speaker pointed out, sounding as if he was more confused at hearing of a supposedly impossible feat being undertaken, and not as if he cared for who the grandmaster’s sifu was.

Shimmer spoke next, as Heath Rose tried to think of an answer to Speaker: “For how long has Sunshine been working with Bulk? I mean, he’s older than I am”

Heath Rose explained that she hadn’t been able to tell for how long Bulk Biceps had been receiving tutelage from Sunshine, but his meteoric rise in the immaculate order started from a very early age, so it was not out of the question that Sunshine might have been grooming him since foalhood. In response to Speaker’s observation in regards to the impossibility of unicorns leading sidereal martial arts, then she could only note that Sunshime undoubtedly knew of that as well, and so was taking all kinds of arcane and mystical precautions to ensure that the grandmaster’s essence could process the level of enlightenment that sidereal martial arts required.

“Right – well, how does this relate to us? You’re basically just telling us that this grandmaster is even more powerful than we thought” Sullen Hoof noted, annoyed with the doom and gloom spreading throughout the room.

Sullen Hoof’s words caused Heath Rose to perk up and nod a bit: “You’re right, I haven’t told you that yet, but it’s quite simple: By the laws of heaven it is punishable on par with causing mass extinction or murdering a god, for a sidereal to a teach a non-sidereal the secrets of our martial arts”

Speaker furrowed his brows deeply. He recalled clearly that in the first age solars were all ultimately taught some flavor of sidereal martial arts, be it the Scarlet-Patterned Battlefield style that let a master alter the very way that battles were fought, or Citrine Poxes of Contagion style, while struck down foes with sickness at every touch. Since when was it illegal to teach non-sidereals in such martial arts? Right now that question was irrelevant, but a style that mastered illness would no doubt later be useful for Speaker as a means to subdue sickness and spread good health to all.

“Ok, so… if you have all this information, why not bust Sunshine for breaking the rules and get rid of Bulk as part of the process?” Sullen Hoof suggested.

Heath Rose gave Sullen Hoof and his orichalcum helmet-mask a pained expression: “None of the information I have is solid enough to warrant an investigation let alone an auditing. That’s where you come in. If you can find solid proof of the grandmaster having learned forbidden martial arts then an official inquiry can be launched in Yu-Shan. You’ll likely have to give testimony, which will reveal your identity to the bronze faction, but considering your connection to Chung Do you can invoke your heavenly mandate to challenge the bronze faction’s attempts at interfering with your rule of creation, which would land them in even more trouble than teaching a unicorn forbidden martial arts”

With this possible solution to their most imedeate problem, namely the supposedly impossible to defeat Grandmaster of the immaculate order, the circle only had only question to answer: How to reveal this connection? The grandmaster no doubt knew that he had to keep his heavenly tutelage a secret, for Anys Sunshine’s tutelage would not have come without grave warnings at what would happen if he blabbed – and the grandmaster was well versed in so many martial arts that to most casual observers any unknown move or technique would easily be chalked up as something from just another exotic magical style one had never heard of.

It was then that the large panoramic window that looked out over the mostly barren land and apartment buildings that so far made up the Sunhill community exploded inwards.  Through the shower of glass shards a pony-sized white owl tumbled onto the stone table in the middle of the room.

Before anyone could act the large snow-owl shapeshifted into the guise of a pony: An eerily familiar light-grey coated mare in moonsilver armor, with a black mane tied up into a rough pony-tail with a leather cord. Cash tripped over his own hooves as he tried to back away from her murderous gaze. Heath Rose barely managed to eep out a whisper of “Lilith” before she faded from existence in a brief flash of green light.

The only two ponies in the circle that didn’t appear moved from the sudden entrance of this lunar elder was Sunrise, who’s steely resolve didn’t easily frighten, and Shimmer who was terrified to the point of catatonia – because she remembered quite clearly who this was.
Speaker, who’d taken cover behind the chair he’d been sitting on, peeked out and had to make a very conscious and strenuous effort not to cower as Lilith’s furious gaze swept the room and met his eyes. None the less, Lilith, Cash’s lunar mate, who back in Chung Do had appeared out of nowhere and nearly murdered Cash, now stood before them all.

With a voice that sounded deceptively young – despite Shimmer having long since informed the circle that Lilith was one of the, if not the oldest still living lunar around – Lilith introduced herself as she stepped off the table and approached Cash: “You know who I am. The young blood told you. I can smell it”

Picking up Cash effortlessly with a single hoof, Lilith pressed him up against a wall. Cash tried to feebly shield his face with his hooves, but Lilith’s gaze still reaches his eyes – for this huntress could not be denied, such was her power.
“What do you want?” Sunrise asked boldly, in a stern tone.

Lilith dropped Cash, who collapsed into a pitiful pile of silk-clad pony, who’s colar of dawn’s cleansing was the only thing hiding the fact that he had just pissed himself. Turning to face the rest of the circle, Lilith responded to Sunrise’s inquiry, first with a deep breath, and secondly with an answer: “I am here to say that I am pleased with your actions”

Sunrise did not respond, sensing that Lilith had more to say.

“Your actions in Chung Do were commendable, likewise your work in Nexus. I am happy to see that much of your old madness from the first age has been tempered by the hardships of this age, though now with this wyld hunt… you need my help” Lilith said, speaking slowly and methodically. Her accent was pronounced and quite difficult to pin down, indeed it sounded almost as if she had only recently learned to speak the river-tongue of the scavenger lands, although it was impossible to tell what she had spoken commonly prior to that.
Stepping out from behind his chair and giving Shimmer, who was sitting next to him – still frozen in terror – a little poke to see if she would come back to life, Speaker asked: “How can you help us?” though he wasn’t quite certain if they even wanted the help of someone who seemed to be in the habit of introducing herself by pining ponies against the wall.

Lilith turned to Speaker and gave him a look that made him deeply regret having asked her anything: “You’re facing a wyld hunt of a scale and potency rarely seen since the usurpation… and now you need someone to force the grandmaster’s hoof into revealing his most secret of martial arts – this I can, for a price”

Sullen Hoof sighed and added: “It would be so much easier to just sneak in and screw with the grandmaster’s diet and training regimen… I mean, if it as to be kept that strict for his essence to be able to handle that kind of martial arts”

Getting up, albeit shakily, Cash audibly gulped and asked: “Ok, and I think I speak for us all when we’re happy for your offer to help – but… you clearly want something , what is it?”

It was obvious from his tone that Cash was afraid that Lilith wanted him… and necessarily alive. This turned out not to be the case, as Lilith struck the stone table. Its surface rippled for a moment, before settling and revealing an engraved image of a large palace.

“In Yu-Shan there is a place, an archive, which holds records of all the sanctified oaths that Eclipse Caste Solars have wrought. I want you to go there and destroy all records that I am tied to…”Lilith said, suddenly looking around and into the ceiling as if she was expecting something to happen. It was like Heath Rose’s presentation of her secret information all over again… almost.

With a sudden gasp Lilith briefly clutched her chest and winced sharply – Speaker recognized it as a very sudden and powerful heart attack and was about to leap to the Lunar elder’s aid when she gestured for him not to and spoke in a decidedly strained tone: “Don’t. It was merely punishment for even speaking of a means to undo the oathes that I am bound to – and it won’t be the last. Do not make me regret breaking that oath, or none of Cash’s future incarnations will live for more than a day”

Stepping quickly to the broken window, Lilith looked back at the circle which seemed to still be digesting her ‘offer’: “Ask your sidereal handler for directions – I’m sure she knows the place” and then leapt out into the air, turning into an owl in the process, silently gliding away into the surrounding woodlands.

The pregnant pause that followed Lilith’s departure lasted until Shimmer spoke up, her fear-induced catatonia finally ending: “Well that went surprisingly well, don’t yall think?”

The rest of the circle wasn’t entirely agreeing with Shimmer, but both Speaker and Cash saw the potential value of Lilith as an ally in this situation. Sunrise was less certain: “We have no guarantee that she won’t just abandon us the moment we have done what she asked”
“I’m inclined to agree. She busts in, uses a lot of force, threat displays – very little in her behavior indicated that she actually wanted to help us – no shows of good faith” Sullen Hoof chimed in, his behavioral evaluation and investigations charms having judged Lilith to not being very trustworthy.

Cash disagreed with Sully’s profile of Lilith: “Nah, its common business sense: She needs to see us come through before she’ll commit – that’s why she felt non-committal and untrustworthy to your charms, plus she didn’t kill me, I think that’s a show of good faith”

Sunrise and Sully remained apprehensive, but both Shimmer and Speaker seemed ok with the idea of doing what Lilith had asked – and at that moment Heath Rose re-appeared, flinching to the point of almost falling over as she apparently didn’t have any idea if Lilith was gone or not. Her expression and overall posture turned to one of great relief when she confirmed that Lilith was gone.

This led the circle to ask the obvious questions: Why was Lilith so scary to Heath Rose, and what was this archive place.

Curiously enough it was the question about the oath archive that drained all the blood from Heath Rose’s face – not the one about why she was afraid of Lilith, which turned out to ‘simply’ be because the current primary cause of death among sidereals was elder lunars with an axe to grind.

“No… you can’t ask that – please, don’t do this” She begged. Sadly, this only made the circle even more curious.
Speaker, trying to appeal to Heath Rose’s sense of compassion, said: “But come on. The amount of lives this will save, and the goodwill this would generate with the Silver Pact? This is too good an opportunity to pass up”

Heath Rose face-hoofed, fiercly so. It left an imprint on her forehead which only faded slowly as she grasped for words to describe just how bad an idea it would be for a circle of solars to access the Palace of Oathes Eternal: “I… no – the moment anyone finds out that you’re planning on this the bronze faction will clamp down on that place and never let go – and if you’re caught there… then there’s nothing the gold faction can do, I doubt even Lytek will be able to fix your incarnations after that”

“You still haven’t explained why you don’t want us there” Cash said in a mix of defiance and curiosity.

Heath Rose gave Cash a sigh that conveyed much giving up and dread. That was all Cash needed, for suddenly he looked quite pensive: “Ok, I get your point… that would probably frighten a lot of celestial gods and the bronze faction”
“What are you talking about?” Sullen Hoof asked.

Cash explained: Through a charm of subtle social cue observation he had discerned that Heath Rose didn’t want Cash to enter this archive because it would reveal all the oathes he could stand to collect on. Several millennia of gods, spirits and even other celestial exalted who had promised Cash favors or other services, promises that Cash had sanctified, all waiting for Cash to rediscover them and cash them in: “Of course, from how Lilith acted then not all of those oathes were made willingly – so I can see why a lot of gods and sidereals might not want me to know what I kind of strings I can actually pull”

“And that’s why the bronze faction will move heaven and earth to prevent you ever getting there – or getting out of there alive” Heath Rose emphasized.

Cash gave the sidereal mare a pained expression. He knew what he was about to say went against quite a lot of what he personally considered right and proper – but at the same time, then he wasn’t particularly fond of the idea of getting killed as part of all this, either from the bronze faction for pulling this off or from Lilith if he didn’t pull this off: “What if I wipe out all the oathes from my past incarnations? Is that even possible?”

Heath Roses expression quickly cycled through a multitude of brief expressions. Ultimately she settled on something that looked just slightly hopeful: “I’ll have to look into it, but if I recall correctly then each oath is stored on a scroll of heavenly parchment. They’re indestructible, but if you just manage to remove them from the archive that’ll prevent the spirits working there from detecting any breaches done on those oathes – but I have no idea what you can do with them after that”

“Let us worry about that – just get us an excuse to go to Yu-Shan” Sullen Hoof said, enjoying the idea of pulling off a heist a lot more than the idea of burning down some sort of library as he had originally thought this would have to go down.

Heath Rose left quickly, without even saying goodbye – though she did do something weird to the door which faded right after she had gone through it, after which she wasn’t out in the hallway… she was just gone.

“Well that was interesting” Sunrise commented.

The circle agreed to disperse and wrap up any remaining personal projects in Sunhill, while waiting for Heath Rose to return with more information and an excuse to enter Yu-Shan.

Speaker gathered up a large number of volunteers and found that he knew quite a lot about farming – knowledge that he magically passed on to the volunteer ponies who would now work to ensure that Sunhill could supply its own food in the form of rice, nuts and other fruits from orchards – at least to begin with. It would require some work from Cash to set up large enough chicken and pig ranching to supply Sunhill properly with a more varied diet.

Come evening Heath Rose reappeared, rounding up the circle in a most auspicious of ways – for they all ‘just happened’ to walk by the same spot and gather up without any obvious manipulation from the sidereal. She didn’t look pleased, but liked Cash’s idea of possibly erasing all the oathes he’d set up in his past incarnations: “That might be the only way you’re getting out of there alive… at least it’ll probably make the bronze faction want to kill slightly less”

“Ok, and what’s our excuse for getting into Yu-Shan?” Cash inquired, sounding a lot less worried about the heist than simply getting there.

Heath Rose handed Sunrise a scroll that seemed to be made of thin parchment-like silver: “This is an official invitation from Raven King, the god of all things rotting, to meet and discuss means to curtail deathlord activities in the east. He’s quite adamant about this, seeing as he considers the undead an affront to his domain and purview… the dead should be rotting in the ground, not walking around and what have you – I would suggest actually going to this meeting”

With that Heath Rose somehow disappeared again without even saying goodbye. She seemed distraught. Cash said it was likely from what he might learn inside that archive: “It’s actually making me a bit scared of what I might find in there…”

Getting to Yu-Shan from Sunhill wasn’t difficult: Shimmer conjured up a cloud and the circle flew down to the celestial gate near Great Forks that they had used in the past. They didn’t use Nah because they would have to leave at the gate.

Apparently just having the official invite made the gate possible to see and pass through – and thus the whole circle found itself in Yu-Shan once more, marveling at the gold-brick cobble that the streets were paved with, and the diamond palaces that lined those same streets… it was a start change from the almost-town that Sunhill was, even more so the squalor of Brookside and Nexus in general.
The giant celestial lion that guarded the gate on the Yu-Shan side seemed to instinctively sense the invitation the circle had, so while Cash thought about how he could set up a nice little business giving rich guild merchants tours of heaven, Shimmer started to conjure up a cloud for them to fly off on, but the celestial lion quickly shut that down: “No noise or light pollution allowed here”

While sorcerous spellcasting usually involved working through enough essence to flare one’s anima, and in the case of conjuring a cloud there was a lot of rushing wind, then none in the circle had ever considered the spell particularly noisy. This made getting around a bit more difficult – considering that Raven King’s palace was thousands of miles away.

“Why aren’t we getting an aerial rickshaw?” Speaker thought out loud.

Sunrise looked around at the multitude of colorful spirits that passed them by. Most seemed to ignore the circle, or at the most regard them like curious strays that had somehow wandered into Yu-Shan. Shaking her head at their folly, Sunrise said: “We do not have celestial money to pay for that. We would need to be worshipped down in Creation for there to be any heavenly funds in our name up here”

“There are a few hundred of the Sunhill ponies who pray to Speaker as some kind of healing saint – would that be enough?” Sullen Hoof noted, having overhead the ceremonies and prayer groups of these ponies many times during his security sweeps.
Appearing pensive for a moment, Sunrise shrugged: “It should…”

With a quick prayer the nearest aerial rickshaw was summoned, and the circle found that simply stating that their payment for the trip could be deducted from Speaker’s heavenly account more than sufficed. Cash quipped that at least the monetary part of the Celestial bureaucracy seemed to function smoothly.

The Raven King’s palace was… not as one might have expected for a heavenly abode – though for the god governing the concept of rot it really didn’t surprise anyone: The walls around the palace was fashioned from tomb stones and other grave markers, and the gate… well… like the entrance to a cemetery.

“You’d think a big god would have guards at the front? I mean, pretty much everywhere else we’ve been has celestial lions and stuff standing guard. Even the toilets in the Bureau of Heaven had guards” Cash noted.

Speaker shot Cash a dirty look: “You know where the toilets in the Bureau of Heaven are?”

“Yes, why?” Cash quipped back, amused that Speaker would even ask such a question… then he remembered: “Oh… right, sorry – we found them long after you had left to meet Lytek”

Entering the courtyard to the palace was like walking into a newly tilled field filled with fine mulch. There was no grass, no paved roadway, no nothing. In fact, there wasn’t even a palace… there were simply a lot of neat small piles of rotting garbage here and there, and ravens picking at them – and ravens flying above in artful flight patterns.

Cash was about to ask out loud if the rest of the circle thought they had been pranked, but then a giant quarter-mile long, fifty-headed, twelve tailed giant snake monster burst from the ground.

The reactions from the various members of the circle were predictable: Cash was shocked, Sunrise looked unphased but weary, Shimmer shapeshifted into her beast-pony form and took an immediate defensive stance, Sullen Hoof disappeared, Speaker summoned Gift from elsewhere and dropped into his primary Thousand Wounds Gear Style fighting stance and the giant snake monster… looked snaky, though with a distinct worm-like twist.

The giant monster didn’t have scales: Like an earth-worm it seemed to have banded skin – and it wasn’t really attacking… instead one of its fifty heads lowered itself down to the ponies that stood before it and asked, in Old Realm, what their business was with its master Hran-Tzu.

“Who?” the circle could hear Sullen Hoof say, though none could see him.

Cash quickly looked at their invitation, then chuckled: “Raven King is the title of the god we’re meeting, Hran-Tzu is his actual name”
Declaring that they had an invitation and then displaying it to the giant monster, the monstrous worm-snake moved aside and one of the piles of garbage and the ravens that had been working it over floated up into the air: Pristine funeral garbs and living but completely immobile ravens floated together to form the shape of a pony – a hollow and grotesque shape, but one that appeared to have a face and everything none the less.

It floated towards the circle like a ghost poised to haunt someone, but it was when it spoke every pony in the circle felt their bones chill, for the voice of Hran-Tzu was truly a voice from beyond the grave – like icy claws in your soul – but beyond that the god was surprisingly nice and grateful for the circle to come visit: “Greetings, I am Hran-Tzu, god of decay, the Raven King and Executive Director of the office on Rot and Deterioration – and I am glad that my summons have finally been heeded”

It turned out that Hran-Tzu, despite being really creepy to talk to, knew a lot of useful things and was surprisingly eager to share them. Not all of this news was very good: For one he informed the circle that they did not have three months to deal with the Wyld hunt that was moving towards Chung Do: “My informants notified me a few days ago that the Mask of Winters had shipped over a thousand slaves through the underworld and out of the Black Chasm, along with large amounts of silver, handing all of it over to that Wyld Hunt of yours almost a week ago”

Hran-Tzu’s analysts had found figured that this would allow the hunt to simply buy supplies on the go, and even order them well in advance. That, combined with the legion of slaves to haul their gear, would speed up the wyld hunt dramatically: “We project it arriving at Chung Do in roughly three weeks from today”

“Fuck” Sullen Hoof blurted out. The rest of the circle appeared to share his sentiment, though they held their tongues.

With that bombshell out of the way, Hran-Tzu explained what he would like from the circle: “As god of decay I see all things undead as what they truly are: Abominations and affronts to the true and proper circle of life, death and rebirth. My main enemies are the deathlords, for they scheme to expand the power of death over creation – and their neverborn masters. Thus, when I was informed that you’ve tangled with yet another Deathlord that I have yet to hear from… well, you became very interesting to me”

Thus, Hran-Tzu informed the circle that he had discovered that the reason that their Nexus operation had been foiled was NOT because funds from the blessed isle had finally arrived… no, it was because a Deathlord had funded them – covertly of course, through spies and infiltrators that made it look like a shipmest of silver and jade had arrived from the blessed isle.

“So… the Barbate Arbiter strikes again” Shimmer grumbled.

Frowning deeply, Speaker wondered: “Will he move against Sunhill too?”

“He already has, through the wyld hunt sent against Chung Do – to strike at you, likely to render it defenseless” Hran-Tzu noted.

The tea table the god had conjured out of the ground smelled of fresh mulch – but looked clean. The same applied for the rather comfy chairs the god had willed into existence for the circle to enjoy while in his ‘palace’. The discussion that followed revolved around Hran-Tzu urging the circle to take a more aggressive stance towards the Deathlords and neverborn, not simply indulge in their own personal projects in places like Nexus or Sunhill. The circle in turn argued that they had very little to work with in that respect, no clues or places to truly start.

The frayed bit of gray-white cloth that made up Hran-Tzu’s face curled into a rather unnerving smile: “I do… seek out the city of Shining Reefs in the south-west, and discover the secrets of the sleeping princess – if possible, bring her to me. There is a Yu-Shan gate that leads to the place directly, but it was recently blocked after I talked a sidereal into investigating the place”

That sidereal apparently never returned – only Lytek’s subsequent pruning of that exaltation’s memories revealed that the manatee folk that now lives in Shining Reef’s underwater ruins had eaten the young sidereal alive, slowly. This had not endeared Hran-Tzu with the bureau of destiny: “Indeed, this request from me to you is as much about me trying to save face as it is to discover how these monsters are working with their undead masters – for they worship the Neverborn, and receive commands from them somehow via their ‘sleeping princes’ – I must know how this works, either so the process can be disrupted or so we might strike directly through that connection to the neverborn. In return I can give you official protection as agents in my employ, in the fight against the deathlords. No more hiding your names in the convention of deathlords, you’ll be answering directly to me – no heavenly official can touch you”

“Ok, that sounds like a solid lead to work with – but you also mentioned that it was the deathlord Mask of Winters who funded the wyld hunt? We haven’t tangled with that deathlord , only the Barbate Arbiter” Speaker said, trying to make sense of that particular connection – mainly because knowing exactly who was your enemy or not was always a good thing to be clear on.

Hran-Tzu explained that the deathlord known as the Barbate Arbiter mainly worked in cooperation with other deathlords – and the Mask of Winters, who rules over Thorns, is a big player in the eastern underworld, so the two are undoubtedly connected: “From the reports I’ve read from Heath Rose on that topic, and from the examinations of the abyssal manse you turned over to the convention of deathlords, then it seems that Mask of Winters was experimenting in means of creating manses in the underworld that open up shadowlands in creation as a means to insert military forces quickly and without warning. Considering the Mask of Winter’s current history of conquest, then adding such a stratagem to his arsenal would be disastrous”

“It strikes me that Lookshy should be informed of this, post haste” Speaker pointed out. The circle agreed, though Cash also added that unless Hran-Tzu had any other information to share at the moment, then the circle had business elsewhere in Yu-Shan to wrap up before they could head back to Creation.

The god of decay nodded: “Very well. I have nothing else to offer at the moment, beyond a promise of support and a standing invitation for tea should you need an excuse to enter Yu-Shan for whatever reason. Oh, and Speaker, feel free to bring Resplendent Buttflow for tea as well, for I am one of the few in Yu-Shan who enjoys his work”

Speaker wasn’t really sure how respond to that. Cash graciously thanked Hran-Tzu for his generosity before herding the circle out into the gold-brick cobbled streets of Yu-Shan, away from the giant fifty-headed, twelve tailed, worm-snake monster which was apparently called the Ur-Snake by Hran-Tzu, it supposedly being the very primordial worm/snake original that all other slithering creatures were based on.

Thus, the circle wandered into the bustling streets of Yu-Shan, past divine vendors of heavenly junk food, clerk spirits hauling literal mountains of paperwork, and elemental dragons dancing across the sky.

> Chapter 62: Going Off The Deep End
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Palace of Oathes Eternal was surprisingly easy to find: All the circle had to do was tell their aerial rickshaw to take them to it. Getting inside turned out to be slightly more difficult – as Heath Rose had warned the circle to under no circumstances reveal that they were solars trying to gain entry, because that would set off alarms across Yu-Shan.

Thus, the circle settled down for the night in a supposedly small and trashy heavenly hotel. The toilets were merely solid gold, not solid diamond – oh the horror. Shimmer and Sullen Hoof cased the palace while the rest of the circle slept, and in the morning they compared notes.

Shimmer had concluded that the few shapes of spirits she could shift into would suffice to pass herself off as a lowly messenger spirit, which should be enough to get her inside the palace. Sullen Hoof had similarly played around with his disguise charms, masking his very essence as that of a fairly high ranking god, which should automatically give him the authority to stride by the celestial lions that guarded the palace gates.

With this information the circle cooked up a plan where Shimmer and Sully would approach the palace together, Sully claiming to have received a rather insulting message from the palace regarding him having supposedly broken some ancient oath and now facing some flavor of punishment – unless Sully came over to bribe the gods that worked in the palace archive. From what Cash and Sunrise had gathered from other heavenly sources they had prayed to and consulted then that kind of might-be scandal would be a perfect diversion for Cash to sneak into the archives.

Of course, Cash would need to get past the celestial lions to begin with. Shimmer had a simple plan for that: “I can shapeshift you into a flea and hide you on me or Sully – then you jump off and shake off the shift when you get into the archive”

“Yes, but the guardian spirits at Lytek’s office spotted you doing that, hiding in my mane as a flea, in a heartbeat” Speaker pointed out.

Cash gestured for Speaker that his worries were unfounded: “Lytek’s security was insane compared to what we’re dealing with here. They have four celestial lions covering fifty miles of front steps and entrances. I doubt we’ll get caught”

“It’ll only be suspicious if you only have one flea like that… add a few more and it’ll look like some kind of strange collection” Sullen Hoof suggested, looking at Sunrise and Speaker.

Thus, the whole circle donned disguises: Sullen Hoof and Shimmer as spirits, the rest being turned into fleas by Shimmer and dotted around her air-elemental hair.
Approaching the three-hundred steps of stairs that made up the front of the Palace of Oathes Eternal, the two exalts looked very spirit-like. Shimmer was floated just above the golden cobble, while Sullen Hoof’s disguise charm worked illusions into his appearance, giving him a slightly semi-transparent appearance, along with several orbiting lights floating around him and his now purple glowing robes.

Stomping up the stairs quite demonstratively, Sullen Hoof barely even drew a single look from the celestial lions, and even less attention was given to the quite meek looking air elemental that was following behind him at a respectful distance.

Throwing open the doors to the palace, Sullen Hoof shouted: “Who here said I dun goofed?”

Even as fleas, Sunrise, Speaker and Cash found Sullen Hoof’s subsequent chewing of scenery and hammy acting quite amusing, as he paraded around as if he owned the place – shouting down clerks and administrative spirits, none of which could seem to find the source of the forged message that Sullen Hoof and Cash had cooked up, which looked quite official and legit, because it was it traced off an official missive Sully had briefly stolen from a messenger spirit earlier last night.

The fake message Sullen Hoof claimed to have received had been written in such a way that it linked him to an oath he, as a god, had supposedly sworn to Cash’s previous incarnation – and thus Sully demanded access to the records to see exactly what he had done wrong, because he was certain he had made no such promise.
In a mortal setting this ruse would likely not have worked, but in Yu-Shan most gods and spirits instinctively sense the potency and power of other gods and spirits around them, using that sense to indicate if a god is more powerful and thus automatically higher ranking than them. With Sully’s disguise charms he felt to them as if he was someone they weren’t even allowed to look at directly – and so his request, while technically not legal to abide to, was obviously carried out.

Shimmer, in the form of a lowly air elemental messenger, was in turn dragged along by Sullen Hoof so that Sully could show the foolish messenger just how wrong it was – because if there was one thing that Yu-Shan seemed to have in endless amounts it was petty gods, so such behavior was not considered strange or suspicious at all.

As the false god and the false spirit was led out of the main lobby, through a vast heavenly cubicle farm where spirits monitored various ‘active’ oaths for breaches, they ultimately found themselves in a massive vault-like hall of indestructible jade-steel and orichalcum that seemed to stretch into infinity. From left to right the archive proper of Solar Eclipse Caste oathes went as far as the eye could see, with rows upon rows of shelves, the only sources of light being several skylights in the ceiling that seemed miles away.

The trembling and absolutely miserable little spirit that had drawn the short straw and been chosen to lead the angry high ranking god that was Sully, along with Sully’s whipping-spirit, quickly flittered among the seemingly endless stacks of scrolls, displaying a supernatural ability to navigate the otherwise poorly labeled and arcanely indexed oath scrolls racks.

After about an hour of searching the three found themselves at the mile-long shelves that contained all the oaths that Cash’s exaltation was linked to. Most were caked in dust to the point that they seemed impossible to dig out – while at the very end of the shelves a few hundred fresh scrolls gleamed, the sheets of indestructible gold they were written on having yet to lose their luster to the millennia of dust.

The clerk spirit which had led them to the shelves moved aside so that Sully could look for the scrolls marked with his name. Of course, there were none for the divine name and title Sullen Hoof had given was false. Also, the clerk spirit shouldn’t be there to see the circle appear and rifle through the scrolls… for it would no doubt call for help and raise all kinds of less than fun alarms.

The solution came from Cash, who whispered to Shimmer that she should suggest that the clerk spirit fetch the Sully-god refreshments on the double – that would buy them time.

“You, feeble little excuse of a godling, fetch my master refreshments! Now!” Shimmer barked, her air-elemental form lending her voice the power of a gale wind – which blew quite a few scrolls around, though she did have the sense to shout away from the shelves with Cash’s oaths.

The tiny spirit, upon extracting itself from a toppled shelf and despairing at the new mess which it would no doubt be forced to clean up later, whined: “But I’m supposed to leave anyone alone in here… its regulation”

Sullen Hoof slowly put down the scroll who’s magical seal he was examining – each seal named those the oath concerned – and slowly turned to face the miserable spirit with a face so twisted in fury that it seemed almost comical: “You dare...” he began menacingly.

The spirit ran off at great speed, leaving a trail of dust in its wake.

“Ok, we’re clear – everyone out!” Shimmer declared, revoking the shapeshifting effects on Sunrise, Cash and Speaker. As the three solars tumbled out of Shimmer’s cloud hair, the search for Cash’s oaths to Lilith began in earnest, and it was a daunting task indeed: Several thousand years of exalted living had left so many oaths to check that it would likely take a group of mortal ponies all of their lives to perform such a task.

With Speaker and Sully’s investigative charms they were done in less than a minute – the otherwise nondescript scrolls and their golden seals suddenly appearing glaringly obvious to them, even at great distance.

“Ok, this is a big pile… and they’re indestructible, so… now what?” Sullen Hoof mused, looking at the pile of scrolls they had amazed. The pile was the size of a large house, containing thousands upon thousands of scrolls.

Shimmer looked around at the circle: “Any ideas to destroy them?”

Speaker had a poke at the scrolls, but their magic seals only allowed Cash or the spirits working at the archive to open them – and that didn’t do much either, for the ink on the golden sheets seemed tamper-proof as well: “I think I’ll need more time than we have here to destroy these…”

“Don’t forget that Heath Rose said that the guards here will known instantly when a scroll is removed from the palace…” Cash added, shaking his head as he put away the scroll Speaker had tried to open. It contained an oath where Lilith had promised never to detail some random and apparently meaningless little mistake his past incarnation had made while trying to cook at some point. It certainly made Cash question how his previous incarnation had used his power to sanctify oaths.

Shimmer sighed: “Ok, I have a charm that can open a hole to a small den I have elsewhere – we can throw all the scrolls in there. I can open access to that den anywhere, so we just have to get out when that’s done, but it’ll probably trigger the alarm the moment the first scroll is tossed through, so we need to be quick”
“That just means that we have to prepare the scroll insertion properly – say, how big can you make that opening?” Speaker wondered, calling forth his singing staff and striking it against the marble floor.

About half a minute and some lively music later, a large funnel of marble had been raised out of the ground, and everyone was filling all of Cash’s oath scrolls into it – not just the ones connected to Lilith, but all the oath scrolls aside from the new pones from his current incarnation… and Speaker could barely expanding the length of the funnel fast enough to keep up with the large volume of scrolls the rest of the circle was filling it with.

At the bottom of the funnel was a three yard wide opening – currently plugged with more marble. The plan was thus quite simple: Once all the scrolls, or as many possible, were in the funnel, Shimmer would open her elsewhere-den portal as well as conjure up a flying cloud. Once the cloud was up Speaker would remove the funnel plug and get on the cloud with everyone else, and then they would make their escape through one of the skylights which were miles above on the ceiling. The den portal would remain open as long as possible, for Shimmer would be able to feel when nothing more was passing through it.

This plan worked out well – to begin with. It apparently took the clerk spirit quite a while to fetch suitable refreshments worthy of a high ranking god, so the circle managed to get almost all of Cash’s old oaths into the by then almost mile high funnel. Of course, this meant that it would take quite a while for all the scrolls to funnel through into Shimmer’s elsewhere den – still, Lilith’s scrolls were at the bottom, so they would go through in the first second, which they did.

In that same instant wailing claxons began sounding throughout the vast archive, and celestial lions came crashing in through the walls and doors demanding to know what was going on. Of course, this had been expected, so the funnel – despite its size –had been camouflaged as a giant vertical stone scroll. Sure, it was a silly, but Cash had reasoned that the celestial lions guarding the outside had likely never been inside the archive before… thus it wasn’t until the spirits who actually worked there were let that the obvious was pointed out: That the giant stone scroll in the middle of the archive wasn’t supposed to be there… of course, a giant stone wasn’t a missing golden scroll – and Speaker had played the construction of the giant stone scroll in such a way that it would muffle most of the rattle and noise of millions of scrolls falling into a hole into elsewhere.

Maybe it was because the celestial lions simply didn’t know how the archive worked, or because the clerk spirits there didn’t have powers that allowed them to actually sense the locations of the scrolls, but Shimmer concluded a few hours later that her den felt VERY full… and that no more scrolls were entering into it.

“You know, for all of Heath Rose’s warnings about that place, then this wasn’t that difficult…” Cash mused, as Shimmer flew the cloud towards forty-third celestial Yu-Shan gate, the gate that Hran-Tzu had suggested the circle use to get near Shining Reef.

Speaker shrugged: “Four solars with essence purity not far from the levels we had back during the primordial war, and an elder lunar? Honestly, I’m not surprised – though I’m sure if the bronze faction expected a raid on the archive they would have greatly increased the number of spirits guarding the place”

“Yes, but even that has certain limits: There were no spirits or gods guarding the archive itself, think about that for a moment. Any guardian spirits in there could have tried to peek into the scrolls to find out things about the people by magic oaths… it would be a prime source of blackmail material, since you could probably greatly embarrass a lot of gods up here by exposing what they had magically promised to do at various points in time – or exploit things they promised to do or not to do” Cash noted, suddenly realizing that unless they actually found a way to destroy the stolen scrolls, they would likely still be considered a great threat by heaven…
Despite the speed of Shimmer’s magic cloud, then its speed simply wasn’t enough to reach the forty-third heavenly gate before nightfall . Considering the lack of an actual terrestrial-style day and night cycle, this was mainly decided to be when the circle started to get sleepy, because if Shimmer fell asleep the cloud would disappear and that would be bad for both obvious reasons, and because crashing down into some random god’s palatial estate would likely be punished severely.

At Sunrise’s urging the circle opted not to sleep until out of Yu-Shan, since at this point the bronze faction was likely all up in arms over the archive heist, so getting out of their immediate jurisdiction sounded like a really good idea.

One aeriral rickshaw later the circle stood in front of the forty-third heavenly gate, the gate that Hran-Tzu had suggested the circle use to get near Shining Reef, the sunken city where the ponatees lived.

Entering through the gate left the circle suddenly bathed in darkness – as it truly was the dead of night in Creation. They were also inside…something. Since there weren’t any stars or clouds when looking up, this was fair obvious, they the question was then where were they? There was a distant sound of pounding surf, as well as the quiet sound of hooves on stone from various directions around them, which echoed mildly revealing that they were in some system of hallways.

Shimmer quickly used a charm that gave her the layout of her surroundings, to which she concluded: “We’re in some kind of palace…”

It was then that a pony with a spear and some kind of exotic feathered head-dress came around a corner. The wad of highly luminescent coral stuck to the spear worked quite nicely as a torch and completely revealed the circle to the pony who started shouting in a language that only Shimmer seemed to understand – and then it turned and ran, shouting some more.

“Ok, we need to get out of here, right now” Shimmer said, looking around for an exit as she broke into a gallop down the opposite direction of where the pony with the spear had run.

The rest of the circle quickly followed suit, with Speaker shouting as she galloped: “What is this place?”

“We’re in the palace of the Feathered One, the ruler of the Wavecrest island nation. That puts us in Seacrest, their capital, in the palace – and we really don’t need this kind of attention” Shimmer said urgently as they moved at speed.

Galloping through the hallways of the palace of the Feathered One, Shimmer added that Wavecrest was a realm tributary – so even if they didn’t have any intention of sticking around or making trouble, then they might find themselves on the receiving end of whatever realm legion that happened to be stationed in and around Seacrest: Four to five thousand armed realm legionaires and their scores of unicorn officers didn’t sound like something the circle wanted to fight right at this moment.
After passing a row of wooden masks – crude tribal relics by any standard of civilized eastern pony culture – Sullen Hoof’s whispering voice appeared from the shadows around the circle: “Why in heaven would the realm want to control a place like this? The spears the guards have are tipped with flint! Stone! There’s no silver or valuables here! Why would they even bother wasting a legion on a place like this?”

Sullen Hoof’s voice heavily implied that he had already gone ahead and searched most of the palace. Shimmer smirked in the flickering light of a nearby glowy coral torch: “Wavecrest is the single biggest landmass in the west. It’s the biggest agriculture producer around – controlling the food means controlling most of the west, outside of the small independent tribes that just fish and forage to get by”

Cash got the picture: “Makes sense – any settlement that grows too big to feed itself will need to trade with Wavecrest, and if the realm plays gatekeeper to that…”

Bucking open a gate to a sandy cobblestone-covered courtyard, the circle held off the palace guards as Shimmer conjured a cloud. As they flew off into the sky two unicorns arrived on the scene, blasting at the cloud with lightning and gouts of high pressure water – and while they did hit the cloud, then striking a cloud with water and lightning was about the most harmless thing one could do. Of course, to the ponies on the cloud dodging gouts of waters that might knock them off the cloud, or similarly not convulsing so much from the lightning that one fell off, was slightly more difficult – and in the case of the lightning, painful, though Speaker ensured that none of the injuries the circle sustained were permanent.

As Shimmer’s magic cloud quickly accelerated, moving out of range of the unicorns on the ground, the circle observed a large and actively volcanic mountain approaching. Even in the dead of night the angry red glare from its caldera made it very obvious that this volcano meant business.

“That’s odd… I don’t remember there being any volcanos in the west, not even the south-west” Speaker mused.

Shimmer noted that the volcanos of Wavecrest had been there since the shattering of Saigoth, the old continent that used to cover most of the west, the one that the Solars had raised from the ocean during the first age: “When the great contagion came there were so few ponies left here that most of the west just sank into the wyld. The stories my elders told me… they still frighten me  - so many ponies were lost in those days” 

“Does that explain why they’re tossing ponies into the volcano we’re flying over?” Sullen Hoof asked as he peered over the edge of the cloud.

Speaker was horrified as Shimmer simply shrugged and explained that the volcanoes were very unstable, so their gods required almost daily live sacrifice to keep the island from ripping itself apart. It was usually criminals sentenced to death by the Feathered One’s judges who got tossed on – indeed, it was the only criminal punishment for locals on Wavecrest: “It keeps the tribals that live under  the Feathered One’s rule very peaceful – for western tribals”

“Barbaric” Speaker mused despairingly as he watched the faint speck that was a tiny pony down on the volcano be tossed into the caldera. The cloud was far too high up for the poor soul’s screams to be heard.

The cloud flew mostly south, from what little Speaker could tell. Cash seemed far more certain that they were going slightly west as well – this troubled Speaker, for they were getting dangerously close to the parts of Creation where one would usually stop drawing a map and instead merely write “bordermarshes”.

This fact became painfully obvious as they flew over a floating island seemingly wrought of gigantic pearls and eerily colorful flowers. It was hypnotizing to look at – and both Cash and Sully had to be slapped rather hard to break them from their entranced stupor. Shimmer explained as they passed from the place that it was a place of changeling power, held by the Pearl Court: “I don’t know who’s their ruler right now – changeling’s swap rulers quite often. Infighting is in their nature”

As the sun set and the moon rose, Shimmer began looking for a place to land for the night. Of the few scattered islands they occasionally came across none were deemed safe by Shimmer. Changelings apparently loved to simply craft island illusions as means to trap lost sailors and fisherponies. Flying her cloud close to one such island and letting Speaker throw Gift at it revealed an enormous gaping map quickly snapping shut around the whole island, revealing its lure-based nature… though the massive changeling monster didn’t enjoy it when Gift ripped and sawed its way out again – but none in the circle cared.

“Is it like that all over the west?” Sunrise asked. Shrugging, Shimmer noted that even the most primitive tribal ponies knew not to sail out to fish alone, and always bring iron harpoons with them. The waters around Wavecrest, The Neck and Coral were all patrolled against changelings, pirates and Lintha.

“There’s still Lintha around?” Speaker blurted out, sounding surprised.

In her somewhat sleepy state Shimmer merely shrugged: “Haven’t they always?”

Sullen Hoof, having no clue what so ever what the two were talking about shot Speaker an inquisitive look. Shimmer responded: “Half-demon half-pony pirates. Nasty cannibal things” Speaker added that they were originally made by the primordial Kimbery as her version of ponies. The Solars tried wiping them out in the first age, but they were good swimmers and hide in the deep if threatened enough – though the idea that the Lintha was now ‘only’ half-demon half-pony creatures… that was a bit unsettling to him.

Cash was about to point out the similarity between the Lintha’s primordial connection and the ponatees they were seeking, with their supposed connection to a dead primordial, when Shimmer called out for everyone’s attention, especially Sullen Hoof’s: “Ok, we’re touching down for the night”

Shimmer’s choice of nighttime accommodations turned out to be the floating and somewhat bloated carcass of some giant sea monster. Cash quickly set about trying to poke around for anything of value in it, despite Shimmer assuring Cash that what little that was worth selling from the husk had already been eaten by scavengers…
Sullen Hoof managed to carve away most of the rotting flesh on the surface of the husk to make things bearable and even made some weird but surprisingly soft ‘cushions’ out of things he didn’t want to get into details with, while Shimmer almost lazily threw a net of her essence-spun webbing out and hauled up a feast of fish that the circle dined on.

The next morning Cash made Shimmer swear to never make the circle sleep on a floating rotting husk of a sea-monster ever again, because the smell – even with Sully having carved away most of the rotting bits – made Cash’s nose feel as if it was falling off…

“Nah, that’s probably more because we’re in a bordermarsh right now – you’re probably just mutating a bit” Shimmer joked.

Cash didn’t appear amused, and Speaker could see with his essence sight that Cash quickly put on his shaping-defence charm, since that chiefly warded one against unwanted mutations.

It was late afternoon when Shimmer’s cloud reached the surface remains of the City of the Shining Reefs. It wasn’t much that could be seen from above the waves: A few towers and what might once have been a first age dock.

“Ok… so, how are we going to do this? I’m a little new to the idea of kidnapping heads of state” Cash mused, looking at the pounding surf against the first age ruins beneath them.

Shimmer looked pensive as Speaker waxed nostalgic over how the place had worked in the first age: The ponatees predated the primordial war, but in the first age it had been a Solar Deliberative trade hub for the south-west… though there really wasn’t much left of that now: “…and it looks like the sidereals and dragonblooded had their fun picking the place over”

“I don’t know – from what I’ve been told this place has been left pretty much alone since the great contagion – not even Leviathan’s beastponies do much with them” Shimmer said, which seemed to disappoint the rest of the circle immensely, mainly because she was the only native westerner among them.

Sullen Hoof was all for scouting the place and doing some thorough legwork first, but only Shimmer and Speaker had the ability to breathe underwater… and for Shimmer that required some amount of shapeshifting.

Thus, Shimmer first landed the cloud atop one of the ruined towers and then leapt into the water in the form of a school of small fish. The fact that Shimmer could turn into more than one thing at a time and its various implications escaped the circle.

She surfaced an hour later, turning into a seagul and flying up to the circle as quickly as possible – for moments later the waters where she had appeared from began to churn violently from quite a lot of marine life poking around just under the surface.

It was then that a ponatee poked its head up through the water: It had a gnarled grey skin and features not unlike a pony, with sunken black eyes and these jewels of black jade set in its forehead – but where a pony had hind legs the ponatee had a big round fin, and its overall features were more rounded and bulbous. The circle had taken cover so as not to reveal itself, sans Sullen Hoof, who was using stealth charms to remain unseen while he silently observed the primordial being.
After a while Sullen Hoof became visible once more and signaled for the circle to come out of hiding.

Shimmer explained that the city underneath was indeed akin to that of a reef: On the outside it was a maze of underwater tunnels, quite well suited to defend from everything from changeling from the ocean floor to pirate raiders diving in from above. While Speaker suddenly found himself curious at how western pirates could fight underwater effectively enough to consider it viable to raid underwater cities, then Shimmer’s description of how the coral labyrinth housed scores of barracks and holding pens for strange and foul-smelling creatures, many of which looked eerily… stitched together… ended up worrying him far more.

“Basically a lot of their ‘troops’ look like ponines that have been surgically turned into some kind of freaky mix of undead and sea-pony… and it doesn’t look like it was voluntary procedures” Shimmer noted, sound none to happy about her discoveries.

Sullen Hoof’s observations about the lone ponatee that had come up from the waves and looked for Shimmer gave equal amounts of grim insight into the true nature of the beings: The spear it had been wielding had a black jade tip, as well as other black jade protrusions along the length,  and was floated in the air – so the ponatee had awakened essence.

Speaker confirmed that most primordial creatures had awakened essence as a natural part of their nature, while he also identified the spear – based on Sullen Hoof’s description – as a shock pike.

“Something you’re familiar with?” Sunrise asked, noting that Speaker referred to the device in a familiar tone.

Taking a deep breath, since he was to explain quite a lot, Cash quickly interrupted him – having read the entire exposition dump in Speaker’s expression and breath alone, thanks to his charms – and summarized: “Lookshy has them, they were the standard issue weapon for mortal troops in the first age, it’s basically a short spear allows you to hit stuff at range as if it shoots the thrust of the thing out at your target”

Speaker nodded: “That, and the versions meant for enlightened users pack a very serious punch – and they’re damn near impossible to dodge or parry, if it’s their ranged attack”

“If they’re equipping their scouts with that…” Sullen Hoof mused.

Shimmer interjected: “That wasn’t  a scout, the lone ponatee that came after me: It was herding the other… things… that they sent after me, those freaky half-pony monsters they had made”

Thus, the circle concluded that the ponatees were likely a lot better armed than previously imagined – they weren’t just some ancient tribal remnant of primordial barbarians: These things knew how to cut ponies apart,  attach enough fish-bits to make them work underwater and maintain first age weapons. This called for a more subtle approach.

Ultimately the plan for the subtle approach turned out to be somewhat untenable: Sullen Hoof had no doubt that he could sneak into the place – but he could not breathe underwater. Only Speaker had charms for that, and Shimmer with her shapeshifting. Thus, the plan became for the two to sneak in and kidnap the sleeping princes and just get out quickly. The kidnapping part itself should be simple enough, since Shimmer could ‘store’ the sleeping princes elsewhere with her den charm where they were currently holding all those indestructible oath-scrolls.

Using her shapeshifting powers to change Speaker into a small parasite fist and attaching him to herself in the form of another small western fish, Shimmer swam into the coral labyrinth that covered the outer parts of the City of Shining Reefs.

With her charms she could still communicate with Speaker, but Speaker was unable to respond since being a tiny lamprey mainly meant that he was struggling not to try to eat the fish-Shimmer he was currently latched on to.

To Speaker it seemed like both an eternity and no time at all having passed when Shimmer suddenly undid her shapeshifting of him. He found himself underwater, obviously, with Shimmer in her fish-form calling for his attention to his left: “I need you to figure out how to open this”

Swimming around a bit to turn himself around, Speaker beheld his surroundings with great awe: Adamant struts held together lattices of black jade, transparent crystals and first age metal alloys, creating a beautiful organic looking hallway. In front of the two was a large door of black and green jade fused with some kind of really hard sea-sponge. Around them was bio-luminescent fungus that shed a light bright enough that one might mistake the underwater scene for being exposed to bright sunlight.

It was a strange kind of door, but using his charms to quickly deduce the central essence focus of the locking mechanism. Speaker brushed his hoof up against several parts of the sponge he could see were essence-reactive, making the semi-organic jade door react like animal being poked into reacting. 

It took a little while to puzzle out the right sequence to get the door to open, but ultimately it yawned open as the jade-infused sponge pulled away, revealing a massive panoramic view of a ruined underwater city: Metal-framed adamant towers, some lit by still-working essence-powered lighting, many other were overgrown with the same luminescent fungus from the hallway, creating eerie outlines of beautiful first age architecture.

Shimmer noted that there were surprisingly few guards and sentries beyond the coral labyrinth – but Speaker reasoned that the ponatees probably didn’t expect anything to get by their outer defenses un-noticed, so internal security likely had a lower priority.

“True – and honestly, I think it was a good thing that you didn’t have eyes while I swam us down here… you wouldn’t have liked what I saw going through some of the holding pens for the necro-surgical monsters the ponatees hold here – hold up, take cover!” Shimmer said, quickly swimming into cover as memories of ponies sewn back together wrongly in combination with sea-monster parts flashed before her.

Speaker scrambled to get out of sight of the open door as four ponatees swam by outside. They were mumbling something that Shimmer couldn’t hear in her form as a fish, but Speaker’s elemental immunity charm meant that his senses were as unimpeded by the deep waters as his breathing was. They were speaking old realm, using an accent that was considered old and arcaich even in the first age. The topic of their discussion was the sighting of a foreign ship near the city’s surface ruins.
Speaker hoped that the rest of the circle was safe. Shimmer agreed on the sentiment, but pointed out that they had to get the princes before heading back to the surface and checking on the others: “I don’t know if I’ll be able to dodge their labyrinth security again... they were still looking for me from my scouting run, and I don’t see us leaving quietly”

With their internal security surprisingly lax, Shimmer and Speaker were able to approach the undercity of the first age ruins very quickly: Shimmer conjured several yards of her essence-spun thread and gave it Speaker, who in turn tied it around Shimmer after she had turned into a suitably larger pony-sized fish – allowing her to pull him towards the depths much faster than merely sinking.

At the foundations of the first age constructions, among still gleaming pillars of adamant and black jade so thick that it truly boggled the mind how such vast quantities of magical materials could ever have been amazed, the two found several large holes where ponatees dressed in gaudy garbs seemed to move in and out. With a little bit of careful timing the two were able to enter and behold the wonders hidden under the first age foundations… 

> Chapter 63: Heists and Horrors
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was clear that much of what Last Shimmer and Bright Machine Speaker saw under the foundations of the City of Shining Reefs had been built long before the structures above. Ancient mable and verdigris that seemed to have been grown organically over millennia was everywhere, stretched into palaces illuminated by more luminescent fungus and the odd essence-fueled glow stone. Everything was a palace more grand than the other, though swimming past them revealed that the interiors were filled with rotting furniture and finery so degraded by aoens of no maintenance and care that even the most filthy slum hovel in Nexus seemed more clean and pretty than what Speaker and Shimmer saw.

How these Ponatees had ended up like this seemed like a mystery, until the two found their way to the very bottom of this patch of the great western ocean. At the root of a particularly magnificent but also algae-encrusted tower Speaker detected a dark confluence of essence. The dragon lines which fed it ran for as far as he could see in the deep darkness – which wasn’t much – but he could sense that these necrotic essence flows stretched on for hundreds of miles. There was something potent in this place… and the amount of ponatee guards outside seemed to indicate that the ponatees also considered it important.

It was at this point that Shimmer suggested that they consider their exit strategy very carefully. Hidden in a large cracked wall out of sight from the guards, the two discussed how to leave once they had their target.

“How quickly can you swim up to the surface from here?” Speaker wondered ,hopelessly unable to gauge just how deep they were at this point.

Shimmer shrugged, which looked rather weird since she was a in the form of a fish: “We’ve been going down for almost three hours. I’d say if we went straight up maybe two hours of swimming to reach the surface?”

“That won’t cut it – we need to be able to get out of here faster. The ponatees are sure to bring hell once we nab their heads of state” Speaker noted, looking around for something, anything, useful.

Shimmer noted that if she had some kind of self-inflating form to shift into then the pressure difference should rocket them to the surface much faster: “…but none of the puffer fish I can turn into would survive at this depth”

“Well it’s an idea – but hey, we did swim past several air-filled towers up in the first age ruins. Maybe if we disconnect one of the devices that do that, we can make an underwater air-ballon to do the same?” Speaker suggested.

The Shimmer-fish gave Speaker a big wet kiss – then swam off in search of something matching Speaker’s description. She returned not long after and guided Speaker to what she had found.

In one of the still-lit first age towers, through a slightly makeshift albeit still elegantly organic air-lock, Speaker and Shimmer trotted down a hall with soggy half-rotting carpets. Speaker recognized the carpet as being jade-infused, with delicate green jade filigree woven into the spider-silk fabric… which explained why it was ‘just’ half-rotten after millennia – but it was Shimmer’s tugging at his old wet uniform which got his attention:

“I found the air-water extractor above a window… they have prisoners here” Shimmer explained, as she stroked the rather disgusting but remarkably utilitarian necromantic crab-lock thingy that held the door closed.

Speaker was about to ask what in heaven the ponatees needed live pony prisoners at this depth… but then he recalled Shimmer’s tales of freaky necro-surgical monsters wrought of ponies and sea-creatures: “Ok, we’re getting them out, right now”

Shimmer agreed and gave the necro-crab lock a mean glare. Sighing as she shapeshifted into a squid, which flopped over and then latched on to the crab-lock – then ate it – Shimmer turned back into a pony, spitting profucely: “Luna’s hairy balls that tasted bad”

Beyond the door was a massive prison complex, as well as a floor covered in the same half-rotten carpeting, as well as a putrid-smelling mix of blood, shit and fetid flesh: There were hundreds of cells, each with at least half a dozen emaciated ponies, many little more than walking sacks of skin and bone, and quite almost all had some variation of hoof-rot and gangrene.

“Shimmer, how can we get all these ponies out?” Speaker said through clenched teeth, simmering with rage.

Part of Shimmer truly enjoyed seeing Speaker so enfuriated. Not out of malice, but because it reminded her of how she had always wanted Speaker to be: Driven, focused, angry at the injustices of Creation: “Elsewhere den, remember? You just open the cell doors”

Speaker instantly called Gift into existence and swiftly began cutting prison locks on the three floors that still had live prisoners – he couldn’t help the dead. The pony prisoners were beyond relieved to be saved, though a language-barrier prevented Speaker from understanding what they were saying. Many were barely able to move: The ponatees apparently didn’t need well-fed or… well… living subjects, for their necro-surgical exploits.

Shimmer opened a portal to her elsewhere den and the ponies flooded in: Anything was better than watching from your cell as your fellow ponies were cut open, killed on the operating table while tentacles, claws and gills from various sea creatures were grafted on to them…

“They’ll be ok in the den?” Speaker asked, as Shimmer closed the portal.

Shimmer nodded: “I have a lot of food and water stashed in there – its only limitation is that if I go in there and close up, then I can only open the den portal to where I entered it…”

Quickly moving back to the airlock, the two made their way to the outside and swam around to the first age device which still filtered air out of the water… or was it simply converting the water into air? It was hard to tell – either way it was a marvel of first age craftsponyship. Detaching the device was easy enough for Speaker, though it did result in the three floors that had previously been kept full of air imploding spectacularly, filling the water with the disgusting smell and taste of blood and gore as Shimmer packed the device away elsewhere.

The sudden deluge of blood and shit in the water proved quite useful: A pack of the ponatee’s half-pony monstrocities arrived moments later, but were distracted by the chummed waters – buying Speaker and Shimmer enough time to escape down to the temple-tomb of the dead princes.

It was supposed to have been a quick smash and grab. It was supposed to have been a quick break-in, it was… not so simple.

The inside of the temple-tomb was not filled with water – glowing wards on the walls kept the ocean water moisture out, though they didn’t do much for the smell of the place since instead the whole place was filled with some kind of noxious smelling embalming fluid. The ground was covered in granulated bone that stirred slightly as Speaker and Shimmer swam over them… and the ancient ponatee priests were but animated corpses, embalmed and withered from their centuries of undeath with their ghosts having been necromantically bound to their bodies, thus allowing them to serve their dead princes even in death.

Decked out in the rags of once magnificent clerical garbs and jewelry from a bygone era, these ponatee priests looked intimidating and pathetic at the same time…
Oh, and the mummified priests also turned out to be really dandy necromancers… as was evident by the dozen upon dozen of skeletal ponies and ponatees that they summoned in mere seconds the moment that Speaker and Shimmer entered, as black lightning shot out from their decrepit bodies into the ground around them, bonding together bits of bone into whole skeletons.

The skeletons quickly swarmed Speaker and Shimmer, piling on to them as they tried to bite at their flesh. It was a diversion: As most of the priests retreated into the inner sanctum, a few stayed behind and began to shape into being various necromantic spells to slay the two exalts…

Shimmer and Speaker didn’t waste any time going on the counter-offensive: Shimmer turned into her beast-pony form, which seemed surprisingly adept at underwater maneuvering, while Speaker shattered scores of skeletons with Gift and his powerful magical martial arts.

It was when one of the three remaining priests flung a pale sphere of ivory essence at Speaker and the skeletons he was engaged with that the brilliance of these dark power revealed itself: The orb shattered next to Speaker and the skeletons – so at first neither Speaker or Shimmer had paid it any attention, since it obviously wouldn’t hit him, but as the sphere cracked pale energies pulsed out and caught Speaker in the front… and it was then that Speaker felt the flesh on his face and forelimbs begin to sag in a brief moment of pain – then force began to simply push his flesh off his body.

It was by will and essence-shielding alone that Speaker’s face wasn’t ripped off entirely – and even then large bloody rips were left around his jaw and down his legs, rips which trailed blood into the otherwise clear embalming fluid that surrounded them.

Shimmer was all over the ponatee priest that had flung the ivory orb, ripping the undead ponatee to shreds just as another priest raised its skeletal limbs at Speaker who had just downed his last skeleton…

Speaker felt his gaze suddenly torn towards that particular ponatee mummy-priest, and behind it he saw the shadowy figure of a purple hooded being of darkness… and Shimmer saw Speaker momentarily frozen, as his aquamarine coat flickered and inverted its color… and then it shattered – as if Speaker’s coat had been a mirror which was broken, leaving jagged patches of bloody muscle and flesh exposed underneath.

This second mummy priest was also quickly dispatched by Shimmer in a swirling mess of opulent jewelry, ragged cloth that might once had been beautiful, and flesh so shriveled up that it barely even offered any resistance as it was cut into pieces.

The third mummy priest saw what happened to its two fellows and fled towards the inner sanctum – but Gift cut it down in an instant… and thanks to the spirit slaying charm that Speaker had opted to also apply to that attack, Gift equally destroyed the mummy priest’s ghost as it was freed from its mummy prison.

“Shimmer, they’re leaving ghosts behind – be careful!” Speaker warned, Shimmer quickly scanning the surroundings with her third eye, even though the embalming fluid stung. How she had understood his bubbly speech underwater was a mystery he didn’t give much though.

As Shimmer launched herself at the ghosts of the two priests she had slain with claws glowing with pale moonlight, Speaker swam towards the inner sanctum. The feeling was unmistakable: It was a shadowland. Shimmer seemed to detect it as well, giving Speaker a worried look.

The doorway into the inner sanctum felt cold to the touch, much colder than the surrounding luke-warm but clear embalming fluid – and it had the unmistakable feeling of dread to it as well: Soulsteel, but covered in a thin layer of black jade and some other strange substances…

Steeling herself, and growing out her bone-armor over her beast-pony form, Shimmer urged Speaker to put on as many defensive charms as possible: “They know we’re coming in there any second, and there’ll probably be backup on the way so we have to be in and out quick – we don’t have to kill them all, just nab the princes and get out of here, then I’ll pull the air-machine out of elsewhere and spin a web-bubble for it to fill”

Speaker nodded and put on both of his shaping-defense charms, enacted his chaos-repelling pattern and girded himself in as much essence as he knew how to, resulting in him glowing quite intensely with a golding sheen of light as he bucked open the door in the inner sanctum…
The priests were ready for them.

Two lions wrought of tangled bones and blood, which kept mixing with the surrounding embalming fluid to create a murky haze around them, with manes of bone-quills, launched themselves instantly at Speaker – but Shimmer leapt before him and took them both on, all three quickly churning the embalming fluid around them into a mess of blood and bone-chips.

Speaker barely got a moment to turn around and observe the beautiful if macabre murals and decorations which adorned the surprisingly spacious vaulted ceiling of the inner sanctum of the dead princes: A massive skeletal warstrider in the form of a ponatee launched itself at him, with a lance wrought of spinal columns and steely sinew that struck with supernatural precision: Gift was able to block the blow, but Speaker still struck into the ground and almost half-buried in the mix of granulated bone and chipped teeth that made up the floor of the place.

With his balance charms and Sullen Hoof’s jumping charm Speaker quickly launched himself over the priests and past the massive bonestrider. Beyond them he saw two massive claw-like skeletal hands jutting out of the ground, upon each a mummified ponatee sat – but these mummies were different… they were almost buried in jewelry, and the clothing they wore was still pristine, likely spun of imperishable first age silks. This had to be the dead princes!

…then one priest ripped at the flesh of another – in a seemingly very consensual maneuver  – and snakes of black essence shot out of the gaping wounds, striking at Speaker as he struggled to maintain his trajectory in the embalming fluid. As the snakes began to entangle Speaker, a third priest grinned at Speaker in a most unsettling way: Its mouth was bursting with blood, but then heaved and vomited forth a brown and grey slurry that materialized into well over a dozen hungry ghosts!
Each of the hungry ghosts tore at Speaker but were unable to penetrate his shield charms – the bonestrider’s massive spine-lance didn’t have this problem, blowing right through it all as void essence tipped the lance… right through Speaker’s left femur.

Emitting  a somewhat bubbly howl of pain, Speaker steeled himself and used his one good leg to jump off the lance to the twin thrones of the dead princes – dislodging the bone-lance from his thigh painfully.

As he tumbled into the  thrones, the two dead princes remained immobile – but all the priests turned to Speaker with crusty mummified faces contorted in rage… and of the dozens of priests three more vomited forth a tide of hungry ghosts, though at this point the number of ghosts filling the embalming fluid began to work in Speaker’s favor: There were so many materialized hungry ghosts that they were bumping into each other and starting to fight each other… for hungry ghosts were but feral souls, ever-hungry for essence and the warmth of the living – and them getting in each other’s way suddenly made them targets for each other.

For a moment it occurred to Speaker that while these mummified ponatee priests were clearly skilled necromancers they weren’t good with tactical combat spell-casting… of course, that was a very brief moment of thought, as next Speaker tore the two mummified royal ponatees from their bone-thrones and called for Shimmer: “Now!”

What next had been carefully planned: Shimmer burned bright with the cleverest of moonlight as she shot a thick strand of her essence-thread through the mess of ghosts, ponatees priests and other undead horrors conjured during the fray and yanked Speaker back… who had the two surprisingly inert mummified princes in his hooves.

With the twin dead princes so close to Speaker the necromancer ponatees suddenly seemed bewildered and confused with regards on what to do. Any attack on Speaker had the chance of hurting their royals… and failing to stop Speaker and Shimmer meant their royalty, their leaders… if you could call two fairly dead looking ponatee mummies leaders… being stolen away from them.

Leaving the inner sanctum happened in three swift motions: First Speaker and Shimmer collided for a split second, then Shimmer shot out a clawed limb at the doorway out of the sanctum… her avian forelimb stretching unnaturally in a feat of shapeshifting Speaker didn’t recall seeing before, which then latched on and pulled Shimmer who now also held Speaker and the twin dead princes tightly under her wings.

The four of them shot out of the inner Sanctum as Speaker tried to cover them by parrying or deflecting necromantic attacks from the furious priesthood who seemed to have thrown caution to the wind a this point.

The moment the four of them pushed through the door to the dark ocean waters from the outer sanctum Shimmer and Speaker found themselves surrounded by a swarm of the ponatee’s finest and most horrible creations… though their handlers, living ponatees armed with essence whips and black jade shock pikes, were holding them all back: They were using their monstrous necro-surgical abominations to block any escape route… not to attack with.

With this realization, and the priests from within only seconds away, Shimmer spun up a tight ball of her essence thread and withdrew the water-air engine from elsewhere and passed both to Speaker, all the while carefully maintaining a guarded stance in case any of the undead monstrocities around them broke formations and attacked…

In seconds Speaker had the device working, running off his own essence. The essence-thread ball inflated to twice the size of a pony in less than half a second, forcing its way out from Shimmer’s bone-armored wing and instantly beginning its ascent.

Speaker had been clever enough to attack the two mummified princes to the machine, while hanging on to it himself – Shimmer in turn twisting around and propelling herself up to catch Speaker, flinging several essence-threads upwards to latch on to Speaker, the air-filled web-sphere or the even the princes…

…but she was pulled down, as one of the priests and the remaining bone lion had latched on to her and were holding her back – though with each of her limbs flailing about like clawed tentacles, slashing throats and clawing out eyes every second Shimmer was certainly making her impedance cost the ponatees dearly.

With fury and spite the mummified priest, its body already deteriorating simply by being outside the protective embalming fluid of the tomb temple of the dead princes plus most of its face having been reduced to shreds by Shimmer’s claws, gave Shimmer one last hateful remark in old realm before imploding into a dark vortex of purest void… and Shimmer was sucked into that, along with most of the undead monsters giving chase to Speaker in a vile moment of tactical idiocy and mad desperation.

Speaker barely managed to look down and see Shimmer disappear beyond the black event horizon of the vortex, exchanging one last pained look before she was no more to be seen… or heard… or felt. The water-air engine kept inflating the essence-web sphere, accelerating his ascent. The machine’s structural integrity field ensured that anything they bumped into on the way up didn’t damage the sphere, and soon the tomb temple of the dead princes was out of sight, replaced by the gleaming underwater spires of the ruins of the City of Shining Reefs, the essence-thread sphere having taken on an ovoid shape to accommodate the constant acceleration as the air-water engine expanded it…

Moving far faster than the ponatees or their undead monsters could give chase, Speaker quickly closed on the coral labyrinth that encapsulated the city – boosting the air-water engine’s structural integrity field with more essence, the essence-thread sphere shot into the labyrinth like a falling rock from the heavens, punching through several thick layers before even beginning to slow down…

His entr y into the maze hadn’t gone unnoticed – and the sounds of many alarms and captured sea-monsters rang out in the waters around Speaker, barely giving him time to grieve as he looked for a means to escape to the surface with the two dead princes.

It was just as a swarm of disgusting-looking undead necro-surgical creations came around a corner of the maze and saw Speaker that his solution came into effect: By installing Gift between the essence-field projector connecting the air-water machine to the silvery essence-thread sphere, Speaker was able to put a spin on the integrity field by activating Gift, making the by now enourmous sphere into a giant drill.

The solid structure, grown by millennia of carefully cultivated coral and other underwater plants, groaned and gave way to the unconventional drill, sending Speaker and his prisoners on their way up to the surface beyond the domain of the ponatees – though that didn’t mean that the things were giving up pursuit.

Without Gift to throw down at his pursuers it was difficult holding him them off – and they were more than smart enough to recognize that attacking the glowing sphere of essence-thread was all they needed to, meaning that Speaker had to use his essence sight to spot the otherwise invisible shock pike attacks and black them with his bare hooves – and while his charms gave him ample essence shielding, then shock pikes hit hard and by the time the essence-thread sphere breached the surface Speaker was trailing a lot of blood from multiple cuts and stab-wounds, in his battle to protect the sphere and ensure that Shimmer’s sacrifice wasn’t in vain.

Having reached the surface with the essence-thread sphere, Speaker barely had time to dislodge himself from the air-water machine and get to the surface himself when he felt the whole thing being pulled up and out of the water. Thinking that this was the rest of the circle coming to his aid he simply defending the sphere and his prisoners…

A few moments later Speaker was up on the deck of a ship wrought of curiously black wood, manned by sailorponies who looked decidedly pale but otherwise healthy enough… but hey, his circle was there too!

Rushing to meet Speaker, the others quickly noticed that Shimmer was missing. Cash noticed this first and offered his condolences before gesturing for Sully to pull the two prisoners aside.

Sunrise helped Speaker up: “Are these the sleeping princesses?”

“The proper term would be dead princes – but yes…” Speaker said, getting up and finally breathing air instead of water.

Looking around it was clear that the ship was not eastern in any way – mainly because the sailorponies seemed to be talking the same language as the prisoners that Speaker and Shimmer had freed earlier… gods, what would happen to them, now that Shimmer was gone?

Speaker quickly deactivated the air-water machine and then said that he needed time to recover… the rest of the circle seemed to understand, though Cash did note that the captain would want to meet Speaker – in fact he had apparently insisted.

Below deck, tending to the myriad of claw scratches and bite-marks that adorned his hind-legs, Speaker finally felt his tears. Sure, Shimmer had ‘died’ before, but this time there wasn’t any bisected corpse to patch back together and make her come alive again – this time it seemed to be… Speaker banished the thought.

Looking around, trying to distract himself, Speaker pondered for a brief moment what kind of wood the shit was made of: It was a curiously dark wood, with an almost invisible grain. It was also very dense, and the caulking used to waterproof the planks that made up the outer hull seemed to be at least partially made of bone-glue.

Just as he was about to examine the bone particles in the glue Speaker found himself interrupted, a pale but stout looking pony addressing him: “Bright Machine Speaker?”

Turning to face the stallion, Speaker noted the garish costume the pony was. There was no doubt: This was a pirate who enjoyed taking the fanciest looking bit of clothing he could steal and wear them, even if the strange mishmash of colors and styles made the stallion look somewhat silly. The eight cutlasses the stallion had strapped to himself did make up for this though. Speaker nodded.

“I am Captain Moray Darktide. I am sorry to hear that your lunar mate didn’t make it back from the ponatees. They are not kind to intruders taken alive” Darktide spoke, bowing his head in respect.

Speaker shook his head: “They didn’t get her like that…”

The captain sighed: “I must admit, I was actually hoping to speak with her. I’m hunting a lunar who’s in league with the lintha – I was hoping for some advice”

Releasing the last few motes of essence committed to his medical charms, Speaker got up and faced Captain Darktide: “When I meet her next incarnation I’ll let her know – she had no love lost for the lintha and would probably have loved to help”

The Captain smiled and helped Speaker all the way: “I don’t suppose you know anything about the lintha? The location of Bluehaven, or the identities of any lintha mothers or fathers?”

“Only things from the first age – nothing about their current locations or family structures” Speaker mused, feeling utterly useless.

There was a sudden knocking on the hatch up to the deck and the captain excused himself and ran to the hatch while noting: “The lintha rank themselves with family terms. A mother or father is quite high ranking, and would know things I can use… but hold on, I need to check this”

The captain disappeared above deck for a moment. A few seconds later the hatch opened and Cash called: “Speaker, you’re needed up on deck”

Up on deck Speaker was met by the rest of his circle and a messenger spirit – not the sort conjured via sorcery, but a heavenly messenger spirit. It had been sent by the Raven King to collect the dead princes and needed Speaker’s consent to take them away.

“Sure, just tell Hran-Tzu that this had better be worth it. Shimmer died getting these two” Speaker said in a jaded tone.

The spirit faded from sight, along with the dead princes, leaving the circle to ponder a rather uncomfortable conundrum: How were they going to get back to the east? Yeddim weren’t used in the west at all… and without Shimmer to conjure magical clouds then they didn’t have any means of quick transportation at all.

Captain Darktide offered to let the circle stay on his ship until their next port of call – which sadly wasn’t scheduled for several months… this reduced the rest of the circle’s mood to roughly Speaker’s level, because they all knew that without a means to get back and defend Chung Do then the city would burn.

That evening, as the moon loomed high on the sky and Speaker gazed out over the endless waters in the rough direction of the City of Shining Reefs a light appeared on the horizon. It was faint at first, but grew in size as it got closer.

From the lookout atop the main mast the alarm was sounded – and almost just as quickly canceled. It turned  out to be a messenger spell… from Shimmer.
“I think I’m in the underworld… somewhere – will try to find a landmark and send another message so you can find me”

> Chapter 64: Going Home To The Underworld
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The news that Shimmer was alive… sort of… sent a shock through the circle. How could she be in the underworld?

Maybe she had died and it was her ghost that had sent the message – it might not even be aware that it was dead. It wasn't unheard of for the ghosts of sorcerers to keep on using their magical powers beyond the grave... especially necromancers, thought whether or not that was true could be debated since such rumors mainly came via Immaculate Monks.

“Why would she even leave a ghost behind that can do something like that if she’s dead? I mean, a ghost shouldn't be able to send messenger spells like that, right?” Cash wondered out loud. 

Sunrise shook her head, her bright orange mane and its tightly bound hairbun jiggling softly: “All ponies can leave behind a ghost if they have an earthly tether – someone they love too much to let go, or something they care for greatly – and as ponies with enlightened essence we all stand a chance of leaving behind powerful ghosts that can do more than just haunt you in the night”

“That and sorcery isn’t tied to your exaltation – damnit… its just the stories the Immaculates tell - and we don’t have a means of getting a message to Lytek to see if Shimmer’s exaltation has arrived in his office yet” Speaker begrudged, realizing that the message Shimmer had sent indeed had no indication of whether it was her ghost, or whether she was truly alive somehow.

For Cash there was also the issue of Shimmer having all his oath-scrolls stored elsewhere… which gave him an idea: “Hey Speaker – you saw Shimmer disappear into that vortex you talked about, right?”

Speaker nodded, sighing deeply.

“Well that settles it, she’s alive then” Cash said with a cheerful tone.

The others gave Cash a suspicious look. Cash explained: “Speaker, of what you’ve told me about storing things elsewhere, then if you die all those things reappear where you died… right?”

The old Lookshyan stallion stood upright as his eyes brightened: “You’re right!”

“Hold on, what if that vortex sent her somewhere that killed her… say… the underworld, wouldn't that still mean she might be dead?” Sunrise noted, urging for caution as opposed to getting ones hopes up too much.

Speaker disagreed, explaining that Shimmer had been in her beastpony form when she had disappeared, with all her combat charms active. If she had simply been sent to the underworld there shouldn't be any reason why she wasn’t still alive.

“That sounds possible – but if we can’t find her or send a message to her…” Sullen Hoof noted glumly, his words trailing off as he knew it wasn’t a popular sentiment, though he felt it necessary to point out.

Shrugging, Speaker said: “Then we find someone who can. We just need to get back to Nexus and contact that Deathknight… what was his name…”

“The Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes was his name… or title… if I recall correctly” Sunrise noted.

Cash nodded, adding that he remembered the deathknight’s contact information. Some Sijaneese mortician working in Nexus who would know where to find the deathknight.
With their plan clear, the question once more became how to return to civilization post haste. Staying on Captain Darktide’s ship would waste too much time and mean Chung Do being razed to the ground by the wyld hunt.

The solution came to Cash the next morning, as he peered across the waters. Gathering the circle and the good Captain, he proposed his solution: “We might not be able to find a yeddim here – but Shimmer often spoke of many strange sea creatures and monsters here in the west. We just need to catch one and ride that all the way home…”

“Sounds like you want a sea-dragon then” Captain Darktide noted, sounding rather bemused at the thought.

Cash gave the Captain a daring look: “Perhaps? If it’s the toughest creature around then perhaps it is – how do we catch one”

For some strange reason the Captain wasn’t all that hot on the idea of using his ship as part of catching a sea-dragon. Apparently these creatures were massive, sixty foot scaly things, more maw and teeth than fin and flesh – but they also prefer shallow waters to feed on sharks, so finding one on open waters was unlikely…
“Damnit – then what kind of big sea creatures do you have out here on in the deep sea?” Cash groaned.

The Captain suggested that Cash try his luck with the great western Siaka – the monster sharks of the great western oceas: “They can smell blood for miles… should make it easy enough to attract one, if you spill enough blood in the water – though something like that’ll likely just eat you, not let you ride it” 

Cash cared not. He wanted back to the east. The source of blood for chumming the waters was easy enough to find: In one end of the ship’s hold there was a pen with a tangle of giant spiders. Apparently the crew fed the spider’s the rats that ate their bread and rice supplies – and in turn also butchered and ate the spiders – something in that diet supposedly staved off scurvy somehow.

With copious amounts of spider-blood trailing the ship a giant siaka appeared soon enough – and it was truly massive: 40 feet long, and with a maw big enough to eat two stacks of ponies at once with its five rows of six inch teeth… Speaker wondered if Shimmer had ever hunted one of these things to take it’s form: He figured that she probably had.

To ‘tame’ the beast Cash displayed a marvelous use of his riding charms, using his shoes of distant claws to fire a claw into the Siaka and pull himself onto it. With a dazzling display of golden light and riding charms Cash calmed the beast enough for it to cooperate and then had it pull up to the ship.

The Captain and his crew looked on in awe as the circle climbed down onto the siaka, even more so when they swam off at a speed that no ship with sails could ever hope to match.

“Uhm… Cash – do you have any idea where we need to go? We’re out in the middle of the western ocean here” Speakear wondered.

Cash waved a map at Speaker: “I didn’t spend all my time on Darktide’s ship moping around – I talked with their navigator. If we keep a heading of north by north-east for a day or so at this speed we’ll reach the Wavecrest archipelago. There we can nab a sea-dragon or see if there can’t be a single yeddim hidden somewhere on the island”

The next day the first few outer islands of Wavecrest appeared on the horizon, and soon after the pillars of smoke from the Wavecrest volcanoes became visible as well.

Cash expressed quite firmly that he’d prefer to find a yeddim – somehow – or some other creature they could fly with, mainly because it would simply be faster if whatever they rode around on didn’t need to breathe water. The circle agreed, though Speaker pointed out that Captain Darktide had said that sea-dragons have to surface to breathe…

“Ok, sea-dragons remain an option then – but first let’s find one of those nice realm-controlled port cities here and try to buy a yeddim. I would like to stay dry for the trip home” Cash stated.

Releasing the siaka from his charmed grip near what looked like a big port city, Cash waved goodbye to the shark from the shore as the rest of the circle dried themselves off – Cash needn’t bother with such things due to his collar of dawn’s cleansing keeping him clean and dry even if swimming.

Making their way into… oh this looked just a little familiar… yup – the circle had made their way back to Seacrest, the capital of Wavecrest.

“Well, that should mean that it’s the center of commerce here – so if they’re pulling around big loads of agricultural produce they might actually have a yeddim or two here” Cash noted.

Speaker was less enthused: “Just make sure we stay away from any realm garrisons… and remember Cash, you’re the only one among us who speaks sea-tongue now – so please be careful”

“Oh you noticed that – well I shall do my very best to make our stay here on Wavecrest as brief as possible” Cash said, bowing elegantly.

The outskirts of the city were replete with farms, fields and orchards. Speaker guessed that the volcanic ash made for good fertilizer, though the fact that most of the local farmer-ponies used stone tools made him roll his eyes… though Cash was quick note that even in the east then Lookshy’s farming techniques and tools were second to none: “But ya… this is about as primitive and inefficient as it gets”

The city itself was quite nice: In the outer districts where craftsponies toiled away at smithies and workshops, mostly supplying local shipwrights with materials and parts, the buildings were made of stone and wood, whitewashed, with dried seaweed instead of thatch for roofing. In the better part of town, especially around the quite obvious realm embassy and unicorn estates the buildings were clad in tiny nacre tiles, and roofed with larger earthenware tiles.

Brightly colored awnings overhung the streets everywhere, with shops underneath selling refreshments, tourist knickknack, at least in the nicer part of town, and the circle did cross several groups of ponies who were clearly from the realm: They spoke high realm – though Cash was the only one who understood what they said in passing.

At a large square on the north side of the city, not far from several shipwrights, the circle found two things they wanted: First they found a nice little place to eat lunch, with Sullen Hoof paying close attention to the uniquely western fish dishes he observed going out the kitchen to the various costumers. Secondly they came across a massive guild-wagon-sized timber hauling operation which was in the midst of unloading their cargo to one of the nearby shipwrights. The massive timber-wagon was pulled by a yeddim.

After lunch Cash inquired where the yeddim was from and if there were others around. Convincing the old mare in charge of the timer wagon and yeddim that he represented some rich realm unicorn, he managed to weasel out of her that there was a single yeddim breeder on the island – and in exchange for a few coins of silver he also got the locations of that yeddim breeder.

With that information Cash first made rounds at a few nearby provision dealers, securing supplies for the circle’s journey – and by nightfall the circle was flying east at great speeds, loaded up with enough food to last the entire trip.

Unlike the time the circle had to pick up Speaker at the Densic, the circle this time flew north around the Blessed Isle, covering a massive distance before Cash finally had to land and get some rest. The island Cash landed the as-of-now unnamed yeddim on was a cold one, indeed Shimmer figured that it was one of thewest-most islands that made up the northern part of creation. The amount of snow on the ground and ice in the water was a dead giveaway.

Speaker quickly used his  singing staff to create a shelter big enough for the circle and the yeddim, while Shimmer collected dry flotsam on the beach to make a fire… well, she would have. Cash had to collect firewood instead, while Sullen Hoof made the best of their supplies.

The next morning the circle flew east once more, following the islands and later the mainland coastline. Shimmer warned that many of the coastline territories were realm tributaries, so setting down near any of them would likely be met by unicorns asking questions and throwing elemental essence blasts around.

By nightfall Sunrise spotted something eerily familiar as Cash raced to use the last bits of sunlight before landing for the night. It was a long stretch of strangely white roadway, wide enough that it could be seen clearly from high in the sky. Sunrise had never seen it before, and yet it felt unsettlingly familiar: “What road is that, do any of you know?”
“That’s the Travelers road. We’re passing over Wallport, Whitewall’s sister-town. I’ve talked with merchants from Whitewall, they’re a fun bunch” Cash remarked.

Sunrise didn’t feel quite satisfied by Cash’s description, feeling that there was something else to it – but none in the circle had ever been to the place, so they knew nothing of Whitewall’s first age legacy.

Moving further east the circle flew into territory that Cash insisted was part of the Bull of the North’s domain. Sullen Hoof confirmed this after they flew past an encampment where he spotted, using charms to enhance his sight, banners bearing solar-style sunbursts and the image of a yellow or golden bull.

Staying one night at a small wayside tavern barely fifty miles south of where the grass gave way to endless northern snow, the circle continued on in a more south-eastern direction, giving the lands of Cherak a wide berth – for it was another realm tributary according to Cash – meaning that that day was mostly spent crossing the inland sea.

Two days later the circle finally arrived at Sunhill, where the new yet still un-named yeddim was fed and prepared for head out again.

The circle barely stayed a day in Sunhill before heading to Nexus in search of the deathknight known as the Bodhisattva.

Approaching the by now familiar sight of hillsides dotted with first age towers and a mess of slums, carved up by a network of canals down in the valleys between the hills, the circle strategized:

“Our first priority is not to get caught: I can only imagine that when the council of entities sold off all our assets to cover the damages the changelings did that they expected that they were selling a fully staffed hospital…  plus I destroyed most of the art and jewelry that Shimmer couldn’t stuff into elsewhere – so I doubt we’re that popular” Cash noted.

Sullen Hoof was quickly chosen to sneak into town and contact the mortician who supposedly knew where to find the Bodhisattva. Hovering over the north-western edge of Nexus, just beyond River Park in the Nighthammer district, Sullen Hoof leapt from all the way up in the yeddim down to the rooftops, sticking the landing perfect as if he had just skipped over a puddle.

It took the circle quite by surprise when Sullen Hoof reappear on the yeddim howdah a few hours later, mainly because he had disguised himself as a pale and sickly looking beggar clothed in rags, but as he dispelled the illusion that his magical helmet had made he told the circle where to pick up the Bodhisatva: “He’ll be atop the Nexus Military College around midnight – we can swing by and pick him up there”

This left the circle wondering what to spend the rest of the day with… and spending the day in Nexus wasn’t really an option – which annoyed Cash endlessly, especially after Sullen Hoof showed them copies of the wanted posters that had been distributed all over town: “They really nailed our likeness – I’m the only one they don’t know the face of…”

Sullen Hoof also informed that circle that while council of entities indeed seemed to know of Sunhill, then the guild at large didn’t seem to have much interest in going after the place. This was good news, as it meant that the guild controlled mercenary armies that operated in and out of Nexus wouldn't likely be raiding Sunhill any time soon.

Camping on the north shore of the yellow river, across from Nexus, the circle waited until midnight and then flew towards the Nexus Military College to pick up the Bodhisattva.

The college was located in the northern end of the cosmopolitan Manehattan district, and was a beautiful old first age fortress used by the mercenaries of Nexus as a shared academy for officer training. It was also partially on fire when the circle approached, the tall flames from the college’s nearby warship docks and drydocks illuminating the college itself and making the mosaic windows with their images of the Mare of Battle and other first age gods of war shine and sparkle.

The Bodhisatva was, sure enough, atop the highest spire of the college, his dark form difficult to spot – but Speaker’s essence sight allowed the circle to home in on him quite expertly.

Approaching the deathknight, the circle was surprised when he suddenly leapt about fifty yards up onto the howdah, landing with a heavy thunk on the wooden planks.
“Your handywork?” Cash casually inquired, nodding towards the fire raging beneath them all.

The Bodhisatva, his ghost-flesh head and limbs rippling and twisting ever so slightly, while his lidless blood-orb eyes gave little to no hint of emotion, merely shook his head: “No, but I did just kill the pyromaniac who set the fires, as well as the owners of the construction company that paid her to set the fires”

“Lovely – now, did Sullen Hoof tell you why we wanted to talk to you?” Sunrise asked quickly, looking down at the fire in disgust now that she knew the truth of the situation.
The deathknight nodded: “Your lunar is stuck in the labyrinth and you need a guide”

The circle and the deathknight compared notes as Cash flew the yeddim east towards Sunhill.

A few hours later as the circle arrived at Sunhill in the dead of night several things had been cleared up: First of all the Bodhisattva recognized the necromantic spell that had that sent Shimmer to the depth of the labyrinth – which was apparently a place at the very center of the underworld, not far from the mouth of the void of oblivion. This was good since that was where the circle would need to go to destroy the oath scrolls, but also very bad since it also meant that Shimmer wasn’t that far from the tomb-palaces of the Neverborn… and just being in close proximity to dead primordials was all kinds of bad for your health – not even Deathknights went there willingly unless they were completely mad.

“Ok, but can you find her?” Speaker asked, not even trying to mask how worried he was as they walked the halls of the Sunhill manse towards its top levels where the circle lived.

Nodding, the deathknight noted that it was not impossible and retrieved a picked-clean unicorn pony skull from elsewhere, then conjured up a necromantic equivalent of a sorcerous messenger sprite – just in the form of a bat-winged unicorn pony skull – and bid it to seek out of Shimmer: “I am a messenger spirit sent by the Bodhisattva, your deathknight ally from the Chung Lands. Seek higher ground, exit the labyrinth by going upwards. When you enter the city of Stygia seek the district of Whispering Streets, say that I sent you and let them hide you. Eat nothing offered to you. Your circle is coming, I am bringing them. Message me or your circle when you are ready for extraction”
The ghastly necromantic sprite flittered off at great speed, after which the deathknight turned to the circle: “Is your flying yeddim expendible?”
Sunrise gave the deathknight a distrustful look: “Why? What is your plan?”

Cash was about to say something  when the Bodhisattva sighed: “We will need swift transportation to get in and out of Stygia quickly. The mightiest of the deathlords all share control of Stygia with an uneasy truce, so I doubt we will be able remain undetected for long – and there are no shadowlands on the blessed isle thanks to the stabilizing nature of the elemental pole of earth, so it will be a long trip to get there”

“Lovely – so how will we get there?... and get out again?” Cash inquired.

The deathknight turned and looked out of a large panoramic wall to wall window which stretched the length of the hallway they were in: “There are plenty of shadowlands in the east – and once in the underworld I know fast but dangerous means of even faster travel – the issue is getting to a shadowland, quickly”
“Don’t forget we need to do the… thing, once we get Shimmer” Sunrise reminded the circle.

The deathknight sighed, its breath sounding like a dozen faint voices ghasping weakly for air: “You have business in the underworld?”

Speaker looked around at Cash, Sunrise and Sullen Hoof with a pleading look. He didn’t need words to ask whether they should tell the Bodhisattva about the stolen oath scrolls or not. Sunrise frowned and lightly shook her head, Sullen Hoof following suit. Cash seemed ambivalen, so with all that in mind Speaker opted not to tell everything, just enough: “yes we do – but nothing that concerns you. We just need to get to Shimmer and a way to leave, that’s all”

Cash opened the door into the atrium that separated the circle’s private quarters, with the deathknight stepping through and pausing for a moment– admiring the scenery: The atrium was decorated quite tastefully with a mix of some of the western art that Cash had originally imported via the Densik, as well as other curio that the circle had acquired: A suit of worn but good lamelar barding with the crest of Chung Do, Red’s old blade from before she started constantly shaping daiklaives out of her essence, and a rather worn old robe that was probably once Sunrise’s – likely her first robes from the Cult of the Illuminated.

“You want a way out of the underworld, fine – but if you intend to stay any longer than is needed to simply rescue your lunar, then I must know so I can plan your exit accordingly” the deathknight stated as he beheld some nice flowers in a pot. The flowers wilted merely from his presence as if to emphasize the Bodhisattva’s statement.

Sunrise grimaced and sighed: “We have something that Shimmer is holding on to that needs to be dropped into oblivion – it is the only way to destroy it. You needn’t bother yourself with what it is”

It would have been understandable if the Bodhisattva wasn’t pleased with not being given all the details – but if that was how he was feeling then he didn’t show it.

Later in the evening a response from Shimmer arrived via another sorcerous message. Just the first messenger that Speaker had received it relayed Shimmer’s message in a perfect copy of her voice, as if Shimmer herself spoke it – but it spoke in a ragged and tired voice, with heavy breaths between her words: “I’m where the Bodhisattva told me to be. The ghosts here… they keep offering me water from this weird fountain. I haven’t drunk any – but this place… its creeping me out, please come. I’ve hidden in my elsewhere den to get away from the voices, helping the ponies we rescued in there and we’ve begun sorting the oath scrolls, to find the ones involving Lilith”

As the conjured messenger dissolved into motes of silvery essence the circle sighed in relief, though Sunrise was quick to point out that Shimmer didn’t sound that well in the message.

“Rescued ponies? You’ve been busy” The Bodhisattva noted with a rather obscene-looking grin on his face – though that was likely just a result of his ghost-bodied nature; not being able to look kind, happy or amused.

Cash nodded: “We had to do a little thing in the west to cover our flanks with regards to the bronze-faction sidereals wanting to kill us. Had to nab us two dead princes from the ponatees for that”

The Bodhissatva  stood silent for a moment, then he forced something akin to a predatory grin: “You stole the conduits of Who’s Whisper Chains? Oh you are bold indeed – Were you not in a hurry you will be welcomed in Stygia as heroes”

The circle gave the deathknight an odd look – for it was truly difficult to read the face of a being with transparent flesh and blood-red orbs for eyes: “The political landscape of Stygia has changed much since you freed me – I can tell you more while we travel to the nearest shadowland. We have to get there before nightfall”

“The one from that weird manse is gone – and I’m not familiar with any other shadowlands in this part of Creation. I mean, we are pretty far north from the big one near Great Forks. How about The Black Chase, the shadowland that Sijan is in?”Cash suggested after a little bit of thinking.

With a mighty disgruntled stomp the deathknight began marching towards the door leading back to the hallway they had just arrived from: “I’ll go hunt for a ghost in the nearby forest – forget bringing your flying Yeddim, we’ll enter the underworld just outside Sunhill just before dawn. Rest now and steel yourselves”
As the deathknight marched off, leaving the circle somewhat confused about what he was planning, the circle ultimately agreed that it sounded as if the Bodhisattva knew what he was talking about, and thus they all rested easy.

Rousing just before dawn and eating a quick but surprisingly filling meal, curtsey of Sullen Hoof, the circle assembled in the courtyard of castle Chung. The young Shogun was still asleep as the Bodhisattva came out of a door which led down to the castle dungeons – pulling something that only Speaker could see with his essence sight: The miserable looking ghost of a pony, likely one that died while a prisoner…

While Speaker could see it, then he felt himself quite happy that he could not hear the thing – for the ghost was thrashing around and clearly screaming, though not in anger from having been roused or taken from its lair… it was absolutely terrified.

Speaker quickly began to feel the ghost’s dread as the deathknight hauled the ghost up into the air and drew a soulsteel daiklaive from elsewhere. A few dark words that seemed to split and crack reality as spoken made the dark metal on the straight-edged daiklaive glow with a pale light, which was then swung into the ghost as it came down… and thus a pony-sized gash in Creation formed: A hole leading into the underworld. The echoes of the ghost’s screams could be heard as they faded from beyond the portal.
“Quickly now” the deathknight ordered – indeed, the hole was already starting to shrink.

Sullen Hoof, with saddlebags laden with gods knows what, was first through. Sunrise followed suit, then Cash, then the deathknight.
Speaker lingered for a moment. There was no visible light beyond that dark portal.

Steeling himself and taking a deep breath, Speaker stepped through the hole which closed after him, his hooves stepping onto a walled courtyard of pale grey ash-covered cobblestone. Everything was monochrome, aside from his circle-mates and the blood-red eye-orbs of the Bodhisattva. The air reeked of burnt pony flesh.

> Chapter 65: That Which Is Not Dead Can Forever Prattle On
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The underworld wasn’t all that different from Creation. Hell, aside from the fact that almost everything seemed monochrome then one could have fooled Speaker to believe he was still in the courtyard of Castle Chung.

Indeed, the circle was in the courtyard of Castle Chung – only, it was not ruled by any living pony: It was ruled by the ghost of one of Chung Onyx’s ancestors – and it seemed that he wasn’t all too keen on living ponies appearing in the middle of his courtyard… amid scores of pony bureaucrats clad in dull and drab robes seemingly spun of shaved pony manes, who were enacting some kind of ritual. This ritual was of course hopelessly disrupted by the appearance of the circle.

Armed pony ghosts, likely soldiers buried with their weapons and armor, leapt at the circle – but the Bodhisattva flared his anima, which splattered everyone around him in bright red blood and finely pulped viscera – and the war-ghosts stopped instantly, dropping to the ground and begging for forgiveness quite melodramatically.

The Bodhisattva merely kicked them aside and made for the gate out into Chung Do, gesturing for the gate to be opened. The circle followed, exiting out into a pathetic shantytown. The cries and moans of hundreds of pony ghosts roamed the street, with vendors barking at ghosts passing by to buy goods from empty stands… and some of those ghosts even stopped and paid with pebbles for nothings in return. It was pale and semi-transparent imitation of life, and the air was fetid and stank of rot.
“This place… what is this?” Speaker asked, not even sure if he honestly wanted an answer.

The Bodhisattva was about to speak when Sunrise gestured for him to not do so: “Isn’t it obvious? It is the ghosts of all the ponies who have lived here for centuries, if not millennia. The Shogun of the castle I believe was Chung Broadhoof, one of the earlier warlords to claim this land – I remember his painting from the castle”
“But… there are so many…” Speaker said, shaking his head.

The Bodhisattva looked around for a moment, then nodded: “Right – well their numbers are simple enough: Most ponies die fearing death, a fraction so much so that they rise as ghosts – or if they have some other tie that binds them to Creation. Vengeance is common for that. If they run out relatives for ancestor worship they have to do something else to keep from fading… look, I could talk underworld economics for ages – I’m sure Cash would have fun with that – but right now we need to get a move on. The deathlords have spies everywhere, and Chung Do is no exception”

Looking at Sullen Hoof, who seemed to be observing everything around him quite intently,  then at Cash who seemed more curious at the Bodhisattva’s mention of economics, Speaker sighed. Sunrise put a hoof on his shoulder: “Take heart – I too wouldn’t mind seeing these souls guided back to Lethe for reincarnation, but right now we have to rescue Shimmer and finish our business here. Creation comes first”

The deathknight strode into the middle of the square in front of the palace – though, calling it a square might be a bit much: It was a well-stomped field of dirt with hovels built around it – and called out to the ghosts in earshot: “I am The Recalcitrant Bodhisattva of Penance and Suffering Ended. I need one soul for a single charge, and I promise to lead whoever aids me to Lethe upon completion of that task”

There was an instant outbreak of murmurs among the ghosts, many sending untrusting looks towards the deathknight and the circle.

Finally, a truly pathetic ghost crawled up to the Bodhisattva: It was a pony mare – or had once been – for the corpus of the ghost was battered and broken, it’s hind quarters and legs shattered to the point that the poor soul was dragging itself along the ground with forehooves worn down to be but nubs of bone and tattered ghost flesh. Sadly this wasn’t the worst aspect of the ghost: Her face appeared partially melted, with droopy eyes from which a constant trail of black tears flowed.

She clung to the Bodhisattva’s left foreleg and begged: “Please, do with me what you must, just end my suffering… please”

The deathknight looked down at the ghost with disgust, but picked her up none the less: “Silence – I care nothing for your drama”

What happened next looked really weird – at least to Speaker and the circle: The deathknight took firm hold of the ghost and began bend and stretch it, molding pale essence into it and even growing parts of the ghost. The ghost in turn screamed in a truly horrible way its remaining bones were broken and refashioned into other things, until even its mouth was molded into something else. In a matter of minutes the ghost had been turned into a grotesque mockery of a cart – but where the front half of the cart was a pony… sort of.

“Here is our transportation to Stygia – Cash, you’re helming it” the deathknight half-stated, half-ordered.

The circle, collectively, gawked and simply mouthed: “What…”

Sighing, the Bodhisattva extended a limb like a black tentacle and one by one yanked the circle onto the cart: “Ghosts here might look solid, but everyone is merely soul-stuff. If you know how you can mold it easily into anything. The forgotten ghosts of slaves are caught and hammered into soulsteel by the ghosts of blacksmiths, and this wretch is now our transportation”

Speaker was horrified at this callous exploitation: “But her legs were broken – she’s been tortured, and now you just tortured her even more”

“Please – I know this type of ghost. She likely bribed the castle guards to ambush her and break her legs just so she would have something to be mad at – ghosts do this all the time” The Bodhisattva explain, adding that for the ghosts who linger so long that they can no longer resolve the thing that caused them to remain as ghosts – say revenge on a rival, or saying goodbye to loved ones – they have to find other things to keep their passions inflamed: “If a ghost becomes complacent and content they pass on…. And remember: Chief among their fears is death. They want to stay alive as much as possible, even in this reduced state”

Cash took the eerily fleshy reigns and gauged them for a moment, then nodded to himself: “Ok – everyone, hold on!”

The self-propelling cart, with its two front limbs, shot off like a demon on wheels. Luckily the Bodhisatva had made for sizable seats in the cart that included really creepy seat-belts held tight by mouths that bit on to rope spun of sinew.

Traveling west at a speed at least ten times that of Nah, Speaker mulled over what the Bodhisattva had said with regards to ghosts and how the mare-ghost they were now using as a cart had likely arranged her own torment… as well as the fact that his truth-telling charm had only confirmed that the Bodhisattva hadn’t told a single lie so far. It was strange to think how such ghosts could get themselves to do such extreme things – but… this was the underworld: Death and suffering was like the only constants here.

The sun hung low in the sky, yet it was clearly at its zenith when the circle reached what the Bodhisattva called the Inland Sea of Shadows – the underworld counterpart of the inland sea that separated the Blessed Isle and the rest of Creation. While the Deathknight ‘molified’, as the craft was apparently known, the ghost-cart into something sea-worthy, the circle discussed their journey so far.

Sunrise didn’t say much – indeed she didn’t really seem to care all that much for the Underworld or its denizens. Sullen Hoof was similarly quiet, but did express curiosity as to what the ghosts ate? According the Bodhisattva then ghosts didn’t need to eat – but as with many of their attempts at clining to their passions of life, then cooking and fine dining were popular ways to pass time and even earn a living among the dead.

Cash again was intrigued by the thought of the dead having a working economy. Indeed, on their speedy treck across the underworld’s hundred kingdoms they passed countless merchant caravans, trading posts and other places of commerce. Cash was dying to know what ghosts dealt in. The Bodhisattva explained that most underworld commerce revolved around trading grave goods with products created in the underworld, such as animated effigies as automaton servants, slave-souls as ‘raw materials’ for mollifying into pretty much anything, soul-fire gems or soulsteel products.

“Wait – why would ghosts want anything made of soulsteel? That stuff absorbs souls” Speaker quickly noted.

The deathknight rocked his head from side to side as he tossed the strange-looking boat-cart-pony-ghost into the water: “That’s raw soulsteel. If tempered correctly and worked right, it can be a conduit instead – absorbing the essence of a slain target’s soul into the wielder… that’s a powerful way to feed here in the underworld”

“I thought you said ghosts didn’t need to eat” Sullen Hoof inquired.

Elongating his limbs to stride out onto the boat with little effort, the deathknight quipped: “Ghosts do not go hungry – but if they want essence to fuel arcanoi, the ghostly version of exalted charms, then they need it somehow. In the underworld that either means via an ancestor cult, taking it by force, or trading in soul-fire gems”

It turned out that soul-fire gems were special gems that absorbed ambient essence at special places where lots of it was found – apparently Stygia, the city where the circle was going, had that as one of its chief exports, to the point that it was more or less the default currency of the underworld. Cash found this detail quite interesting. 

“Hold on – why would gems with motes of essence be any special here? I thought all ghosts could use essence to begin with” Speaker wondered out loud as the circle boarded the now ghost-boat.

Cash got comfortable at the ‘helm’ which was made of two ghoulish and elongated ears – evidently the ghost-boat worked by swallowing water and then… excreting it… at high speed, to propel itself. A novel design, though unnerving.

The deathknight made its limbs dissapper so it would take up less space on the boat, reducing himself to his soulsteel-armored chest and the ghostly head jutting out of the hole showing where it had been cut off: “Ghosts can only work essence if they had that power in life. Thus, ordinary mortal pony ghosts cannot. This doesn’t prevent such ghosts from learning arcanoi – the charm equivalent of ghosts – but to fuel them must barter for soul-fire gems or rip the essence from other ghosts”

“This place just sounds lovelier by the minute”  Speaker sighed, starring into the water. He quickly stopped, as pale eyes under the surface looked back. The Bodhisattva glumly noted that all ponies who become ghosts on account of drowning are stuck in the surface of the sea of shadows…

Cash and the Bodhisattva got into talking about ‘fishing’ these ghosts up and possibly putting them to better use – but Speaker didn’t listen: He was more curious about the rising mountain to the west. The underworld’s counterpart to sacred mount Mero.

As the pale underworld sun climbed to its zenith the circle reached the shores of Stygian Isle – the name thatof the underworld Blessed Isle. It was a barren and desolate place, and as the circle sped across its wastes on the now again ghost-cart Cash couldn’t help wonder why there weren’t any ghosts around: “Back east there were ghost villages and towns everywhere – but there’s nothing here… what gives?”

“The immaculate faith of the Realm outlaws ancestor worship, and its dogma train all its adherents to seek reincarnation.  Quite smart of them, all things considered” The Bodhisattva mused as the circle passed a mile-long moor filled with bogs and brambles. The monotone landscape seemed to blur into one as Cash sped on, and by evening the mountain in the distance seemed very close… it also didn’t look quite like a mountain anymore.

Speaker remembered mount Meru quite well – from his recent fly-by of it, plus was versed in geography. This only made him all the more confused as bits and pieces of the mountain seemed to move around: “What is that?”

“That is Stygia, the grand necropolis. Though what you’re likely looking at is the Calender of Setesh” The Bodhisattva stated matter-of-factly.

Speaker appeared lost in thought at the mention of this strange underworld calendar as the circle approached the outskirts of the city, with the ominously named Waters Run Red district greeting them first with its spiked iron fences encircling the city, and its creaking gates guarded by pony skeletons in battle-worn and tattered armor. The moment they crossed the gate the Bodhisattva bid the circle to disembark from the ghost-cart as he reformed his ghostly limbs.

With a necromantic ritual the deathknight then banished the ghost-cart, for the lack of a better word, to lethe – releasing it from the underworld and sending the soul on for reincarnation. All the nearby ghosts at this border checkpoint bowed their heads in reverence…

“We should move quickly – the deathlords have spies and agents everywhere” The Bodhisattva spoke, breaking into a gallop down the broken and bleak cobble road.

None in the circle questioned their undead guide, following him with great haste onto an elevated walkway of strange stone that seemed to constantly crumble – yet not enough to fall apart. Under them the sprawl of Stygia rose, with homes, shops and a constant heady scent of incense. Another strange feeling in the air, an intense sense of desperation and hope mixed with potential and fervor, turned out to be the currents of prayer flowing into the city: “Almost every ghost in the underworld prays to the Dual Monarchs of Stygia, for it is by their might that time passes in the underworld – well, the sun rising and setting here. Without this it wouldn’t be possible to tell time in the underworld” the Bodhisattva explained, Speaker noting that he recalled this feature of the underworld existing back during the first age as well – plus that it strangely enough wasn’t of solar artifice.

It was via their strange walkway that the circle quickly found itself in an oddly empty part of the city. Shadows crept along decreptic buildings that loomed over ill-lit streets. The Bodhisattva said that it was the part of the city know as the District of Whispering Streets.

“Ok, and what’s whispering here then?” Sullen Hoof asked, sounding rather uncomfortable as he seemed to look over his shoulder every other second.

The deathknight paused for a moment, grinning menacingly as it seemed as if his shadow kept on going. A stern stomp made it zip back under him: “This district of Stygia is cursed. We have yet to discern the true nature of the curse, but it drives the ghosts here mad – and even twists the landscape. Look behind you”

Looking back from where they had come the circle beheld as the walkway that had led them there was no more. Now they were standing with their backs to another row of abandoned homes with hungry looking open doors and broken windows. It was as if they wanted you to go in… and then they would eat you.

“And why have you brought us here again?” Cash asked, feeling thoroughly creeped out.

Trotting down the street forcefully, somehow making the ajar doors and shutters of the houses close as he approached, the deathknight called out: “This is the one place in Stygia that not even the Deathlords dare go – remember: They’re only ghosts as well – and the curse here would take them just as gladly. We’re safe as long none of you drink or eat anything here”

As they continued Speaker kept seeing dark things scuttling about just outside of his field of view. Sullen Hoof seemed more focused on the strange half-heard whispers and incoherent conversations that seemed to flow through the streets of the district on the breeze. Cash remained thoroughly freaked out from the emaciated and skeletal looking ghosts that hid within the otherwise empty homes and buildings that lined the streets of the district.

Only Sunrise seemed unphased by the eerie feel of the district, though even she shuddered as the Bodhisattva gestured for them to halt outside of a particularly dilapidated building that seemed to reek of regret and broken promises: “You must enter one by one here – and remember: drink and eat nothing”

Sunrise entered first, coughing up a surprised gasp as she entered – but nothing else, beyond the sound of her hooves on the wooden floor as she moved further into the house.

Cash was next. He took one look inside and doubled back instantly. It was only by the menacing glare of the Bodhisattva that Cash steeled himself and entered once more.
Sullen Hoof had apparently already entered – leaving Speaker and the Bodhisattva alone outside.

“What exactly is in there?” Speaker wondered.

The Bodhisattva’s face cracked into what was likely supposed to be a smile: “You are wise to ask first. It is the heart of the curse that riddles this district. Shimmer is hidden in here, well out of sight of the deathlords”

Nodding, Speaker took a deep breath and entered. The house seemed oddly empty, with a vaulted ceiling that made no sense – and a small fountain in the middle… next to the fountain sat an old pony who’s face was nothing but teeth and dark hunger – no, a blink later it was a translucent foal playing strange but repetitive game…  another blink and it was a beautiful young mare sitting at the edge of the fountain with her back turned to him. It was only after closing his eyes and reminding himself sternly that his friends were in there as well that they came into view, with no old pony, young mare or foal to be seem… only strange faded stains around the fountain.

Stepping up behind Speaker the Bodhisattva shouted: “Shimmer, your friends are here!”

Next to the fountain the air began to distort and twist, as a hole with a silvery edge opened up. Speaker recognized it as the entrance into Shimmer’s elsewhere den. The lunar poked her head out a moment later: “Ah, there you are – finally!”

It turned out that Shimmer had been spending the last couple of days, since her last message to the circle, sorting Cash’s oath scrolls and tending to the ponies that she and Speaker had saved from the ponatees – though she hadn’t made much headway in regards to sorting the scrolls; there too many to count.

“Well, on the plus side we did manage to find and package all the ones that involved Lilith – that was our first priority” Shimmer pointed out, as she stepped out into the underworld.

Speaker gave a sigh of relief at the sight of Shimmer, though he was quickly interrupted as a foal in adult-sized robes darted in under and around him, twisting around to face the old stallion: “You look old – are you dead yet?”

With essence sight it was easy to spot that the foal was in fact a ghost – and the Bodhisattva introduced the young filly as Unwanted Whisper, the mistress of the district of Stygia they were in.

“Hold on – didn’t you say earlier that the district rulers were powerful ghosts?” Cash wondered.

The filly floated up in front of Cash, her oversized robes and crown dangling from her tiny corpus: “I am the orphan queen! You will bow to me!”

This might have sounded intimidating if not for Unwanted Whisper having the innocent voice of a little filly – not a grand monarch of the dead.

Sullen Hoof floated something out of his saddlebags and tossed it to the ghost filly. She sniffed it curiously then chewed it with great releaf, floating off as if in a drug-induced euphoria.

“and that was…?” Sunrise asked Sullen Hoof.

The gold-masked pony craned his neck and chuckled: “Caramel”

The rest of the circle smiled, and the Bodhisattva complimented Sully on exploiting the craving for delights and grand sensations: “For a filly that only knew the flavors she could scavenge in the streets such a gift has likely just earned you a very loyal ally… I would do wisely to send agents to buy something similar next time I’m in Creation”

With that settled and the circle reunited the question became what to do next. On one hoof Cash wanted to spend some time sorting the rest of the oath scrolls, to see which he could throw out and which were worth keeping.

“Why not just ditch them all if they’r so reviled by heaven?” The Bodhisattva asked, having not understood the full implications of the various oaths, only knowing what little he had gathered from the circle’s discussions enroute to Stygia.

Cash sighed: “A lot of them are innocent enough, and quite useful: Many of the few I read up in heaven were simply sanctified promises of favors for later use – and I’m certain we can use a lot of them. The problem are the ones that are more… dubious… in nature – which is why we’re here to just toss out the ones regarding my lunar mate”

The deathknight stepped closer to the fountain. The calm water in it seemed to shy away from him as he approached, as if some unseen force was tipping the fountain over even though it was standing quite still: “What kind of favors?”

Cash couldn’t tell – he didn’t recognize many of the names on the oath scrolls: “…but I did recognize a few from various celestial gods. For what we’re trying to do in Creation then getting some help from heaven could be really nice”

The Bodhisattva nodded: “Very well – but if you wish to return here and dispose of more oath scrolls then I would like a bit more advance warning next time… and I will likely require a favor or two in return”

Finding these terms agreeable, the circle next inquired on how exactly they were going to reach the mouth of the void. The Bodhisattva frowned: “We will have to move deeper into the city. The mouth of oblivion lies at the center of the city, from there the descent down to the void itself… traveling there is dangerous even for someone like me… but there are shortcuts – though quickest one comes with other challenges”

The deathknight explained that the mouth of the void was considered a ‘holy’ by the mad specters that work to hasten the coming of oblivion to all things. Of those the most powerful, the thirteen Deathlords, each have a mansion around the plaza that surrounds the mouth of the void. These mansions were guarded as well as one might expect for the informal leaders and chosen of the neverborn, so the challenge was getting past that to cross the plaza safely.

“So we need a distraction? Or are there other ways there? What about moving underground?” Sullen Hoof asked in quick succession, figuring that he had discerned the Bodhisattva’s plan.

The spectral abyssal nodded first, then shook his head – the ghost-flesh tendrils that hung from his ghostly corpus like dangling maggots wiggling in ways that looked anything but savory: “Yes, a distraction of a sufficient scale is required. And there are other ways to get to the mouth of the void, but none that are as safe or quick as this. Moving through the underground labyrinth that this city is built on is dangerous for its physical and meta-physical ways change with the dreams and nightmares of the neverborn: Even I can get lost in those tunnels for weeks…. And you do not have that much time”

“I could probably sneak past those mansions easily – even with the stack of scrolls we need to destroy – then toss it into the hole. This doesn’t have to be that difficult” Sullen Hoof pointed out, finding the Deathknight’s plan to be quite unnecessary for a night caste solar such as himself.

With a mighty stomp that shook the entire wooden house they were in the Bodhisattva expressed his dissatisfaction with Sullen Hoof’s likely well-meant but ill-informed statements: “Fool. The hole in the ground is but the top of the mouth. To merely drop something there would make it fall forever. The spacial laws of creation does not apply here. To be certain that something is gone forever will require walking down the steps carved into the sides of the chasm that leads down to the very bottom, to the true and final event horizon of the mouth of the void, and then drop whatever your have into that”

“Can any of us do that?” Sunrise asked, Sullen Hoof having gone silent.

Sighing , the Deathknight shook his head once more, explaining that to be that close to both the tombs of the neverborn and the void was not just dangerouos for the utterly mad ghosts that inhabit that bottom level of the labyrinth, but it was spiritually damaging to be that close to the source of ‘not-is’: “Going there frightens even me – and for what I have given the neverborn of myself they actually like me”

With that in mind the circle agreed that only Sunrise knew the charms needed to shield herself from such horror, and Shimmer gave her the tightly-bound stack of scrolls. It turned out to be too heavy for Sunrise to store elsewhere, but she could manage to carry it on her back.

“Ok, so we need to get you to the center of that plaza – and out again – how many guards are talking about drawing away?” Speaker wondered.

The deathknight explained that with all thirteen deathords’ mainsions there would be thousands of warghosts and worse things, all likely armed with soulsteel weapons if the highest quality: “But I would not have you draw them away. First know that the Deathlords do not live in these mansions constantly – right now only one or two are present so the rest are lightly guarded – but know also that the deathlords are in the end only ghosts! Just like the ghost I moliated into a cart and later used a necromantic spell to forcibly send on to reincarnation. If you create a situation where the deathlords present order a lockdown of their mansions then you will have little to fear from them. Scare them into hiding, and use that as your cover”

“And how would we do that? We don’t know how to send ghosts to reincarnation like you can” Speaker asked, not really seeing the circle in its current form as that big of a threat to the deathlords.

Cash put a friendly hoof on Speaker’s shoulder and shot the old Lookshyan stallion a cheeky grin: “I think I have an idea on how to do that – just keep me safe while I do my thing”

Thus the circle split, with Sunrise and the Bodhisattva trotting off to a safe place near the Deathlord mansions, where they would await the lockdown of the currently inhabited mansions, while the rest of the circle left with the foal ghost queen, Cash having asked Unwanted Whisper to take them to a place within the city with the most deathlord-loyal ghosts.

Leaving the cursed district of Whispering Streets the very air around the circle seemed to lighten, as shadows stopped stalking them and the ever-present half-heard drone of gloomy suggestions ceased to poke at their subconscious.

While the parts of Stygia the circle trotted through was no doubt part of a city of the dead, then it was none the less curious to see street vendors selling jars of green-glowing honey that seemed to make the ghosts that ate it weep, or pony-sized effegies of paper stomp around clad in soulsteel arms and armor keeping the peace. Rich ghosts were pulled around on wooden rickshaws drawn by animated clay statues – likely terracotta statues they had been buried with, and the circle even came across what appeared to be a group of living ponies from Sijan who were selling communication services to the living in exchange for soul-fire gems or high quality grave goods.

Arriving in the district called the Street of Swords was a stark change from the otherwise monochromatic city: Raging furnaces within factories and foundries bathed most of the streets with an angry red, and the traffic there was full of ghosts hauling carts of ore and chain-gangs of ghost slaves being whipped along… their cries for freedom were almost enough to drown out the constant pounding of metal from the massive riveted steel towers that houses the furnaces that lit the area up.

Unwanted Whisper led the circle to a large square where wagon-trains full of slave-ghosts were being unloaded and led away to be destroyed in the forges where soulsteel was made – and it was clear from their screams that these slaves knew what awaited them.

“Well this place is lovely” Speaker barely managed to force out.

Unwanted whisper laughed, her high-pitched filly voice barely audience between the crying slaves and the industrious foundries around them: “The lord of this district is a traitor to Stygia. He arms the deathlords with the weapons made here – instead of arming Stygia to defend it against deathlord influence. Nobody wants to admit it – and The Bodhisattva is too worried that directly confronting Lord Stalwart would piss off the deathlords. This place used to be a lot nicer – not all this soulsteel crap being made. This place needs new management”

“So…. What’s the plan Cash?” Sullen Hoof asked. Shimmer looked similarly inquisitive.

Looking around for a few moments, sizing up the area, Cash nodded to himself: “Ok – Unwanted Whisper, I need you to get out of here. You do not want to be near this place when I start doing my thing. Speaker, Sully and Shimmer I need you to hold off any troops send our way once I begin talking”

“And what are you going to talk about?” Shimmer wondered, as Unwanted Whisper sped off with a mouthful of Sullen Hoof’s caramel as thanks for her services.
Spotting a large cart of ore being pulled by a couple of ghosts that looked as if they were doing their best to ignore the cries of the slaves, Cash smiled: “I will talk about reincarnation… very convincingly”

Speaker chuckled. This was going to be interesting, if nothing else. Sullen Hoof pointed out three groups of armed ghosts around the periphery of the square: “They don’t look the usual peacekeepers we saw on our way here”

“The city likely withdrew their peacekeepers from the area as a way to protest against this Stalwart fellow siding with the deathlords – the deathlords likely gave him troops of his own in return” Speaker noted, following Cash towards the  ore cart.

Suddenly Cash leapt up on the cart and drew a deep breath. He flared his anima to its fullest, causing a golden fountain of coins to erupt around him, each coin fading into a golden light as it fell to the ground: “Ghosts and good ponies, hear me and rejoice, for now is the time to seek a new life and reincarnation!”

> Chapter 66: ...and With Strange Actions, Even Words Can Die
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Looking at Cash Charmer on top of the ore cart, using essence sight, Speaker could hardly see a thing from all the intervowen charms that Cash was using to boost the alluring nature of his speech. Heck, at least one of the charms was making it difficult to even ignore him… and around the circle, around the ore cart that Cash stood on, a throng of ghosts quickly began to assemble as both slaves, slave-drivers and metal-worker ghosts drew near, pulled in by the impossible-to-resist words of the Solar in their midst.

“I see many good souls here today. Some who do not wish to be here, and others who are so dead inside that they might as well have already passed on. I am Cash Charmer, chosen of Celestia, and I have great news to all of you!” Cash went on.

Sullen Hoof pointed out that the three groups of guards were so far just listening. Speaker wondered how large Stalwart’s garrison for the district might be… and how often slave riots took place.

“Many of you might be too young to have ever heard of us, but the oldest among you might know: There were once great golden champions of pony-kind that ruled and defended all of Creation – and I’m here to tell you all that we’re back!” Cash continued.

Speaker spotted a group of ghosts at the edge of the gathering, running away. They would likely spread the news of the happening. Looking around he could only see Shimmer – Sullen Hoof had disappeared to somewhere else.

“Now, we the chosen of Celestia, the chosen of perfection and of virtue, we are here to make Creation a better place. Since the Great Contagion many have spoke of a second age, the age of sorrows, but that ends now! I am heralding the beginning of a new third age, a new beginning – and I want all of you to join us” Cash said – weaving hope and elation into his every word.

It was plain to see the hopes of the slaves rising, many of them seeing their salvation in sight. A few defiant ones in the slave-wagons had even begun to cheer, being out of reach of the cruel soulsteel whips of their masters. Of course, whether that was because they genuinly believed in what Cash was saying, or because of how his charms were adding emotional suggestions to his words... that was harder to tell.

“I speak plainly as a pony to peers here. I want to see you all happy and without fear. With my gifts and exaltation I will strive to give this to all of you – but I cannot give this to you here, for I a ruler of the living, not the dead. Yet there is hope for you all: I implore you all who can hear me, join me in life as reborn souls! Cast of the chains that have been put on you, reject the threats of the Deathlord and show them that you are masters of your own fate!” Cash shouted, the tens of thousand ghost slaves cheering on before a lot of rattling chains replaced the sound of their voice.

Halfway through Cash’s oration all of the slaves in earshot, and quite a few of the other ghosts present – regardless of whether they were slave drivers or metal-workers, simply up and vanished, their ghostly forms having faded away as they fled to reincarnation. With essence sight Speaker could tell that their souls were speeding upwards – towards the heavens of the underworld, towards Lethe to be washed clean of memories and towards reincarnation. It was a beautiful sight to behold, and just as he wiped a tear from his eyes he hear Shimmer sniffle as she, in her beast-pony form, had seen the same wondrous sight.

“Come on gang – we’re taking this show on the road!” Cash said, jumping of the ore cart which now had no ghosts to haul it, as he began to gallop over the now almost empty square.

The circle trotted at a calm pace up one of the largest streets of the district, Cash loudly proclaiming his merry message to all the ghosts that could hear. Everywhere slaves vanished, their chains falling to the ground empty, and many a ghostly artisan and coal-pusher who had quietly resented their master’s choice of allegiance also took Cash’s message to heart, opting to let their first and final act of defiance be that of depriving Stalwart and his deathlord allies of their skill and labor.

It was only the most driven or obsessed  ghosts that rejected Cash’s message – but most of them just quietly ignored him, with but a few voicing objections or shouting obscenities in return.

Five minutes later the first few squads of war-ghosts turned up -  but they too heard Cash’s message and chose to join him in Creation instead of fight him in the name of the deathlords. It was when seventy zombies led by a mad ghost who’s corpus had seemingly been shredded and then glued back together with clotted blood that Shimmer and Speaker finally had to fight, but the mad ghost quickly fell to Speaker’s spirit slaying charm and Gift’s many cutting edges, while Shimmer tore through the decaying zombie flesh with ease.

As the circle continued on, going from factory to factory and liberating its slaves and some of the workers, more zombies were sent against them. Shimmer seemed certain that some of the zombies might have be the bodies of the very slaves they were freeing.

Leaving the streets behind them strewn with the torn remains of decaying and shredded zombie-pony flesh, soaking in pools of fetid blood and bile, the circle never noticed the hidden figures that were chucking piles of nails and maggots into the zombie remains.

At the edge of the district the circle came upon a magnificent mansion decked out in colorful yellow and blue lanterns. The soulsteel columns that stood at its front constantly writhed as the tortured souls forged into the metal forced imprints of their bodies out into the surface of the metal, while heavily perfumed plants made of colored silk paper stood around in massive basalt pots. This was the home of someone with wealth who did not fear flaunting it.

On a balcony from the third floor of the mansion which overlooked the square, the ghost of a middle-aged pony stallion stepped forth. He had a short-cropped iron-gray mane, though his features denoted him as a soul originally from the south of Creation. He wore a thick great-coat which was richly decorated with ornately bound silver chains: “Who dares interrupt my business!?”

Lord Stalwart’s bellowing voice rang out like that of an accusatory slave-driver, but the circle didn’t fret. Cash stepped forth: “I understand you’ve been putting your business above the good of your wards here – that’s not a nice way to run a public office”

The ancient ghost’s eye glowed bright with ivory light as Lord Stalwart gnashed his teeth: “You little shit! I will have you moliated into a chamberpot!”

“I didn’t think ghosts had to poo” Cash quipped back at the angry district lord.

The greasy coat that hung around the old ghost seemed to rise ever so slightly as the ghost drew breath to shout something back at Cash – but the Eclipse Caste didn’t give him time, instead shooting a claw from his magic shoes up at the Lord, intending on yanking the old bag of wind down to the ground to teach him a lesson…

With deft grace Lord Stalwart effortlessly moved out of the way, catching the chain that the claw was connected to with a massive six foot blade of black jade and then yanking Cash up to him instead! Cash barely managed to loosen the chain enough that he was instead pulled up to the railings at the edge of the balcony, but at as his forehooves took hold of the top of the railings Stalwart in turn took hold of his hooves, with skeletal centipedes shooting out of Stalwart’s greatcoat sleeves that locked themselves around Cash’s forehooves.
“Now look on as your friends are ripped apart” Stalwart hissed through his teeth.

From every street connected to the square the circle was in grotesque creatures began to pour in: They looked very much like the zombies that the circle had already dispatched, but now they were nailed together – poorly so – their bodies mainly held together by what appeared to be webs spun by the writhing maggots that were devouring the things from inside… and this shambling horde of already destroyed undead, with nary a leg pointing the right way, heads flailing around wildly, looked hungry.

“Well that’s no fun – say, while they’re dealing with your minions down there, how about we have a little chat?” Cash offered slyly, as Stalwart’s eyes glowed with pale ivory light while he floated his great blade into position to lop Cash’s head off.

His jade blade poised to strike, Stalwart smirked: “I don’t know about chatting – but if you would like a few last words before rising as a ghost for my soulsteel forges I’m all ears”

Cash threw a brief glance down into streets then smiled back at Stalwart: “If you don’t mind, then I might need a moment to think of something suitable witty for that”

Down in the streets Sullen Hoof had reappeared in the midst of the cobbled-together undead, disguised as another undead being…. But surrounded by his telltale whirlwind of cleavers and kitchen knives. The cobblers around him were too dumb to recognize Sully as a threat, so they just kept on shuffling towards Speaker and Shimmer who were busy picking off cobblers at range.

Speaker and Shimmer each had a very different tactic, which showcased their different approaches to problem solving quite well. Speaker, using essence sight, had noticed that the iron nails holding the undead pony corpses together were the mediums through which the necrotic essence that animated the things flowed – so he used Gift to slice through these, targeting central nails that held together key joints around the spine and legs, so that the cobblers simply fell to pieces that couldn’t really move on their own. He was also doing this while balancing on-top of Shimmer…

Underneath, Shimmer was using the strength in her beast-pony form to rip up the cobblestone she was standing on and shape-shift them into similarly heavy stone blades that she swung around herself using her incandescent essence-string – this she did with one forelimb. Whatever cobblers that were chopped or smashed to bits by her blade were in turn tangled up in more essence-string, which she handled with her other forelimb.

All in all it looked almost like a strange mix between an art installation with a spinning bird monster that shot out webbing and swung a stone sawblade around itself, with a pony standing on top if that kept throwing a disk back and forth. Cash didn’t really know whether to ask Speaker for a statue with a similar motif back in Sunhill, or to just laugh.

The ancient ghost that was Stalwart, the ghost who’s grim deeds and alliance with the deathlords was no secret, the hated master of the district built to mirror the geomancy of the constellation of the Bearer of Chains, was not amused. He had planned to see Cash despair at the sight of his friends being torn to pieces – not smiling in amusement over how his friends were ripping several hundreds of cobblers apart!

His eyes glowing with dour light, Stalwart willed his jade blade to cut at Cash – but despite Cash not even moving, and Stalwart having aimed his blade perfectly for the pony’s throat, he still somehow missed…

Trying again, he missed – and down in the streets three dozen cobblers fell. Enraged Stalwart swung the blade again, missing – and down in the streets the cobblers were now down to a tenth of the horde that had originally approached the circle. Furious Stalwart was about to swing again when Cash not only parried the blade with a blade from a suddenly freed hoof, but he yanked the blade away from Stalwart who shrieked in horror as the blade flew down into the square.

The strangest thing happened as the blade fell: Several dozen ghosts braved the stone blades swung by Shimmer – though many were caught in it and had their ghostly bodies turn asunder – all of them trying to get to the blade.

Down in the square Shimmer wasn’t slow to pick up what was going on and yanked the black jade great-sword to her, using her essence-threads. The ghosts stopped instantly and sped back to their homes the instant that Shimmer held the blade in her talons… indeed, even the mighty Stalwart seemed to lessen in a strange sort of way. Cash could feel the ghosts’ grip on his other forehoof weaken, allowing him to free it – though it he still needed it to hold on to the railing lest he fall down.

It was then that Stalwart leapt over Cash – but there was absolutely nothing natural about the way in which Stalwart’s joints contorted or how his muscles flexed, landing right in front of Shimmer, roaring with incalculable malice. His eyes glowed with a luminescent bloody mist, as glittering silvery lights drew in from Shimmer to Stalwarts mouth – the ghost eating part of her essence simply by being so close to her. For a brief moment Stalwart stood still, like a corpse riveted to the gore-strewn cobblestone – but in the next split second he was a blur of speed, reappearing behind Shimmer just as lunged at him with her massive beak… and then, like a ghost wrought of blood and spite Stalwart splashed over her back, only to contract and reform, ripping at her bone-armor violently and repeatedly, cracking open the carapace in many places with sickeningly wet and bloody sounds. Speaker in turn was thrown off, landing hard on the coble even as he stuck the landing, his hooves aching as the very rocks the street was paved seemed to hit back to harm him as much as possible.

Shimmer screamed as she felt the chill of the grave race through her veins. Speaker could see it quite clearly as he groaned in pain, Shimmer shivering and her muscles briefly stiffening completely. This bought Stalwart all the time he needed to raise a hoof that had dissolved into plasmic claws around bone talons stolen from murderous beasts… get nailed in the head by one of Cash’s claw projectiles.

“I think that’s quite enough of you” Cash said as he jumped down and gestured for Shimmer fork over the grand daiklaive she had caught from Stalwart. The remaining cobblers began to fall apart around them, collapsing into the piles of hewn flesh, severed bones, maggots and iron nails that they were made of, and everywhere ghosts of all shapes and sizes were peeking out – curious to see what was going on…
Behind one pile of cobbler-remains stood Sunrise and The Bodhisatva. The deathknight looked at Cash with despair: “Do you have any idea what you have done?!”

> Chapter 67: Temptations
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The circle, reunited once more, gathered in the square as ghosts began to haul off the chopped up zombie remains around them.
The Deathknight known as the Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes was also with them, though he did not look pleased – of course, whether his ghost-flesh body could even emote positivity was actually unknown…

Thus, among the greasy steel walls of the soulsteel foundries, Sunrise Glow reported that she and the Bodhisattva had successfully snuck past the deathlord mansions once news reached them that a solar was running around the district of Streets of Swords, causing all the ghosts that got near to ‘jump into the river’ – using the Stygian idiom for taking to Lethe for final death and reincarnation. This had caused whatever deathlords were present to isolate themselves and lock down their mansions, as expected, giving Sunrise and the Bodhisattva a window of opportunity to do their deed: Descend the stairs down to the mouth of the void and chuck the large bundle of tightly packed oath-scrolls in.
“How was it? Being that close to the void?” Speaker wondered. Sunrise gestured for him to come with him as she walked off.

While Speaker and Sunrise chatted about the metaphysics and spiritual implications of the void and the neverborn, the Bodhisattva in turn tried to address Cash Charmer, while the Eclipse Caste solar twirled the black jade grand daiklaive he had liberated from the defeated Lord Stalwart – but before the Bodhisattva could speak Cash interrupted: “I got what you meant already. But I don’t get why just having a big sword makes me the lord of the Street of Swords district”

“Stygian politics and laws are intentionally strange and impossible to understand – but all district rulers rule because they hold a district-specific symbol of office. If you get your hooves on such a thing, you are the ruler of that district. That blade is it for this district” The Bodhisattva bemoaned, the implications of a solar unwittingly taking over a part of Stygia rushing through his mind. Oh the Deathlords were going to be pissed.

Cash looked at the blade. It was big: six feet long, three inches wide,  with a hilt and handle made for something far bigger than a normal pony – and it was infused with black jade, making it flow like water through the air despite its massive size: “You make that sound like a bad thing…”
“It will certainly complicate a lot of my plans if my circle has to coordinate with you back in Creation all the time whenever we make a move here in Stygia” The abyssal grumbled, semi-transparent flesh frowning over his blood-orb eyes.

Shimmer, used to the idea of controlling and directing western island tribes from behind the scenes, suggested that Cash simply appoint a representative to act in his stead. She did so while looking at the Bodhisattva, who was quick to excuse himself: “I cannot be seen openly working against the Deathlords this soon – but… any local ghost you appoint would likely be just end up as a puppet for the Deathlords as well… argh”

It was with a heavy sigh that the Bodhisattva accepted – at least temporarily – the position as official representative for Cash Charmer, but he did so with a few requirements: “If I find someone more suited I can pass on the position to them”

“Per my approval of course” Cash noted.

The Bodhisattva shook his head: “No – you do not understand Stygian politics as well as I do. Thus you cannot make an informed decision on this. You will have to trust my judgment, just like you trusted me to bring you all here safely and help you”

Looking about at his circlemates and seeing both Sullen Hoof and Shimmer nodding, Cash agreed to the deathknight’s demands.

“Though… I do have a few ideas already about this place” Cash mused, looking around at the towering foundries. The combined output of Stygia’s biggest industrial center, if funneled through Sunhill or Chung Do, could be sold for a grand profit in Creation since the economy in Stygia didn’t use mortal coinage at all.

“That is unacceptable! The Street of Swords must be used to produce arms for Stygia, so we can protect ourselves from the Deathlord’s forces. If you funnel the production capacity here away from the city you’re no better than Stalwart was” The Bodhisattva protested, stomping hard on the ground to the point that the stones around his ghostly hooves cracked loudly.

Smiling at the deathknight, Cash shrugged and trotted around the towering half-ghost pony: “Well what can I do then? I can’t sell soulsteel in Creation – nobody there has any use for it, so if nothing else I wouldn’t mind seeing the soulforges here shut down”

“That… isn’t entirely an option either – this district, like all the other of Stygia, operate on a specific geomantic pattern. If they cease the calendar of Setesh would fail, and that is not something you want on you. This district is patterned on the constellation of The Bearer of Chains – slaves must be used here, and ghost slaves are only good for two things here: Soulsteel and labor… and we have enough regular ghost workers for labor” The bodhisattva said, his unearthly voice revealing just how much he was wracking his mind to find an acceptable solution.

Cash and the Bodhisattva kept on arguing while Speaker and Sunrise wrapped up their discussion on the eerie calm and strange allure of the void. Returning to the rest of the circle they overheard Cash proposing: “Ok, so close down all the soulsteel forges except the ones that are used for executions of criminal ghosts – all soulsteel made goes into a sealed vault. All use of it requires my personal approval. Retool the district’s industry to making weapons and armor for Stygia’s militias – and use the excess ghost slaves to reconstruct the district: This greasy riveted steel look doesn’t suit me - make it out of stone. I’ll have Speaker cook up some new architectural whatnots. Slaves work one eight hour shift per day, are free to find work outside of that and earn their own money on the side, and can buy their freedom for a manumission fee you can figure out. The city council can pay me for the weapons the district supplies in information, magical materials, magical artifacts and help directed your way. Excess steel production can be sent to Creation and sold there”

The Deathknight sighed. The prospect of having to play taskmaster to a whole district was not something the Bodhisattva wanted… and finding someone else who could be trusted to do the job? The Bodhisattva’s expression was one of resolute displeasure.

Leaving the city proved a lot easier than getting in: With control of Street of Swords, Cash had control over all the industry there as well as its products. This included a few experimental transport vehicles wrought of soulsteel and the desire of flight from birds who had wings clipped.
The monstrous soulsteel contraption, which looked like a giant soulsteel skeleton, over which a thin skin of flayed flesh from… something… was stretched. The eyes of the bird were large light-blue crystals through which the pilot of thing – Cash – looked. It smelled like death, it was bumpy and constantly jiggled – and was evidently not designed to carry living passengers… indeed it had apparently been made to deliver curled up skeletal soldiers in large numbers to drop them from the sky onto whatever target was underneath.

Speaker found the design of the thing intriguing but also rather disturbing: “The idea behind this thing is ingenious… though I’m not sure what heights a pony skeleton can survive a drop from”

“True – but if it’s filled with yassal crystals holding hungry ghosts then having them shatter on impact would be exactly what you’d want” the Bodhisattva noted.

Shimmer found either idea abhorrent – but she she did side with Speaker in the debate because the hookups that lined the cargo hold of the soulsteel bird-skeleton’s ribcage seemed to made explicity to hold on to pony sized ribs and spines.

“Pony-ribcages are often used as cargo containers for deathlord constructs… hell, just wait until you see your first skeletal pony-pede, see those things are all about built-in storage” The Bodhisattva noted, sounding disturbingly at ease talking shop with regards to undead things and uses of pony ribcages.

Sunrise sighed dreaded what response she might get from her question: “A pony-pede?” 

“Imagine the front half of a pony skeleton. Forehooves, head, half a spine, shoulders, ribcage… now, take a hundred of these. One in front, and the one behind it shoves its head into the ribcage of the one in front. Repeat a hundred times over and you have a skeletal centipede with all kinds of terrifying uses” The Bodhisattva began, explaining how it was such things that functioned as siege ladders when Thorns was overrun, and that if the front one is damaged the next one simply takes over, or if it was severed it would simply keep working as two smaller ones…

Speaker found the mention of Thorns odd: “How do you know they were used at the battle of Thorns?”

“I was there… under orders and under the influence that cursed daiklaive – I was simply put under the command of the Mare of Mirthless Smiles, the Mask of Winter’s greatest warrior deathknight” The abyssal explained, his beyond-the-grave voice turning particularly sour at the mention of this other deathknight.

The Bodhisattva then told of what few other deathknights he knew of that the circle hadn’t met yet – most of them he described as the most hateful and unrepentant murderers imaginable. Others were sociopathic doctors or butchers who had been exalted to create necro-surgical horrors similar to the thing the circle was currently flying in, only made wholly of bone, flesh, bloody sinew and lots of stitches: “I heard rumors that the the Deathlord The Bishop of the chalcedony Thurible recently gave a black exaltation to a pony who in life was a leatherworker… she now crafts rainments for the Bishop’s clergy out of flayed pony skin”

“Good heavens… and you said there are thirteen deathlords in total working to end Creation? We have our work cut out for us” Speaker sighed, nervously running a hoof over one Shimmer’s.

As Shimmer gave Speaker a reassuring glance, wordlessly saying that Creation would surely prevail, the Bodhisattva noted that this was why his work against the Barbate Arbiter was so important: “The other deathlords all focus maniacally on their own plans to end creation – and few of them are in any way close to being able to bring those plans to fruition. Even the Mask of Winters could only take Thorns, not all of the Scavenger lands. Without the Barbate Arbiter helping the other deathlords, many of them won’t be able to make any kind of move for centuries”

“And what are their deadlines now, with the Barbate Arbiter’s help?” Sullen Hoof wondered.

The Bodhisattva floated out a scroll from inside his armor. It was slick with ghostly ichors from having been embedded in his ghost-flesh. He skimmed the contents of the scroll: “The First and Forsaken Lion is set to finish The Final Maelstrom in about ten years. It’s a flying battle station that rivals that of a directional titan. Without the Barbate Arbiter’s soulsteel supplies it would centuries before he can finish that. The other deathlords aren’t that different in that sense. The Barbate Arbiter’s Deep Rot network provides signal intelligence and intelligence processing to the Mask of Winter – without that the Mask of Winter’s covert activities in the Scavenger lands would suffer greatly… though what you did to Typhon pissed him off greatly as well – From what I’ve been able to gleam then it was the Mask of Winters and the Barbate Arbiter who helped fund the wyld hunt coming for you”

Explaining the Barbate Arbiter’s actions in more detail, the circle was reminded of what the Bodhisattva had told them back when they had freed the deathknight from the cursed blade: The Arbiter’s actions were not only improving and speeding up the projects of various deathlords – the Arbiter was also covering for the fact that a number of the deathlords, due to their madness, personal pride or whatever other things that influenced them, were basically wasting the gifts of the neverborn. If the Barbate Arbiter was to fall, then a number of other deathlords might fall as well, since there would be nothing to keep them from going back to their wasteful private projects or inane bickering.
“You know Cash, it might be an idea to handle this deathlord before making a move to retake you-know-what” Shimmer suggested, taking care not to mention Denansdor in front of the Bodhisattva.

The Eclipse caste shrugged. With such threats to Creation he could see the logic behind what Shimmer was suggesting – but he simply didn’t know how to strike against something as nebulous as a deathlord. To this end he answered Shimmer’s request by turning to the Bodhisattva: “Perhaps – but we would have to consult you on how and where to strike at him”

The Bodhisattva bowed his head gratefully: “It would be my honor to tell you where to strike when that time comes – though for now I and my allies work to shore up our position in the underworld and fix the mess you made in Street of Swords”

The remainder of the flight east passed with quiet chatter focused on more pleasant topics – mainly about what the circle wanted to do in the immediate time after the wyld hunt was dealt with. Cash wanted to visit Chung Do and check up on things, Shimmer wanted to inform her fellow lunar elders of what she had learned during the trip to the underworld, and Sullen Hoof… wanted to visit Stygia again next time Cash was to go there.

The dread soulsteel bird-skeleton entered the shadowland known as the Walker’s Realm and immediately began to shake. Cash shouted from the pilot seat that something was interfering with the controls.

“This shadowland is cursed by the Black Herron – we would do wisely to exit into Creation as quickly as possible. Use the emerald-lever at the border markers!” The Bodhisattva answered – and suddenly the entire ship was bathed in a strange green glow. It was eerily calming, and replaced the smell of putrid flesh with a mild scent of pine and earth. It was then that the massive soulsteel ornithopter translated into Creation.

Landing not far from Great Forks, The Bodhisattva flew off in the flying machine – back into the Walker’s Realm – after saying his farewells to the circle.

By evening the circle was in Sunhill via another newly purchased yeddim… and the next morning everyone was woken up by Cash’s scream of absolute terror as Lilith woke him up with a multitude of kisses and hugs.

It turned out that Lilith had sensed the destruction of the oath scrolls days ago when Sunrise had chucked them into oblivion and had been jubilant ever since.

Shimmer found the sight of the ancient Lunar so happy quite the sight – though to Speaker it looked mostly like a 20-something lovestruck mare finally getting to unleash her affection on her special some-pony.

After breakfast Lilith bid Cash walk with him: “Come Cash Charmer – walk with me. Come uncloaked of lies, that we may speak honestly to each other”

They returned several hours later after disappearing into the surrounding forests. Speaker was in the middle of working his medical charms on the last few day’s new arrivals to the Sunhill hospital when a messenger called for him and said: “Lilith is ready to talk battleplans”

The war-room built into the manse was a simple meeting room, but made with a large table that held on of the many crystalline light and image projector panels that were built throughout the manse. Using the manse’s newly formed hearthstone Speaker had the panel project images of the ponies they were to deal with, using descriptions that Lilith supplied – evidently she had been observing the wyld hunt while the circle had been away.

As servants brought in tea and biscuits, the circle and Lilith began to discuss their options and strategies. The Sidereal Hearth Rose also appeared just in time, though obviously still frightened greatly by Lilith’s presence… though that wasn’t her main issue: “Do you have any idea what the situation up in Yu-Shan is right now? After you lot raided the Palace of Oathes Eternal? Gods and spirits across heaven are panicking, the bronze factions wants all of your heads on sticks! If it wasn’t for whatever you did for the Raven King you wouldn’t be talking with me, but a circle of elder Chosen of Endings!”

Lilith scoffed at the chosen of secret’s worries: “They did so to destroy the oaths that kept me bound and shackled. If anyone comes for them for doing so, they will have to get through me first”

Heath Rose’s look upon hearing Lilith’s declaration of protection went from distressed to a mix of mirth and hopeless despair – mainly from thinking how many of her sidereal peers Lilith have to end up killing to stay true to that commitment: “Ok… I’ll be sure to tell Ketchup Carjack that”

With that out of the way and a good cup of Oolong tea enjoyed, the actual talks on how to deal with the wyld hunt commenced. With Lilith there, Heath Rose re-stated the gold faction’s desire to see Peleps Blueblood, the much hated butcher and leader of the wyld hunt, survive the engagement: “The bronze faction has ensured that all the potential replacements that could take over from him, should he die or become unable to perform his duties, are well liked and supported by the realm noble houses. Right now none of the houses like Blueblood and have thus delayed all their support to the hunt indefinitely. A wiser leader would have resigned in shame, but Blueblood is about as stubborn as they come…”

“How does this hunting organization fund itself if not from the dragonblooded nobles?” Lilith inquired.

Cash’s ears perked at the chance to learn a little about realm and Immaculate Order economics. Heath Rose bit her lip for a moment as she awaited the return of her heavenly information seeking secretary spirit. A moment later a tiny crystal spider appeared in her left ear and whispered her the information she had requested: “Ah right – currently the hunt taxes the surrounding kingdoms near its headquarters, as well as exacting tribute from other realm-friendly places in the north. Blueblood has made enough examples of those unwilling to cooperate that nobody dares question his demands there, but everyone hates him for the same reason”

Lilith laughed. It was a haughty laugh, combined with her first age accent, making for a menacing sounding chortle: “Very well –and you want him to remain able to do his job so that the hunt stays poor and ineffective?”

Heath Rose nodded: “Yes – and that’s why the gold faction handlers who spotted that the bronze faction had sent him to get killed at Chung Do pulled all the strings they could to get the Grandmaster tacked on to this hunt…”

“Don’t forget the extra funding they got from the deathlords “ Sunrise added.

Heath Rose looked… not surprised… at Sunrise’s statement: “Right – well that explains where they got all the money for this hunt. Lovely. What deathlords specifically?”

“The Barbate Arbiter and the Mask of Winters” Sunrise said, looking at the holographic image of Grandmaster  Ragara Bulk Biceps and wondering how a pony of such a pious position could reconcile being taught martial arts by a pony who, by all rights according to the Immaculate Faith, was anathema – since the holy scriptures explicitly stated that anyone claiming exaltation other than unicorns had been given their powers from vile demons.

As Heath Rose took note of this bit of deathlord-related information, Lilith told of what she had planned: “When we reach the hunt I will approach it and speak to this Bulk Biceps. That should be enough to get you the evidence needed for your celestial audit”

To emphasize that she and Cash had both agreed on this Cash floated over his Recorder of Everlasting Glories to Lilith, who effortlessly caught it with her short-cropped mane – the black hairs seemingly springing to life and hiding the device within their midst.

“Ok… Lilith gets the Grandmaster to incriminate this Anys Sunshine – how long for the auditing to begin?” Sunrise inquired, worried that any time wasted processing the information might allow the wyld hunt to lay waste to Chung Do.
Heath Rose gave Sunrise a calming gesture and retrieved an empty door-frame from elsewhere: “The moment Lilith can get that recorder to me with the Grandmaster showing that he has been taught sidereal martial arts I’ll leave for Yu-Shan immediately. It shouldn’t take many seconds for celestial lions to come pick the Grandmaster up, or terminate him on the spot”

The rest of the circle discussed what they would do following the Grandmasters removal from the equation. Lilith noted that once her part in the deception was done she would have to leave… she had to check on personal business: “It has been a very long time since I’ve been active in civilized Creation. There are ponies, Lunars and spirits I have to get reacquainted with - hope you can understand”

The rest of the circle, and Heath Rose, agreed that depending on whether or not the Furious Five, the Grandmaster’s five apprentices – each a master by their own right – would leave, the circle should pull back and observe the hunt. The hunt was still several weeks away from Chung Do – though it would only be another week or so before they would be in reach of the outer-most northern farming villages.

“If they leave I can infiltrate the mortal pony forces of the hunt and poison them with a sedative. Sunrise and Cash can work them over once Peleps Blueblood is dealt with” Sullen Hoof stated confidently.

Thus the circle, as well as Lilith and Heath Rose, left on Nah to cross the northern half of the hundred kingdoms, finding the wyld hunt’s trail by the afternoon. Lilith leapt off Nah, turning into a magnificent snow owl, gliding down towards the seemingly unsuspecting wyld hunt from high above. The rest of the circle circled back to avoid being seen, then flew around a nearby forest to come around in front of the wyld hunt’s path. There the circle dismounted and made their way into cover under Sullen Hoof’s directions. The hooting of a northern snow owl signaled to them that Lilith was ready – though not even Shimmer or Sully could see where the owl was…

The wyld hunt marching through the forest was  a big one. The trees rustled as they passed, the spirits of the forest shuddering in the presence of martial arts specifically made to defeat and subdue divine beings.  Speaker’s essence vision revealed many an enlightened ponies approaching, and indeed at the front of the hunt trotted Peleps Blueblood, the butcher of the hunt, in his fine black jade armor bulking out his light blue monk robes.

Behind the flowing blond mane of Peleps Blueblood marched five unicorns in identical ornate monk robes, though each had a unique elemental symbol embroidered on the flank of their robes. These were the furious five – no doubt about it: The five unicorns had an air of elemental potency about them, their dragonblooded heritage shining through clearly. One of them, a mare, had a mane of fire which only accented her bright orange mane. Another, a stallion who looked very bored, had a mane that looked as if it was wrought of braided leaves. The one walking next to the bored stallion was a mare with a dull stony grey pelt and a purple mane – she was droning on about her poetry about rocks according to Sullen Hoof, who noted that it was very dull poetry. Behind the three walked two ponies in monk robes, one a stallion with a mane that seemed to buoy as if in water, and a pale mare with a bright blue mane done up into multiple braids.

Following the Furious Five trotted eight mortal ponies in worn if not slightly ragged garbs – slaves. They were pulling a wagon which was replete with golden filigree, ornate wooden carvings of dragons and unicorns, and other immaculate symbols. It was the grandmasters private wagon – and it floated off the ground by the power of a pony-sized chunk of blue jade under the thing.

Following these marched a very long column of mortal ponies in monk robes, though these robes were a lot less ornate than the ones up in front. Most carried un-stringed bows and un-headed arrows on their backs, while about a fifth carried long naginatas, basically realm-style swords on staves. There were hundreds – indeed according to Heath Rose roughly 500.

It was then that Lilith in her own form hooted loudly and swooped in in-front of the hunt, then up again, banking and landing on the Grandmaster’s wagon. She then began to preen her feathers.

Speaker looked Shimmer: “That… doesn’t look like trying to tease out anything from the Grandmaster – what is she doing?”

“You don’t speak animal – she talking to him, simply without words” Shimmer admonished. Sunrise nodded, evidently knowing how to speak with animals.

Sullen Hoof hastily added: “He’s whispering to her – hmmm… it sounds like they’ve talked together earlier”
“What? What are they saying? Did she warn them about us?” Cash quickly said in a worried tone.

The night caste solar remained quiet for a moment: “No, it's as if she has already offered to train the Grandmaster in styles he’s never even heard of… probably while we were in the underwold. He says that he’s considered it, and considers it very tempting. She’s pressuring him to reveal the extent of his abilities and known martial arts styles to her, but he says he cannot… says he took an oath before his sifu”

“Figures Sunshine would do something like that – what’s she saying to that” Heath Rose quipped, looking nonplussed but also not in any way surprised.

This continued on for about half an hour, Lilith tempting the Grandmaster with styles he had apparently never had a chance to learn. White Reaper style, Hoof of the Daystar, The Art of Forceful Declaration, Black Claw style, and several others that likely had not even been mentioned among ponies since the first age. Not even Speaker, with his wealth of memories from that time, could recognize all the styles mentioned.

As the elder lunar and the elder unicorn continued to speak without any of the ponies around them noticing, the wyld hunt began passing the rest of the circle. With expert stealth charms Sullen Hoof helped the circle move unseen in parallel to the front of the hunt, while Shimmer ensured that they left no tracks or scent behind for the hunt to pick up on.

It was about an hour later when the hunt exited the forest, entering a vast plain with scattered farms and small lakes and streams. Cash recognized the positions of the lakes: This was an area only about three hundred miles west-north-west from Chung Do.

“Fuck… how can they move this quickly? I mean, this puts them less than two weeks away from Chung Do – a force this big shouldn’t be able to move this quickly” Speaker fumed, knowing quite well the speed of marching mortal troops from his time in service of Lookshy.

Shimmer patted Speaker on the shoulder: “Isn’t it obvious? They’re using charms to bolster their marching speed – and with all the money from the deathlords they don’t have to stop nearly as often to restock supplies. They probably commissioned suppliers to have supplies made ready ahead of time”

“Shush – I think we got him” Sullen Hoof suddenly said, making a very quiet but frantic gesture towards the rest of the circle. Heath Rose in particular perked up: “Do tell”

“Lilith has been trying to make the Grandmaster tell her everything he knows about magical martial arts – reveal all the styles he’s been taugh – well, she tried again – and he again he said he couldn’t, but I got a pattern out of it” Sullen Hoof explained.

Heath Rose gave Sully an incredulous look: “That doesn’t prove anything – I need something concrete to show the censors to initiate an auditing”

“I said I got a pattern out of it. The grandmaster keeps referring to celestial martial arts as common styles among exalted, and terrestrial styles as lesser. He not only knows about sidereal styles, it’s… ugh how do I explain this – my profiling charm: Learning and mastering a sidereal style is all this pony is thinking about, but it’s the only thing he’s not saying. It’s like looking at a puzzle where there’s only one piece missing, so you know the shape of the missing piece” Sullen Hoof said, his voice behind his mask betraying the fact that he found it difficult to explain what his charms allowed him to intuit.

Cash Charmer nodded: “I get it. I have a charm that can confirm what you’ve found, but I’ll have to actually speak with him…”

“It’s not just that… he’s rejecting Lilith’s proposals because he thinks he’s close to succeeding. That means that someone’s teaching him” Sullen Hoof explained, struggling for words.

“Well this… this complicates things a bit – but I think I can work with it” Heath Rose said, her brows furiously furrowed as she tried to restructure her plan mentally to account for this new development.

After a moment Heath Rose nodded at Sullen Hoof: “You’ll have to come with me to testify before the censor” then she turned to Cash: “and you’ll have to come along as well, in fact all of you should come – the moment the bronze faction discovers that they can stop what we’re trying to do by killing off the witnesses they’ll have more assassins on you than you can count”

“Hey, I already took out one sidereal assassin in the Jade Kitchen – if they try anything on me again I’ll just kill whoever they send” Sullen Hoof said dismissively.

Heath Rose didn’t look entirely certain. She noted that ever since the circle’s heist at the Palace of Oathes Eternal the bronze faction had been looking for ways to counter the individual abilities of everyone in the circle: “The sidereal that came for you in the Jade Kitchen – that was a rash decision, likely one the bronze faction only made because they found that you had discovered the food transportation network. They won't make the same mistake again – and they won’t send a young and inexperienced sidereal assassin after you, in fact they’ll likely send more than one elder since this will threaten Ketchup Carjack’s right-hoof assistant”

“Between me and Speaker we have two solars who’ve mastered each of our own style of magical martial arts, plus Shimmer is a beast in battle, and Cash isn’t that bad either – If we stick together I doubt any sidereal plot to kill us will work as intended” Sullen Hoof proclaimed adamantly.

Shaking her head and quickly flicking a few errant strands of mane away from her face with a hoof, Heath Rose sighed: “Ok – but I would hate to see any of you die to this”

Having said that, Heath Rose very quietly stepped away – bouncing silently on a taut strand of fate – having gestured for the others to follow.
As they left Lilith came to them, having sensed that the circle no longer in need of her services and wordlessly communicated: “I am sad that I wasn’t able to deliver the unicorn’s confession – he is much more strong willed than I expected”

“You gave us enough – Sullen Hoof got a read on the Grandmaster, that’s enough to give testimony, and when the heavenly censor yanks the Grandmaster up for interrogation I can confirm it with my own charms. Thank you for your help” Cash quietly said, appearing genuinely grateful.

Once they were all far enough away from the hunt Heath Rose conjured up the spell that summoned the calibration gate while Lilith flew off to piece her life back together.

> Chapter 68: Kaleidoscopic Logic of Bureaucracy
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Speaker had barely exited the calibration gate before Heath Rose had shouted something at the towering golden celestial lion that stood guard at the Yu-Shan end of the the calibration game.

“Official department of destiny business – make way and get us a ride!” The sidereal sneered, coming off as very tense.

The massive golden lion politely abided, stepping aside and bowing gracefully before waving down an aerial rickshaw down. 

As the vehicle lifted off by the power of the pony-sized dragonfly-looking air elemental in front pulling it, Heath Rose gave the circle a hasty instruction in what would happen next: “We’re going to the celestial censor Smiling Bear, a powerful celestial lightning bear. I will present my case and Sullen Hoof will provide testimony – when asked, not a moment earlier. Cash, you may offer to swear Sullen Hoof into an oath to tell the truth, and yourself as well once the Grandmaster has been brought up for questioning. Once we enter the censor’s office none of you are to allow anyone to touch you, not even me. Other sidereals might try to impersonate me and influence you via mind control charms to bear false witness or recant your statements. I can’t stress this enough: We will be pissing all over one the most powerful sidereal’s last century’s worth of work. The bronze faction will not go quietly when they learn about this. Oh, and do not under any circumstances use charms to influence from the censor or deflect questions. The lion-dogs will eat you if you do that”

“Hopefully the audit will be over before the bronze faction has time to respond” Sunrise noted, but Heath Rose was quick to point out that Anys Sunshine would have to appear before the censor once there was enough evidence to begin an audit proper: “Though, if we’re lucky all of your testimony will already have been given at that point… that should allow you leave”

Approaching the Bureau of Heaven the circle took in the sights. The buildings of the Bureau of Heaven were set in an array of concentric circles, dotted with mosaics of windows and enormous murals that blended together into massive images of the constellations. At the center of all this were the Dwellings of the Stern Maintainers of Divine Order, arrayed around the Hall of Celestial Stability where, among countless other divine functionaries, were the offices of the Celestial Censors – the criminal courts of heaven. 

The Hall of Celestial Stability was a huge and awe-inspiring structure combining stern opulence with ascetic taste in large quantities of rare and exotic materials. There were adamant spires, gleaming jade gargoyles and things that not even Speaker could identify – but everyone agreed that the place looked amazing.

Landing on a large balcony with a landing platform, Heath Rose hurried the circle inside. They rushed past gods, spirits and elementals of all shapes and sizes, some appearing like animated piles of leaves, other with bodies of flame and ash, or beautiful arrays of shattered gems shaped like graceful ponies. Some of them didn’t seem to like the group of ponies galloping through their halls, but Heath Rose passed each of them and did… something… making them return to their offices and resume their work silently – with but a touch.

After a few minutes of galloping later Heath Rose suddenly stopped outside a massive door. It was the size of a barn, at least five yards high and even wider. Heath Rose quickly composed herself, and twisted a bracelet on one of her hooves which suddenly caused a very pretty and sharply cut uniform to appear around her, replacing her previous slightly more utilitarian and terrestrial garb. Looking on par with Cash now with regards to attire, with her celestial silks, Heath Rose opened the door and entered, gesturing for the rest of the circle to follow.

Inside the surprisingly enormous office, so which was cavernous to the point that it was difficult to see from one end to the other, sat an equally massive spirit…

“Good heavens… an Ursa Major!” Speaker said in surprise.

Heath Rose shook her head: “Yes, Speaker -  this the Celestial Censor Smiling Bear, an Ursa Major”

The enormous being appeared a bit like a bear, but with a pelt of night sky, dotted richly with stars. Its eyes, alive and expressive, were two brightly shining stars of massive size. It was the size of a large mansion, with claws big enough to be hollowed out and turned into large boats. Speaker tried his hardest to recall what the usual roll of Ursa spirits was… it was something about moving the stars across the skies. Of course, the movement of the constellations wasn’t exactly fast, so it probably made sense that spirits with such tasks had other jobs as well.

“So, Heath Rose, it was you who somehow cleared my meeting schedule today?” Smiling Bear inquired, smiling with a maw full of lightning fangs.

The chosen of secrets shrugged: “Maybe, but I can assure you that it was done for good reason. I am here to petition for an audit into the cause of a highly illegal occurrence”

Smiling Bear shifted in his mountain of an office chair/throne, leaning back and gesturing with a huge paw for the sidereal to continue: “Go on – do tell me of who spilled tea on your dry cleaning”

“I get the impression that not all complaints filed here are equally serious…” Shimmer whispered to the rest of the circle. They all nodded with various degrees of subtlety as Heath Rose began citing various celestial laws and sub-paragraphs.

“…thus, in accordance with the Lotus Proliferation Inhibition act, the fact that a unicorn not only aspires to learn sidereal martial arts, but thinks that his training in such is close to fruition means that there is a sidereal breaking the laws of heaven most egregiously” Heath Rose managed in a single breath, though she did look close to fainting.

The face on Smiling Bear was not one of bemusement upon hearing this. None in the circle was aware of it, but following the usurpation the Sidereals had enacted laws in heaven strictly prohibiting the teaching of Sidereal martial arts to anyone but other Sidereals – punishable on par with the kind of crimes against creation or heaven that caused extinction level events. Of course, none in the circle knew that, though both Cash and Sullen Hoof quickly caught on that this was far more serious than they had previously thought.

The great lightning bear, one of the twelve great star shepherds, leaned forward and down towards Heath Rose: “What unicorn, and what evidence of this do you have?”

Heath Rose quickly waved a hoof at the circle, gesturing for them that the few of them who were to bear witness step forward and introduce themselves as planned.

“I am Sullen Hoof, Chosen of Celestia, Night Caste – I have used my Evidence-Discerning Method and other solar investigation charms to intuit with absolute certainty that this unicorn is receiving training in Sidereal Martial Arts and believes himself to be close to being able to fully realize that ambition” Sully stated in a dour but serious tone, a mannerism learned back in Nexus when meeting with clients who wanted someone poisoned.

The lightning bear was about to speak when Cash stepped forth and boldly announced: “and I am Cash Charmer, Chosen of Celestia, Eclipse Caste. I can confirm my circle-mate’s observations if this unicorn is made available to me for a brief conversation and interrogation, for such are my powers”

“Heath Rose… you have brought Solars to testify for your case? I am impressed… but what bloody unicorn is this about?” Smiling Bear mused, sounding intrigued – it had been over three millennia since Solars had participated in heavenly politics… and this looked to be a grand way to make a return – with Smiling Bear in the middle of it all. This pleased the censor to no end and the giant spirit bear’s body-language showed this clearly, at least to those who were able to read spirit-animal body-language.

“Ragara Bulk Biceps, Grandmaster of the Immaculate Order” Cash Charmer loudly proclaimed.

The quiet chatter among Smiling Bear’s half dozen secretaries, scribe spirits and stand-by messenger spirits all suddenly faded into a much more quiet level of cautious note-taking and passing of scrolls.

From the silence rose a rumbling that grew in strength until was a continuous thunderous booming which suddenly erupted as lightning from Smiling Bear’s mouth as the giant spirit roared: “You would bring the wrath of Ketchup Carjack down on this office!?!”

“No, not me – them” Heath Rose said, pointing to the circle. As was explained on the way to the censor’s office, then a Solar’s complaints about celestial law and crimes related to that carried far more weight than a junior sidereal, especially since a solar’s complaints had to be investigated, no matter what, due to ancient bylaws.

The lightning bear face-pawed, groaning deeply as its mind strained to recall the ancient bylaws of celestial censorship relating to Solar complaints: “Alright – by my decree as the 194th Censor of Heaven I am issuing a summons on the Grandmaster of the immaculate order, Ragara Bulk Biceps, one to be carried out immediately. I officially delegation retrieval assignment to Oversight”

With a wave of his massive paw four of the dozen lion-dogs in the room, the lesser cousins of the celestial lions (They were still golden, but only twice the size of ponies) vanished into thin air as they hurried off to bring the summons to its destination.

“Ok, and while we wait for the Bronze factions to batter my doors in – care to tell me why you had to choose me as the epicenter of this scandal? Ketchup will have my hide for this” the enormous spirit asked, slumping back into his throne and consigning himself to the future reprisals he would no doubt get.

Sunrise raised a hoof, Smiling Bear nodding at her to give him the floor to speak. She drew down her hood and stepped forward: “All of us in this circle exalted within the last year. None of us could stand to match the Grandmaster, and he’s currently part of a wyld hunt close to a country in the hundred kingdoms that we have invested considerable time and energy on saving from disease, rebuilding and leading to glory. Even if we had founds means to attack and kill the Grandmaster we would likely only have called down greater wrath from the realm. This is the only way we can minimize casualties” 

“So humble. It has been a long time since a Solar spoke so softly in these halls” Smiling Bear noted, satisfied with the explanation. He didn’t even need to remind the solars that there were wards and devices built into his office that detected lies… though sufficient essence could counter such detection, but the circle hadn’t been told that either.

Tea and biscuits were summoned to the censor’s office as the wait continued. Smiling Bear’s tea cup was large enough to require two water elementals to fill it, and a fire elemental to heat it – and yet only a tiny amount of celestial tea leaves were needed to make tea. Sullen Hoof obviously pocketed a portion of the stuff for later use.

During the tea-induced chit-chat, while Smiling Bear was regaling the circle about his collection of frozen lightning from the elemental pole of air and the sculptures he liked to make of them, Heath Rose suddenly got up, explaining that she had just gotten a message that she had to follow up on: “Now, when I come back I want you Cash to ask me ‘So, golden or bronze memories?’. I will answer gold memories, but I will say it to Shimmer and only her. If I fail to do that then it’s either not me or I’m being mind-controlled – and for goodness sake don’t reveal what the imposter did wrong, or she’ll likely use avoidance kata to jump back in time and get it right on the second go”

“Is this kind of stuff common up here?” Sunrise wondered, all the while nodding that she had understood the instruction.

The sidereal sighed heavely, running a hoof through her mane and twisting her bracer that made her clothes switch her to terrestrial getup: “Not for normal low level inquiries, but if we get Sunshine audited for this it’ll be the greatest scandal since the destruction of Ondar Shambal. Sunshine will be lucky if her next five incarnations is allowed anything more savory than scrubbing Resplendent Buttflow’s porcelain thrones”

Sunrise seemed to recognize that name… but she couldn’t quite place it. Heath Rose left, and Smiling Bear asked if anyone wanted more tea.
About half an hour later Heath Rose returned, looking supremely confident and quite pleased: “Alright, is the Grandmaster here yet?”

The whole circle shook their heads, and Cash casually asked: “So, did you find your gold or bronze memories?”

Heath Rose gave Cash a tired but happy smile then turned to the secretarial spirits behind their desks: “Golden – now, if the Grandmaster isn’t here, has the retrieval team sent any messages back about their progress?”

The secretarial spirits, well aware of what was likely about to happen, shook their heads and took cover behind their desks.

Seeing the spirits take cover informed whoever or whatever the Heath Rose lookalike was that the game was up. Cash calmly approached her: “So… who are you, and where is the real Heath Rose?”

From Speaker’s point of view the mare before them took a single step back and started activating charms – but the really good ones that would likely have done the revealed imposter any good sputtered and failed, for Speaker had activated his chaos-repelling pattern, denying any attempts to distort reality within four yards of him.

The sudden look of shock that briefly sped over the imposter’s face was replaced by malice and martial intent just as quickly: “You will never take me alive!”

Rearing up and assuming a strange kata, the Heath Rose imposter suddenly refracted into the ambient essence that permeated the area… basically disappearing. To Speaker it was quite confusing, for it appeared as if Heath Rose was everywhere when viewing the office via essence sight, though his normal sight told him she was not in any of those places.

It was then that the sidereal reappeared behind Sullen Hoof, but just as Sully flipped around and struck at the sidereal his hoof simply melded into the Heath Rose imposter…. And the rest of the sidereal simply stepped forward ‘into’ Sullen Hoof.

The whole circle stood in silence for a brief moment, unsure of what they had just seen. Then Sullen Hoof gasped loudly and nearly collapsed. Speaker and Sunrise rushed over to Sully, while Cash and Shimmer both held their distance… which turned out to be a good thing, as Sullen Hoof suddenly caught Sunrise with a powerful buck, sending the young mare tumbling over with painful gasps, before Sully turned on Speaker.

With Gift ready instantly, Speaker was able to ward off the first flurry of punches and bucks easily – and at this point it struck Speaker as odd that the ‘possessed’ Sullen Hoof wasn’t using any of his martial charms to help him fight...

Using the precision of the spider, combined with the furious pounce of the tiger, Shimmmer flung a great mass of her silvery essence web to ensnare Sullen Hoof. 

This worked wonderfully as Sully was unable to get out of the large area covered in webbing – and Shimmer controlled it enough to ensure that none of it touched Speaker. It occurred to Speaker once again that Sully would normally have been able to easily dodge the attack, but he still wasn’t using any charms. Maybe the possession didn’t allow for charm-use?

With Sully thrashing about helplessly in a cocoon of essence string, Heath Rose appeared moments later next to Sullen Hoof – but this time the circle was ready for her.

Shimmer lunged with her strings, but such was Heath Rose’s twisting gestures and fluid hoofwork that the elder Lunar somehow missed – and a moment later the sidereal had caught each and every strand of essence webbing that Shimmer had flung at her, sending them right back to Shimmer who found herself tied up completely.

Cash had a go next, firing his claw-shoe at Heath Rose – but the sidereal just caught the chain the caw was connected too, yanking Cash forward into striking range of her strangely elongated, almost blade-like hooves.

There was a pained cry as Cash was skewered straight through the chest – but that cry quickly turned it a pained laugh as Cash weakly swatted Heath Rose across the face with a shaky hoof before he went limp…

Heath Rose instantly dropped to the ground, golden snakes of fire shooting out of her eyes and mouth while Cash fell to the ground. 

Shimmer, having gotten a single leg free, quickly snared Heath Rose with her essence string, wrapping her in a cocoon, while Speaker rushed to Cash’s side and yanked away at Cash’s heavenly silk garb to get to his wound.

“Hey…” Cash coughed bloodily: “…if I don’t make it, tell my next incarnation to wear better armor more often”

“Don’t say that” Speaker implored as he poured essence into Cash’s sucking chest wound as quickly as he could. The sound of bits of rib and sternum snapping back into place wasn’t pleasant – but it indicated that things were getting better. Cash certainly seemed more relaxed with the anesthetic charm active on him.

That very moment the doors to the office opened and in strode two ponies… one an impossibly well dressed mare with a stripped yellow, orange and magenta mane styled up into an elaborate hair-bun who was sporting a very displeased look, the other a massive hulking muscle-miracle of a stallion in light-blue immaculate order robes who appeared quite serene and at ease.

It was Anys Sunshine, the right-hoof mare of Ketchup Carjack and Ragara Bulk Biceps, the Grandmaster of the Immaculate Order.

“I was ordered to deliver this unicorn to this office post haste, who will sign for him?” Anys Sunshine asked coldly, her voice barely hiding her outrage.

Smiling Bear looked at Heath Rose, who’s firey golden snakes had faded and given way to faint plumes of ashen steam coming from her eyes and mouth, and frowned: “In a moment – it appears that we just suffered some kind of attack”

“Really? Should I return this unicorn to Creation and reschedule this hearing?” Sunshine  asked calmly, again with that same cold tone.

Speaker quickly examined Heath Rose and quickly concluded that she was surprising physically ok. Looking up Smiling Bear, Speaker nodded that it was ok to continue.

“That will apparently not be necessary vizier – also, if you wouldn’t mind staying  a bit. This audit is after all to establish whether allegations to your person are true” the great stellar spirit said, sounding no small amount of pleased.

The proceeding returned to some semblance of normalcy over the next few minutes, as Heath Rose was freed and healed up by Speaker, while Anys Sunshine and the unicorn Grandmaster both remained silent, waiting for things to get started again. Indeed, it seemed very strange to Speaker that Heath Rose refused to even talk about what had just happened… for it was painfully clear that someone had used some kind of magical mind control on the sidereal. Was Sunshine involved?  If only he had had time to examine the essence patterns going around in Heath Rose’s mind before Cash had purged her mind… and since when did he know that technique? Had Red taught him before she died? So many questions… so few answers. This annoyed Speaker greatly.

Feeling good again – mainly due to Speaker’s anesthetic charm -  Cash addressed Smiling Bear just as the audit was about to continue:  “Honored censor, if it pleases you I would suggest we proceed with what I suggested earlier, now that all involved parties are present”

“And what would that be?” Anys Sunshine asked, her exquisite heavenly dress robes making even Cash look plain and uninteresting by comparison.

Smiling Bear leaned down towards Sunshine: “Simple. This Eclipse caste Solar suggested that we reapply an old auditing option available in cases that involve the chosen of Celestia: Everyone gets magically sworn to tell only the truth regarding the case at hand”

The look of absolute terror on Anys Sunshine’s face wasn’t just palpable, it was painfully obvious for all to see. Indeed, Heath Rose had told the circle while enroute to the censor that most audits weren’t determined by how grave the transgressions of the god or sidereal being audited were – they were usually determined by whether the one audited could lie his way out of it or not, no matter the charges.

“Careful Cash, you might end up being requested to do this fairly often…” Shimmer joked while Sunrise looked about as she saw the end of her career hastily approaching.

Smiling Bear gestured for Cash to go ahead, and Cash stepped up in front of the heavenly censor’s desk… which was the size of a large mansion… and addressed everyone: “Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, in regards to this investigation of whether the Sidereal Anys Sunshine had taught martial arts to one Ragara Bulk Biceps illegally, until this audit is declared over by the presiding Censor?”

Cash himself was first to remark that he himself consented this promise of truthfulness. Sunrise was a quick second, followed by the rest of the circle. Anys Sunshine looked like she was about to explode, then the Grandmaster nodded in such a way that it sounded like rough stone grinding against stone – his high degree of pure elemental dragonblood making his earth-aspected body look like a perfectly chiseled white marble body dressed in ornate immaculate robes.

“Lady Sunshine, if you do not consent to this I will take it as an admission of guilt and go to summary judgment and sentencing” Smiling Bear calmly stated, though his voice clearly bore malicious intent in it as a vicious undertone.

It occurred to Speaker that this Censor seemed oddly biased against the Sidereal he was auditing, so he quietly asked Shimmer if she had any idea what was up with that. Shimmer replied: “Didn’t you pay attention first time we were here? We were told that of gods still carry a grudge against the sids for the usurpation – mainly because it meant that a lot of them actually had to work for a living again when you were gone. May Blossom told me…”

Speaker tried to recall Heath Rose’s flat-mate while Anys Sunrise finally and very begrudgingly agreed to the proposed oath.

With that said Cash sanctified the oath, causing bands of shining golden glyphs of Old Realm script to fly around each participating pony before fading into nothingness – becoming another indestructible scroll in the Palace of Oathes Eternal.

“Heath Rose, your requested witness is here, you can begin your questioning if there are no other matters that need handling” Smiling Bear stated.

Anys Sunshine, furious to the point that her cream coat had taken a slightly reddish hue, suddenly shouted – before Heath Rose could get a word in edgewise: “Objection! If this proceeding has already been underway without my presence I demand the right to cross examine prior witnesses and review all evidence presented so far!”

Heath Rose nodded and made no attempt to call the Grandmaster up for questioning, allowing one of Smiling Bear’s scribes to read everything said and done so far. It was clear that Anys Sunshine had – somehow – been taken by surprise by all this, but as she heard Cash and Sullen Hoof’s testimonies it was clear to those who know what to look for that she was hastily putting a defense together.

“I call Sullen Hoof to the witness stand” Anys Synshine loudly declared the second the scribe spirit finished talking.

Sullen Hoof walked up to a chair behind a desk designated for witnesses. It hadn’t been used previously, but it was obvious that with the Sidereal being audited present things were getting a lot less casual and far more serious.

“Please restate your testimony from earlier” Anys Sunshine said, her disdain for the solar before her dripping off her every word like venom from a snake’s fang.

Sullen Hoof retold his little story, Anys Sunshine not appearing overly worried: “So, you claim to have come to your conclusions by listening to a unicorn turning down a lunar’s offer to teach him martial arts?”

“That’s what I said”

“Prior to exalting, did you earn a living as a murderer for hire?” Anys Sunshine quickly asked as a seemingly unrelated followup.

At first Sullen Hoof seemed confused at the question, but then answered: “I worked as a cook and assassin specializing in poison- if that’s wh-“
“Yes that’s fine”Anys Sunshine interrupted: “So you’re a hired killer. Have you been paid to come here and commit character assassination on my person?”

From the sideline, along with the rest of the circle, Cash smiled and shook his head while Sullen Hoof denied the allegation: “Really? Trying to discredit the witness? I excepted more”

Anys Sunshine kept up trying to dredge up dirt on Sullen Hoof – but ultimately she seemed to give up and instead called Cash up.

“Hold on – He hasn’t given any testimony… yet… why not let me talk to Bulk Biceps first?” Heath Rose suggested ever so kindly. Smiling Bear granted her the floor.

The Immaculate Grandmaster was called up to the witness stand where he sat down. To Speaker it was quite strange: The leader of the Immaculate Order didn’t seem to care that he was in a room with several anathema…

Heath Rose began her questioning: “Bulk Biceps, before I begin let me remind you that you are under a sanctified oath to tell the truth and that the solar who sanctified it will instantly become aware if you break  that oath, plus the heavens will punish you if you break the oath”

The massive unicorn remained stonefaced, but nodded ever so slightly anyway.

“Very well. Tell us, do you know the Sidereal Anys Sunshine?”  The young chosen of secrets began.

Bulk Biceps again nodded a tiny bit: “She brought me here - brought me from Creation to Yu-Shan to testify”

“Right, and is this the first time she had brought you here?”Heath Rose continued.

The earth-aspected unicorn remained silent.

“I said is this the first time she has brought you to Yu-Shan?” the sidereal repeated.

Frowning, Bulk Biceps shook his head ever so slightly: “She has repeatedly brought me to Yu-Shan to meditate with the dragons and to advice me on guiding the Immaculate Order.I understand that it is among her responsibilities to ‘manage’ the Immaculate Order”
“And nothing else?” Heath Rose inquired.

Closing his eyes for a moment, Bulk Biceps furrowed his brows: “We have also enjoyed tea on occasion”

“What about martial arts training?” Heath Rose finally asked – no longer amused by Bulk Biceps dancing around the topic.
“Celestial Monkey Style, Jade Mountain Style, Mantis Style and Violent Bier Style” 

A deathly silence fell over the entire office. Even the scribe and clerical spirits stopped dead in their tracks. There were several seconds of silence.

Speaker was mid-lean and about to ask Cash what had just happened when Cash quickly whispered: "It seems that the Grandmaster has been receiving training in more than one forbidden martial art..."

"You mean Violet Bier of Sorrows style?" Heath Rose asked. One would have been able to hear a pin drop onto the polished basalt floor.

The Grandmaster being no fool instantly caught on to the fact that he had unwittingly done something stupid, and so hesitated. Smiling Bear, no longer merely curious to see if there was basis for the allegations against Anys Sunshine, did not want to wait and thus rumbled: "Answer the question unicorn"

"Know your place spirit. I answer to the dragons, not to lesser spirits" Ragara Myrrun retorted, not even bothering to look in the censors general direction.

A bright flash of lightning briefly flooded the vast office in blinding light and deafening thunder. Sullen Hoof and Shimmer both cried out in pain as the charms enhancing their senses yielded painful levels of stimuli. When it was possible to see again Smiling Bear was no more... or rather, the form of the Ursa Major spirit was no more, for Smiling Bear was not a spirit. He was an elemental, a high ranking elemental... a lesser elemental dragon.

Having reveal his true form - which was now crammed into a comparatively tiny looking office, for the form of a lesser elemental dragon of air was that of a several mile long flying serpent with jewel scales, great long whiskers, horns and a mane of stars and lightning. Smiling Bear gazed intently at Ragara Myrrun and said, with a voice that made everything in the room shake: "Answer then"

The massive unicorn, despite all his monkly calm and with over a century of zen meditations within him, looked very much shocked by the revelation: "I... yes, that style"

"Excellent - now, what about instructions in any martial arts styles of the classification sidereal martial arts?" Heath Rose continued, not missing a beat.

Standing opposite the circle, Anys Sunshine was looking panicky as Heath Rose began to pry into the Grandmaster's training for sidereal martial arts... though the Grandmaster vehemently denied to have actually been taught any yet, and to Speaker that sounded true enough... that didn’t mean that Heath Rose was convinced: "Do you know what a student and an elder sutra is, in the context of sidereal martial arts?"

"I do" The grandmaster begrudgingly said as he sighed heavily, after a brief glance up at the lesser elemental dragon glaring at him.

Smiling greatly as she trotted around the table the Grandmaster was sitting at, Heath Rose waved her head from side to side as she pondered what to say next: "Really? And how did you learn of these concepts?"

The Grandmaster briefly glanced at Anys Sunshine who turned away from him. It was a simple but deeply symbolic act: A sifu turning her face from her student. It was at this moment that the Grandmaster knew that he had all but lost in his hope to ever be taught Sidereal martial arts... unless... maybe?

"I will tell all I know in exchange for continued tutelage, be it under Anys Sunshine for whom I have been a student for over a century, or under another Sidereal sifu. My only dream is to cultivate the blossom of the perfected lotus within me. I beg of this court not to deny me this humble quest for martial enlightenment" The Grandmaster pleaded, looking up at the harsh gaze of Smiling Bear.

Anys Sunshine couldn't take this betrayal: "You, you fool! How dare you speak such lies against me!?"

"That's funny, I didn't sense any lies when he spoke" Speaker remarked quietly to Cash, having finished tending to Shimmer and Sullen Hoof's bleeding ears and strained eyes.

Smiling Bear let out a thunderous roar: "Be silent Anys Sunshine. You will get the opportunity to cross examine the witness should you wish so - for now hold your tongue or be held in contempt!"

Nobody needed Sully and Cash's charms of social observation to see what Anys Sunshine's furious scowl back at the elemental dragon was one of "I could take you down if I wanted to"

"I can't guarantee you such a thing. By the laws of Yu-Shan it is illegal for Sidereals to teach our martial arts to anyone but other Sidereals. You might be curious to know that it was your sifu's boss who instituted those policies a few thousand years ago though" Heath Rose noted, trying to play to Myrrun's now destroyed loyalties to his evidently former sifu.

Ragara Myrrun gave Anys Sunshine a most horrified look, and then said the last thing anyone expected to hear: "That's not what he said when she introduced me to him sixty years ago"

A split second later things started happening very quickly: Heath Rose appeared to have a stroke, to which Speaker scrambled to help her up. Anys Sunshine simply looked lost for words - even Smiling Bear's draconic form withered back into the form an Ursa Major at this shocking revelation: “Uhm… I think this calls  for a recess – we’ll reconvene in an hour in the Grand Auditer Courtroom”

Heath Rose quickly fended Speaker off as she called for a messenger spirit to call for Ayesha Ura, noting to Speaker that this was not an implication she was prepared to handle. Anys Sunshine similarly dispatched several other messenger spirits with hushed whispers that not even Sullen Hoof could make out.

"Ok, I think it's time for all of you to leave - you've given ample testimony and I thank you all. I'll have a messenger spirit inform you when the audit is over. Yes Cash, that means you don’t have to.  In the mean time take an aerial rickshaw to my estate, you'll be safe there until I return" Heath Rose said to the circle.

Sunrise wanted to protest, but Cash pointed out that if heads of celestial bureacracy were about to be involved as well as possibly indicted then it would likely no longer be safe for the circle to be present, especially not if they start asking questions about the Palace of Oathes Eternal, which they would no doubt since this recess would give Anys Sunshine and Ketchup Carjack ample time to compare notes.

With a small purse full of golden coins that didn't really feel heavy enough to be properly golden given to them by Heath Rose, the circle left the office of Smiling Bear with permission. At the same platform they arrived at Cash got one of the celestial lions guarding the door into the building to hail a rickshaw which spirited the circle away post haste.

"I would love to know what's going on back there right now..." Cash mused as he reclined in the absolutely luxuries seats inside the rickshaw.
Shimmer smiled as she sat otherwise motionless with closed eyes: "Oh that's easy. They've moved venue to a proper courtroom. Now it's Smiling Bear and two other lesser dragon censors acting as judges. Another Sidereal has also arrived, and judging from how Heath Rose is trembling I think its this Ketchup Carjack, Anys Sunshine's boss - the head Bronze faction Sidereal"

"...and you know this, how?" Sunrise inquired curiously.

Shimmer smirked: "Old lunar hunting charm. I'm sensing everything she's sensing. Hearing, sight, the works. She doesn't seem to mind"

> Chaper 69: Meeting Engagements of Martial Intent
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The next day at Heath Rose’s palatial manse, not the same one the circle had previously stayed in, the circle was finally joined by an exceedingly tired but familiar looking Sidereal.

“So, how did things go?” Cash inquired, having long since tired of marveling at the floating lights or jade carvings that lined the walls of the estate.

With but a few gestures, Heath Rose had her servant spirits assemble the rest of the circle. Once Speaker arrived, having had fun reading some of the heavenly manuals on divine medicine in the library, Heath Rose requested an infusion of will. Speaker complied, giving the Sidereal some of his own mental stamina.

“Thank you… gods, you have no idea how exhausting this audit was – and I wasn’t even the one being audited” Heath Rose blurted out, collapsing on a chair that one of her spirit servants conveniently managed to slip in under her.

Evidently the audit, after upgrading to a larger venue and increasing the number of censors overseeing the proceedings, had carried on all night. Shimmer had only been able to keep the circle in the loop until everyone had gone to bed  - but Heath Rose filled everyone in: Anys Sunshine had ultimately been found guilty of severe breaches of heavenly protocol and policies, with sentencing pending. Ketchup Carjack had been able to talk himself out of everything since he hadn’t been oathbound to speak the truth, but his reputation had taken a serious hit.

“Even with him managing to weasel out any actual charges, then everyone knows that Anys Sunshine can’t possibly have pulled this off for over a century without him knowing that his right-hoof pony was doing something like this. This will have repercussions throughout the bronze factions and the celestial bureaucracy. The gods and the bronze faction sidereals have already begun to doubt whether he’s been truthful on other policy issues, especially on whether or not him and the bronze factions plays by the rules he sets for everyone else” Heath Rose explained, sounding both tired but also quite pleased.

Cash found this development quite amusing: “And so the house of cards comes down”

“It’s not that simple – the Gold faction has long sought an inroad into the gods that the Bronze faction have kept as allies. This is a big inroad for us: proof that the Bronze faction cannot be trusted to uphold the laws of heaven as well as they claim… but please, I am tired beyond words… been up all night – I think we all deserve something good for this” Heath Rose groaned, gesturing for a messenger spirit to come to her.

The sidereal gave the messenger spirit instructions in old realm, to which it sped off at divine speeds.

It turned out that Heath Rose wanted to treat the circle to a trip to the Baths of Venus – a heavenly spa.

“Shouldn’t you get some rest?” Speaker suggested, his medical training telling him that such exhaustion could only be remedied by sleep.

The sidereal dismissed Speaker’s worries with a casual gesture as her spirit servants hoisted her up on a gilded palanquin: “The baths are the most relaxing and curative thing ever made. The Mare of Serenity saw to its creation after the usurpation. We’ll all be safe there and it is much better than sleep or anything else you can get to recuperate – I think we all deserve it”

The trip to the baths was an interesting one. In-between nodding off, Heath Rose mentioned that she’d likely face retaliatory audits and other means of administrative punishment from the bronze faction following this – but at the same time she’d no doubt stand to be promoted in the gold faction, as well as get a big raise for revealing this gross violation of heavenly law.

The baths was a massive sprawling spa complex, mostly hidden by towering trees that ensured that everything would be hidden in a lovely shade whenever Celestia was ahead in the Games of Divinity, though at the moment the sky in heaven was one of night with a distinct purple hue, indicating that the Mare of Endings was ahead in the games of divinity – in turn lamps with a soft silvery light illuminated the heavenly spa.

The very pavement that lined the pathways around the spa was a joy to walk on, for it was as if alive – undulating ever so slightly to massage the hooves and feet of those who walked on it, despite remaining perfectly level at all time. The very air was a joy to breathe, for a breeze ever so gentle wafted the pleasing scent of untold rare flowers and fresh honey towards all who entered the spa grounds.

Heath Rose paid for the circles entry, after which they were all led through the parks and groves that surrounded the spa proper. The bath that they arrived at was an immaculately clean pool of water lined with polished stone of various warm colors, the water itself heated by celestial hot springs. Simply setting a hoof into the waters sent shivers of joy up one’s spine, for the Mare of Serenity had made her greater sign over the waters when the baths had been made, making them truly divine to be in.

Heath Rose quickly drifted off to blissful sleep as she rested at the water’s edge, while the circle discussed what to do next.

Speaker felt pity for the Grandmaster: “If his only side in all of this was wanting to attain enlightenment through a higher form of martial arts… I’m not really sure it’s fair if he’s executed for this”

“You want him to continue on to Chung Do?” Shimmer wondered, not seeing much of a problem in the whole affair.

There was a sudden flutter of ravens as a voice from beyond the grave rang out: “If he is allowed to live you could offer him such training, for only Solars and Sidereals are known to master such martial skills”

It was Hran-Tzu, the Raven King. In his form of hollow funeral garbs, the god of decay gave off a smell of fresh mulch: “I heard that you arrived here so I figured I would say hi and give you all an update on what I have found from the mummified ponatees you recovered for me”

The god of decay excused himself for not joining the circle in the waters – a body of cloth did not do well when wet – but beyond that he was able to tell the circle that he had definitely confirmed that the dead princes were receiving messages from the neverborn through the mad dreams of the ponatee souls trapped inside them: “The implications of this are staggering. This is proof that the Neverborn are not only influencing, but directing affairs in Creation. I currently have a circle of Sidereals gathering more information about ponatee activities in the west, but I have you to thank for all of this. I cannot express my gratitude enough”

“That’s quite alright. Simply being listed as terrestrial agents of yours is currently all we can ask for. It protects us from the Bronze faction and makes us remember talking to Sidereals” Sunrise noted as she slipped into the waters, leaving her off-white robes dry up on a soft wooden bench.

The god nodded: “Even so. I will ensure that any garbage heap in lands under your control are blessed for swift rot. It is the least I can do”

“Hold on – you said you heard we had arrived here… the Bronze faction might still try to pull something through a proxy while we’re here. If everyone here knows about us…” Shimmer began as fearful thoughts began to propagate in her mind, but Hran-Tzu gestured for her to calm herself.

“These are the Baths of Venus. They are bound by oaths of peace and serenity. No pony, god or even demon can raise a hoof against anyone here. The worst you can be assaulted with here are spiteful words” the god said, putting Shimmer at ease.

The god bid the circle farewell, though he noticed that he had seen other gods that were looking for them when he had entered.

Indeed, shortly after Hran-Tzu left  three other gods came by the bath that the circle was in, though only one was a familiar face – not that it was really possible to see Lytek’s face, his form being one of pure light.

The two other gods were strange beings in every sense of the words. One appeared as a pony mare wrought of porcelain, with letters and symbols of every written tongue ever imagined inscribed on her surface, though the heavy robes she wore hid most of the writing. Around her floated dozens of servitor spirits, each carrying a book or a scroll. The other god… assuming that one had the imagination to even classify the being as a god… was a massive three yard long spider of all five magical materials, gleaming with starmetal legs, moonsilver joins and orichalcum mandibles. Innards of jade were barely visible under the undulating segmented plates that made up its body. Speaker was the only one who recognized both: “Luxana, Asna First-born – what brings you two here?”

Sullen Hoof, the least spiritually knowledgable in the circle, quietly whispered to Speaker: “Care to introduce them?”

“Ah right, circle – this is Asna First-born, wrought of Autotochton, the first pattern spider and mother of all the rest of the pattern spiders” Speaker began, gesturing towards the massive metal spider: “…and this porcelain beauty is Luxana, goddess of literacy.  I’ll bet that you’re both here because of me, aren’t you?”

Asna First-Born stood silent for a moment, before whirring into action with a voice that sounded truly synthetic in way that defied description: “So few remember the Great Maker anymore. I make it a point to visit those who do when time and fate permits. Should you ever find yourself at the loom I would offer you a destiny of tea”

Having said that, the giant spider quickly stomped off, its starmetal legs making sharp but not uncomfortable sounds as they hit the stone floor of the spa. This left Luxana looking somewhat sheepish, with her face like a rigid porcelain mask – and yet to read like an open book: She was clearly happy to see Speaker, but there was something more…

“Well out with it” Cash calmly asked.

The goddess gestured for one of her spirits to bring her the scroll it was carrying. It did so, and in turn she floated the scroll over to Cash: “Uvanavu, the Chrysanthemum Shogun, requests Speaker’s presence at his earliest convenience – though according to this you won’t get the specifics on when and where to meet until you agree to the meeting – also the rest of the circle is invited as well”

Cash was about to say that it was in poor taste to read other pony’s mail when he realized that the god literacy probably had the ability to know all things written, which Speaker later confirmed: “Very well – but why not meet us here?”

The goddess shrugged: “No clue – my guess is he’s busy cleaning up after Livilla’s last sex-bomb thrown his way”

“Who? What? Sex-bomb?” Cash quipped, his interest piqued.

With porcelain features frowning stifly, the goddess explained that Livilla – the goddess of prostitution – had it in for Uvanavu for some reason, and so was prone to disrupt any meeting he had with whores. Cash failed to see how that was a bad thing. Sunrise whacked the stallion over the head for such a lewd comment.

“Livilla and Uvanavu are one of the three chief gods of the Division of Serenity. Livilla is after Uvanavu to increase her power in the division… it’s not a well kept secret – she’s been at it for centuries” Luxana sighed, not sounding as if she found the ordeal very appealing.

Cash acquiesced, bowing his head: “Very well – I guess that kind of bureaucratic infighting doesn’t do much for the division’s overall efficiency”
Luxana nodded.

“So, beyond asking if we want an invitation, is there anything else we can help you with?” Speaker wondered, feeling far too much at ease to currently worry about what his old first age buddy Uvanavu wanted from him or the circle.

Luxana quickly consulted a written check-list that one of her spirit servants had close by: “Well, I’ve heard that Burnished Talon, the god of all predators, is looking for another Lunar to breed up some new kind of animal… Oh oh, and Flashing Peak is ecstatic over what you lot did at the Department of Most High Prayer Processing. She hasn’t seen such efficiency and backlog processing in millennia. You won’t believe how much she loves what you did”

Speaker had to think for a moment to figure out what Luxana had meant by prayer processing and who Flashing Peak was – the department was probably where the rest of the circle had gone back when he and Shimmer had visited Lytek for the first time. Had they really improved this that much?

“Alright, but I don’t really have anything else to sa- and I’m leaving now bye bye” Luxana said, suddenly changing tone mid-sentence and running off very quickly, her porcelain hooves making sharp clincing noises against the stone tiles.

Suddenly a fresh breeze blew in through the bath, and on the calming fresh scent of flowers that none in the circle had ever heard of a four yard tall celestial lion flew in. It stood a full yard taller than the normal celestial lions, and like a giant statue of the purest orichalcum it radiated a stoic warmth, with its eyes difficult to get a a read on due to them being of the same material as the rest of the being.

With its great mane appearing cast in solid orichalcum, like the rest of it, this statuesque lion  of heaven’s police and peacekeepers didn’t even need to try to appear awe-inspiring.

“Cash Charmer?” the lion suddenly said, its voice calm and professional.

Currently being up to his nose in the soothing waters, Cash simply stuck a hoof up and bubbled a little bit: “Blub”

The enormous celestial lion nodded: “It has come to my attention that a few days ago nearly all of the records of the sanctified oaths still in effect that involve you were removed from the Palace of Oathes Eternal . I come here to apologize on behalf of heaven and assure you that we are tracking those guilty of this unforgivable crime”

“Very well – anything else you wish to inform us of?” Sunrise quickly asked, not wanting to give Cash time to say something snide that might get him into trouble to this chief of police of heaven.

The lion growled momentarily, as if a fly had caught itself in his right ear: “No I… the aftershocks of yesterday’s audit of Anys Sunshine is still being felt throughout Yu-Shan. Everywhere minor infractions against gods and spirits are being accrued with Sidereals breaking into offices to destroy files and records, likely to destroy evidence of violations of celestial law. Thanks to you I have an awful lot of work to follow up on”

“If you’re here to whine that we’ve inadvertently given you more work you can save it – we came here to relax, not to be annoyed” Cash quickly stated, his voiced certain and himself wet.

The great golden celestial lion bowed its head: “I did not come here to in any way beleaguer you. I came here to warn you. You have upset a lot of gods and Sidereals. I suggest you leave here a lot more discreetly than how you arrived. Failing to do so would likely result in my lions having to break up an assassination attempt – and I would like to prevent such a disturbance. I have already readied an escort of lions to escort you to any Yu-Shan gate of your choosing”

“Gate 19” Heath Rose sleepily mused before drifting off into sleep again.

Shrugging, Cash nodded: “Ok then, when we leave it’ll be to gate 19”

With everything he needed to say said, Shining Barator got up and began to walk away. Speaker wouldn’t have minded if the god had stayed – living orichalcum statues were always pretty.

Finally the circle and Heath Rose got some time for themselves, only interrupted when servant spirits arrived with refreshments, or when lesser gods of massage would come by and offer their soothing touch.

By the afternoon both Heath Rose and the circle were thoroughly at ease. Cash even feared that the experience had ruined all mortal massage parlors and hot spring spas for him…

As they got up to leave Heath Rose bid the circle goodbye. She was certain she had several weeks of retaliatory audits to look forward to, as well as whatever administrative burdens the bronze faction could bog her down with to punish her – but she didn’t seem to mind: “The gold faction prestige I have gotten from all this… I’ll probably get a raise”

Walking the halls of the spa, the circle couldn’t help but notice the quiet whispers and inquisitive looks they kept getting from the gods and spirits they passed by. It truly seemed as if they were the talk of the town.

…and then the shouting began – or rather, one pony started shouting. It was a young-looking mare with an almost colt-ish face, who’s wild though short-cropped mouse-brown mane was barely held in check by a strikingly azure headband. The rest of her was covered in exotic leather and star-metal armor: “You idiots! Do you realize what you’ve done!?”

The circle stopped dead in their tracks as the mare continued berating them: “How selfish and stupid can you be? Getting one of the greatest unicorns in the history of the Realm killed over a legal technicality?”

“It seems this one is upset about our reveal of Anys Sunshine and the Grandmaster’s illicit activities” Cash noted in a brazen tone.

The young mare fumed, her face twisted into a furious expression: “It will be my greatest joy to see you all suffer for this!”

Sunrise, having nothing of this, calmly walked up a slapped the young mare across the face: “Behave yourself”

“Wha… how did…” the young mare seemed entirely lost for words, stumbling backwards as she clutched her left cheek.

Advancing on the young mare, Sunrise maintained her stern demeanor: “You are clearly too old to be acting like an angry foal. Accept what happened and move on. Your behavior is beneath a warrior as well equipped as you”

The mare looked absolutely terried, despite her martial appearance. Turning and galloping away, Cash could only smirk while Sullen hoof shook his helmet-covered head: “What was her deal?”

“Well, she wore starmetal armor… she she’s probably another sidereal, bronze faction from judging how angry she was” Speaker noted, wondering what the mare had been so frightened by.

The circle continued on to the exit of the heavenly spa, where a squad of six celestial lions stood ready with a temporary emergency-pass allowing the lot to transit via the dragon-boats on the express gold river lane.

As spa and surrounding forests faded into a mess of horizontal strands of light, the heavenly dragon-shaped boat moving at speeds that simply defied meaningful words, the circle began to wonder what exactly had been done with the remains of the Grandmaster. If his corpse wasn’t returned to the wyld hunt they might not believe that he was dead…

This turned out to be a moot point: At the Yu-Shan gate they were meant to leave by a spirit was there waiting for them, and next to it was a distinctly violet bier on which the very large and muscly dead body of Ragara Myrrun rested. The cause of death was not readily apparent.

“Well that answers that question – but how the hell are going to give it to the wyld hunt without them thinking we killed him and them getting pissed?” Cash said out loud. The celestial lions appeared to be unable to give less of a damn.

With the body of the grandmaster held elsewhere via Shimmer, the circle was unceremoniously ushered trough the gate. They appeared on an barren hillside. The land around them was of gravely dirt and sparse brush.

Shimmer took a moment and used a charm that gave her a rough idea of where they were – then shifted into her beast-pony form, grew it a few sizes larger than usual and had the rest of the circle mount up.

Flying north the circle very quickly came across a field of broken gossamer and utterly crushed changelings. There wasn’t a single changeling left alive, though the circle didn’t stick around to investigate any further. Sullen Hoof noted that someone had vented a lot of anger on those changelings, and it had happened only minutes before the circle had arrived, if the pools of blood was any indication...

Flying north for about an hour the circle came upon a few landmarks that Cash recognized from the northern hundred kingdom trade routes. This meant that they weren’t far from Chung Do. By evening they were resting in their rooms within Castle Chung.

The next morning the circle left in a hurry, having just barely updated the young Shogun with their recent adventures.  Chung Onyx was surprised, to put it mildly, but also saddened to hear of the loss of his sister: “Her sacrifice was a noble one. I will have artists make a suitable painting to hang in the castle next to mother and father”

Leaving the young Shogun to his mourning, the circle – atop yet another newly purchased yeddim – quickly closed in on the wyld hunt.

With the hunt spotted Sullen Hoof told the circle of how he figured they could give the Grandmaster’s body back to the hunt: “I’ll do something similar to what we did at the Palace of Oathes Eternal. I’ll use my disguise charms to appear as a spirit, then appear before the hunt with Myrrun’s corpse and feed them a few lines about the dragons wanting to keep such an enlightened spirit, while not needing the body”

None in the circle could come up with anything better, so Shimmer recalled the late Grandmaster’s body from elsewhere and passed it Sullen Hoof. With a combination of athletics charms and charms that enhanced his senses to guide him, Sullen Hoof jumped away – leaping high into the sky, to deliver his grim cargo and ‘heavenly’ news.

The rest of the circle hustled to set up a good spot to ambush the rest of the wyld hunt. They wouldn’t know until Sully returned whether the furious five would be part of the force they would be facing – so they prepared for the worst: Speaker and Shimmer hollowed out the ground under the road the wyld hunt would be coming on, mainly to trap most of the mortal monks in a good old deep pit. Shimmer wanted to line the walls and floor of the pit with sharp stake. Speaker wanted to make the pit extra deep but line it with something to cushion the fall: “There’s no sense in killing mortal ponies over this – Cash and Sunrise can talk sense into them”

“They all knew what they were signing up for when they transferred to the wyld hunt – you have to volunteer for that, and I want to see them to reap what they have sown” Shimmer sneered.

Speaker furrowed his brows and stomped once, hard: “Lookshyan battle tactics dictates that you should never use more force than necessary. If we let them go home, or convince them to stay, we’ll either way have five hundred ponies to tell others of our mercy – I would much rather have that kind of reputation, as opposed to one of butchering foes who wouldn’t be able to harm us anyway”

“I’m not Lookshyan… and neither are the ponies coming at us – why bother with the curtsey?” Shimmer grumbled, finding it difficult to argue with Speaker. Her Lunar bond with Speaker was screaming at her to simply do what he said, but her hatred of the wyld hunt strengthened her resolve.

Sighing and stroking his beard, Speaker looked in the direction the wyld hunt would ultimately be coming from: “Because we are better than them, and if we don’t show that, then how will they know? The realm indoctrinates all mortals born in its prefectures to blindly obey the unicorns, to consider them perfect because they are exalted… and if there’s anything we’ve shown the ponies of Chung Do, Nexus or Sunhill then it’s that we’re not perfect, but we do strive towards it – and showing mercy on fools who were never taught any better is a great way of doing that”

Wiping her eyes, Shimmer embraced Speaker: “You’re why the Lawgivers were chosen to lead and bring justice to Creation – now let’s see what we can soften the bottom of the pits with”

Cash and Sunrise’s contributions to the ambush would be a carefully rehearsed charm-fueled mental assault on the mortal ponies once Speaker and Shimmer’s trap was sprung. Speaker, Shimmer and Sullen Hoof would in turn face whatever unicorns remained with the hunt.
Upon his very sudden return – plummeting from the sky, yet sticking the landing perfectly – Sullen quickly informed the circle that the furious five had indeed left the wyld hunt to bring Ragara Myrrun’s body back to the realm for proper burial. That was the good news.

“And the bad?” Sunrise said, trying not to sound worried.

Sullen Hoof took a deep breath through his golden mask: “When the furious five chose to leave two other unicorns who had hidden themselves among the mortal ponies broke rank and tried to talk them out of it. It didn’t work, but this means that we will be facing three unicorns”

“That’s it? That’s great. I’ve seen Red wipe the floor with five unicorns in one of her arena fights back in Nexus. We should be able to handle that easily” Cash cheerfully stated, sounding confident as ever.

Shimmer gave Cash a huff and a stern glance: “We’re not talking random low-breeding mercenary unicorns here – we’re talking purebred realm unicorns who’ve likely been training since they got their horns to kill solars and lunars”

“Ya but still, come on, we’ve faced deathknights and come out on top” Cash argued.

Sunrise reminded Cash that such victories had been when Red had been with the circle: “This will not be easy”

The circle ate lunch and prepared for battle in silence.

It was the sound of distance singing that gave away the wyld hunt. Sullen Hoof quickly noted that the song was in high realm, so he didn’t have a clue what they were saying – but relaying the words to Cash allowed the Eclipse Caste Solar to translate enough of the singing to reveal that it was a cheerful hymn to the dragons. Apparently the hunt was trying to keep up morale… for obvious reasons.

“Ok, places everyone – Cash, remember to keep your distance, Sunrise you’re on mortal detail, Shimmer do the thing” Speaker barked, girding himself in protective essence to the best of his abilities as he called Gift in from elsewhere.

The plan for the mortal ponies required that they were in place over the pits – this meant that the surprise attack on the unicorns wouldn’t be wise to begin until the mortal ponies were over the pits.

In front of the wyld hunt marched Peleps Blueblood. Unlike previously he had his hood down, revealing his beautiful blonde mane. Speaker figured that he had taken down his hood to speak to his troops, or when trying to talk the furious five into staying.

Behind the Butcher of the hunt strode some five hundred mortal ponies, some with bows, some with spears. Knowing that there were unicorns hidden among them meant that Sullen Hoof was up in a nearby tree, trying to spot illusions and veiled horns among the marching martial monks.

From his hiding spot behind a thicket, Speaker frowned at the fact that Sullen Hoof hadn’t been able to identify the elemental aspect of the two mystery unicorns. Oh well: Battle plans were always the first things to die when fighting.

Shimmer, hidden in the earth-pit under the wyld hunt, triggered the pit trap right on cue by knocking out the supports when she sensed that enough ponies were marching above. The nets of hastily-woven bark caught all of the martial monks that fell in, cushioning their fall further into the pit.  

The thing that struck Speaker the most was all the swearing and shouting coming from the pit – those monks really had dirty mouths…
Shimmer shot up from the pit with the help of her essence threads, but she had a unicorn in hot pursuit – an air aspected mare from the looks of things, the unicorn flying after Shimmer on jets of air essence shooting out its rear hooves.

So much for Shimmer being able to engage Peleps Bluebood. With the train of thought that in Lookshy he’d be in big trouble for issuing dueling challenges like this reminding him that where he came from was a more civilized place than the realm, Speaker jumped out onto the road and declared his challenge: “Peleps Blueblood. Your murder of countless ponies puts shame on all unicorns! Step forward and face me!”

The few dozen mortal ponies still up on ground level were scattered down the length of the column that had been marching – Peleps Blueblood had no real troops to hide behind – but he didn’t strike Speaker as the sort who’d turn down a challenge, especially not from who’s blazing caste mark denotes him as solar anathema.

“Gladly” Blueblood stated in heavily accented rivertongue, frowning over the fact that the weapon cart with his jade spear Sting of Danaa’d – of course, this meant he would have to get his hooves dirty killing this anathema scum, and that wasn’t that bad a trade-off.

With a grin of sadistic intent, Peleps Blueblood strode forward towards Speaker, floating off his cloak to reveal his fine black jade breastplate, replete with pauldrons and armored skirts covering his shoulders and haunches quite well.  Speaker braced himself, assuming the form of the Thousand Wounds Gear style.

“Creation doesn’t need filthy anathema such as you – not in my Creation” Blueblood noted as he reared up and flicked his forehooves to slide the black jade tiger claws attached to his shoes into place.

The unicorn attacked first, to no-one’s surprise, but Speaker used Gift as a shield to block and deflect the crashing tsunami of slashing blows that Blueblood threw his way, effectively using Gear Catches Gear defence. Indeed, finding an opening between the pounding and the fact that Blueblood was augmenting his attacks with elemental water that kept flowing directly towards Speaker’s nose and mouth, Speaker was finding it difficult to even think of attacking.

His original plan had been to get close to Blueblood, then use his Thousand Wounds Gear style’s Rearing Crane Release technique to fling Blueblood into the air – then pummel him with ranged attacks via Gift – but this onslaught was making it very dangerous to do anything but defend.

It was then that another unicorn burst from the ground, having evidently burrowed from the bottom of the pit trap to the surface using clearly earth-aspected powers – as evident from the white glow of essence around the unicorn stallion’s horn and the fact that pony’s hooves appeared more akin to polished stone than the normal organic substance.

The earth-aspected unicorn didn’t immediately engage anyone. He didn’t have to: Cash and Sunrise were both still hiding, waiting for all the unicorns to be tied up in combat between Shimmer, Sully and Speaker, and so far both Shimmer and Speaker were very busy. The unicorn in turn knelt down and slammed his horn and head into the well-trod dirt and gravel road… and upon drawing his head back up his entire body had changed into living stone.

Rising, the unicorn dropped into the sturdy Earth Dragon Style form and slowly advanced towards Speaker – but then Sullen Hoof struck, appearing behind the stony unicorn and bucking him hard. The unicorn didn’t even move, let alone flinch, instead launching himself at Sullen Hoof with an avalanche. The ground exploded as the unicorn struck the ground, Sullen Hoof having deftly dodged the attack – but the unicorn seemed to anticipated that:

Shouting something in high realm that Cash later translated to “Stand and be punished you filthy anathema”, the unicorn struck a stony hoof at the ground just as Sullen Hoof was about to land – and the ground beneath Sully opened up like the gaping maw of an earth dragon. Speaker barely had time to see Sullen Hoof disappear into the ground as the maw closed…

Shimmer faring far better in her fight against the air aspected unicorn that had chased her out of the pit trap: Shimmer’s wings allowed her to fly higher than the unicorn’s jet of air essence and steam could buoy the mare – but the unicorn was able to shoot lightning at Shimmer… though Shimmer’s bony armor growths protected her quite well from that. This meant that Shimmer effectively flew circles around the unicorn, trying to lasso her with her essence string. This would likely have been impossible with any kind of conventional lasso, but Shimmer’s essence strings defied gravity and stayed in the air around the unicorn, ultimately trapping the unicorn in a cloud of string that suddenly pulled taught.

With the unicorn trapped, Shimmer called for Cash who fired a claw up at the cocooned unicorn dangling under her – and with a mighty yank Cash pulled the cocoon towards him, Cash himself rearing up for a mighty blow.

Speaker could tell that Blueblood saw his fellow unicorn being lined up for a deathblow – but Blueblood paid no heed to this, much to Speaker’s disgust. The earth aspected unicorn stallion on the other hand did try to intercept, but Sullen Hoof prevented this by tackling the stone-grey stallion as he burst from the ground in a whirlwind of steel cleavers, at the cost of getting pummeled by the unicorn’s earthen anima flux, which tore at his flesh with razor sharp rock shards, piercing his heavenly chef unicorn faster than it could repair itself.

While all this happened Sunrise had seen her cue to approach the pit trap and apply her most potent mind control charms upon the bruised and battered warrior monk ponies down below. Appearing both glorious and terrifying, wreathed in a golden aura, Sunrise first spoke to calm the ponies in the pit, then reminded them to be thankful that the pit had not been outfitted with spikes or hungry beasts… then began to elaborate how such mercy was the mark of a true leader, not like the Butcher of the hunt under whom they served.

With his shoe claws extended  fully, Cash struck with all his might at the desperately wiggling cocooned unicorn – using every applicable martial charm he knew. There was a flash of golden light and a crack of thunder… and a split second later in rapid succession the sound of several large tree trunks exploding into splinters, the trees beginning to fall moments later. The cocoon was dug at the end of a 20 yard long trench dug into ground, with several shattered trees before that. The cocoon was not wiggling anymore, only bleeding slightly from three gashes in the middle of it.

“Sweet!” Cash shouted, only have the ground under him open up and try to swallow him whole. With an almost comical sideways dash Cash got out of the way of the unicorn stallion’s attack, revealing him the sight of Sullen Hoof struck into the ground so deep that only the front tip of his golden helmet showed.

Shimmer and Cash both engaged the unicorn while Speaker fought to regain control of his very blood, as Blueblood unleashed powerful water-manipulating attacks against his body – forcing his blood to not really cooperate with him… it had already made his hooves go numb, and he could feel his blood swelling in his lungs far beyond the point of allowing normal breath, but Speaker was already using his elemental immunity charm to counter the regular drowning that Blueblood’s water-strikes was trying to kill him with.

Seeing that Speaker was able to ignore th needs of breath, Blueblood wisely concluded that his foe was using charms to obviate the need for air – to this end he applied the might of the elemental dragon of water Danaa’d and doused Speaker in water essence in such a way that it washed away all his active charms… this didn’t just leave Speaker choking on his own blood, it left him without his shield charms, and Blueblood was not slow to exploit these facts to strike at the suddenly breathless anathema before him.

Perhaps it was her keen senses, perhaps it was the mystical bond to her solar mate, but Shimmer instantly picked up that Speaker was getting ripped to shreds. This distraction cost her dearly, as the earth aspected unicorn before her struck her with such a force that despite her bone armor his mighty buck completely caved in her chest, causing her to vomit up not just blood but also chunks of pulped lung and heart… the fact that this didn’t down her was a testament to the indomitable spirit of the stewards of Creation. It also seemed to annoy the unicorn, who spun around to attack again…

…or so he would, if not for Cash punching him and sending him flying in a beautiful arch, right into the pit trap. The cries of pain from the mortal ponies struck from the stony unicorn at the bottom of the pit confirmed that Cash’s aim had been true.

“You ok?” Cash quickly asked Shimmer, but she was unable to answer verbally – though Cash seemed to understand her hurried gestures that she would live, for the time being, though she would likely die in seconds once the battle concluded if Speaker didn’t attend to her quickly.

Staggering up, Shimmer threw a hateful look towards Blueblood. Speaker was in poor shape, only standing thanks to his anesthetic charm making him ignore the pain of dozen of deep laceration over his face, forelimbs and chest… and he hadn’t even been able to get a single hit in against Blueblood!

Cash in turn threw an frightened glance at Sullen Hoof. He was still in the hole in the ground that unicorn had punched him into… and he wasn’t moving. With that out of the way, Cash got back to ducking and weaving, trying to avoid being hit by the unicorn stallion, seeing as Shimmer had apparently set her sights on helping Speaker Instead: “Uhm… a little help here?”

The mountainous unicorn’s movements were slow by deliberate, taking time to aim instead of simply throwing his weight around with the speed and fury that Blueblood employed. Cash was, in so many ways, outclassed by this very hardened warrior monk, and being able to dodge well didn’t really do much when your opponent could open up the ground under you to trap you.

It was in such a moment, with all four hooves trapped into a maw of stone and earth that held Cash tightly in place, that the Eclipse caste Solar saw death approach in the form of a hoof of elemental stone.

That was when Sunrise stepped between him and the oncoming one-punch avalanche – and like rocks thrown at the sun it might as well all have fallen to the ground, for the petrified unicorn’s blow didn’t even manage to manage to make Sunrise’s bright orange mane budge.

“You are but dust in the wind in the face of the chosen of Celestia” Sunrise calmly stated. The unicorn before her did not seem to heed her warning, instead simply rearing back to punch her in the face. With a quite literally earth-shattering blow the unicorn’s sledge hooves crashed into Sunrise, sending ripples out in the ground that sent Cash tumbling along the shockwave of dirt and stone thrown out.

Sunrise stood as firm as the daystar stood high in the sky.

“And by now you should be out of essence” she stated with disdain and but a hint of gloating.

The unicorn centered itself, drawing a deep breath before slamming a hoof into the ground and drawing up a pillar of stone in the shape of a massive tetsubo and roaring: “By the grace of the earth dragon, I smite you, in his name!”

The unicorn’s voice was beyond gravely. Petrified vocal cords made the stallion’s shout grate one’s ears most uncomfortably – but that brief pain was easy to forget compared to what happened next: Infused and hardened with earth essence, the tetsubo was swung was Sunrise – and did nothing.

Satisfied with the look of disbelief in the unicorn’s eyes, Sunrise took a deep breath, then exhaled, then drew breath again and looked the unicorn deep in the eyes: “You shouldn’t be looking at me – you should be running”

…that was Sullen Hoof’s cue to fling something at the unicorn stallion, having just barely managed to crawl out of the hole in the ground he had been thrust into: A small carrot, which expertly found itself into the unicorn’s mouth. What couldn't be seen was the tiny vial of dark water that had been stuck into the hollowed out carrot.

The unicorn threw a derisive snort in Sully’s direction, one infused earth essence to the point that it buried the Night Caste Solar in rocks and dirt – then the unicorn simply bit into the carrot and swallowed, as if to demonstrate how useless that little distraction had been.

It was then that black tendrils erupted from the unicorn’s mouth, first dislodging then ripping off his jaw, then ensnaring his head completely and bursting from his belly and rear in many places. The unicorn simply stood still, like an inanimate and very dead stone statue… that bled a bit as the black tentacles evaporated.

Cash had no clue what he had just seen – but he knew that it frightened him, a lot. His look of abject terror said it all.
Collapsing from the weight piled onto him, the last of Sullen Hoof’s strength seemed to run out, but Speaker came to his rescue with a flood of healing essence – just in time.



> Chapter 70: Blood, Water and Breath
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shimmer bounded over the dirt-road battlefield in long leaps, her wings buoying her along the way. It was a grotesque sight, with Shimmer’s caved in chest and bone armor giving her a decidedly ghoulish appearance as she trailed blood across the road, though the amount of blood and amount of chest-indentation did decrease every second as the Lunar’s regeneration charms worked their best to patch her up on the go.

The assistance from Shimmer was well needed: Blueblood’s mastery of celestial water dragon style had granted him control of all fluids, to the point that he had gained control of Speaker’s limbs by bending Speaker’s blood to his will, through a potent magical martial imposition of will and essence. Sure, Speaker could still throw Gift at Blueblood by floating it up from the ground and flinging it at him, but without control of his limbs he couldn’t execute attacks powerful enough to really do any damage… trying to simply cut a master of water dragon style was like trying to cut into an ocean: Any damage was simply absorbed in a sea of water essence.

Shimmer’s last leap was assisted by a powerful beating of her wings, launching her at Blueblood with every one of her limbs poised to strike: Four powerful sets of claws, each with six inch silvery talons and along with her beak open to bite down hard – and the second she slammed into Blueblood Speaker saw  his chance to strike, thrusting Gift at the unicorn while Shimmer held Blueblood tight – but like Sullen Hoof and the now late earth-aspected unicorn stallion, this opened her up to a flurry of attacks from Blueblood. However, unlike Sullen Hoof Shimmer was still covered in her bone-growth armor, though Blueblood was no fool: He aimed for the three places where there was no armor… her eyes.

To Speaker it was a relief to suddenly regain control of his own body as Shimmer tumbled away with Blueblood in her beastpony form. It was less nice when Blueblood, with three swift but well-aimed swipes of his hoof-mounted dragon claws quite effectively blinded her… still, she was holding on tight and Speaker saw his cue to strike at Blueblood, if not to kill then to incapacitate… by massive bloodloss... so he groaned as his lacerated limbs strained to rear him up for a brief gallop towards the two, Gift poised to strike, the gyroscopic chakram blazing with golden essence like a small comet about to strike.

…just as Speaker was about to strike Blueblood simply smirked and employed that simplest of truisms regarding all water: It flows. Thus, suffusing his own body with water essence the unicorn slipped from Shimmer’s tight grasp with unearthly grace, slipping out just as Speaker was but inches away from him.

It wasn’t possible for Speaker to stop this late in his swing, but he did manage to will Gift to retract it blades before he tumbled into Shimmer, resulting in him hitting Shimmer harmlessly.

Like a cat Shimmer almost instantly recovered from her tumble to face Blueblood again – Speaker taking precious more seconds to get up as the wounds on his legs made supporting his own weight a painful affair, even with his anesthetic charm working on himself.

“Stay down – I know just how to handle him” Shimmer said, her beak filthy with blood and dirt.

Speaker wanted to say something to remind Shimmer not to kill Blueblood – but at this point he wasn’t really sure he cared anymore…

Shimmer proceeded to leap at Blueblood, clawing wildly in literally blind fury. Like swinging a blade against rain even her strongest cuts did nothing: Between Blueblood’s black jade armor and the powers of damage absorption conferred by his magical martial arts, her strikes did nothing.

Blueblood laughed: “Foolish anathema, you are nothing against the might of the chosen of Danaa’d. It will be my pleasure to kill you and creation will be all the better for it”

As he made a short leap backwards, Shimmer ‘looked’ frantically  for Blueblood – her large horned-owl like ears swiveling around frantically to locate her foe. With the quiet of a still pond Blueblood circled around her, positioning himself for a deathblow.

Speaker tried to call out to warn Shimmer, but Blueblood seized control of Speaker’s blood once more and forced his lips shut as he moved into position.

With a single graceful leap, right forehoof poised to plunge its jade claws into Shimmer’s neck, it being wreathed in a typhoon of swirling razor-ice. Part of Speaker didn’t want to worry: Shimmer had told of how she had defeated many wyld hunts, including ones with masters of celestial dragon styles, but this… this didn’t look good.

It turned out that Speaker needn’t worry: Suddenly shapeshifting a hole into her neck as Blueblood struck, Shimmer left the unicorn hitting only air as he landed on her back. Then her wings unfurled and trapped Blueblood, who simply laughed: “You foolish creature: Defile your form as much as you want. I will give you a pony’s death and see you buried accordingly”

Shimmer remained silent, though Speaker could see on her beak that she was smiling. It was then that Shimmer dropped down to the ground as her fore and hind legs all twisted upwards to stab at Blueblood again with their six inch moonsilver claws.

Blueblood barely even made any visible effort to avoid getting hit: “This again? You anathema never learn, do you”

“Oh sure we do – and this lesson was one I mastered almost a century ago” Shimmer stated with no small amount of barely suppressed malicious glee as she struck Blueblood on both sides of his flanks and both of his shoulders at the same time, her limbs twisted around in ways only made possible via shapeshifting charms.

…then all of Blueblood’s limbs turned into water and splashed onto Shimmer’s back, leaving Blueblood nothing but a body and a head that tumbled down on the ground: “Whoa!”

Flipping her legs down again, Shimmer got up and helped Speaker to stand. It was then that the loud and sickening series of cracks signaled that the earth aspected unicorn had been destroyed… and the two looked over to see Sullen Hoof half-burried in stone and rocks, more dead than alive.

With strength Speaker didn’t really know he had left, the Lookshyan stallion quickly galloped over to Sullen Hoof, Shimmer in hot pursuit. Fixing the internal trauma was difficult, but Shimmer quickly stabilized Sully as Speaker prepared crank out another medical miracle.

One barge-load of essence later, and Sullen Hoof was able to stand again – albeit weakly. Speaker noted that it would be at least a few hours before he was fully recovered, as Shimmer closed up Speaker’s own wounds – taking care to prevent scaring: “You know, most Lunars carry their scars with pride – I don’t see any shame in carrying the scars from the Butcher of the hunt, especially since we beat him”

Speaker looked into the ground, unsure at first of what to say. The sight of Blueblood in his quadriplegic state had finally caught up with , now that everything had settled down… and that sight had horrified Speaker beyond words. It reminded him of the horror he had committed upon that Waterwalker back in Chung Do… but he had done that out of desperation to save others… this had been done with malice aforethought… and right now Shimmer was using her shapeshifting powers to meld Speaker’s flesh back together after he had all but drained himself to heal Sullen Hoof. There were also the disgusting popping sounds as Shimmer’s chest reinflated, her own regeneration charm knitting her back together and putting rib-fragments back in place. At least she was back in her normal pony form.

“Nothing? Ok… your choice” Shimmer mused, continuing her work with a smile on her lips.

A short while later, with everyone patched up, the question became of what to do with Blueblood, the dead unicorns and all the mortal ponies in the pit. The dead air aspected unicorn that Shimmer and Cash had slain, and the earth aspected unicorn that Sully’s neverborn tears had destroyed would need to be returned to the realm so their families could burry them – and the mortal ponies needed money to be able to travel home.

An offer was given for all those who wished to remain with the circle and settle down in or around Chung Do –the city still having plenty of room for new citizens since the plague’s death-toll. None were interested… likely because most of the ponies had family back on the blessed isle that would stand to be punished if they defected, plus few of them even spoke rivertongue. Ultimately the cargo carts with the hunt’s supplies was pulled up from the pit – along with everyone else – and the supplies were given to the mortal ponies for the trip him. The circle even let the mortal monks keep their weapons, and to Speaker’s surprise none of them exploited that to try to attack the circle…

From the two unicorns there was little in the way of spoils. The air aspected mare had been utterly crushed upon impacting the three thick trees after Cash had struck the cocoon she was in. A blue jade infinite chakram was recovered from the air aspected mare’s crushed body, but everyone in the circle agreed that this artifact should be returned, along with the corpse, to the dead unicorn mare’s family.

While the mortal monks packed up their gear and prepared to return home, Shimmer had a poke at Blueblood – namely to answer a question that had been nagging her: “He should have run out of essence long before we stopped fighting – I want to know why that didn’t happen… I mean, his anima flux never even appeared”

Stripping the quadriplegic unicorn of his armor, Shimmer quickly found her answer: Twin bandoliers of essence-laden gemstones, most of which were depleted and crumbling because of it.

“I’ve heard of this… but I’ve never seen it used back in Lookshy, they consider it too wasteful” Speaker noted, explaining that the things are charged in ways not unlike how the Bodhisatva had said that the soulfire gems of the underworld are charged – but unlike the soulfire gems, then these were one-time use items.

Cash threw a respectful nod at Blueblood: “Well, he clearly understands his shortcomings compared to celestial exalted, and prepared accordingly. That’s smart”

“It also means that he’s not at all drained of essence – so don’t get too close” Shimmer warned.

The Eclipse Caste pony simply smiled: “Hey, I just need to talk to him – nothing drastic – the plan is still to fix him and release him”

“Before you do that I’d like some time to recover my essence: If something goes wrong while your mess with his head I want to be able to help” Speaker noted.

Shimmer nodded: “He still has his horn – he could blast you with an elemental bolt right now if he wanted…”

“And yet he does not – I’m sure he’s just bitter that he was defeated by us like this” Cash mused, stepping over to Blueblood and poking him with a hoof. The pony body and head simply remained still, Blueblood’s face locked in an intense and furious grimace, with his eyes closed.
Floating Blueblood up, so the unicorn’s head was level with Cash’s own while Blueblood’s body dangled helplessly, Cash gave the immaculate monk a thorough lookover: “You know, for a pony this driven, if I just tweaked his goals a little, he would be a great ally”

“Don’t you dare – for what he’s done he’ll pay dearly, just not today” Shimmer barked, still not happy that Blueblood wasn’t to be executed.
Sunrise stepped up to Cash: “Hold on – what are you planning on doing to him? Heath Rose explicitly asked us not to mess him!”

“No, she said that we should avoid doing anything that might prevent him from keeping his position was Pinnacle of the hunt. I just want to change how he conducts his hunts a little…” Cash said in a sly tone, explaining that from his observations of Blueblood so far, even in his limb-less state, and thanks to his charms, he had discerned what Blueblood ultimately wanted.

It turned out, according to Cash, that upon peering into Peleps Blueblood’s soul he had seen a burning wish to reform the immaculate faith to fit Blueblood’s own interpretation of immaculate dogma… this quickly became too much for the unicorn, hearing his inner most secrets divulged so freely: “Be silent! My personal ambitions are not for anathema to know or hear!”

“Aww look, I touched a nerve” Cash said with a chuckle.

This did not please Blueblood who in turn got steaming mad – snorting out of a small gush of smoke and breathing heavily in an agitated manner.

“I’m just going to make him change his priorities a little – focus a little more on not killing ponies, but do everything else as usual. When I’m done with him and he gets back to the hunt’s high command he’ll want to reform the hunt a bit, so it takes prisoners instead of simply killing everyone they deem anathema” Cash declared. He didn’t seem to care that Blueblood was hearing everything – he was supremely convinced that Blueblood wouldn’t be able to resist his powers of persuasion. 

Blueblood wasn’t impressed, appearing quite insulted that Cash seemed to think so poorly of his powers to resist Anathema. This was the last straw.

As Blueblood drew in a deep breath, Cash laughed in bemusement. He could not see the roiling water essence filling Blueblood’s lungs, nor did Cash understand that ultimately the most powerful aspect of water was that of western storms and the tidal waves that often spawned because of them. As a master of water dragon style Peleps Blueblood knew this well – for to master the style one must learn to replicate this phenomena in a mighty essence-laden warcry – a tsunami force shout.

To Speaker, who was content to have a few hours of peace and quiet before Cash and Sunrise began their mind-fuckery of Blueblood, his medical mindset meant that what followed was observed in painful detail, despite it only taking a split second:

As Blueblood exhale with the same force that every year claimed over a thousand lives in the west,  the skin on Cash’s head began to peel away. It started at the lips, nose and eyes. The constant stream of water essence kept everything immaculately clean, so no blood was visible. Just as the last shreds of skin detached from the back of Cash’s head his connective tissue and sub-derbal muscle tissue began to fray and tear away. Jaw muscle, muscles at the front of the throat and neck, muscles at the back of the neck and top of the spine. It was during this that Cash’s eyes finally popped like stomped grapes. 

It was just as Cash’s lower jaw shattered and blew away in a shower of teeth and bone fragments, along with most of Cash’s upper jaw’s teeth, that the tentacle-leg that Shimmer had shot at Cash and Blueblood finally reached them, flicking Blueblood’s head upwards so the remaining few split seconds of the tsunami shout simply blew up into the sky.

Speaker hadn’t even noticed himself getting up or breaking into a gallop towards the two.  His diagnostic charm screamed at him that Cash beyond saving – being little more than a jellied brain in a skull from the shoulders and up. This was not something he could fix.

It was then that Shimmer crashed into Cash, having used her tentacle-shapeshifted foreleg to pull her in – but she just impact Cash… she dissolved into him, and him into her… it was clearly some kind of shapeshifting method, but…

“Painkiller – now!” Shimmer’s voice suddenly sounded. It came from the amorphous pile of Shimmer and Cash. They appeared like a pil of moonsilver-infused clay with splotches of gold in it. Or maybe hairy peat was a better world for it...

Standing dumfounded as he threw his anesthetic charm at the pile – not even sure if it would work on such a mix of two ponies – Speaker simply shook his head slowly, blinking.

As the mix of Cash and Shimmer began to separate, reforming into a really creepy mix of Cash and Shimmer where the two appeared joined at the neck, but then separating into two heads, it became clear what Shimmer’s idea was: She was now breathing for both herself and Cash – and the silvery veins that had sprung up around Cash’s skull seemed to have stabilized his brain for the time being.

“Amazing…” Speaker mouthed, still in shock.

A sharp pain suddenly spread over the back of Speaker’s head, Sunrise having just slapped him: “Do something you idiot!”

Snapping back into reality, Speaker quickly went to work. He had precious little essence to work with, but ultimately enough to pop off a single healing charm, a medical excellency and another run of his diagnostic charm. It was by no means enough to fully heal Cash – but then again, without Shimmer’s quick thinking and very much unorthodox way of providing emergency life-support, Cash would already be dead.

By the time Speaker was done regenerating what he could with his current supply of essence, he had managed to remove all the teeth that had lodged themselves into Cash’s spine, and restored enough muscle tissue around Cash’s neck that his head wasn’t just dangling by his spinal cord.

Cash still couldn’t breathe on his own, plus his skull and upper spinal column was cracked and splintered in so many places that Speaker had simply stopped counting. At least, on a somewhat positive note, Cash appeared to have remained unconscious  throughout all of this.
Blueblood was dealt with via a hole in the ground and him going in head first – leaving only his leg-less flanks exposed – while the rest of the circle settled down for the evening.

Without Cash, the circle had little use of Nah – but without Shimmer able to function fully, her having to dedicate most of her attention to manually maintaining Cash’s chakras to avoid his soul falling out of his body, then the circle had no means to swift travel.

To this end Speaker and Sully went about constructing a shelter for the night – a simple but very well made wooden cottage, only pausing whenever Speaker had enough essence to give Cash another round of regeneration.

None in the circle debated how this experience might affect Cash – or if there was even anything truly left of him. Such hard questions would first be answered once Cash’s body was healed.

By morning Cash’s body had been mended to the point that he had one working eye back, which whenever Speaker’s anethstetic charm lapsed began to look around frantically and tear up profusely – for Cash had no other means of communicating, though the message was clear: the pain he was still suffering was immense.

Still, with but one eye – lidless and constantly weeping – as his only way of sensing the world around him (his spine having been damaged to the point of rendering him paralyzed from the neck down) Cash was still able to use his charms. He mainly used the one that allowed him to communicate perfectly though body-language without speaking. His message was clear and simple: 

“Kill me”

> Chapter 71: Atonement of Sins Most Foul
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the lone wooden cabin situated in the middle of nowhere, not far from Chung Do, the circle huddled around the stone hearth as Speaker and Shimmer regenerated Cash’s flesh, grew back his teeth, retrieved the teeth that had been forced down into lungs and disposed of them.

As Cash’s condition improved the messages he sent non-verbally also improved, though he did request that any bits of skin and flesh from his head that had been torn off be recovered and stored elsewhere... he didn't specify for what, but he seemed eerily happy when he was presented with most of the skin from his head. It had peeled back like a banana from the front of his face to the back of his neck, so it was almost in one piece… lush blond mane and all. Cash clumsily put it elsewhere once his spine was healed, allowing his use of his body again.

By their second day in the cabin Cash was well enough to ride Nah. The circle abandoned the cabin, though they left behind a plaque outside to commemorate their battle and the defeat of Peleps Blueblood.

Speaking of which, they found the Lord of t he wyld hunt half a mile away, having apparently conjured elemental water into his hole and floated up and out of it, then worming his way away. He was not pleased to see the circle again, and attempted to use his tsunami force shout once more, but Shimmer used Lunar tricks to deceive his eyes and ears – making him waste his essence. With that done Shimmer used her flesh-melding charm to seal Blueblood’s mouth… he wasn’t saying anything with it anyway.

“Won’t he starve?” Sullen Hoof wondered.

Shimmer shrugged, not really caring either way: “He’s tough, he can take it. I’ve gone for without eating anything”

“It doesn’t count if you’ve shapeshifted into a tree” Speaker noted as Shimmer tossed a now essence-string cocooned Blueblood up on Nah’s howdah.

As the circle gathered up on Nah, Cash slowly took the reins with shaky hooves. He looked somewhat out of character: It wasn’t his heavenly silks, now his magical shoes… Cash looked unsure of himself, glancing every so often over on the cocoon.

“Don’t worry – he’s facing away from us. Even Blueblood is mad enough to blast through his own mouth, he’ll only end up hurting himself” Sunrise said to reassure Cash.

Back in Chung Do it took a few days before Cash had regained enough confidence to have another go at Blueblood.

The unicorn had been hoisted up Twin Fountain Square, where all could see him. Sunrise had loudly proclaimed to the masses who their captive was and what he had been trying to do. Suffice to say the ponies of Chung Do in turn expressed their dislike. When Cash and Sunrise finally came to pick up Blueblood and take him to the castle for a final round of ‘polite talking ‘. Blueblood was caked and soaked in juices from spoiled fruits and vegetabes, plus it seemed that someone had tied a big paint-brush on a stick and decorated the hapless unicorn. 

With no mouth the unicorn obviously couldn’t speak – and indeed he did look rather hungry – but Cash was able to read Blueblood’s hateful looks and defiant wiggles just fine: “What we’re going to do to you? We are going to tell you certain truths, truths that will hopefully make you change your ways – nothing drastic, just some information on the nature of the celestial exalted”

The information given to Blueblood was simple enough: The unicorn was explained, thoroughly, how Solar and Lunar exaltations would simply reincarnate of their bearers were slain – so if the wyld hunt was to be improved, it should start capturing such anathema, not simply kill them.

Blueblood was understandably skeptical about this – namely because he though Cash and Sunrise were lying to him constantly. Sunrise ultimately spun the story in a way that Blueblood seemed to buy: “The evil powers that we gain our powers from are freed when you kill us – they can then seek out and tempt others in sin. Capturing anathema and holding them prisoner prevents their evil from simply seeking other hosts”

Sunrise wrapped up the séance by using her memory reweaving technique to make Blueblood forget that he had taken captive, as well as forget that he had gotten ideas put into his head against his will – though the idea of taking anathema captive was made to remain. 

Thus the infamous unicorn, the Butcher of the Wyld Hunt, Pelebs Blueblood was released far to the west of Chung Do, bearing only the marks of mild torment and the memories of having been captured, publicly humiliated, and released to spread the dire warnings of the powerful anathema protecting the Chung lands in the hundred kingdoms. It would be months before he would reach realm controlled territory.

It was thus, with many a great sighs of relief that the circle celebrated their victory in Chung Do. The celebration lasted well into the wee hours, but at dawn the circle was not greeted with hangovers and merry memories – but instead cries of horror from one of the servants at the castle, as the young colt ran through the halls screaming bloody murder.

From their room Speaker and Shimmer quickly ran out, Speaker still fiddling around with the buttons on his old uniform.

It turned out to be a false alarm: The young servant had woken up in the bed of one of his superiors, with little but a hazy recollection of last night’s events. Upon reviewing the most recent content of his Recorder of Everlasting Glories, Cash confirmed that the two castle servants had been flirting and drinking with each other.

“Ugh… so can we go back to bed?” Shimmer groaned, looking out of one of the castle windows. It was barely even dawn.

Cash shrugged: “Why not…”

For the first time in a good while the circle relaxed for a good day or so, resting well on their laurels. The young Shogun was similarly at ease, knowing that Chung Do was safe once again.

The next day the circle flew off to Sunhill after having lunch. Speaker wanted to check up on the hospital, especially in case there had arrived any new patients requiring his care, while Sunrise wanted to minister to the ponies of Sunhill. Cash in turn felt that a visit to Stygia was due, to see about that council spot his grand jade daiklaive had gotten him…

All of their plans, however, were dashed the moment they got close enough to Sunhill that Sullen Hoof’s charm-enhanced hearing could pick out the screams and shouts down on the ground: “They’re being raided!”

Cash yanked on Nah’s reins, the flying yeddim groaning in a long and rumbling fashion as it dove towards the dimly lit city. In the dusky light it was just barely possible to get by on the ground without a torch, while Cash had the lights atop of the Sunhill Manse to navigate by.

The circle readied themselves for combat, all except Speaker, who instead pulled out the hearthstone of the Sunhill manse and closed his eyes.

Above the manse lights suddenly flared into being. They soon focused into cones aimed down to the ground, scanning over the surface and locking on to each of the raiders. A the same time Speaker’s voice boomed out from hidden essence resonators: “Beware all you who trespass on Sunhill! Its guardians approach and your punishment will be swift and terrible! Citizens of Sunhill, seek refuge in the city manse – its doors will hold the raiders out”

To the ponies running the streets, seeing the manse spring alive with lights and the voice of the Solar lords of the place was met with mixed reactions: The raiders noped out, dropped whatever loot they were carrying, and began to gallop off – while the denizens and legit visitors or travelers in Sunhill made for the manse.

As Nah neared the ground and followed the searchlights, Sullen Hoof and Shimmer quickly crashed into the biggest groups of raiders. Sunrise equally leapt off, though not to fight: She rallied the ponies of Sunhill and organized the ponies running for shelter in the manse.

It took a little less than a few minutes to round up most of the raiders. From the lights of silvery and golden glowing animas it was possible to tell that the raiders had been mortal ponies, some clad in piecemeal armor, some only armed with clubs.

Cash put Nah down next to the tangled pile of prisoners between Sully and Shimmer in the western main square of the city. It had only taken them the first short seconds between jumping off Nah and Cash landing Nah to catch all the raiders within reach.

The search lights soon faded, Speaker not being able to detect any more raiders through the manse – though how he did that was something Sullen Hoof was quite curious about: “Wait, how?”

“The searchlights was the combination of three primary functions of the manse: It can project images, lights, sound and allows me to sense everything that happens within its area of influence… as its hearthstone-bearer I can focus on the stone, and sense everything in and around the manse… a then make illusions, sounds and whatnot appear anywhere within that sphere of influence as well” Speaker explained, adding that the intended use of these features are to allow him to guide the hospital staff more efficiently, including looking in on operations, medical procedures and consultations.

Sully remarked that it also looked to be a dandy surveillance system – but Speaker noted that you could only really focus on one place at a time, so that would require other manse functions as well. 

“Alright, lets round the raiders up and find out where they’re from” Sullen Hoof said in a grim and determined tone. His voiced obviously hinted of the implied cruelties that would be necessary to make the raiders talk.

It was then that Sunrise came stomping into the square, followed by about two-hundred raiders.

At first the circle was alarmed – but then it became obvious that Sunrise was in charge…

It turned out that a group of raiders had followed some of the Sunhill civilians into the manse. Sunrise had come across them and used her charms to mentally dominate the raiders. Exploiting this, she had gotten them to lead her to their camp outside of Sunhill, where she had done the same trick to the rest of the raiders that had gotten out of the city.

“I’ve made sure they’re very sorry, and will help us form a military to defend Sunhill, with them as our first recruits” Sunrise asserted, much like a teacher listing off what her students had agreed to do.

Speaker and Shimmer both found this turn of events quite amusing. The pile of beat-up raiders in the square were less amused, a few of them groaning that they felt a bit cheated.

“Don’t fret – there’s plenty of mindcontrol charms to go around” Cash noted, returning from having parked Nah in its appropriate stable.

In retrospect it might have worried some, but at this point the circle felt sufficiently at ease with using mind-altering charms to make enemies into allies, and thus they spent the next few days turning the raiders into an armed defence force for Sunhill. Equally, the now ex-raiders told that they were mercenaries hired by one of the neighboring warlords to probe Sunhill. This led to Cash and Sullen Hoof taking Nah to visit said warlord, either to form a non-aggression pact via Cash’s skills of diplomacy, or for Sullen Hoof to do a little assassination and then let the warlord’s territories fall into a war of succession.

It a day after Cash and Sully had left, around noon, that Speaker suddenly got a magical messenger from Shimmer that quickly stated: “Come to the manse, meeting room 2, big fucking emergency”

Sighing, Speaker looked around. He was in the northern main square, which had been repurposed slightly as a parade ground, with one of the nearby tenements having been turned into barracks for the city’s new armed forced. The square was filled with the two or so hundred ponies that made up the fledgeling Sunhill Army, made up of roughly two thirds former mercenaries and one third volunteers, most of which had been active in Brookside’s neighborhood watch/defense force. Suffice to say that they were thoroughly undisciplined and were barely able to hold on to weapons properly.

“Ok, I have to leave for a moment – everyone continue on the drills I showed you until I get back, or the dining halls call in for dinner” Speaker shouted, galloping off and using his jumping and balance charms to quickly cover the distance to the manse.

Up in meeting room two, Speaker found Shimmer, Sunrise and… the mare from the baths of Venus who had shouted at them. The mare looked… not happy, but more in a sad and horrified way, not in an angry way.

“Ok, what’s going on?” Speaker asked, unsure of what to expect from the situation.

Sunrise exhaled, then took a deep breath: “Speaker, this is Iron Siaka, chosen of Venus – she has… news for us”

Judging from how both Sunrise, Shimmer and Iron Siaka looked, then Speaker quickly figured that it likely wasn’t good news. He nodded towards Siaka, to signal her to speak.

The previously angry mare looked thoroughly remorseful. It was clearly difficult for her to look any of the ponies in the room in the eyes, which clashed oddly with her martial attire which otherwise signaled a strong and confident type: “I… I’m sorry”

Shimmer waved a hoof around in a circular motion: “…and?”

Iron Siaka took a deep breath and looked towards Speaker: “I was sent by the bronze faction to spy on you, after you left Yu Shan. I followed you to Chung Do, and reported back to Yu Shan everything you did there. I’ve just found out what that information was used for…”

Speaker did not like where this was going.

“…I think my superiors sent the information to the Deathlords. I know this because I got a warning to leave Chung Do after heavenly fate augers tracked two abyssals heading there. I came back after they said it was safe, and I found this” Iron Siaka lamented, retrieving a scroll from elsewhere. 

The scroll was wrought of rough ash-grey paper, and the writing on it was in old realm.

Sunrise read out loud: “To the circle of solars that has caused me and my peers much grief. I have ordered the juvenile Shogun of Chung Do captured. His continued safety depends entirely on whether you all stay out of me and my peers’ work for the next several years. Chung Onyx will be returned unharmed, unaged and without memory of his capture at the time of the conclusion of me and peers’ work. This should be in around five to fifteen years or so”

Speaker looked incredulously at Sunrise: “...who sent it”

Sunrise grimaced: “It is signed ‘The Barbate Arbiter of Unbounded Gravitas and Unremitting Strife, Deathlord by the will of the Neverborn”

There was silence over the meeting room so loud that it was deafening. When a servant came in with tea and biscuits everyone but ever-stoic Sunrise were startled, but at least it made everyone start talking again.

“Iron Siaka, what exactly did you think the information you gathered would be used for?” Shimmer wondered.

The sidereal shrugged: “The usual, I guess. I thought Chung Do, or maybe the juve-Shogun would get cursed astrologically, or linked with a bad destiny – not sold out to the freaking deathlords”

Sunrise remained silent, glaring intently at the scroll. Speaker shook his head in anger: “I bet this is revenge for Cash taking over the Streets of Swords district”

Iron Siaka gave Speaker a very confused look: “Your friend took over what?”

“One of the twelve districts of Stygia, the capital city of the underworld, long story – and Speaker, I don’t think that’s all. Remember all the deathknights we killed or captured up around Chung Do, I’m sure the Arbiter was pissed about that – the information Siaka gave just told him how to get to us” Shimmer noted, giving Siaka a look that was more of pity than of anger, before finally adding: “Speaker, is she telling the truth?”

To the best of his abilities and charms Speaker could not discern any lies from what Iron Siaka had been saying.

It was then that Sunrise spoke, addressing the sidereal: “If Red was still alive she would have ripped you apart, even if you are but a harbinger of bad news. Pray that her next incarnation is more merciful. In the mean time, Shimmer, send a message to Cash and Sully to return with Nah”

“Yes, and then message the Bodhisattva to arrange a meeting, let’s say somewhere in Stygia, to help find Chung Onyx” Speaker added.

Shimmer, still giving Iron Siaka the same sorry look, approached the sidereal and put a gentle hoof up on the armored mare’s shoulder: “and you get to inform the gold faction of what you’ve done, including any and all evidence that shows your superiors giving the information to the deathlords”

Iron Siaka did not look happy about this request, but she didn’t appear surprised by it either: “I’m afraid that won’t help much. The information was sent to one of the Green Mare’s dead drops, and I do not know on who’s orders that was – and I doubt anyone will ever admit to it”  

“My truth-telling charm can find who gave that order” Speaker noted through gritted teeth.

Iron Siaka sighed and explained that enough essence could mask such lies – and a bit more essence, used differently, could mask the use of essence to begin with, so essence sight wouldn’t help to reveal charm-based cover-ups. Speaker was not pleased.

“Assigning blame beyond the bronze faction as a whole isn’t necessary. We know why they did it, now we have to fix things. Shimmer, send those messages – everyone else go do what is needed and prepare for battle” Sunrise said with a notably raised voice.

Speaker turned to leave, to wrap things up with the Sunhill militia and the hospital as quickly as possible. Just as he was about to exit the meeting room with Sunrise, who was likely going to clear her schedule as well, Iron Siaka called out: “Wait – can I come? I want to help”

Looking at Sunrise, Speaker’s look clearly communicated his disapproval, but Sunrise didn’t seem to care as she turned to the martial sidereal: “Right now we only need information, and we know that the Bureau of Destiny has little in the way of informants in the underworld. But when the time comes for the rescue itself you’re welcome to join, provided that you can leave any bronze faction misgivings about us behind you while working with us”

“Where will you go for information? I’ll wait for you there” Iron Siaka said earnestly, sounding almost desperate to be there to help as quickly as possible.

Sunrise looked up at Speaker, who at this point simply shook his head and walked off, leaving Sunrise to instruct the young sidereal on where in Stygia they might meet.

Giving the Sunhill militia some quick instructions before heading back to the hospital manse to check on the few patients there, Speaker couldn’t help but fear that Iron Siaka was a bronze faction plant sent to betray the circle, rather than help…

About an hour later Cash and Sullen Hoof arrived. They barely had touched Nah down outside the Sunhill manse before Shimmer appeared, chucking several sealed barrels of food and drink up on the howdah, herself joining moments later. Speaker in turn leapt on board with Sunrise on his back.

“So, where are we going?” Cash wondered, not even questioning why Shimmer had saddled them up with enough supplies to last a month. Shimmer took a deep breath, steadying herself as she peered up at the Sunhill manse: “Stygia. The Bodhisattva replied, says he’ll have someone ready to meet us in the Street of Swords district, at Stalwart’s old mansion”

Nodding, Cash made Nah fly off at great speed. Once up in the sky, an issue came up: Would Nah be able to fly into the underworld? Cash’s answer: “No – because this isn’t Nah, it’s the yeddim we bought to fly back from Wavecrest. Didn’t we name this one Han?”

Polite discussion on yeddim naming conventions ensued, though regarding the original topic Cash noted that one of the charms he had recently developed was one that would magically steady any beast he was helming: “We all know that yeddim are stupid, but with this charm you could set it on fire and it still wouldn’t care – it’ll fly into the underworld just fine”

It was about then that Shimmer wondered why Cash was flying almost due west, instead of south towards Great Forks and shadowland known as The Walker’s Realm.

“Well, the Bodhisattva said that that shadowland was cursed, right? You all remember how that flying construct began to shake when we crossed into it? The curse was ripping the thing apart! I don’t think a living mount would last long in that” Cash explained as the yeddim flew across a vast plain of tiered rice-paddies filled with ponies.

Shimmer agreed that such a route made an awful lot of sense all things considered, though she was still weary of how the yeddim would fare while in Stygia.

“Good point, but this one was fed and watered before we left –it won’t need to bed fed again for days – we just have to find a safe place to stash him in Stygia, and I think I have the authority to see to that” Cash noted.

Approaching the absolutely massive shadowland known as the Black Chase, the western half of which being where Sijan was, was a strange sight. Most of the chase was filled with highly contrasting pine-trees: black needles on ash-white wood made the whole forest look really strange. Sijan itself was a more dour sight, with its vast plain of tombs, crypts and graves spread out as if suburbs to the central Sijan necropolis. Between all the grey and black stone buildings, and the fact that no grass grew in the shadowland, made the whole place look very bleak.

Speaker found the flight over the outskirts of Sijan quite interesting: Apparently his essence sight showed him how the entire landscape of Sijan was built according to some really neat first age geomantic principles, though he couldn’t identify the effect of it all.

“Hey Speaker, did Sijan exist in the first age?” Sullen Hoof wondered.

Thinking for a moment, Speaker nodded: “Sort of. There was a Sijan before theh primordial war, but it was annihilated when a primordial died over it – that’s what created the black chase shadowland. The Sijan we know today was built after the primordial war as a place to burry all the dead – and there were a lot of dead following that war…”

“Hold on – shouldn’t Sijan be bigger then?” the Orichalcum Chef asked, finding it odd that Sijan could have remained so small for so long.
Cash let out a loud “Ha!” – then explained that from what he could tell in Stygia, then less than one in a hundred ghost stayed behind for more than a few years: “Once they’ve resolved whatever issues that made them stay – assuming they get the chance for that. I once traveled alongside a Sijaneese corpse caravan. They told me that one of the biggest businesses Sijan deals in is specifically helping a ghost to get in touch with family or loved ones, or whatever, so they can say goodbye properly and pass on. When a ghost jumps in the river, their ‘home’ or grave becomes vacant for all intents and purposes”

None in the circle thought to ask what happened with the mortal remains that such a ghost would leave behind – but then again, certain questions are best left unanswered.

As the sun set and the circle transisioned fully into the underworld, Cash snapped Han’s reigns, making the yeddim speed away towards Stygia. The dim stars of the calendar of Setesh lit the way, and soon the factories, workshops and foundries of The Street of Swords rose from the suburbs of Stygia…

Landing in a mostly empty square, Cash quickly retrieved his black jade sword, the symbol of office that granted him domain over the district. Waving the sword around, Cash quickly convinced a group of nearby ghosts to find somewhere suitable for Han to be stabled, while the circle made way towards the former lord of the district’s mansion.

At the mansion, with the square where the circle had fought against the twice-risen undead, the circle was greeted by a dour looking mare. It was difficult to tell if she was a deathknight or a ghost – either way she was dressed in black rags, had a pale ash-grey coat, and appeared to have no face… as if she had taken a big cleaver to the side of her head, right before the ears.

“I am The Bearer Of Titles Unoriginal, and you must be the circle that the Bodhisattva told me to meet with” the mare without a face somehow said… without having a mouth, or nose. Her voice was unpleasant to hear, not unlike a feminine version of the Bodhisatva’s beyond-the-grave voice.

Sunrise nodded, stepping forth: “We’re here seeking information about the Barbate Arbiter. He has something we want”

The seemingly ironically named deathknight shook her head: “I’ll have to ask around for clues on that. In the meanwhile the one among you called Charmer has a meeting with the other Stygian lords at their council. They also want him to bring a good singer – it was Stalwart’s turn to bring entertainment and cake. You don’t have to bring cake”

Cash arrived just in time to hear the mention of not having to bring cake: “Excellent – Sunrise, you’re with me then”

Thus the circle agreed to part, Sullen Hoof, Shimmer and Speaker going to see the Bodhisattva, while Cash and Sunrise proceeded to the city council meeting. One thing Cash did before the circle split up was show how he was going look at the meeting…

“Since when did you learn disguise charms this advanced?” Shimmer inquired curiously, as Cash spun essence into potent illusions around himself, giving him that semi-transparent ghostly look, topped off with using his own torn-off face as a very macabre mask.

Speaker didn’t really pay attention to Cash’s explanation on how Sullen Hoof had been, at Cash’s request, teaching him disguise charms, mainly because he found Cash’s new appearance positively nauseating, with only the illusion-shatering powers of his essence sight allowing him to look at Cash without feeling sick.

The strangely named deathknight led Shimmer, Sully and Speaker off to seek information on the Barbate Arbiter while Cash and Sunrise were guided by ghosts to the palace of the twin monarchs, where the city council met.

While enroute to wherever they were going, Shimmer simply had to ask: “So… your name, uhm… title, what’s the deal?”

The faceless deathknight threw Shimmer a look that – under the kind of normal circumstances that involved actually having a face, with expressive eyes and whatnot – might very well have been very tired and disapproving, then shook her head and sighed: “The Barbate Arbiter originally gave me the title of Scribe of Lethal Linguistics. He lured me into this with promises of revenge on the cretins in Nexus high society that drove me into suicide by public ridicule. I was fine with that, but when he wanted me to send necromantic letter-bombs with killing words all over creation… “

The deathknight mare elaborated, adding that the Arbiter seemed to generally target creative ponies who were betrayed somehow for abyssal exaltation. This kind of strangely specific exaltation pattern was apparently common among the deathlords, but as the deathknight pointed out: “It also means that not everyone who gets a black exaltation are fit to wield one… and not all deathlords are equally apt at weeding out abyssals that aren’t loyal”

“So that’s why you’re helping the Bodhisattva? Are there others like you two?” Sullen Hoof wondered, having taken on a disguise not entirely unlike Cash’s, making him appear like a gaunt ghost in ragged clothing, not unlike the untold millions of ghostly commoners that lived in Stygia. He even used his own burn-scarred face to great effect as part of the ghostly illusion wrapped around himself.

Gazing intently at two of the steel-plated buildings they had just passed, their greasy and rivet-covered facades helping to give the district that distinct oppressive and uncaring feel, the deathkninght stopped: “Hey that’s the archive, we need to go in there – and there probably are others, but many deathknights are still on the fence. A lot feel trapped and lied to by the Deathlords. Few can see a way out. That’s part of what me and the Bodhisatttva are working towards: Finding a way to revert us into Solars… that’ll give a lot of Deathknights hope”
“I guess proving that that’s possible would be interesting” Sullen Hoof mused, not sure what he was feeling about the building they were about to enter. It looked like a metal box.

Stopping at the door, the faceless deathknight turned to gaze intently at Speaker, Shimmer and Sullen Hoof: “It’s imperative that the Bodhisattva succeeds. The Barbate Arbiter might be a jerk, but for all the Deathlords he’s the most popular one among the deathknights. He’s really good at selling others on his projects, and he’s similarly really good at framing his own ideas as very fun and interesting projects. This means that he has a lot of support from deathknights that are loyal to other Deathlords”

“So…finding a way to turn a deathknight into a Solar would give you more allies against the Arbiter? And give him less?” Speaker noted quizzically, him suddenly realizing how oddly similar the Bodhisattva’s plight was to that of the circle with regards to their work in creation, on gaining support and taking support away from their enemies.

The deathknight mare nodded, tiny shreds of flesh around the edge of where her face had been removed jiggling ever so slightly: “That, and as one who has suffered greatly I am sympathetic to the suffering of the Neverborn. I want to ease their pain, but not by killing off the rest of Creation. I’m a poet first, and as such I prefer a living audience, not a dead one… the ghosts around here wouldn’t know good poetry if it slammed them upside the flank – the Bodhisattva’s plan on destroying the neverborn seems a lot simpler than taking on all of Creation and heaven”

“Sunipa would approve” Speaker said, smiling. It pleased him to no end that this deathknight seemed not only to want to ease the suffering of beings in pain, but didn’t want to do so in a reckless manner that would endanger others.

Inside the Street of Swords archive the circle was assailed by a thick smell of embalming fluids, and the mad giggling from a clearly deranged archivist ghost who appeared to be busy stuffing bloated ledgers with blood and guts for reasons no sane being could comprehend.

> Chapter 72: The Polite Raid Where You Just Look Around
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The lady deathknight, who seemed to prefer that Speaker, Shimmer and Sully call her “Tita” wasted no time wrestling the mad ghost in charge of the archive to the ground. With a move that Tita seemed way too comfortable with executing, she ripped the ghost in twain, spraying plasmic fluids all over the floor.

As the half-circle began to sift through the massive archive, the files mostly being made of off-white or ash-grey paper similar to the ransom-note found in Chung Do, it quickly became clear that under Lord Stalwarts the The Street of Swords had consumed millions of ghost slaves in its soulsteel foundries, and over the centuries worked at least half as many into madness and oblivion. One thing the circle couldn’t find was any reason to go through the archive…

“Uhm, what exactly are we looking for?” Speaker wondered out loud.

Tita, annoyed that she had to explain everything, snapped at Speaker: “and here I thought that the Bodhisattva meant it when he’d told me that you were a smart bunch. Isn’t it obvious what we’re looking for?!”

The three celestial exalts giving her quizzical looks told the deathknight that the answer to that question was no.

“Ok – we’re looking for shipping papers. The Street of Swords was, until a week ago, the underworld’s biggest producer of soulsteel. A lot of Deathlords received shipments of the stuff. If you want to know where the Barbate Arbiter is, then look for where he ordered Soulsteel shipped to” Tita explained, her tone condescending, as she tossed around more scrolls and ledgers that clearly didn’t list what she was looking for.

It took about half a second before Shimmer objected: “Hold on – we don’t need to know where the Arbiter is. He kidnapped the younger brother of a former circlemate of ours. We’re here to find where he is and rescue him!”

There was a loud clatter as the deathknight dropped everything she had been floating about herself. She turned around, slowly, to face Shimmer: “Are you fucking kidding me? You just need to go to the quadruple dwelling and poke around… fucking hell did we just waste almost two hours here for nothing?”

“Well you seemed quite certain about what we needed to do – none of us are that familiar with this place” Speaker said apologetically.
Tita wasn’t impressed: “Always double-check when working with someone who had a job delegated to them – do you have any how often stuff gets lost in translation around here?”

A bit of shouting and comparing of notes later, it turned out that the circle needed to go to the Deathlord’s stygian estate – one of the thirteen mansions that surrounded the mouth of the void, the ones that the circle tricked into lockdown earlier to get Sunrise and the Bodhisatva to the mouth of the void itself.

It was decided that the circle would wait for Cash and Sunrise in Stalwart’s mansion. This idea was quickly discarded when it was discovered that the mansion had been thoroughly looted and completely covered in plasmic graffiti… as well as various bodily excressions, primarily large angry rants written in blood or smeared feces. The weird thing about this was that ghosts didn’t eat or excrete, so where that poo was from was anyone’s guess.

Either way: Stalwart had obviously been quite unpopular – and a lot of ghosts had taken the opportunity to vent their frustration on the now quite thoroughly deceased ghost’s home and possessions. Amid the mostly empty streets of the district, the square in front of Stalwart’s mansion was littered with broken furnite – anything that could have been tossed into the street from the place had apparently been treated accordingly.

Sullen Hoof noted that the pattern of destruction, while random and clearly the act of many disparate souls working independently, all bore traits of cathartic release: “The ghosts who did this were very relieved to be able to do enact this”

“Nobody in Stygia liked the idea of a district lord allied with the Deathlords” Tita glumly noted, kicking over a broken chair.

A short while later Cash and Sunrise showed up. Cash had apparently taken off his disguise, but both of them seemed rather amused – the council meeting had apparently gone well.

“Had fun at the meeting?” Shimmer shouted as the two approached.

Cash let out a loud laugh as he got near the circle: “Oh you have no idea. I haven’t seen melodrama like that since once had to foal-sit for this troupe of traveling actors… they were just priceless”

Sunrise added, with a distinct bemused tone, that at the start of the meeting over half of the other councilors thought that Cash had killed and mutilated himself to better fit in with them, due to his disguise. Cash couldn’t help but giggle: “and the other half was so terrified of me pulling a stunt like what I originally did when we walked around here to distract the Deathlords that they constantly tried to prevent me from talking. It was hilarious”

With the circle assembled, Sullen Hoof updated Cash and Sunrise on where they needed to go. As they were all led towards the Arbiter’s Stygian home, Tita warned them about the place: “Of all the Deathlord estates here, the Arbiter keeps his open. Since he’s so popular among the Deathknights the place is often used as a meeting place…”

“So we’re risking running into exactly how many abyssals there?” Speaker asked, not liking the idea of walking into a hotbed of deathknights.

Tita laughed, which looked really weird since she didn’t really have a mouth – only a throat-hole at the bottom of the front of the remaining half of her head: “Yes, yes we are. There will likely be dozens of abyssal there – over fifty when there something interesting going on there – but don’t worry. You see, the place has a very unique dress-code that will keep you all safe, provided that none of you flare your caste mark or anima there”

Tita led the circle to a long line of sheds next to a large walled compound. Sunrise recognized the place as being near the mouth of oblivion – and indeed, everyone in the circle could feel that the air was a bit colder… but oddly enough it also had an ever so slightly calming feel to it. Sunrise noted that it was part of the ‘allure’ of oblivion. Tita chimed in, adding that any pony without enlightened essence would be driven mad by it, and be compelled to jump in into it.

“Lovely – now explain this dress-code thing and how it’ll let us enter, please?” Sullen Hoof inquired, annoyed that Tita seemed so willing to help to talk about other things than the topic at hoof.

Tita opened the door to one the sheds. As the stone door silently swung open a hideous ghostly servant that appeared to have been similarly face-butchered, just like the deathknight, only the ghost’s massive cranial wound was still open and was far more jagged… with several trickles of blood and other messy plasmic fluids leaking out from various bits of dangly flesh. It said nothing, silently ushering the circle inside.

“Ok, here’s the deal: The Barbate Arbiter has a massive hate-boner on glory-hounds. To this end he demands that all deathknights in his service gets the facejob. He calls us his faceless legion” Tita said, gesturing to her mutilated head.

Pointing to a rack of black cloaks, with large slightly luminescent clasps set with large green gems, Tita continued: “The Arbiter has decreed that seeking personal glory is the greatest source of strife and failures there is – so everyone who wants to help out at the Quadruple Dwelling of Chthonian Desolation, the Arbiter’s estate next door here – has to use these: They make you look like me, via illusions, and prevent you from saying your name”

“Cash, correct me if I’m wrong, but organizing ponies so they work together with no prospects of individual credit to for their work… that doesn’t strike me as a very good way of making ponies work for you” Speaker wondered out loud.

Cash, already trying on different cloaks to find one that fit, mused: “Actually it can work really well – Tita, tell me, how does the Arbiter reward his agents for a job well done?”

“He doesn’t reward individuals. If the whole of the faceless finishes a project, or accomplishes a worthwhile deed, then the whole is collectively rewarded with access to new tools and libraries of ancient knowledge. The Arbiter encourages his agents to make the things they need themselves –  and similarly he often allows deathknights from other Deathlords to participate in faceless projects, as long as credit is only given to the faceless” Tita notes, wondering if the circle at all understood how out of the ordinary it was to see a Deathlord willingly letting agents of other Deathlords use his workshops and libraries to their own ends.

As everyone put on the cloaks, the illusion from the gemstones became apparent: One’s face disappeared, as if you didn’t have a mouth, nostrils, or eyes, and one’s coat appeared strikingly green. The black cloak constrasted starkly with the green coat and featureless face of the wearer… and true enough, even one’s speech sounded strangely indistinct. You could recognize your own voice, but everyone else sounded oddly similar.

“Ok, before I put on my cloak – yes, even his own deathknights have to do this while at quad house – we have to agree on some ground rules. You will not be able to identify each other until you take the cloak off, and they do not come off while inside quad house. To identify each other we have to agree on a hoof-sign we can all make, so we know if we’re part of the same group – any suggestions on what it can be?” Tita asked, as she floated a cloak over herself, the illusion actually giving her a full head, albeit without eyes, nostrils or mouth.

The circle agreed on a simple circular gesture of the sun as a means to identify each other.

Once everyone had a cloak on a door appeared opposite the door that had led into the shed. Through it the circle entered the Quadruple Dwelling of Chthonian Desolation… and the first thing that struck the circle was the smell: It was the most intense and foul smell the circle had ever encountered. Two of the faceless in the group vomited.

One of the faceless gestured for the circle’s attention, making the agreed upon gesture: “In quad house the Arbiter has everything. This includes stolen things and kidnap victims. We will need to search the archives in the lower levels to find a reference to the one you seek, along with directions to where he is kept and what has been done to him – the Arbiter is a stickler for paperwork, though he has servant archivists here to do that for you: You just report what you’ve made and its recorded for future reference”

Another of the faceless nodded: “Ok, lead the way”

“There are four – this is the quad house, not singular house. I suggest we all meet back here in two hours. This is the lobby of the House of Play and Bile”

Thus the group of faceless split up. It was impossible to tell who went where – Speaker only knew that he soon found himself in a large library, after having delved into the sublevels of this strange necrotic manse.

Making heads and tails of the essence flow of the place was a weird exercise in underworld physics.  It had quickly become apparent that the manse connected to the underground zone the Bodhisattva had called the labyrinth – but at the same time the manse kept things orderly, though in a very disturbing way. There were rooms where mad faceless ghosts tumbles around in piles of shit and rotting filth which connected to the hallways of the manse, but the hallways and the rooms clearly didn’t share the same spacial geometry… but ultimately Speaker peered into a room that turned out to be a vast library of scrolls.

Approaching the librarian, another mutilated faceless ghost chained to the front desk of the library, Speaker recalled the instructions that the faceless – likely Tita – had given the group before they had dispersed regarding interacting with others in the manse: Never allow anyone to tell you what to do, just ignore anyone who questioned your motives, and always stay focused on what you were there for – because the manse could easily offer up countless distractions that might appear superficially interesting, but would ultimately become a meaningless waste of time. The room with the poo-tumblers were likely such a place, though how anyone would consider that fun was being Speaker.
After getting directions from the faceless ghost on where the ledgers on kidnappings were Speaker quickly found what he was looking.

It was quite weird: It just felt way too easy… why would such information be available to anyone who entered the manse? This place was just begging to be filled up with spies… and here it was, with green ink on parchment wrought of flayed flesh: “Chung Onyx, stored in stasis crystal in the Punishment Incentive Storage  Section. Release only possible pending direct approval from the Barbate Arbiter. Kidnap/capture reason: Blackmail”

Well that… was easy enough. Now where was this Storage Section? Hmm… and who else had the Arbiter kidnapped? This ledger, and the dozen others on same bookshelf, were quite voluminous. There were tens of thousands of ponies in the books, and the kidnapping or capture dates went back several thousand years… though they seemed to have increased greatly in the last few years, which coincided with the appearance of the deathknights.

As Speaker kept perusing the ledgers, reading names that he had never heard of, he kept running into listed kidnapping reasons such as ‘Deep Rot Replacement’ or ‘Deep Rot expansion’. What was Deep Rot? The Bodhisattva had mentioned it, hadn’t he? Something about an intelligence analysis project of some kind. But why kidnap ponies for that? Maybe the project ran on slave labor?

It was then that Speaker came across several entries that sent chills down his spine: The entries for Deep Rot expansion ceased – only replacement ones appeared – as well as entries with kidnap or capture reasons mentioned ‘Preliminary resources to End Time Relay prototyping, pending finalized design specifications from Deep Rot’.

Common ponies wouldn’t see how such obscure project names would be bad – hell, Speaker knew that all the Deathlords had ongoing projects aimed at destroying or conquering creation, so it really shouldn’t have surprised him to see the Arbiter having a project that hinted of ending creation somehow… the problem was that it was a reference to something he himself had envisioned back during the primordial war.
Asking the librarian for information on the End Time Relay turned out to be fruitless: It said that those files were for one of the Arbiter’s private projects, and thus off limits without specific permission given from that very deathlord.

“Ok, then where can I find information on Deep Rot” Speaker asked, figuring that if that the kidnapping ledgers indicated that the End Time Relay hadn’t been fully designed yet, then going to that place might yield more information.

About half an hour later Speaker was ready to vomit. The highly detailed descriptions, the schematics, the large paintings of sickening motifs… Deep Rot was an abomination. If it could be destroyed before it finished producing the designs for the End Time Relay, then it would be double the victory.

Speaker left the library after having witnessed the disturbing ritual by which the faceless ghost librarian tortured a ghost slave into utter destruction, reforming the mutilated ghost slave into a copy of the book Speaker wanted to check out. Suffice to say it made him utterly regret wanting to bring a copy of the “Complete guide to Deep Rot” with him – but he took hearth in knowing that putting an end to that horror would bring peace to so many other souls.

Meeting back in the lobby of the house of Play and Bile, which apparently was the wing of the quad house that housed most of the entertainment that the Arbiter’s estate offered, as well as various discussion forums on topics that Speaker really didn’t care much for.

After making the agreed upon gesture towards several groups of faceless, Speaker finally came across one that reciprocated it – they left quad house together through one of the exits into the dressing room sheds… and Speaker was not the only one who breathed a heavy sigh of relief upon leaving the stench and vile atmosphere of that wretched place.

“Thank the gods… If I had to peek into one more torture chamber full of flayed whores and rent colts – that place was horrible” Shimmer said in between dry heaves.

Cash hadn’t much usefully information either, though he did seem to have learned things… things that could not be unlearned: “I found this place where flayed pony bodies were stacked up several yards – I don’t think I’ll be able to sleep again…”

“Oh please, you didn’t look deep enough. I looked around the lower levels… I found a place where I think reality was broken – had to put up my shaping defences. Couldn’t make sense of anything there… it was pure madness” Sullen Hoof despaired, looking as if he was having difficulties standing up straight – having evidently been shaken both spiritually and physically from his experience.

Sunrise apologized that she hadn’t been able to search much at all: “I was roped into a discussion about how to best destroy the Realm. Some of the faceless there wanted to develop some advanced disguise charms and impersonate the Empress, others said that they had been conducting false flag operations on the blessed isle, as well as assassinating spirits and lesser gods there in order to leave the essence flow of the isle unprotected for later geomantic strikes…”

“Interesting – if we ever need to do diplomatic dealings with the realm we can use that information” Cash figured, eager to think of things more pleasant that what he had seen inside quad house.

Tita had not come out… likely maintaining her cover inside the place as a still loyal agent of the Arbiter. This left Speaker as the only pony who had not spoken up – something Shimmer noticed: “What did you find?”

Looking around in the ground, Speaker wasn’t entirely sure how to explain it. There had only been a few trusted exalts who had even known of the idea of the End Time Relay – and all involved had sworn to destroy all records of it… who had broken that oath? There weren’t any other way that a deathlord could have learned of it.

“Speaker, hello? What did you find?” Cash inquired, his charms telling him that Speaker had learned something useful.

Looking at his peers, Speaker took and deep breath and sighed even deeper: “First off, I know where Chung Onyx is – but I also learned something far worse… something even more important, but I won’t speak of it until we’ve rescued Onyx and returned to Sunhill”

The circle needed little convincing – Speaker rarely spoke in such a dire tone. Leaving the shed and returning to the Street of Swords, the circle came across several work crews that were dismantling the steel wall covers of the buildings in the district. In a few places where all the walls were gone, leaving only the steel supports that held up the roof, other work crews of ghost slaves, overseers and architects were starting to lay brickwork.

“Ah, I see they’ve started on my beautification project already, lovely” Cash noted.

Sending a sorcerous message to the Bodhisattva about the whereabouts of Chung Onux, in the Punishment Incentive Storage Section, the circle got a reply moments later in the form of a ghoulish messenger spirit with a hastily scribbled scroll that read: “I know where it is. Ocean of PISS is to the far south-east, in an island of stability within the wyld. I will have Onyx dropped off in Sunhill in a few days”

“Well that’s nice to hear – does that mean we can go back to creation now?” Shimmer wondered out loud, looking hopeful.

Sullen Hoof gestured to speak: “Leave without me – I have a few things I need to check up on. I’ll get back on my own in a few days”

Speaker gave Sully a worried look, but nodded: “Ok, just be careful – we’ll have more than enough to see to without having to rescue you as well”

With that said Sullen Hoof leapt high into the air, disappearing among the rooftops. The circle in turn had Han retrieved, which seemed little worse for wear, though it was rather uneasy until Cash used a charm to calm it. Flying back east was quick, the circle getting back to Sunhill by dawn the next day.

While Cash went to bed, having stayed up all night to get the circle home as quickly as possible, the rest of the circle was well rested enough to talk about the scary thing Speaker had been unwilling to discuss back in Stygia.

In one of the Sunhill manse meeting rooms Speaker requested Shimmer to use her charms to see if anyone was listening in or observing them.

After a moment of intense concentration and essence use, Shimmer exhaled slowly: “It’s just the three of us”

“Ok, listen closely. During the primordial was, at a point where things looked bleak, I and a small group of other twilight caste solars came up with an idea for an… option, a final act of defiance. We called it Option Zero – the destruction of all of Creation, to deny it to the primordials, should we lose the war. Down in quad house, after I found the reference to Chung Onyx, I also found a reference to one of the key components to Option Zero, one of the really bad ones” Speaker explained with a heavy heart.

Sunrise was quick to cut to the chase: “So this End Time Relay, what does it do, and how do we stop it?”

“To explain that I will need to explain part of how the sun works how it was once used” Speaker began, explaining that the Daystar as the sun was once known, is not simply a bright like that travels across the sky: “It is piloted – originally by Celestia herself, but that was later delegated to a loyal and trusted god. Among those controls is a device called the Eschaton Key. It has been used once, and only once, in the past”

Sunrise nodded: “And this key does what?”

“Simple: It flares the sun, increasing its output of light and heat to the point that it burns away everything – think all of Creation reduced to lifeless cinders. The End Time Relay is supposed to be a remote trigger for the key – but it was never built. It was only ever theoretical” Speaker explained, feeling distinctly uneasy with divulging the information.

Both Shimmer and Sunrise agreed that such an event sounded really bad – though Shimmer was curious as to one point: “You said it was used once?”

“I recall it was either during or before the primordial war – A vain primordial, or maybe it was a powerful changeling, created a mock copy of Creation within the wyld. During Calibration Celestia flew the Daystar into the wyld, to this false Creation, and turned the Eschaton key. The wyld consumed the ashes of that place, leaving no trace of it” Speaker explained, not really feeling well about having to explain this to others. Him and the other co-designers of the End Time Relay had all sworn to take the secret of the Relay with them to the grave – this was not something meant for others to know of.

The three ponies did not speak for a moment, the very idea of a sickly knock-off of Creation being too alien for them to truly envision. After this little pause Sunrise summarized: “So, the Arbiter is building this relay?”

“Yes, and he’s using Deep Rot to create the designs somehow. I don’t know how far along he is in that process – but he must be stopped” Speaker insisted.
Nodding in agreement, Shimmer noted that they would need some more concrete information to go on: “We should ask the Bodhisattva. He told us of Deep Rot earlier – maybe he knows something about the relay?”

Speaker wasn’t sure if the Bodhisattva knew of the relay, but it was definitely a sound idea to ask him either way: “Also, ask him if he has any idea how the Arbiter might have learned of the relay. The only written record of it was in my… oh…”

“What? The only written record of the relay was where?” Shimmer inquired, suddenly very curious about Speaker’s apparent epiphany.

With an expression not unlike a foal that had just shit on the floor, Speaker found himself feeling really stupid: “Ok, Shimmer, do you remember my tomb – the really well hidden one? I had originally made that with an archive of all the magitechnicaly theories and discoveries related to arcane science that I had learned of during my thousands of years as a Solar?”

“Ya, on stone tablets? But they were all destroyed, weren’t they? You think the Arbiter did that? Are you sure that nobody else could have made records of the relay?” Shimmer said, trying to furious make sense of it all.

Sitting down on a chair and pondering furiously, Speaker noted: “There were no signs of the tomb having been broken into – and I swore everyone, including myself, to magical oaths that we would never commit the thing to writing”

Sunrise cleared her throat - loudly, making Speaker and Shimmer look at her: “I believe the more salient question is what exactly a deathlord is – because it sounds to me like it was your prior incarnation’s own ghost that destroyed those tablets – and such a being wouldn’t need a written record of the relay’s design”

Speaker and Shimmer both fell silent upon this the proposal of that line of events. What would the implications of this be? This was definitely something the Bodhisattva needed to help them with.

A message was sent post haste, informing the deathknight that the circle was now targeting Deep Rot since it was involved in designing a relay device that could lead to the destruction of Creation – plus inquiries were made on the true nature and origins of the deathlords, since it was now suspected that Speaker’s old ghost might be involved.

The three received a reply a few hours later. The Bodhisattva first of all expressed that he was pleased that the circle finally recognized the threat that Deep Rot represented, though he didn’t know anything about any apocalypse relay or anything – but it didn’t surprise me either. Regarding the nature of the deathlords then it was only known in the underworld that they were wrought of powerful ghosts from the first age who had been empowered by the neverborn, and that the Mask of Winters and the Walker in Darkness were the two last deathlords to be ‘made’. One popular theory was apparently that the Deathlords were ghosts that had leapt into the mouth of oblivion and returned from it, blessed by the neverborn.

Later in the day, when Cash woke up he too was briefed on the situation: “Ok, but doesn’t this also mean that we’ll have to take out the Arbiter himself? If he is connected to Speaker’s old ghost, then he would still know of the relay and be able to start up a new Deep Rot to design it”
The circle could not argue against that logic.

“This makes it all the more important to keep Sunhill and Chung Do protected. We cannot let ourselves be distracted by raids and attacks here if we’re to battle the Arbiter in the underworld” Speaker noted, not wanting to leave their flanks exposed while gone.

Cash agreed, saying that he would fly to Chung Do once Chung Onyx was delivered to them and then go talk to the Chung nobles: “…to remind them that they owe their lord fealty and should send troops to help protect their capital”

“You do that. The rest of us will stay here and shore up Sunhill’s defences. We won’t have to turn this place in Lookshy, but it should be able to ward off raids and other mortal pony attacks” Speaker noted, his mind already racing on how to achieve this in the shortest order possible.
The next morning Speaker resumed his training of the Sunhill militia. He wasn’t fully comfortable calling it an army just yet – the poor souls could barely even march in line. Still, the charms he already knew about manipulating large numbers of ponies at once, be it to instill panic or fearlessness, meant that he understood the basics of how to communicate thought-based essence patterns to large numbers of ponies at once in a martial context. With a little bit of inspiration from his educational charms, and several days of trial and error, Speaker ultimately discerned the secret that had allowed Solars in the first age to raise armies of elite troops in but weeks. Back then this military training charm was known as the Tiger Warrior training technique, for dawn caste solars were back then known as the bronze tigers, for at the dawn of pony civilization tigers were the strongest beasts known to pony-kind.

The recollection that tigers had once been held in such esteem amused Speaker, which only added to his good mood as he beheld the initial results of the use of his tiger warrior training of the Sunhill Militia: They were actually marching properly… all of them, and were obeying his commands properly and in time. Sure, they weren’t able to handle much beyond the most rudimentary of formations, but for now they were at least no longer a ragtag mix of civilian and mercenary bandits – and this made Speaker very happy.

With the basics covered, the question of unit specialization became an issue. Speaker advocated for a two to one ratio of archers to spear-armed infantry, while Shimmer wanted a more diversified force that also included sling-armed ponies and light skirmishers armed with throwing spears and hoof-blades for close combat.

“We’re making a defence force – not an army meant for conquest. That kind of mixed arms forces are for offensive uses” Speaker argued, basing his logic on centuries old 7th legion military doctrine.

Shimmer groaned, working against her lunar impulse to simple obey her Solar mate: “Perhaps –but skirmishers are far better at actually repelling raiders who get into the city. The kind of force you’re suggesting would be good for helming city walls and guarding the gates – my forces would allow us to be flexible, plus they could be used for patrols outside the city as well”

“That… is actually a good point, but tiger warrior training only covers basic military skills like armed close combat and archery in formations. I won’t be able to teach skirmishing techniques until I figure out a more advanced training charm. I know there is one, just like the advanced educational charm I know, but right now it eludes me” Speaker noted, feeling just a tinge of annoyance that there were so many things he recalled from the first age that he wasn’t able to do yet.

Shimmer was about to say something to the effect of suggesting to train skirmishers the regular old mortal way, when Cash came knocking on the room to their quarters within the Sunhill manse: “Come quickly, Onyx has arrived, but he’s trapped in some kind of crystal!”

As Speaker and Shimmer followed Cash, they were led to the plaza at the Sunhill manse’s southern entrance. A large crowd had gathered, and in the middle stood a large pony-shaped figure that could only be the Bodhisattva, cloaked in roughly sewn-together hides. Next to the Bodhisattva, on the ground, laid a large semi-transparent crystal. The crystal was of a pale sickly-green color, but was transparent enough that it was clear to see that a pony was frozen inside of it… also the crystal stunk of ammonia, as if it had been bathed in piss.

“Ah, there you are. I have brought you your former circlemate’s younger brother – though how to release him is beyod my ken” the deathknight stated, many of the ponies in the crowd shying away simply due to the unearthly and disturbing sound of the Bodhisattva’s deathly voice.

Cash politely urged the ponies around to make way as Speaker, Shimmer and the Bodhisattva moved the crystal into an empty warehouse. Out of the sunlight, the deathknight equally put away the hide-cloak, stuffing it into the empty spaces within his armor – him apparently being able to manipulate his own ghost-flesh to make room for such.

Examining the pony-sized crystal in essence sight, Speaker found himself perplexed: “This crystal is unlike anything I have ever seen… it’s not organic, or mineral in nature. I have no idea what this is”

“Moot point – my charms still work on it” Shimmer said, using her shapeshifting essence to alter the nature of the crystal, making it pliable like moist clay. Thus, Speaker and Shimmer carefully scooped the now semi-fluid crystal away from Chung Onyx, slowly freeing up the adolescent colt.

Once free of the crystal Chung Onyx suddenly convulsed, coughing up foul-smelling fluids before he also regained his consciousness. At first Onyx didn’t know where he was, but he quickly recognized Speaker and Shimmer – though the second he saw the Bodhisattva the young colt simply shrieked, vomited and fainted… all roughly at once.

A bit of bathing, some rest and recovery, and a good meal later Onyx was sent off with Cash to the Chung lands to secure Chung Do a proper garrison. Cash assured the rest of the circle that whatever garrison commanders were sent to the city would be sworn to protect the city and their Daimyo.

This left Sunrise, Speaker and Shimmer to twiddle their hooves. Indeed, there wasn’t much in Sunhill at the moment that required their attention: A steady stream of merchants from Great Forks and beyond had been arriving via the canals leading down to the yellow river for months now, word having spread of the miracle healer of Nexus having settled at the now Sunhill back during the construction of the Sunhill manse. Exports including high quality carpentry products and would-be medical students offering payment for their training, as well as trade in rare medical herbs from the forests around Sunhill, were providing the burgeoning city with good income.

One thing the three exalts did do was talk to the Bodhisattva about the nature of the deathlords before the Bodhisattva left.

In a nice apartment building that Cash had marked for future use as embassies and ambassadorial residences, well away from any source of sunlight, the Bodhisattva explained that as far as he knew then the deathlords had always existed: “It is well known that they’re ghosts – but they’ve been around for as long as anyone can remember. To my knowledge there are no records of a time when they weren’t around”

“What about the information on the relay? Any idea how the arbiter learned about it?” Speaker asked with a notable sense of urgency.

The ghost-fleshed deathknight shrugged apologetically: “You said yourself that you weren’t the only Solar who knew of the thing – and it is common practice among the deathlords to capture the ghosts of ponies of interest, then ripping their minds apart for any knowledge they seek. Maybe your last incarnation left a ghost behind, maybe someone else did…”

“Maybe the Arbiter is Speaker’s old ghost?” Shimmer suggested, the tone of her voice clearly showing that she wasn’t exactly happy about the notion, but at the same time it was clear that it probably wasn’t impossible…

Speaker was about to object to Shimmer’s suggestion when the Bodhisattva cut him off: “The deathlords are not mere ordinary ghosts  of great power. There are plenty of ancient ghosts in the underworld, a few even dating back to the first age, but the deathlords are unique – gifted and blessed by the neverborn… and from what I have seen of how you handle yourselves, then I cannot imagine Speaker, in any form, submitting to the neverborn and trying to destroy creation”

Nodding, Speaker added: “A skilled necromancer can fully control and dominate a ghost, that much I remember from the first age. I can’t imagine the deathlords not being skilled in such dark arts – so the idea of the arbiter having mind-ripped this from a solar ghost… I don’t like the thought of it, but I find it far more plausible than your idea Shimmer”

Shimmer smiled: “You’re probably right – there are a lot of things I can imagine you doing, but trying to destroy creation is not one of them”
The four exalts discussed things a bit more, the Bodhisattva mapping out the location of Deep Rot before leaving. Apparently he was planning an expedition to the wyld, seeking a first age war manse and weapon stockpile, so he wouldn’t be around for the next several months.
With the Bodhisattva off, Speaker, Sunrise and Shimmer split up to work on separate projects.

To further bolster Sunhill’s defences Shimmer and Sunrise spent the time waiting for Cash’s return touring the local spirit courts. They might not have the ability to sanctify oaths like Cash, but were none the less able to negotiate a new addition into their deal with the local forest gods: In exchange for elementals being made available to Sunhill’s defences in times of need Sunrise and Shimmer, together with the forest gods, agreed on set yearly dates for the festival in honor of the forest gods, including the specific rites and sacrifices that would please the gods the most, such as milk poured on the roots of wooden altars wrought of specially shaped trees, or gold-flecked honey offered in uniquely painted clay bowls.

Speaker spent his time figuring out the advanced military training charm, ultimately feeling stupid for not having figured out its elegant simplicity and arcane subtlety earlier, though he didn’t complain as now he could train the Sunhill light skirmishers up to properly match Shimmer’s suggestion – and do so in record speed, though he only managed to squeeze in a single such profound lesson in the martial elegance, strategic importance and tactical uses of slings to the ponies chosen to become skirmishers before Cash returned, signaling that it was time for the next part in their plan to take on the Arbiter and Deep Rot.

“Has Sully returned yet?” Cash inquired, while directing the supplies getting loaded up on Han around.

Shimmer shook her head, her purple dreadlocked mane flipping around vigorously: “It’s been almost two weeks… I’ve sent him magical messages”

“We really need to get everyone in the circle initiated into sorcery – or get us some other means of long range communication” Speaker mused, annoyed of the fact that everyone in the circle could already be initiated thusly… though he really didn’t want to initiate into Shimmer’s Silurian style of sorcery, recalling a preference for Devonian style, though he wasn’t entirely sure why or what the exact differences were between the two.

Cash recalled that he had seen a few messenger baubles on sale in Nexus: “But they have a very limited range…”

“Moot point – we’re going scouting, right now. We have no idea how far along the Arbiter is with his designs for the relay. We’re not coming back here until we know this. Shimmer, send a message to Sully about where we’re going and tell him that he can try to meet us there, otherwise just keep trying to get back here” Speaker huridly stated. Now that the time was nigh he didn’t want to waste a single moment, knowing that the fate of creation depended on this recon mission.

> Chapter 73: From the Ashes Into the Elements 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The recon mission the circle had planned was simple enough , on the surface: First Speaker wanted to check out the location in Creation that mirrored where Deep Rot was in the underworld, to see if there was anything to be learned from the terrain or the local dragon lines, since that was likely to be identical in the underworld.

This was of the mission was exceedingly easy, since it simply mean flying Han to a spot roughly seven or eight hundred miles east-south-east of Lookshy, in the heart of Marukan nomad territory.

Having left Sunhill early that morning, the circle arrived in the skies above the Marukan heartland, with the Grey river disappearing over the horizon to the east. Down on the ground the last few guild plantation dotted the terrain before giving way to the open plains of the roaming Marukan ponies and their cattle-herds.

Before having left the circle the Bodhisattva had given them the most accurate location of Deep Rot that he had known: Apparently the Arbiter didn’t let deathknights go there – and any maintenance work was done personally by the Arbiter or ghost slaves who were never heard of or seen again.

Both Shimmer and Speaker looked long and hard for any signs of geomantic disruption as they circled the area – and it didn’t take long for someone to detect something…. Though it was Cash who noticed it first: “Hey, Han here keeps acting up when we pass over the western part of this area. There’s something he doesn’t like  there”

Focusing their attentions on that particular area, Shimmer quickly spotted a series of minor demesnes there. This was nothing out f the ordinary, but looking at the area at large Speaker pointed out that something was off: “Those demesnes are far less potent than the dragon lines in the area than they should – something is draining them”

The implication was obvious. Cash landed the yeddim near the cluster of weakened demesnes, letting Speaker and Shimmer have a closer look. After chasing out a group of changelings that had taken up residence in the heart of one of the demesnes, the circle soon came across strange shrines of soulsteel and inverted fountains of blood.

Shimmer found the shrines most curious: Set in the geomantic centers of the of the various earth and wood aspected demesnes in the area, the things seemed to focus and suck in the ambient essence flows, turning the essence into blood via lenses of black jade and soulsteel – yet from the outside the demesnes didn’t appear as if they were tapped or drained in any way.

“That’s because these shrines aren’t sending the essence they’re collecting back out in a new form – they’re sending the essence to the underworld” Speaker said, looking very unhappy about that conclusion.

Shimmer gave the particular shrine they were at a careful lookover: “The surface of the soulsteel basin where all the blood is draining way is etched with runes – but I can’t read them all because of the blood. If I could just read a few more lines so I could get an idea of what kind of sorcery was involved in making this”

“Just be careful… this kind of stuff… even towards the of the first age… was still theoretical. Draining essence from one plane of existence to another, without using hearthstones? This is amazing” Speaker said, still shaking his head ever so slightly in disbelief.

Cash was quick to ask if they shouldn’t simply destroy the shrines, but Shimmer was even quicker to point out that that would likely just alert the Arbiter to something being up…

“Perhaps, but Lookshy would probably like to know that another deathlord has a base of operations so close to them – it would be far less suspicious if they destroyed  these things” Speaker pointed out.

With their survey of the creation-side location of Deep Rot, the circle flew towards the tiny shadowland known as the Mourning Field.
“A shadowland that close to Lookshy? I’m thinking it’s related to a realm invasion?” Cash noted, as they approached immaculately marked and salted borders of the shadowland six miles south-west of Lookshy.

Speaker thought about Cash’s question for a moment before recalling the relevant history lesson he had learned as a foal in one of Lookshy’s  primary schools, though he was far more preoccupied with whether Lookshy would react to a flying yeddim coming the Lookshyan hinterland airspace: “The second realm invasion, back in year seventy-five after the great contagion. Four realm legions came, one directly for Lookshy – but we were ready for them. By the time they were done burning and pillaging the hinterlands beyond the Lookshyan Wall siege-response plans were in full effect. Lookshy held out just fine for well over a year of siege before sneaking something  into the legion encampment that wiped out three quarters of it in one go – that made the shadowland. It is called the mourning field now”

“Any idea what they used for that?” Shimmer wondered, seeing an opportunity for a way to possibly sneak a similar thing other realm holds. Speaker sadly did not know this – noting that it was a legion secret withheld from their history books.

Crossing into the shadowland, the circle performed the same simple ritual that they had used several times already, as taught by the Bodhisattva, allowing them to transition into the underworld while still in daylight.

The pale sun of the underworld lit the ashen plains of the marukan wastelands as the circle flew high above marukan ghosts that herded animate effigies of cattle and goats, just like they had done in life with real livestock. Approaching the location of Deep Rot the terrain changed…

The rolling plains flatted, having clearly been dug out and leveled. A grand circular wall then rose, replete with towers, soulsteel fortifications and massive buttresses all around.

Cash dared not bring Han in too close, as Shimmer quickly spotted lightning ballistae in the towers – a yeddim was no match against that. Thus the circle circled high up in the underworld sky, at a safe distance to the outer walls of Deep Rot.

From their position it was clear that the circular walls of Deep rot contained a similarly circular domed structure, and Shimmer was sure that she could see what looked like some kind of pit extend downwards under the dome, but from this distance – even with her charms – it was difficult to tell.

“Cash, put us down – I need to get closer for a better look” Shimmer said, her now truly hawk-eyes searching the wall for anything that looked like a gate.

On the ground Shimmer leapt of Han, instantly beginning to scurry around the ground, alternating between listing and sniffing around… apparently in the hunt for bugs. After a few minutes she cried out in frustration: “Aww come on!?”

Evidently the ground around them had no life in it – not even the ghosts of bugs or anything. To this end Shimmer explained what she had tried to do: “I wanted to find a local bug so I could eat it and shapeshift into its form, then use that to sneak over the walls”

“How about going under the walls?” Speaker suggested, retrieving the singing staff.

Cash and Sunrise stayed behind to guard Han and be ready to leave in a hurry, while Speaker and Shimmer moved underground, carried by the inquisitive and quiet tune played on the singing staff.

A few minutes later Speaker and Shimmer very carefully broke through just under the wall, upon which Shimmer shifted into a cockroach and snuck above ground while Speaker waited patiently.

While Shimmer was away Speaker carefully considered his essence sight observations of Deep Rot from up above. The geomancy and dragon lines of the area was vastly different from the same area in creation, for Deep Rot seemed to be capping a massive necrotic demesne, with several lesser ones feeding into it. Disrupting those essence flows might very well do wonders to mess up Deep Rot, but it would only cause catastrophic essence building up at the points of disruption, not inside Deep Rot itself.

Speaker continued to ponder the mysteries of Deep Rot until things started getting noisy up above – and suddenly Shimmer, in her beast-pony form, fully encased in her bone-armor,  crashed through the thin layer of ashen dirt separating the tunnel from the surface, down onto a very surprised Speaker.

Shimmer barely even bothered to take the time to let Speaker untangle himself as she simply shouted: “Run!” and hoofed it down the tunnel. Speaker instantly activated his graceful crane stance charm and righted himself instantly, following suit as quickly as possible.

A second later a swarm of war ghost led by a truly terrifying being plunged into the tunnel: It was a creature of horror that might once a long time ago have looked like that of a pony ghost, with a ravaged and bizarrely tormented form that trailed semi-transparent blood. Its devouring eyes hurt to look at, for they gleamed deeply with the cold madness of oblivion – but worst was its chilling scream, like the last cry of a dying tortured foal.

Using Gift to collapse the tunnel behind him, Speaker only barely managed to buy himself a little extra distance to the disturbingly distended jaws full of roughly hewn iron teeth that were snapping behind him.

Emerging from the tunnel Speaker found Cash with Han up in the sky, flying around erratically in evasive maneuvers, as dark beams of essence that glistened in the red sky along with thunderous arcs of lightning shot up at the flying yeddim from the walled fortifications around Deep Rot.

Mere seconds later the ghosts and the freakish super ghost spilled forth, clawing at each other to get up and out of the tunnel. The monstrous ghost shrieked once more, but this time the cry drowned into a horrid black mass that the thing vomited forth – and the black mass congealed into the form of a shadowy snake, which quickly began slithering towards Speaker, while the monster ghost and its minions held back.

Gift did nothing to the ghostly black snake as it purposefully approached him at speed – and it suddenly coiled up before launching itself at Speaker, trying to strangle him. Slashing at the thing with Gift did nothing; neither did pulling at it with his hooves.

As Speaker fell to the ground, struggling to remain conscious, the ghosts began to advance. To Speaker the world began to darken, so much so that he didn’t see Shimmer slamming into the ground in the form of a solid moonsilver tyrant lizard, or how she began to rip the ghosts apart with silvery teeth and claws. This reminded Speaker of the fact that he knew a similar spirit-smiting charm, and using that he had Gift cut the ghost-snake strangling him to pieces while he felt somewhat silly.

With the spirit-slaying charm in fully effect, plus a few added tricks via his thousand wounds gear style of martial arts, Speaker began chipping away at the tide of ghosts pouring out towards him – but these ghosts… they were dodging, they were weaving, they were even trying to parry Gift with their grim blades. Of course, unlike the fight at the late Lord Stalwart’s mansion, then this wasn’t a fight about destroying the defences of Deep Rot, only making enough room that Shimmer could safely shift back into her beast-pony form and fly off with Speaker – and with Speaker’s jumping charm this was even easier… well, it would have been if not for the fact that some of the ghosts started flying up after him! The essence artillery blasting at them didn’t help either, having already scorched many of the feathers on Shimmer’s wings and tail.

Shimmer flapped her wings as hard as she could – the muscles around her ribcage and and back bulging and glowing with unearthly silvery light as charms, her body straining to the point that Speaker had to use his anesthetic charm on her. Feeling release from the painful strain on her wings, Shimmer gasped: “Thank you – now let’s get out of here!”

With another charm that had Speaker scramble to hold to Shimmer’s feathers lest he fall off, Shimmer’s body suddenly went into overdrive, her eyes blazing with silver fire as her grand feathery wings began to flap as if they were that of an insect, producing a strange humming noise akin to certain rare eastern birds.

Having attained the speed and maneuverability of a hummingbird, despite her size and passanger, Shimmer effortless dodged the lightning and necrotic essence beams shot at them as they flew up into the sky to Cash and Sunrise.

Landing on the howdah, Speaker shouted to Cash to get them out of there as he jumped off Shimmer and quickly began to check her for injuries.

Cash didn’t need to be told twice, yanking on Han’s reins hard which caused the yeddim to bellow a deep and throaty moan, plus it made the already flying yeddim accelerate at breakneck speed, something it didn’t seem all the happy about – likely due to the hits it had taken from the essence artillery, which had left much of its left side a scorched mess smelling of burnt fur.

Despite the wind howling around them, Speaker quickly began to examine Shimmer’s body as she shifted back into her normal pony form. Her body was a wreck, having strained nearly every muscle possible, and pulled even more. His medical diagnostic charms told Speaker of multiple internal hemorages and near lethal buildup of lactic acid in the muscles around her shoulders – of course Shimmer felt none of it, thanks to the anesthetic charm.

“Shimmer, you need to use your regeneration charm, right now – your body, it’s…” Speaker began, but Shimmer motioned for him to shut up.
“Shush – I know – now listen before I go into hibernation to heal: Inside the Deep Rot… all the ponies you found records of being captured and brought there? It’s their brains and eyes. They’re all in jars! They have buildings up on the surface with holding pens and rooms where they’re butchered, but somehow still alive. They have thousands of them, and they keep them alive with the blood stuff from creation, but also blood brought in from other places. It… gods… I’ll tell you more when I wake up, ok?” Shimmer quickly blurted out before she faded off into a deep slumber.

“She ok?” Cash shouted, his attention fixed on controling Han as they made for the mourning fields shadowland.

Speaker nodded: “She better be… she better be”

As the circle neared the mourning fields Cash slowed down so Sunrise could perform the rite of transition into the lands of the living properly. During this Speaker and Cash talked about their options.

“The brain-eye thing in jars fits with what the bodhisattva said – so Deep Rot is like having a legion of clerks enslaved to read and think about whatever you tell them to” Cash noted bluntly, thinking of how the whole thing was organized and if his position as a lord in Stygia could help disrupt the operation.

Speaker shrugged, at a loss for words to describe how horrible he felt, to the point that he could only focus on how to destroy the place: “The way it’s fortified certainly won’t make any attempt at sabotage easy – and we’ll have to wait for Shimmer to recover to tell us more about those additional blood feeds running into the place. If we could shut them all down we might be able to starve all the jarred brains”

“Wouldn’t you want to save them?” Cash wondered, finding the idea of simply destroying such a massive enterprise a bit wasteful if nothing else.

Giving Cash a stern look, Speaker reminded the eclipse caste pony that he too didn’t really want to be saved after Blueblood nearly killed him: “And then factor in that a lot of these poor souls have likely been held captive like that for decades – the ponies I read about in the kidnapping ledgers were all young… the Arbiter isn’t taking elderly ponies, because they’re likely to die from old age too quickly… a lot of the ponies down there have probably been like that for decades, assuming a brain in a jar lasts that long”

Cash sat down, hard, on the howdah, the look on his face telling Speaker all he needed to know about the dawning realization of what horror the jarred pony-brains had to be going through – and for how long they might have had to exist like that: “You’re right – that place has to go. Did Shimmer say anything about the relay?”

“She didn’t – hopefully she’ll have something on that when she wakes up again. In the mean time we can plan what to do next” Speaker said, looking towards the blurring edges of the shadowland as Sunrise finished the final incantations of the ritual to ensure their exit of the Mourning Fields would lead to Creation.

Being more of a business pony than a military strategist, Cash wasn’t entirely sure about what to say to that, but he was certain that it would require a lot of held to breach Deep Rot, and likely even more help to destroy the place – that much he was certain of: “…what do you think Speaker?”

It was then that Cash noticed that Speaker was looking at something else, something off in the distance…

There was something off on the creation-side of the shadowland – and judging from the flashes of light coming whatever it was, it seemed to want to communicate, maybe…

“Speaker, what are those lights? It’s not something being shot at us, right?” Cash said, picking up the reigns and holding them tightly.

With a look of deep concentration, Speaker tried to make out the repeating sequence of lights: “I think its heliograph communications – and from their height up in the air I’m thinking its someone from Lookshy who came to the Mourning Fields after we crossed into Lookshyan airspace”

Cash had heard of the Lookshyan heliograph system. He had seen the various Lookshyan outposts and fortresses scattered around the scavenger lands, though he had never understood how they were able to read blinking lights at such a distance, nor had he ever been able to figure out the code the lights represented – of course, that had been while he was a mere mortal pony. With a glance at the lights Cash laughed: “They want us to identify ourselves or they will open fire”

Speaker looked at Sunrise, then back at Cash: “Do they even expect us to be able to understand that message?”

“That’s actually not a bad question, why don’t we go ask them?” Cash said, turning to pilot Han out of the shadowland.

Sunrise cleared her throat, loudly: “Speaker, something flying straight Lookshyan forces out of a shadowland that doesn’t identify itself…  what would Seventh Legion protocol be on that?”

“Destroy it” Speaker noted.

Cash didn’t put down the reins, but he did slump his shoulders and sigh: “Right, well then lets identify ourselves – Sunrise, you have the brightest anima, show them some lights for when we come out of the darkness here!”

And thus it came to be that a light that shone like a small sun, on the back of a wounded albeit flying yeddim, came out of the dim grey wasteland of ashen grass that was the Mourning Fields straight into the very large jade-steel hooves of five blue jade flying warstriders, which were held aloft with enormous blue jade wings.

“Well fuck me… they scrambled the Wondervolts to catch us” Speaker said, absolutely awestruck.

Cash too found the sight that met them very impressive: “The Seventh Legion’s best fliers – never thought I’d see them this close”

“Yes, you can see their mounted lightning ballistas tracking us so clearly” Sunrise glumly noted, reminding Speaker and Cash that they weren’t in the clear just yet.

Indeed, in the gigantic metallic forehooves of the equally enourmous and metalic flying pony-shaped warstriders – which looked a good deal like the similarly sized automatons in Denansdor, there were open apertures which revealed the business ends of lightning ballistas ready to fire.

The middle Wondervolt warstrider, decorated with more streaks of yellow and dark blue than its peers, suddenly activated a voice-enhancer, allowing its pilot to talk – very loudly - to the circle: “Land immediately or we will blow out of the sky!”

Cash gave Speaker a bemused grin, the yanked the reins to make Han circle down towards the ground: “This is awesome”

As Han landed the lead Wondervolt warstrider landed as well, while the four others circled around them in the air – weapons still trained on Han and the circle.

“Is there a pony by the name of Bright Machine Speaker, formerly Heart Speaker, among you?” the pilot of the warstrider in front of the circle boomed out, the gruff but female voice coming out at an almost pain volume.

Speaker shot Shimmer a worried look, then an annoyed one at the warstrider before quietly quipping: “Looks like someone got the vocal relay system stuck on Royal Canterlot Voice”

The lead Wondervolt warstrider reared up and point its forehooves at the circle, opening its lightning ballista gun-ports: “I will not repeat myself!”

Taking a deep breath Speak activated his balancing charm and his jumping charm as he leaped the impressive ten yards between Han and the warstrider, landing perfectly right on top of the armored head of the thing.

The warstrider instantly began to twist and turn, seemingly trying to spot where Speaker had gone – for Speaker was right between the two primary vision-crystals in the warstrider’s eyes that let the pilot see outside: “Where are you? What are you doing?” the pilot again boomed out – and this close to the warstrider’s vibro-crystal from which the sound of the pilot’s voice was emitted that meant that Speaker’s ears started bleeding.

“I am Bright Machine Speaker – and your warstrider is broken!” Speaker said as he reared up, channeling his repair charm into his hooves before slamming them down on the warstrider.

A golden glow flowed down through the warstrider, giving off an inner light under the jade-steel armor plating, as Speaker flushed the warstrider’s systems and realigned its essence signal relays around the control core where the pilot was. The vibro crystal gave off a burst of static which quickly faded as the pilot shouted – now at a far more comfortable, albeit still amplified, volume level: “The hell did you just do?”
“I fixed your warstrider – now, you wanted to talk to me?” Speaker said, speaking into one of the warstrider’s ears.

The warstrider got down on all four, Speaker effortlessly – thanks to his charm – moving to the back of the giant mechanical suit of armor’s head. A hatch then opened to the left of the warstrider’s ‘spine’, and out came a unicorn mare with a mane that was all yellow, orange and red streaks, as if it was on fire. Her uniform was, to the surprise of no one, a Seventh Legion officers uniform, a red one, similar to the one Speaker was wearing, only not faded.

Looking at Speaker with her slitted eyes – one of the most common traits among even mildly pure-blooded unicorns thanks to their dragonblooded heritage – the mare respectfully nodded: “Ok Bright Machine Speaker – how in the seven hell shells and a wet coat did you fix my ‘strider, from the outside, without tools or even looking inside?”

Speaker smiled sheepishly and shrugged: “Old first age trick – now, you were looking for me?”

“Yes, there are standing orders to bring you in for questioning – Taimyo Karal Linseed wants you in her office almost two seasons ago” the unicorn mare said with a smirk.

On one side Speaker wanted to quip that Taimy- wait… Linseed made Taimyo? “Since when did Linseed make Taimyo? She was Shozei when I retired”

Over on Han, and still very much in ear-shot of Speaker and the unicorn, Cash asked Sunrise: “Do you know what those terms mean? I get they’re military somehow but…”

“The Seventh Legion still uses old realm rank names. This Linseed pony is a general, but used to be a high-ranking mid level officer, like a major or captain, but not a colonel” Sunrise noted, knowing just as little about military organization as Cash did, but she did recall the terms from the first age.

After Speaker jumped back to Han and told Cash and Sunrise that he was to come with the Wondervolts to Lookshy Cash insisted that the rest of the circle follow suit – the Wondervolt commanding officer, her name being Karal Warm-Steel, didn’t seem to mind this, and thus t he Wondervolts escorted the flying yeddim in over Lookshy.

Looking down at the marvel that was Lookshy Speaker got all sorts of nostalgic – both from having grown up as a mortal in Lookshy, but also from his first age memories of having built and ruled the place back then… now gazing out over the walled rings of the city, as it rose up the peak of the promontory it was built on, Speaker couldn’t help but feel proud that he had the unique honor of having been part of shaping both Lookshy’s past, but now also its future as a Solar again.

Cash and Sunrise’s appraisal of Lookshy was slightly more practical. Having never been in Lookshy they mainly remarked at how very… fortress-like the place was: Lookshy was apparently built at the top of a peninsula that rose up towards its end, making fortifications built along the way highly effective. The city was built in four tiers of fortifications, with Cash easily spotting that the biggest markets and whatnot seemed to be concentrated between the outermost walls and the second-outermost walls. Speaker identified this as the fourth ring, and pointed out that Cash had rightly so identified the district of trade into which the main gate to the city opened, next to the agricultural district, which had several neatly arranged fields inside its walls. Each district was walled of, and each wall intercection had a massive tower that undoubtedly house artifact artillery and other weapons to counter sieges and defend the skies above Lookshy.

As per the instructions of the Wondervolts, Cash followed in formation at a very slow speed – indeed, the circle had been told that breaking formation or any sudden acceleration could result in them being shot down by the city’s air defenses. 

The plus side to the slow approach over the city was that it gave the circle ample time to enjoy the sights.

“You sure this isn’t a trap? I could easily see someone spinning a story here that we did something wrong to get us shot down…” Cash said, in a moment of anxiety as they passed over a heavily armed battlement bristling with ballistae and strange-looking essence artillery.

Speaker put a calm hoof on Cash’s shoulder: “This isn’t the realm – in Lookshy a pony is judged by his actions, not his faith or the faith of others”

Crossing from the fourth and outermost ring over into the airspace above the third ring, Speaker explained that the forest-covered district that took up half the ring was called the Green Hunt, and was a game preserve, as well as public park and recreational area, as well as the location for quite a few tombs for various heroes and leaders of Lookshy. The other half of the third ring was made up of fairly similar and non-descript buildings – though the far side opposed the Green Hunt had an almightly and constant noise coming from it.

“It’s like being in earshot of the Nighthammer district again” Cash remarked.

Speaker nodded: “Well, it’s the districts of savants and craftsponies – all of Lookshy’s heavy industry is housed there. A lot of metalworks and essence-fueled industry is housed there”

Approaching the second ring, above the sea of blue stone buildings roofed with mostly flat roofs covered in white stone, or tiled in blue stone tiles where pagoda style architecture was in use, there was a notable shift in the kind of buildings one could see. The second ring had several towers and magnificent structures in alabaster and gold, clearly first age structures, with many of their surrounding buildings fashioned in similar styles. Speaker explained that the second ring was called ‘The War Quarter’: “Most of the ponies in the city live in the second ring, I grew up here… though my family’s apartments are on the other side of the old city”

“And that’s the Lookshyan port, right? I’ve heard about the naval fortifications here… they’re supposed to be the finest in creation” Cash remarked, looking down at the massive wall jutting out to shield the harbor district. Speaker agreed, noting that he’d see if he couldn’t arrange a proper tour of the city once their business with Taimyo Karal Linseed was done.

“Karal, that’s one of the noble houses of Lookshy, right?” Sunrise asked.

Nodding, Speaker noted that Lookshy clung to a lot of old realm terms in their daily parlance: “Like, the district where we’re going, the old city, is also called Deheleshen – that was the name of… well… my city, that’s what this place was called in the first age. The lighthouse on our left, above the harbor, that’s still called the Deheleshen Lighthouse – it has a shard of the eye of Oliphem embedded in a star-light focusing array… hmm… I wonder if Lookshy actually knows that”

Cash found this clinging to archaic terms silly, but Sunrise found it admirable: “They venerate the old ways, instead of simply doing whatever pleases them, as is custom in the realm – that is a good quality”

Approaching the heart of Lookshy, the old city, the last remnant of ancient Deheleshen, Speaker found himself in tears. Beneath them was the pyramid-like Teocala of Tu Yu, the temple of the god old Deheleshen. It looked just like it had in the first age. Indeed, the entire district, which was roughly the size of the market district in the fourth ring, was a perfectly preserved and still functional first age city district. Not the many realm invasions, or when the then Seventh Legion of the Shogunate had made its last stand in Deheleshen agasint the oncoming tide of changelings during the Baloran crusade had this part of Deheleshen been breached by enemy forces. It was pure. It was protected, by all the blood and lives given to keep it safe.

Speaker silently wowed to repay that dept – as thanks for keeping at least this part of his city safe… though he subconsciously doubted that the Lookshyan general staff would let him take over the city just yet.

Cash followed the Wondervolts up, as they passed by the bulbous and looming Lookshy Manse, the biggest and most heavily armed manse in the city. It was in a noticeably different style from the otherwise organic and flowing style of the first age structures around it – but Speaker was still able to make even Sunrise blush as he told the story of the place: “Legend has it that the architect of the fortress manse, on the day of the official inauguration of the place, was rewarded by the goddess of Lookshy with steamy oral sex on the front steps on the manse”

“Doesn’t something like that happen on a weekly basis in Great Forks?” Cash wondered, while giggling at the thought of a grand military parade being interrupted by a divine blowjob.

Sunrise refrained from commenting, though her silent frown and look of embarrassment spoke volumes.

The only other truly grand feature in the old city – and it was indeed the grandest of them all -  was where the circle was being led on Han by the Wondervolts: The Aviary. This was where Lookshy’s fleet of magical first age skyships and flying artifacts were docked and maintained. It was a gigantic segmented obelisk with multiple platforms with gates leading inside its three-hundred by three-hundred yard interior, where giant platforms reminiscent of the lift in the Denansdor manse moved ponies, equipment, the odd flight-capable warstrider and whole skyships around. Ponies on every platform stopped to look at the flying yeddim, flanked by the Wondervolts, approached to land – though Speaker found it far more interesting to gawk at the hulking Kireeki-class skyreme known as Skywolf, the flagship of Lookshy’s skyguard.

The Skywolf dwarfed Han, being more than a hundred yards long and shaped like a giant steel and blue-jade orca. The hulking killer whale sported dozes of mounts and pods where artillery could be mounted, and Speaker claimed that it could ferry around almost a thousand (cramped) ponies at once.

“Well that’s neat… but it must cost Lookshy a fortune to keep that thing in working order” Cash mused, looking at how many repair crews were buzzing around the thing.

Speaker laughed: “Oh you have no idea… it took Lookshy 28 years to build the thing, and they had to put all other artifact production on standby while that went on. It’s probably the most expensive and powerful mobile weapons platform made in recent history”

“Neat – now, it looks like they want us to land over there…” Cash pointed out, bringing Han down for a nice and gentle landing.

Half a dozen teams of support ponies and sorcerer-technicians rushed to the Wondervolt warstriders as they landed around the yeddim, while three unicorns flanked by two dozen obscenely heavily armored mortal ponies approached the yeddim and the circle.

Telling Cash and Sunrise to wait for a moment and keep an eye on the still sleeping Shimmer, Speaker jumped down and greeted the unicorns before him. Not recognizing any of them, but seeing the rank pips of the unicorn in front being that of Kazei (colonel in more tongues), Speaker saluted: “Chuzei Bright Machine Speaker reporting, maam”

The unicorn mare gave Speaker a derisive sneer: “We’ll see about that – Taimyo Karal Linseed wants an audience with you, now”

“Of course – but… what about my friends? Should they stay here? This isn’t a place suited for an injured yeddim” Speaker asked.

The unicorn officer, a mare with a dull blue coat and a mane as white as snow, frowned. Lightning began to crackle around her horn: “We can euthanize it, carve it to pieces for transport off this level and reimburse you”
> Chapter 74: Explanations and Excuses
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------


“No – how about I heal it real quick, then my friends can fly it down to the market district and stable it? They can wait for me there while I talk with Taimyo Linseed” Speaker suggested, shocked to hear such a brutal suggestion from a Lookshyan officer – he had expected curiosity at how it flew…

The dragonblooded Kazei shot Speaker a clear look of both disgust and disbelief – one clear enough that even Speaker picked up on it fairly quickly. Not wanting to take any chances, Speaker rushed back to Han and quickly used his instant diagnosis charm to get a read on the yeddim: It had been struck twice by a concussive essence cannon shot, and once by a lightning ballista. The essence cannon had mostly just bruised the animal, its thick hide and fur having absorbed most of the impact of the blast. The real damage was from the searing hot lightning, which had burnt a jagged pattern across the side of the yeddim – still, it was nothing that a swift and exorbitant expenditure of essence  via medical charms couldn’t fix…  even though Speaker had never in his life really worked as a yeddim veterinarian.

If the  Chuzei was impressed by  this, she certainly didn’t show it. With an aloof sneerf she barked: “Rice Pudding, get up on that thing and guide them to the yeddim stables in the trade district – stay with them and send a messenger back to me once you’ve found a place to wait while Speaker here talks with the Taimyo”

Thus Speaker was escorted away to one of the smaller Aviary lifts, while Cash, Sunrise and a somewhat terrified wood-aspected unicorn stallion who looked so very green, both visually with regards to his behavior as a junior officer. The screaming once Cash sped off towards the trade district also didn’t help.

“Is the scale of Gunzosha really necessary?” Speaker asked as the lift platform decended downwards. The iridescent force-field around the platform made slight shadows dance across everyone as the unicorn mare and her aide, another unicorn of lower rank and the two dozen heavily armored mortal ponies accompanying them all remained silent.

From his many years of service to the seventh legion Speaker knew damn well that being stonewalled by senior officers while you were being escorted to an even more senior officer, especially while under armed guard, was rarely a good sign. Sure, he wasn’t in chains or anything, but at the same time he was a retired officer – a chuzei just like the young unicorn that had been ordered to accompany Cash and Sunrise on Han – so being treated like a common criminal did not sit well with Speaker: “Is someone going to tell me what the purpose of my meeting with Taimyo Linseed is?”

“Be silent anathema” the unicorn officer sneered, looking very much as if she was more than ready to order Speaker roughed up for daring to ask questions.

With the a-word having been dropped, Speaker quickly figured what the issue was. The irony of him having reassured his friends not five minutes ago that they weren’t going to be judged simply for being Solars was not lost on him – Cash might even have found it funny, though Speaker sure didn’t: “I will not! I served the legion for over twenty years! I fought at Mishaka, Darangin, Puyo – more places than I can even remember – and I’ve kept good officers like you alive at each of them so you will treat me a bloody retired seventh legion medic and chuzei or so help me I will haul you in front a justice directorate disciplinary committee!”

It was unclear whether the unicorn was merely amused of Speaker’s old pony ranting, or if she was genuinely convinced that Speaker was suddenly worth treating like a retired officer who had earned the right to be treated with respect – Cash could probably have spotted what it was – but the mare nodded ever slightly and smirked: “The Taimyo wants to evaluate you personally, to see if you still are who you claim to be, or if you are anathema. She probably…”

Speaker gave the unicorn a curious and slightly concerned looked as she hesitated for a moment before continuing: “The legion wants to know if you’re a threat or not”

With a pleased sigh Speaker relaxed a bit, the lift platform coming to a rest at the ground level. The walk to the legion administrative headquarters in the aptly named district of the legion was short, but before leaving the old city district Speaker noticed that they were passing by the teocala of Tu Yu, the temple of the old god of Deheleshen: “Permission to pay my respects to the old city gather before we leave the district?”

The teocala, itself an old name that had long since lost its actual meaning, was a grand pyramid structure clad in perfectly smooth alabaster. It had a massive ground level entrance, and a large balcony level that spanned all the way around the pyramid about four fifth up its height, beneath which was a three story high band of bright blue first age glyphs, artfully arranged to spell out prayers to heaven and praise to Tu Yu. This was the home of the old god, as well as the ceremonial center of Lookshy, where foreign dignitaries were often met for official talks – and it looked the part.

Seeing the old banners and colors of Deheleshen, his colors, intermingling with the many banners of Lookshy’s allies – past and present – brought tears to Speakers eyes, so much so that without a thought Speaker did what he had always done when he visited his old friend: With a calm motion Speaker grasped his singing staff from elsewhere and struck the thin end of the gnarled wood-grained white-jade staff at the ground. The seismic resonance from the blow made every bell and wind-chime spring to life, ringing out a beautiful tune.

“How did you…” the unicorn began, snapping Speaker into reality. He quickly swung his singing staff back elsewhere, reminding himself that the seventh legion would likely confiscate his staff in a split second if they caught him with it within the city – this was standard protocol for magical artifacts that could serve the legion in a vital capacity…. And the ability to bring down castle walls in seconds, or jut out bridges in minutes, had near infinite strategic and tactical potential.

“Same way I did that” Speaker sheepishly grinned ,wondering where Tu Yu was… he usually always appeared when the music played.
His unicorn escort was about to inquire further into the nature of Speaker’s staff-trick when suddenly a whirl of dust rose from the ground, Tu Yu appearing in it: This god was tall – much taller than any pony – at least a head higher, with aristocratic features that gave the old god an undeniable air of sage wisdom and worthiness of reverence. His supernaturally dusty robes were of the finest silken robes – through fashion-wise they were horribly out of date, with a mix of bright colors and patterns that clashed in ways that were difficult to imagine to have ever been in vogue.

“Who summons…” the old god spoke, his yellowed and snaggle-toothed grin and curiosity and bemusement quickly fading into one of shock and… tears?

Speaker, the unicorn officer next to him, her officer and the two dozen heavy infranty-ponies behind them looked on in mild confusion as Tu Yu, the city god of Deheleshen, broke into tears like a senile old pony who’d just been told that he was getting soup for dinner instead of rice and steamed veggies… it was pitiful.

Rushing to the aid of the god, Speaker helped the much larger pony up: “Are you ok?”

Rising up with supernatural speed, the balding god who’s beard seemed frayed and tattered suddenly grabbed Speaker – hard: “Yes, yes I am quite good – and with you I will be even better! Yes!”

The mad grin of the god, who’se gaze was like that of a wounded predator looking at a fat meal that would see it grow strong and whole again, frightened Speaker is ways he had no worthwhile words for. Wresting himself free and distance himself from Tu Yu, the god stumbled after him, crawling after Speaker while howling: “You were good to me… not like the others… you must be good to me again! Make things like they were!”

Tu Yu began a mad tirade about things that Speaker needed to do, fix, replace, rebuild, tear down, grow, paint, dance, brew… it turned into an incoherent ramble, the god half-crying over things lost, and cackling madly over how good things would be once things were ‘back to normal’.
“We’re leaving – now” the unicorn officer quickly stated, Speaker following suit.

The sound of Tu Yu’s bawling faded as the noises of the city outside drowned the mad god out – but the memory of Tu Yu’s behavior would haunt Speaker for quite some time.

Leaving the old city and crossing one of the minor residential districts that surrounded the old city, Speaker and his escorts entered into… Deheleshens old business district. Oh sure, the seventh legion’s operations directorate had its headquarters here, plus all the other directorates had their ancillary offices there, but they were all housed in buildings clearly not intended for such use. For example he faded facade of the Sunflower Hotel was still as it had been over a thousand years ago, with its alabaster and gold still shining, though pretty much everything else with it was faded and sun-bleached into a grey and worn mess. Suffice to say that it was rather obvious what parts of the buildings where dragonblooded retrofits, and which were original first age creations.

The Operations Directorate offices were in the backroom what was very clearly the the ‘Tivi Sava Loan Commission’ – the big orange sign was still on the top of building, though few of the ponies that worked in the district could likely read the old realm script that encircled the sign. It was inside this building that Speaker was led, through a few hallways, up two floors, down another hallway, then he was searched for weapons – a futile exercise due to his elsewhere storage ability, but Speaker didn’t tell the soldiers doing the search that… mainly because he didn’t want to see Gift picked disassembled and used for spare parts, or his singing staff relegated to toppling castle walls or strategic bridge-building to enable quick troop movements.

The outer office of Taimyo Karal Linseed, the commander of the Seventh Legion’s first field force, and Speaker’s former commanding officer, was not as sparsely decorated as the hallways of the Operations Directorate – indeed, between paintings of famous Lookshyan leaders, including one of Linseed in dress formals, and a nice drape featuring the elemental dragons and a display case with several trophies taken in battle there was a kind of youthful exuberance to the place… never mind that Linseed was  in fact older than Speaker himself – though not by much – but by unicorn standards she was still young.

At first his officer escort had gone into the Taimyo’s officer to report – no doubt to tell of the things Speaker had done so far, and to give her own personal impressions of him. Speaker hoped that she would not let any religious prejduces color her evaluation of him… of course, the mere fact that any kind of evaluation was necessary proved that the general staff didn’t know if they could trust Solars or not – so things weren’t exactly off to the best start.

As the unicorn officer left and motioned for Speaker to enter she only said “Speak only when spoken to” – but Speaker gave her a very disaprooving glare, akin to how he had looked in the aviary lift, prompting her to say: “…or take your chances – your choice”

As the unicorn mare marched off Speaker sighed. The fact that she never told him her name bothered him – it was simply polite among officers to introduce one-self, even if meeting under less than ideal circumstances. Cash would probably have reasoned that it was so Speaker couldn’t retaliate against the unicorn mare if things went bad during the evaluation and Speaker needed someone to punish  - but it wasn’t in Speaker’s nature to think of such things.

Entering Taimyo Karal Linseed’s office proper, Speaker bowed and saluted his old commanding officer: “Bright Machine Speaker, formerly Heart Speaker, reporting – and congratulations on your promotion”

The mare sitting behind the stone-topped desk shot Speaker a look that Cash and Sullen Hoof would likely have enjoyed analyzing. What Speaker saw was a superior officer who didn’t look happy, which wasn’t entirely wrong, but it certainly wasn’t the whole story either. Out from under a short but bushy black mane, under a suit of lamellar armor that was clearly nothing short of a masterpiece which was over an orange coat, two slitted red eyes peered out: “Close the door”

Speaker suddenly found himself wishing that he had cleaned himself off properly after leaving the underworld. His old red and faded first field force uniform had ectoplasmic stains from the ghosts he had destroyed at Deep Rot… and he had always been taught that it was usually a good idea to dress up properly if you were facing a proper dressing down.

Walking over in front of her desk and standing at attention, Speaker waited for the Taimyo to say something.

Linseed took her time. The fact that Speaker seemed anxious pleased her – what his escort had told her had made Linseed think that Speaker had become more hotheaded… and she didn’t remember Heart Speaker as ever having been hotheaded: “I have read some interesting reports mentioning you and your friends – care to explain?”

Waiting with baited breath, Speaker knew better than to just start talking when asked such a question – it was a common Lookshyan officer trick, when dealing with green recruits, civilians or inexperienced officers: Linseed was supposed to wait a few seconds, and then specify what those reports were about, then ask to what she really wanted to know – this was basic officer knowlegde… it occurred to Speaker that Linseed was perhaps testing him to see if he still remembered that information? It would stand to reason that if he was indeed a demon inhabiting a pony host, then that demon might not know these things.

“The elephant in the room is obviously the accusations of you having revealed yourself as a Solar anathema, but there’s also reports of activity from Nexus, the northern reaches of the hundred kingdoms and most recently you and a group of Solar anathema staking claim to some land around a demesne north of Great Forks” Karal Linseed noted, floating out a stack of scrolls from her desk. The red glow that enveloped her horn and the scrolls sparkled and sparked, as if threatening to set the very scrolls on fire, but Speaker knew that such was but a trick of the eye when seeing fire aspected essence expressed and used.

Nodding, Speaker motioned for Linseed to get to her point. The Taimyo nodded in turn, smiling over the impression that Speaker indeed did seem to remember the proper protocol: “I want to know exactly what happened to you, what you’re up to, and how in the sweat name of Heshiesh you repaired a warstrider just by knocking on its head?”

It was difficult for Speaker not to laugh, for his relief at hearing these questions was immense. First off he flared his caste mark, then he looked around the room and spotted an old broken sword hanging on the wall. The sword was inscribed with artful old realm glyphs that read “The heart-water drinker of Chumyo Nefvarin” – at this point Speaker dared not look up at Linseed, for with the realization that he had just taken one of the blades of the very founder of Lookshy, Chumyo Nefvarin Gilshalos, the brilliant unicorn commander who led the seventh legion during the Balloran crusade and defended the city successfully from the never-ending tide of changeling attacks for several years… and this was his broken sword.

Taking a deep breath, Speaker took a step back and spun up his crafting and repair charms. With the essence of the sun Speaker formed new steel where there had once been, the broken blade seemingly growing tendrils of light that weaved together and became the blade that it had been over seven hundred years ago. It was pathetically easy for Speaker, for as a Solar of the Twilight Caste he was a peerless paragon of artifice in all its forms.

Floating the new fully restored blade down onto Linseed’s table, Speaker looked up – seeing the Taimyo confused and astounded: “To answer all of your questions: Yes I am a Solar, in fact I am the reincarnation of the Solar Bright Machine Speaker, who’s name and memories I have inherited, the original founder of Deheleshen.  My intentions are to restore my lands to their former glory, and I intend to do so in the same way I just did with this blade – which was the same way I fixed the vibro-crystal feeds on that warstrider”

It was a little known fact that Chumyo Nefvarin’s blade was a weapon wrought of unknown first age alloys, which had made repair and restoration of the blade utterly impossible. It had been given to the office of the Taimyo of the first field force five centuries earlier, as a reminder of the fact that while Lookshy had many  potent weapons of the first age, then it did not always have the means to repair them.

By Taimyo Linseed’s logic, Speaker had just done the impossible – with no new materials needed to make repairs, only golden essence no less.
It took Speaker a good moment or two to realize that Linseed was utterly dumbfounded, at which point he pulled up a chair and asked: “Do you want to know what other things I’ve been up to since I exalted?”

Steeling her mind with a charm to regain her composure, Linseed floated the now restored blade back up on the wall it had hung on, then pulled out a magical auto-dictation quill that began to scribble down everything Speaker and Linseed said with golden ink and bright red ink it seemed to produce itself respectively. 

“Before we begin – the rest of you, return to the staging ground and wait there for debriefing” Linseed commanded.

Speaker was, to put it mildly, startled as eight Lookshyan unicorn rangers in what looked like half-plated magical robes. They left silently, and without a word. The legends surrounding the impossible feats that Lookshyan rangers had supposedly performed throughout history were… well… legendary – and Speaker hadn’t had inkling that there had been eight of them in the office. Looking around it became even weirder: The office wasn’t even that big… 

“Speaker, talk to me” Linseed said with a bemused look. It seemed to please her in no small amount that she had managed to get the drop of Speaker in the way.

It was no lie that Speaker wasn’t as good a storyteller as Sunrise or Shimmer, nor was he as good as Cash at making all his deeds sound equally heroic – but he told his tale as an honest soldier recounting his deeds to a superior officer, and for this Linseed seemed honestly impressed and thankful, though it was also clear to Linseed that Speaker was omitting certain things (Namely the circle’s trip to Denansdor, or his possession of a singing staff) but she seemed perfectly willing to accept that Speaker withheld certain things. Lookshyan battle manual was clear on this topic: It was only a fool of a general who revealed all his activities to even his allies – one should always have a few tricks in reserve.

As the magical pen finally came to rest, Linseed only had one other thing to ask about, a topic that caught Speaker quite off guard: “Right then. Now, while I am satisfied with your explanation of  your actions so far, there was one thing you didn’t mention: Your attempted murder of Prince Bien River Parter”

That was not a name that Speaker had thought of for quite a while, though considering River Parter’s Lookshyan mother and her familial relations to Gens Yushoto, then it really shouldn’t have surprised him that the incident was ultimately reported to Lookshy.

“I did no such thing. He was about to order his samurai to rob a merchant who refused to give over his wares for free when I and the merchant both exalted as Solars. River Parter ordered us killed, we defended ourselves. During the fight I could have killed him, but I did not” Speaker claimed, Linseed’s furrowed brow showing how she didn’t seem entirely convinced.

Pulling out a scroll with a copy of the incident report, Linseed skimmed it briefly: “It is well known that River Parter is a zealous immaculate believer. The Bien lands are close enough to the coast for realm monks and preachers to pass through it regularly – this has been factored into our evaluaton of the report, and while I am personally incline to believe you, then there are many in Lookshy who would not, so I cannot simply dismiss this”

Speaker watched wearily as Linseed put down the scroll and gave him a sly look: “There is a way to settle this though…”

His mind racing, Speaker tried his best to recall what the standard procedure for this kind of accusations was. Military tribunal? A hearing by the general staff? Attempted murder of a unicorn was about as serious as crimes got in Lookshy, of course this had not happened in Lookshy – and the seventh legion knew well enough to not bother trying to impose its laws outside of its sovereign territories.

Seeing Speaker’s look of confused desperation, Linseed raised a hoof and gestured in a friendly maner for Speaker to calm himself: “Easy now – Bien River Parter is currently studying here in Lookshy, taking brush-up courses to get into the Academy of Terrestrial Governance here”
“Oh… so you’re suggesting we just go ask him?” the solar said mixed in with a sigh of relief.

Linseed shook her head a bit from side to side: “Well, no – I was thinking more along the lines of having him brought here. You’re not cleared to leave this place until we’re done here”

At this point it occurred to Speaker that River Parter would no doubt stick to his story that Speaker had tried to murder him in broad daylight – and Lookshy had a long and undeniable history of siding with unicorns when it was a matter of word against word: “Am I allowed to have any witnesses speak on my behalf?”

“Well, this isn’t an official hearing… and it happened well out of Lookshyan jurisdiction – this is only for your evaluation, but who do you have in mind? We’ve talked with the ponies of the town it happened in, they all confirm River Parter’s story” Linseed noted.

Rolling his eyes, Speaker sighed: “Of course they would – no, I was thinking the merchant that River Parter was robbing when I exalted”

The Taimyo found this to be acceptable, but noted that until that merchant could arrive in Lookshy, then Speaker would have to remain in protective custody – basically imprisoned for intents and purposes.

“Oh that won’t be necessary – that merchant, that was the pony who helmet the yeddim we flew in on” Speaker pointed out, suddenly feeling rather good about his chances.

The idea that there were more Solars running around Lookshy without proper supervision, or the intelligence and security directorates having been notified, sent chills down Linseed’s spine. When Speaker noted that his escort whose name he never got sent a unicorn officer by the name of Rice Pudding with them, Linseed became at ease once more.

“Alright, wait here while I go message Rice Pudding and send someone to fetch your friend – don’t touch anything… or fix anything” Linseed said, getting up and walking out the door.

It took a surprisingly short amount of time before Cash and Karal Linseed stepped into the office. Apparently Cash had been picked up in one of Lookshy’s Chariots of Infinite Heavens – Speaker recalled such a thing as basically being a nice wheel-less chariot that flew via a blue-jade essence drive, the precursor to the sky chariots that were later developed following the genesis of the Pegasus ponies… but such musings on the ancient origins of this would have to be for another day.

Cash looked quite amused, Linseed less so, when they stepped into Linseed’s office. River Parter, evidently a year older and looking like a growth spurt had hit the adolescent unicorn, was even less pleased… infact, he was down right terrified when he saw Speaker: “Wha- what’s he doing here? He tried to kill me!?”

Wisely choosing to let Linseed and Cash do most of the talk, Speaker figured that River Parter would be confessing in short order via Cash’s subtler hypnosis charms, making all this end mercifully quickly. True enough, Cash barely needed to introduce himself before Speaker’s essence sight saw hidden words and commands worm their way into River Parter’s mind while the magical quill once again wrote down everything said, evidently using thick and shimmering black ink for River Parter’s statements.

When Cash had finished giving his testimony, which all confirmed Speaker’s retelling of the events, the young unicorn stepped up in his magisterial school uniform, trying to look all kinds of high and mighty: “And for the record, I am Bien River Parter, son of the venerable and wise Daimyo Bien Plumtree Root of House Bien, Lord of the Bien lands in the hundred kingdoms. Verily, on the day in question last year I was investigating the rumor that a merchant had a merchant had arrived in one of the smaller towns near the family castle. I had set out with a dozen of my most loyal and sycophantic samurai, and we were in the process of intimidating the merchant – the pony to my left here – into hoofing over all of his wares, less he disrespect me and thus be executed. The mercenaries he had along for the trip didn’t seem keen on letting that happen, and a fight seemed sure to break out, but then the old fool and the merchant both revealed themselves to be anathema – as described in the immaculate texts - so of course I ordered their immediate execution. Furthermore I should add that I never liked Heart Speaker, for my mother – the sister of Yushoto Rice Biscuit of the Seventh Legion – had hired him on multiple occations to act as my tutor on topics such as math, medicine and history, all topics I too this day find highly irrelevant for a prince to learn – such things are for servants and clerks to know – so I had at the time been looking for an excuse to kill Speaker for years for boring me with such things, even if it was at my mother’s bidding. This of course doesn’t mean that I did anything wrong – the immaculate texts are clear on anathema, they must die”

Both Linseed and Speaker just blinked as River Parter ended his little confession. The Taimyo quickly told both Speaker and Cash to go outside and wait in the front office until called back in, though it didn’t take many seconds after the door closed on them before Cash lit out a somewhat restrained giggle: “So, was that good enough?”

“I don’t… what did you do to him? Did you know that River Parter was in Lookshy?” Speaker asked, looking all kinds of terrified.

“I just put a few ideas into his head – like lying is bad, telling the truth is good, and that Lookshy couldn’t punish him for his actions anyway, plus the idea that he might even stand to gain some brownie-points with some of the younger gens Amilar scions if word spread that he tried to kill a couple of Solars purely out of religious hatred” Cash said nonchalantly, sounding ever so sure in the righteousness of his own actions.
Despairing, Speaker sat down on the floor: “You do realize that mind-controlling unicorns in front of a member of the general staff will get the both of us executed?”

“Oh please. The moment I saw Linseed and River Parter together I knew exactly what she expected and what I should do – please don’t underestimate the power of my charms of social observation. First of all Linseed was giving River Parter distrusting looks, which told me that she knew he would lie and that she expected her suspicions to be confirmed via some kind of lie-detecting thing she has on her…” Cash began, adding that the unicorn that had come with him, Sunrise and sleeping Shimmer on the yeddim had taken the three to a tavern near the yeddim stables to calm his nerves, which had apparently also resulted in the same unicorn turning into a drunking chatterbox who had told Cash and Sunrise all kinds of fun things, including that it had recently become fashionable among the younger scions of gens (the old realm term Lookshy stilled used for noble house) Amilar to be one-up each other with religious fervor, mainly focused on realm-style immaculate teachings.

Speaker wasn’t entirely sure if he was all that pleased by having been saved by the power of gossip, but at least River Parter had been dealt with: “So if Linseed is questioning River Parter on why he came clean, what will he say now?”

“Don’t care. The hypnosis will make him rationalize his sudden desire to be truthful – maybe he’ll say that seeing the two of us he thought he might as well come clean, putting his past behind him, though I think he’ll go with the idea of wanting to promote himself as the immaculate zealot he really is, instead of pretending to Lookshy that he isn’t” Cash explained with a devil-may-care tone as he twirled around and sat down on a chair.

Speaker shook his head and sat down as well. While the two waited Cash chatted with Linseed’s secretary, an old shrew of a mare who’s need for glasses Speaker quickly did away with – and in exchange Cash swore the secretary not to tell of anything she had heard Cash and Speaker say to each other previously.

Having done that, Cash got an idea: “You know, considering how you’ve kept saying that Lookshy is all about judging a pony by his deeds not his words, then I think a great way for us to win some solid favor would be to throw you at some old injured veterans. Fix them up, make Lookshy love us, then they’re sure to want to help us”

“That’s… look I would love to do that, but it would be to help ponies who need it, not to curry political favor. This isn’t anything from how we ran the hospital in Nexus or how Sunhill is supposed to work” Speaker protested, looking down right insulted at the idea of exploiting Lookshy’s wounded veterans like that.

Pouting, Cash rolled his eyes: “You really have a knack for wasting political capital, you know that? But fair enough… I’m sure we can find some other way of being useful here – Lookshy would probably love to have someone around who can swear bothersome warlords into actually obeying treaties”

A few moments later River Parter stomped out of Taimyo Linseed’s office. Cash and Speaker were discussing the apparent lack of security in or around the office, but River Parter’s blatantly obvious foul mood stole their attention.

The young unicorn stomped off, looking very angry, while Linseed called for Speaker and Cash to come into her office again.

“Ok you two…” Linseed began, sighing: “Bright Machine Speaker, these are your old papers of helotry, amended with your new name. As for you Cash Charmer, then I expect you to behave yourself while in Lookshy. Familiarize yourself with our laws and don’t break them. The general staff will convene later today – we will decide what to do with you there, which will likely require the presence of you and your circle, so do not leave Lookshy before this. Beyond that I have nothing more for you here – you will be escorted back to the market district when you leave here” Linseed quickly sounded off. It was almost as if she didn’t want either of the two Solars before her to actually say anything.

Ushered out of Linseed’s office, Speaker with a capped scroll-container out of bamboo with what amounted to the documentation that he was a legal native of Lookshy floating before him, while Cash was ‘merely’ carrying a big  grin smeared across his face.

As they were escorted out of the district of the legion into the adjacent district of savants, Speaker asked what Cash found so funny. “Oh that’s simple – Linseed was pissed, probably from whatever River Parter had said – like, really furious – but she hid it will”

Speaker shook his head at Cash, praying that the Eclipse Caste wouldn’t get into too much trouble while in Lookshy – and that such trouble wouldn’t lead back to Speaker himself.

In the market district the two were released on their recognizance, with Cash quickly leading Speaker over to the watering hole near the massive yeddim stables. The place itself was a dive bar, indeed the smell inside very much seemed require that one take a deep breath before entering – though the number of pony laborers inside with stains of manure on their coats and work clothes quickly revealed the source of the vile aroma…

However, upon approaching Sunrise and very clearly drunk unicorn Rice Pudding the scent in the air was replaced by a pleased and faint odor of wild flowers – the effect of Rice Pudding using her elemental powers to clear the air. Presenting the scroll case to the rest of the circle – sans Shimmer, who had evidently been left on the howdah on Han to sleep – Speaker explained that he had been cleared of any misgivings, though he also noted that the general council would be talking about what to do about them later in the day: “…so I think it’s a bit early to make any plans for how to get help here – we should probably look for somewhere to stay for the night”

“Perhaps – but good Rice Pudding here has been telling me of your miraculous and instantaneous healing of our yeddim, and has a proposal to make” Sunrise said in a calm albeit tired voice, evidently not that pleased with her surroundings.

Rice Pudding perked up at the mention of his name, the young unicorn’s horn flaring with essence as green as the stalion’s thick but crew-cut mane. In the blink of an eye the unicorn went from swaying from side to side with drunken attempts to grab hold of his drink while letting out the occasional slurred and garbled nonsense, to sitting perfectly and addressing Speaker quite clearly: “Oh hey – you’re back, and you got your papers! Awesome, I figured she’d let you stay, with all the stuff that’s happened and all… but anyway, if you’re looking for a place to stay, then I might know a way you can lodge at the gens Yushoto mansion while you’re here in Lookshy”

The sudden lack of any signs of inebriation prompted a quick smile from Cash and Speaker raising an eyebrow before he realized that as an obviously wood-aspected unicorn, then Rice Pudding’s dragonblooded powers allowed him immunity of all organic poisons at will – alcohol included, though t that didn’t stop any of the Solars from listening intently to the young officer.

“Lord Bright Machine Speaker, what do you know of my gens matriarch, Yushoto Risotto?” Rice Pudding asked.
> Chapter 75: Regrowth
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the smoky tavern, thinking for a moment, Speaker recalled that last time he heard mention of the Yushoto matriarch. It had been a good while before his retirement almost eight years ago – Yushoto Risotto had been getting increasingly ill over the last several years, but she was also well over two-hundred and fifty years old, making her one of the oldest known unicorns alive in creation… and in old age even unicorns would find their bodies suffering from age-related illnesses, though few unicorns in this day and age ever got to experience that luxury.

“You are right on both accounts I’m afraid. Mistress Risotto is one of the wisest and brightest business-ponies and strategists Lookshy has, but an illness of a sort has taken her… she is bed-ridden and unable to speak – if you could use your powers on her, heal her… it would give you a powerful friend on the general staff, as well as indebt my gens to you greatly” Rice Pudding explained. Speaker quickly noted that old age wasn’t something he ‘cure’ just yet… but Rice Pudding noted: “Oh this isn’t old age – sure, she’s not as strong as strong as she used to, but this isn’t a medical issue… its occult in nature”

This got Speaker’s attention: “Explain”

“It’s a difficult image to show with words – you can best see it using essence sight lenses. Her essence is corrupted somehow” the young unicorn explained, his voice and expression pained at the thought of the leader of his house in such a state.

His brows furled into a deeply serious expression, Speaker asked for how long Risotto had been like that. Rice Pudding could only shrug: “Honestly I don’t know – I don’t even know what caused it – but if you would all come and have a look, and work the miracles I heard you did in Nexus and Chung Do…”

The trip to the northern parts of the residential district, the area where most of Lookshy’s gentes had their large mansions and town houses, proved somewhat tricky to reach since only Speaker and Rice Pudding – being natives of Lookshy – were allowed to leave the fourth ring. Foreigners simply weren’t let into the city beyond the market district and its neighboring districts of agriculture and mercenary barracks.

The solution was for Rice Pudding to pull a few strings, after which two justicars – well armed and armored Lookshyan military police ponies – arrived to escort the circle and Rice Pudding through the city.

“Wow you lot don’t kid around…” Cash blurted out as they all trotted past two large wood and blue stone buildings that seemed to house large markets specializing in the sale of weapons – one market for sales to individuals, and one for bulk sales to armies and large mercenary forces.

It took an hour or so to navigate the city, though most of that was spent at security checkpoints. Rice Pudding noted that if the circle was to stay in the city for longer they should all get visitor’s passes: “and if you can help the matriarch then your passes should be good for the whole city”

The residential district was evidently circular in shape – built around the old city district. The southern parts that the circle and its escorts entered first housed a good part of the city’s poorer population, with five or six story tenements and apartment buildings. They were by no means anything grand, but the aqueducts coming out of the old city supplied running way in copious amounts to public water fountains and baths, and that alone put the place leagues above how most ponies in creation lived. The addition of the odd remnant of first age architecture and infrastructure, such as street-lights set with stoned that would glow brightly at night made this would-be slum into something  that not even most nobles throughout creation could match.

Circling around the old city by going through the western part of the district, the circle passed by several parks and very nice compounds marked by flags not of Lookshy. Cash correctly recognized them as ambassadorial residences, including the curious hide-bound cluster of yurts set on a big lawn that was evidently the Marukan ambassador’s ‘house’.

The northern part of the residential district had notably more intact first age features, including a pillar with a glowing sphere of light above it that Speaker figured as still-functioning tether for a light rail system – though it didn’t seem connected to any active light rails.

“Oh that, ya – I think the old light rails failed over three hundred years ago – the sorcerer-technicians back then weren’t able to fix it, first age spare parts and all” Rice Pudding mused, looking very much as if he was a good bit curious at how the rail system would have looked if it was working.

Seeing this, Cash smiled knowingly at Speaker.

Finally at the Yushoto compound, a large walled estate and small castle by all rights, partially built into the northern parts of the outer residential district wall. It was spacious compared to the cramped tenements where the helots lived, but not so much that one could argue that space was wasted: It was clear that every fountain built in and around the place served a purpose, be it as an easily accessible source of drinking water for ponies-at-arms on patrol, or for washing clothes, or fire fighting as part of siege-response. Even the trees that lined the roads in the district were sorts that either bore edible fruits or nuts – it might be pretty, but everything had a use.

At first there was some mild confusion from the guards at the compound – but Rice Pudding once again pulled rank, so to say, though this time it was his social rank within gens Yushoto that paved the way.

“Is he that important to his gens?” Cash quietly and discreetly asked Speaker.

Shrugging, Speaker could only tell his friend what any pony in Lookshy would know: “Unicorns can always pull rank over mortals – but I doubt he’s that high profile here. Respect in Lookshy is something you get from deeds not just having a horn, and he’s a low ranking officer so I doubt he’s had much time to make a name for himself in the legion”

Passing under the gatehouse into the Yushoto compound, Rice Pudding chimed in: “True. I was blessed with my horn barely two months ago. I’m still taking intermediary lessons in warcraft”

“Your humility suits you well. I’ve met unicorns from the Realm while in Great Forks that were far less honest about their abilities” Sunrise said in an almost cheerful tone.

Nodding as he looked ahead in anticipation, Rice Pudding noted: “Well, this isn’t the realm”

Approaching the central structure of the compound, a large palacial residence capped with a large five-tiered pagoda clad in very nice blue-lacquered tiles, the group was met by other ponies – some adult, some still foals – all of them wearing quite stylish civilian-cut military uniforms, something the circle had seen plenty of on their way through the city. Evidently such garbs were the height of fashion in Lookshy.
“Uncle Pudding! Who’s this?” a little filly asked, her mane wild and her flank blank.

The officer smiled: “You can go tell your cousins that it’s another doctor for granny and the good doctor’s friends”

The little filly quickly turned around and filled in her peers, while the more adult scions of gens Yushoto appeared to expect a few more details.

Chit chat ensued, introductions were made, and the whole party moved into the main tea salon, while Speaker was led up to the matriach’s private chambers by Rice Pudding.

Leaving Cash and Sunrise behind to chat with the other Yushoto scions, Speaker finally inquired more candidly into the nature of the matriarch’s ailment: “Is there anything you haven’t told me? Anything not suitable for metic ears?”

“To be honest… I don’t know – I may be blessed by Sextis Jylis and her healing ways, but my skills in medicine are middling, and this is a supernatural ailment if there ever was one – but it’s something also never seen before” Rice Pudding state with no small amount of frustration in his voice as the two walked up their third flight of stairs in a row.

The matriarch’s private quarters were guarded by two guards-ponies in nice lamellar armor emblazoned with the green Yushoto crest of three crossed sticks. They parted way to allow Rice Pudding and Speaker entry just when a unicorn mare came out.

She seemed to instantly recognize Rice Pudding and greeted him in a thick northern accent: “Lamy! Up here to say hi to old-mother? And who is your friend?”

“Riza, this is Bright Machine Speaker – we’ve talked about him, remember?” Pudding motioned, stepping aside to let Riza pass.
Trotting around Pudding and Speaker so they could get into the room, Riza gave Pudding a concerned look: “Lamy, you think this is ok with Boribap?”

Speaker wondered for a moment who Boribap was. Rice Pudding seemed to think it was ok, arguing that he had faith in Speaker’s powers, though he also noted: “…and ultimately I don’t need his permission to try to help, we all agreed on that a long time ago”

Giving Rice Pudding a deep nod Riza acquiesced and stepped away, leaving.

“Ok, so who was that and who is Boribap?” Speaker wondered out loud as the two entered the Matriarch’s private chambers.

The young officer noted that Riza Grot was a northern lost egg – the common term for a dragonblooded pony discovered outside of a unicorn noble house. Such unicorns were often invited to join to the realm, formally adopting lost eggs into their noble houses. Lookshy had similar practices – for both it was a matter of recruiting the most horns to ultimately fight each other or fend off invasion in the case of Lookshy. On the other hoof, Boribap was an older Yushoto unicorn stallion who apparently fancied himself head of the gens while the matriarch was incommunicado – though he wouldn’t become the official patriarch until the day she died or formally retired.

“Oh I know that feeling” Speaker sighed, trying hardto banish painful memories rarely thought of.

Quickly stepping up to the curtains surrounding the matriarch’s large bed, Speaker quickly swiped them aside – if for nothing else then to change the topic. Part of him quickly regretted doing so, another part of him wanted to scream.

The matriarch was a wood aspected unicorn – that much was clear. She had a grass-green mane, though her old age was showing as the tips of her mane were withering, and her coat was clumped together like bark… indeed, her entire body had a very distinct wooden appearance to it.

…it also looked like the matriarch had half-melted and sprouted roots all over her bed, turning into more tree than pony. Sure, you could tell where her legs, hooves, hips, torso and head were… or had been… but she had all but disintegrated and turned into vegetation.

“Ok, I get what you meant now… this is…new, even by first age standards” Speaker very quietly and calmly said, his medical professional self having come to the forefront – and a good doctor should never act surprised to a patient.

His instant diagnosis charm told Speaker of strange and bizarre leaks in Yushoto Risotto’s essence flows – like her body had at some point simply failed to contain the potency of her unicorn powers, making it leak out of her as if she had been lacerated all over. It was clearly through each of these bodily essence vents that the wooden manifestations had… taken root… and made her body mutate into the half-tree half-pony, or… well… mostly-tree, just-bare-pony that Risotto was now.

“Are you certain that she is still… alive, that she hasn’t fully turned into a plant?” Speaker asked quietly but sternly, not wanting Rice Pudding to in any way dodge such a vital question, even if it was an uncomfortable thought.

The young unicorn shrugged and ran a hoof through his green mane. It hung like drap vines from his head in a way that reminded Speaker of Shimmer’s dreadlocks – but these were thinner, more delicate looking: “Sorcererous lenses show that her soul is still in there – so she’s still a pony, just not… well”

Speaker’s own essence sight confirmed this. It also revealed the extent of the constant essence-leaks.

“Very well – I… think I’m going to start with her head. This malady has essence markers of poison, but also disease as well as mutation – has she been exposed to any sources of wyld energy in the last few years?” the Solar healer inquired, finding himself intrigued by the puzzle before him.

Rice Pudding could only give Speaker an apologetic and equally puzzled shrug.

Shaking his head with brows furrowed furiously, Speaker approached Risotto and gently touched what appeared the matriarch’s left forelimb. The thick layer of bark obscured most of the details of her body, but it was still possible to make out the outline of her limbs and chest.

One thing that particularly puzzled Speaker was the lack of any visible means to breathe or eat. Risotto’s head was a gnarled mess of thick cracked bark, barely leaving the outline of an old sleeping mare’s face.
“How do you feed her?”

The young scion of gens Yushoto explained that Risotto was ‘watered’ with thin soups and broths – her bedsheets had incidentally not been changed for years, since she had apparently formed roots going into her mattress and bed – but they kept her and the bed clean via charms.

Hygiene wasn’t an issue Speaker had considered – but it made sense. Wreathing his right forehoof in golden healing essence and channeling it through his medical suplimental charm, Speaker was about to inject his first experimental shot of restorative essence into Risotto when the door to the room burst open.

“Hold it!” thundered the deep and harsh voice of a mare who was clearly used to barking out orders.

Turning around, Speaker saw a rusty-red coated mare about his height, with legs like logs and fury in her eyes. She was clad in bright forest-green armor, the colors of the second Lookshyan field force.

Rice Pudding seemed quite surprised: “Khao Lam, don’t – he’s trying to help”

“I will not let any anathema near grandmother! Get away you monster!” Khao Lam shouted, rearing up into a martial stance – ready to strike with both essence and hoof.

Quickly taking five steps backwards, Speaker bowed graciously and forced a polite smile: “I don’t believe we’ve been introduced”

“Cousin, this is Chuzei Bright Machine Speaker – I’ve told you of him, from the reports out of Nexus remember? Speaker,this is Shozei Yushoto Khao Lam” Rice Pudding quickly stated, looking all sorts of terrified.

Hearing that Speaker held rank, the earth-aspected unicorn mare dropped down on all fours and gave Speaker a distrusting but less aggressive look: “Chuzei? What unit?”

“First field force 3rd Gunzosha 1st medical scale, under the then Kazei Karal Linseed” the old stallion said, purposely trying not to puff out his chest or doing anything else that could be interpreted boastful behavior.

The green-armored unicorn mare stood silently for a moment or two, giving Speaker the same harsh and evaluating look.

“Taimyo Linseed gave him his papers – that should be enough for any of us to trust him. Please, he might be our only hope” Rice Pudding pointed out, pleading for Khao Lamto to just let Speaker continue.

Giving her cousin a very dirty look, Khao Lam sighed: “You know that after the last failure that all doctors and medical procedures for gran have to be cleared with him first”

“This is the healer from Nexus I’ve been telling you about – he’s been undoing wyld mutations there for months, as well as regrowing limbs and all kinds of other magical mysteries. We should at the very least let him try” Rice Pudding pleaded.

The two bickered back and forth a bit more. It was plain to see that Khao Lam wasn’t keen on letting Speaker do anything to her grandmother, though that reluctance seemed to stem more from the failures of the many previous doctors and healers, than Khao Lam’s religious convictions – although they were clearly also a factor here.

Ultimately Khao Lam relented – mainly due to Rice Pudding’s persistence. Still, it was clear to Speaker that he wasn’t going to get that many tries before he would be told to leave, so he chose to blow all the essence he could on his initial examination.

The dimly lit room, with its green embroidered curtains, flared into full daylight as Speaker’s anima was called upon. Bathed ti its bright golden light Speaker’s senses sharpened: His eyes picked up more detail, his hooves felt the texture and softness of the carpets more acutely, and his hearing picked up something very important: A heart beat. A singular heartbeat from Risotto. Plants don’t have heart, ponies do!

This confirmed to Speaker more than enough that there was something worth saving under the massed of knotted wood-cancer. Taking a deep breath and giving his two unicorn one last look to see if they were ok with him beginning – Rice Pudding gave a cautious nod, while Khao Lam gave a more distrustful look.

His anima flaring again, this time to its full totemic form for a brief moment, three parirs of golden wings of light erupting from Speaker’s back along with ancient symbols of wisdom,healing and good health. Firing up nearly all the healing charms he knew of at all.

Gently placing his brightly glowing hoof on Risotto’s forehead – or what had once been it – Speaker gave her everything. Healing charms, mutation-undoing charms. The wooden body fof Risotto burst into golden fire.

At this point all Speaker could do was pray… perhaps to Uvanavu, the god of good health? Perhaps to Celestia, for guidance in his act of healing, that it be as close to perfection as possible?

…moot point – the instant treatment charm had kicked in, as had the order-affirming charm that reverted all mutations.

The distinct sound of old dry wood creaking rang out in waves, as ripples coursed through the bark down through Risotto’s chakras. Now, old dry wood was never known for its flexibility – quite the opposite – so the ripples quickly turned into cracks, through which blood began to spurt at high pressure.

Standing so close to a wooden fountain of blood meant that Speaker got drenched – but at the same time Speaker couldn’t stop smiling. Khao Lam and Rice Pudding in turn looked horrified, but their expressions softened when Speaker reminded them that plants didn’t bleed… and the blood sprays were from Risotto’s tree sap turning back into blood – and again, normal trees didn’t have blood.
The blood fountains eventually subsided as the cracked bark began to slough off in layers.

Using his medical charms every ten or so seconds to keep watch of the developments inside the wooden layers, Speaker was able to guide the by now very curious and equally hopefully unicorns through the magical processes going on inside the matriarch: “Now, I can’t tell if you can feel it – but I can see that she’s starting to stir inside her cocoon here…”

“But didn’t you say she’s asleep?” Khao Lam asked, sounding very worried – likely mainly because she knew that it would be her flanks in a sling if this turned out poorly and it became known that she could have stopped it all.

Carefully running another wash of healing essence through the Matriach’s system to help restart her dormant body and force away any bits of wood that hadn’t let go just yet: “Well, this process is undoubtedly painful to her – even with my anesthetic charm – but not in a way that hurts her – more like that buzzing and stinging feeling you get when you’ve rested on a hoof wrong and it fell asleep. You know, pins and needles until you wiggle it back awake”

A sudden gasp for air as the Matriarch’s airways cleared signaled the final part of the transformation. Speaker again applied his healing charms, closing up the wounds left behind by the most deeply rooted – literally – bits of wood that had grown from and merged with the matriarch’s flesh. Much of her skin was ultimately replaced this way, as was much of the muscles around her legs, though that was actually a good thing in Speaker’s opinion: “At least this way she won’t need nearly as much physical therapy to build up her strength with new strong muscles like this”

With this strength the Matriarch soon began to stir more willfully, not just jostling in her sleep from the discomfort she experienced. Khao Lam and Rice Pudding both had to help hold the matriarch down to keep her from hurting herself as she briefly tried to thrash about.

“I think it’s her new eyes. Look at how the wood over her face is receding – this is probably the first time in a while that she’s experienced light on her face, especially with the new eyes I’ve regenerated into her sockets – it probably feels really weird” Speaker explained, careful floating away loose bits of wood and bark from her face and carefully opening her eyes to see if there were splinters or bits of roots left in the sockets as the eyes fully formed of golden light.

“Those eyes – they look jaundiced” Khao Lam worried.

Speaker nodded: “That’s from being formed by golden light – it should recede in a few moments. Her liver and blood toxicity are at normal levels”

Discussing briefly what blood toxicity meant, the three gave Risotto time to finish her transformation. The whole process had taken about half an hour, leaving the now fully reformed matriarch still partially trapped inside the remains of what was now basically a wooden cocoon. Her face was cleared, as were a few other patches around her waist and legs, but for now Speaker reasoned that they should let the matriarch sleep for now.

“Make sure to have plenty of food ready, as well as milk – she’ll need plenty of milk to finalize her bones, otherwise they will become brittle. No water or wine for at least a week” Speaker ordered, feeling quite pleased with the results, though he was annoyed that he hadn’t been able to figure out exactly what had caused such strange systemic mutations to begin with.

Joining the rest of the circle, Cash quickly figured that the treatment had gone well by judging the looks of the two unicorns accompanying him which prompted him to joke: “So, will it be our weight in jade or just a polite pat on the shoulder?” 

“I believe that compensation should be worked out by the matriarch herself – she will hopefully wake up soon enough” Khao Lam proudly declared, noting that until such a time the circle was welcome to stay at the Yushoto compound.

Drinks and snacks were called for and an impromptu celebration for Speaker was started.  The other scions of gens Yushoto were summoned from across the city, and Speaker quickly found himself in a strange position that he had only ever been able to dream of back when had been a mere mortal: He was being celebrated by the very unicorns he had spent his life looking up to.

A toast was about to be called when a rather roughed up maid stormed into the tea salon that everyone was assembled in, shouting “She’s awake!”

A stampede of hooves raced up to the matriarch’s quarters, which was strewn with wooden splinters – as if someone had violently burst out of wooden cocoon… and over by a wash-basin which sat embedded in a stone pedestal stood a mare who appeared deceptively young, her coat even appearing as if still soaked amniotic fluids as if just born. Her mane was a tangled mess, as one might expect with years of non-stop bed-hair, but her eyes were sharp and intelligent, if a bit bloodshot: “The fuck are you all looking at?”

Foremost among the ponies that had rushed up to meet the awoken matriarch was the commanding officer of the second field force Taimyo Yushoto Boribap, who’s face seemed to curl up into an impossible caricature of a stallion upon hearing his grandmother swearing like that in front of stranger.

Seizing the moment Cash pushed Speaker forward, whispering “Go check if she’s ok” – stumbling forward, Speaker felt the baleful gaze of a dozen unicorns trained on him as Yushoto Risotto turned to look at him.

“Well you’re new – thought your uniform sure as hell isn’t, and that’s a worn off medical scale insignia imprint on your shoulder… so are you the doctor I can thank for my recovery?” Risotto expertly pointed out, revealing just how sharp her powers of quick observation were.

Nodding, Speaker stepped forth and applied his diagnostic charm: “I am – my name is Bright Machine Speaker, formerly of the first field force 3rd Gunzosha 1st medical scale, retired – and you… seem to be working perfectly – you have a few bruises that are already healing, but other than that nothing seems to be left of your essence-leaks”

“Well I did just take an unholy shit, my piss was thick like pine resin and I feel like I could eat a whole pig, but ya – certainly feel better than last I remember going to sleep” Risotto said, smiling gleefully with her brand new set of perfect teeth.

It was at this point that Baribap loudly intervened – sending Speaker, the rest of the circle and everyone else out, except for a few servants who were through quick military gestures wordlessly told to quickly fetch water that the matriarch might be washed, clothed and briefed on current events: “Out, all of you!”

Going back towards the tea salon, the circle and everyone else quickly found themselves diverted by servants towards the main dining hall: Apparently the matriarch’s hunger fit with having an early dinner.

Well over two hundred mortal and unicorn ponies had arrived from all over Lookshy, all of them part of the gens, to greet the Matriarch.

Speaker was seated close to the Matriarch – not directly next to her – those seats of honor were given to Baribap and Rice Pudding, though Speaker got the spot next to Rice Pudding. The Cash and Sunrise was seated quite far away – next to a few foreign merchants who were in Lookshy at the moment and were on good terms with the Gens.  Cash enjoyed this greatly, while Sunrise felt that they were being pushed aside as if they weren’t worthy.

For Speaker all the attention he got, all the questions about his background, what battles he had been in, what things he had fought before retiring, what things he had done after retiring – including another retelling of his exaltation and the events that followed that. He had to take care to use the exact same story he told Taimyo Linseed, because Speaker knew that any deviations, or mentioning things previously not mentioned, would ultimately filter back to Linseed. Upon explaining the circle’s adventures in Chung Do, he got increasingly interrupted and asked questions… apparently there was a thing mentioned that interested the Lookshyans very much:

“Hold on – so you and your circle has fought these necromantic anathema?” Baribap inquired, giving Speaker a doubtful and judging look.
Nodding, Speaker put down his chop-sticks finished chewing on his savory – albeit slightly rubbery – mouthful of mushrooms: “On several occasions. To be honest, then their origin is still a mystery to me – but its something I mean to eventually look into. Most of them seem to be really bad news – but I have met a few who were benign”

“But what do they want? The reports we’re getting show them as murderers, assassins and expert ghost-wranglers – some working for this Deathlord warlord who took Thorns, others seemingly working independently – but ultimately they all leave a trail of corpses” Baribap inquired, sounding very much like a military leader who was frustrated at a lack of intelligence about a potential enemy.

Quickly realizing that to explain everything the circle had learned about the abyssal exalted and the Deathlords would take all evening, which would derail his retelling of his adventures as a Solar, Speaker suggested that him and his circle compile a report or two on the topics and hand it in to the Intelligence Directorate.

“That sounds very nice. If all Solars are as upstanding as you, then I might just have to suggest that the general staff reconsider its official stance on you lot” Matriarch Risotto noted, her mouth full of mushroom.

That got Speaker thinking. What was the general staff’s stance on Solars? Had Lookshy taken a stance on Solars? Was it influenced by what had happened in Nexus? Speaker suddenly felt very worried…

Burping loudly, the matriarch suddenly looked like she just remembered something: “Hold on – the general staff meeting! What’s the time?”
“Six going on seven glass after noon” a young unicorn in Valkhavsen student robes said from further down the table, referring to the one-hour hour-glasses that Lookshyan time-keeping was based on, so it was somewhere between six and seven in the evening.

Standing up very abruptly, the Matriarch swallowed back and straightened out her dress: “Then we need to get going! Speaker, bring your circle, the general staff is to meet at seven glass! Baribap, get your fat rump moving!”

"Mother,  please" Baribap groaned as he got up and straightened out his food-stained uniform.
> Chapter 76: Hind-Sight Is Crystal Clear
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The General Staff convened in the Legion District, in a large conference room of one of the few still functioning first age structures in the district – another old hotel dating back from the shogunate. The conference room itself was not particularly ostentatious, with its biggest piece of decoration being a large polished bronze plaque with the last official orders given to the Seventh Legion of the Shogunate over seven hundred years ago, etched into it: “Protect the River Provinces at all costs and await further orders”

Seeing this plaque brought a tear to Speaker’s eyes – for with the wisdom granted to him from his exaltation, which included some rather advanced mathematics, he suddenly found himself with an actual understanding of just how many ponies had given their lives to carry out those orders.

As the general staff itself assembled itself around the large round table, the unicorns making up the military top leadership of Lookshy, Cash pulled Speaker aside before the two sat down: “It’s obvious that we’re here for them to decide what to do with us – So just to let you know; I will not accept another compromise like what the council of entities forced down our throats in Nexus. I’ve talked with over four dozen Yushoto scions and some foreign merchants – they’ve given me a fairly good idea of what we can demand in return for whatever Lookshy wants from us”

Speaker gave Cash an indignant look: “We are not here to extort Lookshy”

“And you think we’re just here to get a pat on the rump for being nice upstanding ponies? We’re here because they need to figure out if we’re a threat or an asset! And assets get used” Cash said, frowning. He could see how Speaker’s opinion of the situation was being colored by his life as a loyal Lookshyan pony.

The master of ceremonies, an old and heavily bearded and balding unicorn in sharply cut blue robes, struck the greenish wooden floor loudly with a steel-shod hoof: “Will all attendees of this meeting please be seated”

“Look, trust me on this – they are going to ask us to do something, likely under the guise of us as a circle having to prove that we’re an asset to Lookshy. You can agree to whatever you want, but you do not speak for the whole circle here. We each have a voice, and remember that Shimmer is also somewhere… sleeping… either way please let me do the negotiations on reward versus services rendered if it down to that” Cash insisted, his caste mark flaring briefly as he used one or two charms to ensure that Speaker got his point, well – it was simply a charm that added a subtle undesirability to Cash’s statement, preventing a listener from outright ignoring it – and Speaker didn’t have the rhetorical mastery needed to create a sufficient retort on the spot.

Giving Cash begrudging nod as he sat down, Speaker took a deep breath and reconsidered his position ever so slightly: There were undeniably ponies in Lookshy who were apprehensive and even fearful of Solars, who spoke of anathema – his escort to Taimyo Linseed, who was already seated at the council table and looking at him, certainly showed that such ponies existed within Lookshy’s walls, but then again it wouldn’t matter: After this meeting when the general staff makes a public statement that Solars aren’t bad everything would all be good, and no pony here would judge him or the circle simply for silly religious reasons: This wasn’t the realm.

The master of ceremonies declared that Taimyo Linseed had the word. On the empty seats around the table glowing circles of lights lit up, emitting sorcerous illusions of Taimyos who were away from Lookshy – likely some kind of magical communication allowing for remote conferences… probably some relic of of the first age, for Speaker recalled similar setups for the Solar deliberative.

“Members of the general staff, I have convened this extraordinary meeting so we can debate the topic of the Solars, represented here by the three Solars present here. Please introduce yourselves” Taimyo Linseed stated, appearing very young compared to the far older and visibly more haggard senior unicorn officers that made up the general staff, as she gestured towards Speaker, Cash and Sunrise.

Cash Charmer quickly seized the moment, introducing himself with a charming smile and polite bow: “Greetings good leaders of Lookshy. I am Cash Charmer, exalted by Celestia the Unconqu ered Sun in the Eclipse Caste, co-founder of and one of the five Lords of Sunhill and Royal advisor to the Shogun of the Chung lands”

There was a quiet murmur as the dozen and a half of unicorns present whispered their comments to each other. Ultimately Linseed asked: “What is your place of birth?”

“I was born on the caravan trails in the hundred kingdoms. And since you don’t seem to want to ask directly, then my first time in Nexus was when I arrived there with this circle of Solars I’m part of here – so no, I’m not one of them”

More mumurs, a few thankful nods and a several scowls followed. Speaker realized that of course the general staff would be apprehensive about a Solar who was also a Nexus-style merchant – he himself having no love lost for Nexus and their cut-throat practices, so the prospect of having to deal with a Solar with such a background… yes, that would be somewhat intimidating.

“We understand that you all, as a circle, claim lordship of the Sunhill manse and the ponies who live there. Mister Charmer, what is your approach to governance?” Risotto asked, surprising Speaker by not swearing at all in her statement, though his medical charms told him that she was under the influence of a mild sedative.

While Cash gave a detailed answer that explained his minimalist approach, it occurred to Speaker why it was Cash being asked this, not Speaker himself or Sunrise: The intelligence directorate had obviously identified Cash as the member of the circle who was chiefly responsible for the practical administration of Sunhill, as well as drafting its laws – and Lookshy had no love for tyrants – so this was another test... another attempt to gauge whether Cash was a pony to their liking or not.

Looking around at the round table, Speaker mainly saw respectful nods from the unicorns present as Cash explained: “A leader is best when ponies barely feel his existence. When his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: We did it ourselves, for we wanted to. This approach makes the average pony far more happy and content, feeling that they are genuinely the masters of their own destiny. This allows me to spend the least amount of time necessary ruling – and more time personally combating the evils of this world, such as the Deathlords”

Far more murmurs and even a few raised voices followed the mention of the Deathlords, with Taimyo Baribap pointing out that Speaker and his circle-mates had already promised to compile a full report on their knowledge of the… Deathlords… as in plural? The dawning realization that there might be more than just the Mask of Winters made the entire general staff visibly uncomfortable, as if they had just learned that the realm had deployed not two but twenty legions against them, without them knowing where they were.

Baribab finally cut through the uncomfortable silence, saying that he had heard enough and was ready to move on to the next topic.

“Very well – assuming the statements given here are true I see nothing preventing us from moving on either”  Linseed chimed in.

A loud clearing of the throat from a very tall and surprisingly grim looking unicorn mare, who looked like her morning grooming regiment involved copious amounts of gravel – both for breakfast and as for washing in. Speaker quickly snapped from his train of thought about why nobody wanted to hear from Sunrise when recognized the mare: it was the Matriarch of gens Maheka: Maheka Feldspar, Taimyo of the third field force, also simply known as The Battleaxe – a pun on both her personality, looks and battlefield proves.

“Do you have anything to say Feldspar?” Linseed politely asked, with but a slight hint of caution in her tone. Cash looked like he had just gleamed volumes of political insider information from that statement via his charms of social observation.

The old mare, matriarch of the venerable and  industrious Gens Maheka, rose from her seat, looking to be slightly taller than Speaker with her clearly earth-aspected but by no means pretty appearance: “I simply wish to once more protest to the presence and utilization of anathema – it besmirches the good name of Lookshy, and quite frankly I do not like that”

Her voice was rough and coarse – like her appearance, likely just another effect of her cleary earth-aspected elemental dragonblood. Being an old unicorn this had altered her body slowly over time, resulting in her rough-hewn looks and rough voice. It didn’t make her look like living stone, as with the late Grandmaster, but more as if she had an unkempt coat, making her if not ugly then quite plain.

Unlike Cash’s mention of Deathlords and the silence that had followed it, the uncomfortable silence that came after the Battleaxe’s statement was much more shortlived, as Linseed quickly noted: “Feldspar, old friend, we are well aware of our opinions on this matter – but this isn’t the realm: It has never been the policy of this council to judge ponies on dogma alone, and so far none of their actions warrant such language”

There was a rocky grating noise as Feldspar’s expression changed into one of grim resignation: “Be that as it may – I stand by my statement I know damn well that I’m not the only one here who feels that way”

“Perhaps, but that kind of apprehension is exactly what our next topic is meant to clarify, isn’t it? Baribap, do the thing” Risotto calmly said in an almost condescending but also amused tone – Feldspar’s expression certainly didn’t improve.

It turned out that the next topic of the meeting was a test of the circle - just like Cash had predicted: They wanted the circle to do something for them – something impossible.

“The general council has been aware of Solar anathem-“ Baribap began, but Cash interrupted him: “Excuse me, that’s either Solar exalted, or chosen of Celestia, thank you very much”

Baribap gave Cash a brief derisive glare, then sighed while the rest of the council tossed around various mixes of disapproving and amused gazes: “Very well – we’ve been aware of Solar activity in and around the river provinces for about a year or so now. We have yet to be able to come to any kind of uniform decision on our stance on Solars, but we have in turn heard quite a lot about your seemingly miraculous abilities – and so we request a demonstration, beyond what has already been demonstrated to and on members of this council”

“What would that entail?” Sunrise asked from under her hood.

Baribap floated an ornate bronze scroll-tube over to the circle.

Uncapping the tube and quickly reading the scroll, Cash turned to Speaker: “What is the Gunzota redoubt and where is it?”

Speaker stared silently at Cash in disbelief, then snagged the scroll from him and read it.

Sure enough: The general council wanted Speaker and the gang to ‘solve’ the Gunzota redoubt issue.

Looking up at the council, Speaker blurted out: “Are you trying to have us all killed?! Getting into Denansdor would be easier than this!”

There was a mixed murmur of quiet chatter in response to this, but Risotto finally stated: “I haven’t been back in the loop for that long, yet – but the rest of the council seems adamant that this is not an unreasonable way of testing your abilities. You apparently did something similar in Nexus if I understand correctly”

It was then that a loud horn sounded and a pony-at-arms burst into the council chamber: “Rebel activity in the basement!”

With that message everyone aside from Cash and Sunrise got up and instantly began to file out of the council room.

“Hey, what’s going on? Who’s rebelling against what?” Cash asked. Sunrise shrugged.

Speaker gave Cash a stern glare: “This is not the time. We’re all in danger – just follow everyone else”

Outside the old Shogunate era hotel more alarm-horns were sounding – though as everyone moved towards the nearest gate out of the district the horns suddenly stopped.

“Ok, what was that?” Cash finally asked, satisfied that the looks on the unicorns around him weren’t frightened anymore.

Risotto, looking visible relieved, gave Cash a distrustful glare: “The rebel is… a touchy subject. Suffice to say that it’s some kind of remnant of a desire to get Lookshy to join the realm – that’s it”

It didn’t take much for Cash – not even charms – to figure that there was more to it than that. As everyone began to move back towards the council chamber Speaker filled Cash and Sunrise in. Apparently the rebel was something of a spook in Lookshyan culture… a real one, not merely a boogy-pony one frightens foals with as bed-time stories: “The rebel itself… I’ve never seen it, but it’s been described as not a specific pony, but a phenomenon that seizes a group of ponies and warps them, mutates them, turning them into a combined monster that spouts obscene anti-Lookshyan slogans and lashes out at any pony who gets too close.

“That’s terrible… why isn’t it stopped?” Sunrise wondered.

Cash bobbed his head from side to side, having already figured that this likely wasn’t something Lookshy knew how to stop: “Probably because Lookshy doesn’t want a reputation that they have internal issues that they cannot handle?”

“Pretty much – each appearance of the rebel ends with it slain. A single pony-at-arms with a spear can kill it – it just keeps reappearing every now and then, either in Lookshy or the hinterland communities inside the Lookshy wall. It’s not something talked about to ponies from outside of Lookshy for the exact reasons Cash mentioned” Speaker explained, sounding a bit embarrassed to have to inform outsiders of this persistent little stain on Lookshy’s military history: A recurring foe that could not be slain permanently.

Sunrise was about to ask if attempts at simply capturing the thing, or performing some kind of exorsicm on it to see if it was caused by a demon or an evil spirit would work – but Speaker was quick to note that Lookshy had tried everything, including what Sunrise had suggested: “ Today we just kill the thing, mourn the ponies taken in its creation, burn its body to ash and move on with our lives”

“Is it an evil spirit or some kind of ghost haunting Lookshy?” Sunrise wondered.

“Why not ask our sidereal friends if they know what causes it? I’m sure they track it on the loom of fate” Cash suggested.

Finding himself dumbstruck that he hadn’t thought of that earlier, Speaker enthusiastically agreed, though he noted that it would be a moot point until Shimmer woke up so she could send magic messages.

“Right, anyway  - this Gunzuta redoubt… a redoubt is a fortress of a sort, right? What’s so bad about it?” Cash asked, as the circle followed the general staff up the front stairs of the old hotel turned office building.

“The Gunzota redoubt. I just know that if you go near the place you die now – and that it used to be a fortress around the rock and lesser rock river, for monitoring ship and barge traffic” Speaker shrugged, trying to make it sound as if the Gunzota incident was nothing too grand, just a dangerous mystery that Lookshy hadn’t been able to puzzle out.

To such paltry fears Cash could only scoff: “Well why we are you going on as if it’s impossible to fix? We’ve cheated death more than once, you and me especially. Let’s just hammer out some proper compensation for this and we can be back in a day or two to collect”

Speaker gave Cash an uncertain look. It was difficult to overcome the fears and doubts that had been ingrained in him as part of his mortal pre-exaltation life – even more so it was difficult for him to look beyond his feelings of patriotic duty to Lookshy and demand payment for helping Lookshy, but Sunrise was quick point out that unless they put their hoof down they could easily end up like in Nexus: “And I for one do not wish to be treated as an indentured slave again”

At Cash’s request Speaker remained silent or deferred to Cash’s better judgment for ensuing negotiations on compensation for what the circle was to receive if they could complete the challenge before them.

This turned out to have been a really good idea, as Speaker had never seen unicorns this furious before – well, outside of a battlefield. Taimyo Feldspar in particular was livid that Cash wanted part of the payment to be for Speaker to be given one whole month to play around in one of Lookshy’s two factory cathedrals – though what Cash wanted him to make was beyond him. Additionally Cash wanted Lookshy to use the Sunhill hospital manse for all injured troops that could survive the trip to them – and of course pay for that service. This would grant Sunhill an nice constant revenue stream, though how Cash managed to talk the general staff into agreeing to all that, plus waiving Sunhill’s federation military support fee (the payment that all Hundred Kingdom warlords and kingdoms payed to Lookshy to fund Lookshy’s continued protection against the realm) for the next twenty years was beyond Speaker… even some of the unicorns seemed a bit confused as to how Cash managed to make such a deal sound good to them – but it did sound good, somehow, so they would be foolish to not take it… right?

Thus the circle was escorted back to the market district and the yeddim stables where they found Shimmer playing dice with some of the stable-hooves – and losing. Cash tried to bargain with the stable-hooves to pay off her gambling depts, which while minor seemed to annoy Shimmer greatly, because the Lunar thought that her gambling partners had been cheating – the stable-hooves in turn accused Shimmer of trying to weasel out of paying her gambling debts.

While Cash and Shimmer had their fun Speaker at first simply looked on in mild amusement, but suddenly a dusty gust of wind signaled to him that something else was up. The voice of Tu Yu whispered into his ears: “They must not know – the legacy of Lookshy is too precious… use this in the center of the redoubt… you will be greatly rewarded”

Speaker felt a tiny amount of weight appear in one of his rarely-used uniform pockets. Exhaling slowly, Speaker nodded, not really feeling that comfortable with taking orders like this – but at the same time he understood why… and checking the device he had been given revealed it to be some kind of assembly of blue jade disks in a bronze casing, coupled with runed jewels – a thunderflash grenade? Of course… it would destroy everything.

When Cash and Shimmer finished talking the stable-hooves out of needing to be paid any money Han was taken outside and fitted with his howdah, which was in turn loaded with supplies and what have you.

Heading roughly in the direction of Chung Do, only slightly more to the south, Cash once again inquired into the nature of the Gunzota redoubt: “And this time there are no Lookshyan generals listening in on us talking – so what do you really know about the place” 

Speaker did not like Cash’s accusatory tone one bit: “Hey, don’t talk to me like that”

“Then answer me truthfully – you didn’t tell me everything you knew earlier. I didn’t even need charms to tell me that” Cash demanded, wanting to know exactly what the circle was getting into.

Pointing to the scroll from the general staff with the mission briefing, Speaker said: “Doesn’t it say all we need to know?”

Sure, the scroll described the issue with the Gunzota redoubt to a certain extent: It said that there was a still functioning essence-based weapon of unknown origins active in the redoubt which turned all organic tissue within range into crystal – turning ponies into statues and whatnot. So the circle’s mission was basically to get close enough to somehow stop the device – but what it looked like and how the thing worked was lost to history, since the Gunzota redoubt had been in such a for centuries at this point. Cash wanted to know more: “Like why this weapon was used on the redoubt, and who did it”

“I don’t know that – I told you” Speaker said in an annoyed tone.

Even Shimmer could tell that Speaker wasn’t telling everything: “Come on Speaker. At the very least tell us if the truth behind this has any bearing on what we’re here to do”

“No, it shouldn’t – but please don’t ask any more into this either. It’s probably part of the test: The general staff wants to know if we can keep out of sensitive business while on missions” Speaker said, noting that for a test mission that was a bit of a steep unspoken mission parameter.

Nodding, Cash couldn’t help but smirk. His charms having granted him a sagacious insight into the intent of others whenever he wanted, especially spoken statements, he had already discerned what Speaker was trying to hide – but out of respect for his fellow Solar he refrained from sharing it, though he did wonder if it was possible to let it be discovered more legitimately now that he knew what to look for.

It took a day or so to reach the Lookshyan encampment outside of the exclusion zone around the Gunzota redoubt.

From the sky the redoubt looked like a typical river-side fortification: A small moat around a mix of overgrown earth-walls and rough stone battlements, centered around a large paved courtyard with several structures built into the wall around the compound. The curious thing about the place, in the dim morning light, was the glittering display of light coming from the crystals that had replaced everything organic within the place, as well as everything organic within a radius of a few hundred yards, centered somewhere on the redoubt itself.

Landing near the more temporary wooden rampart next to the redoubt, the Lookshyan legionnaires were surprisingly un-surprised by the arrival of a flying yeddim, though a few still gawked a little bit.

The commanding officer, a unicorn mare with a fiercely black and orange mane and a similarly orange coat in bright green armor greeted them: “Shozei Tiger Eye, 2nd Field force, 3rd heavy infantry – you must be Bright Machine Speaker and circle”

Looking around at his circle-mates Speaker shrugged: “True – though it’s really not my circle per se – we’re all equals here”

The unicorn laughed, her roary and passionate voice matching her fire aspected dragonblood: “Lovely – now, Taimyo Feldspar messaged that you were to have a crack at little gem… though how you plan on doing that is beyond me”

It turned out that ‘little gem’ was the local nickname for the crystallized redoubt. A quick demonstration with a metal rod and a freshly snapped off twig tied to the end poked into the crystallization zone gave Speaker and Shimmer great insight into how the crystallization worked… after the legionnaires had calmed down from the shock of seeing Shimmer shifting into her beast-pony form – shapeshifting ponies seemed to spook them, since there was apparently a changeling freehold a week or so away from their location.

The crystallization effect seemed to leech essence from anything organic put in range of whatever was causing the effect – and upon depletion – which was pretty much instantly for a twig, the thing turned into a twig not of wood, but of pinky and purple slightly opaque crystal.

“It’s not quite quartz, but weights similarly to it, though it’s really brittle” Tiger Eyes noted.

The area around the redoubt was littered with crystallized ponies. Many looked to have been running away from the redoubt when they crystallized, while quite a few others appear to have been tossed into the gem-zone from the outside. Tiger Eye noted that such was the usual treatment for realm spies and looters caught trying to find a way in.

“Wait, so there is a way to enter safely?” Speaker wondered, looking a little confused.

Tiger Eye sighed and scratched her horn: “No, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t ponies who try – the redoubt was fully stocked with essence artillery and other weapons. Aside from keeping an eye on what shipping went up to Greyfalls it was also a hub for Lookshy’s anti-piracy efforts here on the rock rivers.

Looking out at the waters beyond the redoubt where the rock river and its barges full of iron ore floated merrily on towards the yellow river and ultimately the forges in the Nighthammer district of Nexus, and to the right where the lesser rock river joined it, Speaker nodded: “Ok – but what about survivors? Is the effect instant once all essence is drained away?”

The officer led Speaker in through the sturdy wooden rampart built next to the redoubt. It was a much simpler construction of wood and compacted earth-walls. Inside, in the stockade, sat three ponies – two looking ok but a third was heavily bandaged around the face and right fore-hoof.

The bandaged pony was ordered out – the legionnaires standing guard there helping the injured stallion hobble his way before Tiger Eye.
“We caught this one skirting the edge of the gem field. He only had his nose and right hoof in for a second or two – found him screaming in pain” Tiger Eye noted, adding that the stallion supposedly claimed to be an escaped slave from Greyfalls: “…though most of the realm spies we catch around here claim that – even when caught hoof-deep in our surveillance ledgers or tampering with our heliograph system”

“Lovely – let me have a look at him” Speaker said, removing the bandages from the clearly in shock pony before him. Shaking ever so slightly, but not resisting the examination either, the supposed ex-slave relaxed greatly when Speaker’s anesthetic charm was applied, though Speaker did manage to confirm via his lie-detection charm that the pony was indeed an escaped slave who hadn’t known of the redoubt’s crystal curse.

As for the slave’s nose and forelimb there was little to save: The crystal had indeed been quite brittle – so the pony’s nose and crystallized forehoof had shattered shortly after the pony had been taken captive, leaving bloody stumps that had clearly been kept clean and prevented from being infected, but nothing beyond that either.

After a few minutes Tiger Eye came galloping once she heard the slave whooping and cheering – finding the slave’s previously missing nose and hoof fully restored: “Wait, how did you…”

Speaker simply smiled and said that such was his powers – also adding that the slave’s story was quite legit, so he could be set free right now. The unicorn didn’t seem entirely sure about freeing the slave just yet, but said it would be considered.

Returning to the rest of the circle between the redoubt and the rampart, Speaker and Tiger Eye discussed their findings. The circle was happy to learn that Speaker could undo the crystal effect – but at the same time Speaker noted that such would probably only be possible if you didn’t get fully transformed into a crystal statue: “I can’t fix you if you’re dead – I’d only be turning crystal into dead pony”

It was at this point that Shimmer cleared her throat – loudly so – calling attention to the fact that she was standing on a crunchy layer of crystallized grass… and she wasn’t turning into crystal.

What ensued was no small amount of hubbub as the Lookshyan soldiers and officers who bore witness to Shimmer’s daring feat all lost their shit – even more so when Shimmer revealed the source of her immunity: Her moonsilver tattoos… which was in turn followed by several requests from various legionaries for similar tattoos.

“Tell you what – go find some moonsilver, then we can talk” Shimmer said as she turned and trotted towards the redoubt. Shouting back to the circle, Shimmer said that she’d have a look around the place and try to find the source of the effect.

A few tense minutes followed, with Speaker having to repeatedly explain to the various Lookshyan legionnaires who had gathered what Shimmer was and how a Lunar worked. Most of them agreed that they too wanted a Lunar mate if they all looked as good as her.

Speaker could only smile at the youthful hoofcamp humor – apparently most of the legionaries stationed at the rampart were fresh out of basic training, having recently rotated in. It was just as Speaker began wondering where Cash and Sunrise had gone that someone shouted that Shimmer was returning… in a gallop.

“I found the thing – didn’t touch it – but it didn’t like me. I need everyone to clear out - half mile from the redoubt… now!” Shimmer said in-between catching her breath. Indeed, Speaker found it weird that she appeared out of breath.

As the officers began barking orders, calling in a dustoff by the numbers – evacuating the entire rampart next to the redoubt as that was within range of what Shimmer had said – Shimmer asked Speaker for some essence, and upon receiving some and taking a deep breath Shimmer went: “We stay – you need to see this”

“But didn’t you say th- you lied, you just wanted everyone away and out of sight” Speaker realized, though to what end he didn’t understand.
Smiling in an overbearing fashion, Shimmer tugged at Speaker and bid him follow her: “I’ve already turned off the device – but put up your shaping defence charm anyway… make it look good”

Looking back at the now fairly distant legionnaires, Speaker took a deep breath, flared his anima into a golden bonfire and galloped after Shimmer.

Passing the hundred and  forty or so yards of crystal glass beyond the redoubt was not fun – getting close enough to the crystal statues of Lookshyan legionaries from centuries ago that never got away, close enough to see their horrified expression, their mouths locked in eternal prismatic screams… it was really eerie.

Passing over the bridge over the small moat to the redoubt was tricky – the thick wooden beams of the bridge had turned into brittle crystal, and the iron rivets, hinges and other connectors had all rusted away centuries ago – but Speaker’s balance charm meant that he impacted no more weight upon the bridge than a dry leaf, while Shimmer swam across, having evidently been fully drained of essence and thus unable to shapeshift for the time being.

The courtyard of the redoubt was a chaotic mess of shattered crystal statues, the remains of various types of equipment that had been left out in the open for centuries and the rusty bits left over of things that had not been made eternal through crystallization.

Shimmer motioned for Speaker to come with her into the main keep of the redoubt, but Speaker fidgeted with the sonic weapon that Tien Yu had give him… he figured that the old god of his bygone city wouldn’t have given him a sonic weapon for his little mission if it wasn’t needed… and there were things things in the crystals here which simply weren’t meant to become common knowledge – especially not if the rumors were true.

“Come on – You need to see this in the big room in the basement” Shimmer called, from the shattered crystal door into the keep.
His curiosity getting the better of him, Speaker rushed to join shimmer: “Ok, what is it?”

“Two things… down in the armory, lower level, that’s where the crystal artifact is – but it’s what in the big ballroom upstairs that’s really interesting” Shimmer quickly stated, rushing upstairs.

Feeling furiously conflicted, Speaker’s curiosity ultimately won out: He could always destroy the evidence after having had a look for himself, right?

The mass of unicorn and mortal pony statues in the grand ballroom were difficult to misinterpret. Between the remains of broken pony statues up on the tables still clad in imperishable jade clothing, the crystallized kegs of likely crystallized drink, the crystallized food, or the ponies frozen as crystals under the table between the legs of crystallized unicorns… unicorns with jade insignia that undeniably marked them as Taimyos every single one of them, plus even a Chumyo. This had been one hell of a party and orgy

“…and what’s a Chumyo?” Shimmer asked somewhat hesitantly. She could see the tears forming in Speaker’s eyes.

Finding the question a pleasant distraction from the blatant evidence of vice and hedonism before him, Speaker slumped to the ground: “When the realm invades, or in other times of great war, the general staff chooses one of their own to become a supreme leader of Lookshy… until the conflict is over – then that unicorn has to step down and accept the rank of Taimyo again”

“Alright, so they were having a party… no big deal, right?” Shimmer said, figuring that playing down the scene seemed like the best idea.
Speaker threw his Lunar mate a very disapproving frown: “The only times all the Taimyo and the Chumyo would meet would be for a general staff meeting…  and that kind of meetings should not include tug and chugs for officer discussing grand strategy, or dancers on the tables, or… is that one giving out a a sack of something?”

It turned out to be a sack full of jade. A bribe – a big one at that. Money was never exchanged at general staff meetings – this was so blatantly and painfully obvious… the sex workers, the banquit, the dancers, the Lookshyan leadership…

“Gods… so that was why Tu Yu wanted this destroyed” Speaker said, taking out the sonic device that the god had given him back in Lookshy.
Shimmer gave the gadget a cursory glance: “Hey… don’t do anything rash, ok?”

“Oh I won’t. I’d always heard rumors that the reason behind the Gunzota incident was some kind of foul treason, possibly a realm spy who managed to set something off… but… I never heard anything about this”

Shimmer looked around the at the unicorn statues. None looked displeased. There were no crystallized ponies in the hall who weren’t taking part of the frozen festivities. This had been a completely corrupt general staff, giving no care to have whores and bribes being tossed around during what was supposed to be a meeting of the rulers of Lookshy: “Well I guess this is some kind of treason… not sure how else to describe this, though considering how Lookshy’s general staff runs now things seem to have improved” 

Throwing the sonic device aside, letting it skid over the stone-brick floor, Speaker got up, his face twisted into a grim and determined expression: “This was an execution, a coup. Tu Yu will answer for this. Covering up past mistakes and incidents of corruption is the best way to ensure that they can happen again – nobody learns anything from that! Damnit – I thought he just wanted me to conceal who had done this to spare Lookshy the embarrassment, not conceal why it had been done”

> Chapter 77: Schisms and Gardens
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Retrieving the sonic device and then heading down into the armory, Shimmer showed Speaker the artifact that had caused the crystallization phenomena in and around the Gunzota redoubt.

The device itself sat in a white jade chest, roughly the size of a pony. It mostly looked like a big water-melon sized ant egg: A big tubular milky-white object with rounded and slightly tapered ends. On its surface were bands of old realm symbol etchings that shimmered with crystalline inlays – and through the semi-translucent surface swirling forms could be seen that constantly shifted and moved.

“Any idea what it is?” Shimmer wondered.

Speaker had no clue to begin with, but after a moment of thought and beard-stroking he recognized some of the first age glyphs and pictograms: “This is some kind of essence-reformatting device… I remember fiddling with something similar back when I briefly worked on the Eye of Autochton, because this thing is primordial too. They were used as weapons against villages and towns, dropped from the air by flying demons. Crystal-fire bombs, that’s what they were called”

“A primordial weapon… used by demons? How did Lookshy get their hooves on this thing!?” Shimmer asked, shaking her head in utter disbelief.

The best guess Speaker could come up with was that Lookshy had – at some point – found a first age cache of confiscated weapons dating back to the primordial war: “The Solar Deliberative put a lot of effort into erasing yozi remnants from Creation – but not everything could be destroyed… some things could only be hidden away”

On that somber note Shimmer asked Speaker if what Tiger Eye had said earlier was true, that the redoubt was supposed to still have a full complement of artifact weapons and whatnot.

“Of course – those things don’t degrade from exposure to the elements… they might need some polish and repair from dirt getting into their hinges and whatnot, but it should all be salvageable” Speaker noted, looking around the armory… and realizing what Shimmer was talking about.

The armory was devoid of all weapons – aside from the crystal-fire bomb.

“Shimmer… what happened here?” Speaker wondered, it being his turn to be in utter disbelief.

A quick bit of recon of the rest of the redoubt confirmed it: The place had been picked clean. There wasn’t a single sword, suit of armor or even rusty remains of such anywhere in the redoubt.

“….and here’s your culprit” Shimmer suddenly noted as they walked by a crystallized wooden door that had been broken down.

Speaker wasn’t sure what to look at until Shimmer pointed out some scratches in the crystal. It looked like a wild animal had used part of the broken crystal door as a scratching post. Apparently it was actually a secret Lunar scratch-based cipher.

“It says ‘This lair of fools has been liberated of all things worthwhile by… oh gods..” Shimmer chocked, looking horrified.

Mainly curious, but also interested in having someone to blame for the missing weapons that the general staff would no doubt want to recover, Speaker urged Shimmer to finish reading the message.

“It’s a name… gods… so the stories were true. He’s still alive after all this time” Shimmer said, stepping back from the writing.

“Shimmer” Speaker said, sounding ever so slightly not in the mood for melodrama.

Shimmer threw Speaker a very upset look: “Ma-Ha-Suchi! Do you even know… I mean, remember who that is?”

“Partyboy? He’s still around?” Speaker mused, surprised to hear the name of the famed first age master of seduction – the Lunar who successfully wooed and bedded every single celestial exalt, or was working on it at least… what would he need a fortress worth of magical essence artillery for?"

Shimmer appeared to have a slightly different understanding of who Ma-Ha-Suchi was: “Uhm… no, he’s one of the most crazed Lunar elders who hasn’t been put down – I was warned in so many different ways to stay the fuck away from him and his territory”

Leaving the redoubt, the two were greeted – half a mile away from the redoubt – by the rest of the circle and Tiger Eye, who in turn were quite happy to hear that the redoubt was safe to enter once more.

“One thing though – Tiger Eye – the first thing you want to do is have someone go around and catalogue everything as they are right now. There are events frozen in time that all ponies in Lookshy needs to know about. Use a couple of recorders of everlasting glories if you have any here” Speaker suggested in a very serious tone, trying to calm the ecstatic officer.

After explaining what the crystal-fire bomb looked like and how to activate it – so it wouldn’t be - Cash asked if this meant that they could return to Lookshy. Neither Speaker nor Tiger Eye saw anything wrong in doing so.

As the circle mounted up on Han, a scribe gave them Tiger Eye’s report for the general staff, including an official notification that the Gunzota Redoubt was now occupied by Lookshyan forces once more.

The trip back to Lookshy included a two-day stop at Sunhill. Han was swapped out with Nah, and Cash and Sunrise apparently had fun setting up some kind of welcoming committee… they were apparently expecting visitors. In connection to this Cash asked Sunrise to remain in Sunhill: “We need a presence here – and I think you need to have a crack at spreading the good word of Celestia to our newly minted armed forces”

Upon return to Lookshy without Sunrise, this time landing in front of the main gate into the city, which caused a great stir - because flying yeddim - the circle entered the city under slightly more normal velocities, though the stir only got greater as Cash couldn’t resist grandstanding by loudly declaring, from atop the howdah on Nah, that they had just undone the curse that had held the Gunzota redoubt for centuries – freeing it up for Lookshy to rightfully helm once more. At first the ponies in earshot didn’t believe him, but the fact that he had a very official looking report with him which he was able to display to the crowd around Nah via his recorder of everlasting glories, turned that part of the market district into a small street party. The social charms used to generate an intense feeling of joy probably helped with that.
As justicars arrived – in force – to break up the happening the circle was long gone.

It was clear that the general staff hadn’t expected to see the circle back any time soon – especially not less than a week after giving the circle the original assignment. Thus, with various members of the general staff having left Lookshy to resume command of various operations throughout the east, or attend to other pressing matters, the Circle had to settle with meeting the two only general staff members left in Lookshy: Karal Linseed and Maheka Feldspar – and while both once seemed to have already been informed of the circle’s success then they both took their time reading Tiger Eyes’ report.

Peering up from the scroll with no small amount of distrust in her eyes, Feldspar beheld Shimmer: “You just walked into the redoubt”
“Indeed – protected by my moonsilver tattoos” Shimmer stated, adding that the crystal-fire device still leeched all her essence away, preventing her from using charms.

Taimyo Feldspar looked neither pleased nor impressed. Linseed on the other hoof appeared more appreciative: “You’ve done an invaluable service to Lookshy. Now, regarding payment for services rendered – the things that you asked for… we cannot simply divert wounded Lookshyan troops to your Sunhill facility without vetting it first, and the same goes for giving you access to a factory cathedral Speaker: We won’t have any artifact production facility available for the three or four months”

While Speaker was quite disappointed to hearing this – having spent most of his time while the circle was flying around on Han and Nah since being given the assignment to remedy the Gunzota redoubt thinking about what he would want to make – but Cash in turn took it in stride: “That’s understandable, but that simply means that we shall have to undergo such a vetting process. Good thing we planned for visitors. As for the factory cathedrals, then have any of them begun a production run without having started yet?”

Deferring to Feldspar on the topic of factory cathedrals, the gens Maheka Matriarch noted that the Gazebo of Pasiap had just begun its initial purification rituals three days ago – though what it was set to make was scheduled to take well over six months.

“Excellent – let Speaker helm that process to prove that he can fully use such a place. His crafting charms should also speed things up considerably. As for the vetting then I can fly an inspection team to Sunhill and show them around personally” Cash said confidently.

It was difficult not to smile at Cash, with his infectious charisma. Even Feldspar, in her gruff appearance, looked as if she found it difficult to simply dismiss Cash without at least putting up a good argument for why – though that didn’t mean that she didn’t have some reservations: “As far as I know then Speaker is only a trained physician and surgeon – not an artisan. Letting him waste time in a factory cathedral when valuable magical weapons and armor could be made there would be a crime”

“Why not let Speaker demonstrate his skills? Is there a nearby workshop of any kind?” Cash inquired  innocently, yet with a coy smile.
Giving Cash a brief glance of dissatisfaction, Feldspar turned to Speaker: “That depends, what would you make in a factory cathedral?”

“I’ve been thinking about that for the last few days…” Speaker said, retrieving a scroll with a ludicrously complicated schematic for what Cash could only identify as a roughly circular device.

Feldspar’s frown turned into a somewhat more appreciate if not neutral grimace. Linseed mainly looked confused: “What is it for? And did you draw this up yourself?”

Nodding, Speaker retrieved Gift from elsewhere and put it next to the schematic: “I have been thinking about making a worthy homage to this”

“What in the name of the dragons is that” Feldspar said, her voice giving way to genuine curiosity. Even Linseed had no clue what Gift was.
Cash suggested that Speaker demonstrate the device: “Preferably in a sturdy dojo… with some practice dummies you won’t mind seeing cut in twain”

“That thing is a weapon?” Linseed noted, sounding doubtful. It was clear from the deceptively young-looking Taimyo’s expression that she was finding the orichamcul disk’s potential as a martial device dubious.

Pulling an essence-lense out of a pocket and briefly giving Gift a look-over, Feldspar nodded: “Oh it is – I suggest we go to one of the dragon dojos to test this”

Leaving the meeting room in the old hotel in the legion district, Speaker noted to Cash that Shimmer had gone missing: “Strange, she didn’t even say she was going anywhere”

“Good point… she was talking earlier – hey, did any of you notice Shimmer leaving?” Cash asked the two Taimyo that Speaker and Cash were following. They had not.

A short while later in what turned out to be a gens Yoshoto-owned dojo elsewhere in the city designed for training in magical martial arts – hence the extra sturdy stone and jade-steel reinforced structure – Speaker demonstrated the use of Gift and the magical martial art designed for its use.

Using a mix of his jumping charm, perfect balance charm and the various attack-charms of the Thousand Wounds Gear style that he knew, Speaker made short of well over a dozen target dummies of increasing toughness, ultimately sawing into a wooden target dummy and leaving deep marks in a dasling display of blazing golden essence and noisy discy cutty fun. Speaker certainly enjoyed himself – it was nice to lot lose without having to be in a fight to the death.

The ponies present, mainly young Lookshyan unicorns learning to wield their elemental powers in a propper martial fashion from various elder Lookshyan unicorns, as well as two Taimyos and each of their entourage, were very impressed. Mastery of a truly heavenly magical martial art was something that often took very long – but for Speaker to have ‘re-learned’ such in less than a year…

Afterwards at the dojo’s small smithy – a humble little workshop where a team of young bladesmiths and carpenters worked to maintain the training weapons of the dojo – Speaker was told by Feldspar to ‘show her what he could do’. Bowing, Speaker floated up a large chunk of raw iron ore and a bit of charcoal, then walked out of the workshop, back into the dojo.

In the middle of the dojo, on the worn mat that covered the floor, Speaker performed a miracle: With but essence and an intense glare he transformed the ore and coal into the finest masterwork chakrams of high tensile steel that Lookshy had ever seen. Later it would become known that the bladesmiths couldn’t even dent the things without using jade smithing hammers… an unheard of feat for weapons not of magical materials.

Suffice to say that Feldspar was suitably impressed.

Speaker stayed the rest of the day at the Gens Yushoto compound with Shimmer, while Cash left on Nah with a group of Lookshyan inspectors to vet Sunhill for suitability to handle 7th legion wounded.

At dinner Matriarch Risotto informing Speaker than him and his circle were welcome to stay there any time they visited Lookshy: “Also, I hear that you impressed Feldspar today”

“Yes… and she told me to report tomorrow at The Gazebo of Passiap tomorrow at dawn – where is that?” Speaker said, enjoying the fine cooking that the Yushoto chefs had come up with – wondering if Sullen Hoof had snuck into the kitchen without him knowing.
The Matriarch said that she’d have a servant ready to show him the way in the morning.

The Gazebo of Passiab, one of Lookshy’s still functioning first age factory cathedrals appeared deceptively familiar to Speaker as he was brought up to the roof level of a large foundry in the district of craftsponies: Atop the stone brick building with its arched windows and heavy buttresses was a large garden, in the middle of which was a very picturesque gazebo large enough to house hundreds of ponies… and indeed, several dozen ponies were inside of it waiting for Speaker.

As the sun crept up over the horizon to the east Speaker couldn’t help but recall how he had built this place in his past life. The garden of Kadesh it had once been called – though what Kadesh was escaped him. A strange but pleasant feeling of purpose and inner strength surged through him as Speaker recalled many of the wonders he wrought into being within the place.

The forepony helming the gazebo, a lithe unicorn who was blind on one eye with an ugly scar over his face, was about to say something when Speaker brushed him aside with a quick flip of the hoof and a trick of essence – removing the unicorn’s scar and restoring his eye in the same instant.

Speaker stepped up on the central platform and surveyed the assembled ponies.  With only four dozen ponies present this build was without a doubt a relatively small one – and since he hadn’t been instructed to ritually cleanse himself then it likely wasn’t warstrider manufacture: “Bring forth the materials we will be working with”

A small parade of five young adolescent foals brought the materials and molds needed into the gazebo on carts: Three small bars of blue jade, five bars of good steel, a long straight blade mold, a thick and tightly sealed glass jar full of crackling bits of frozen lightning, a piece of wood of a strange pale varity and a cherry-sized uncut sapphire. Speaker instantly recognize what was being made: A blue jade daiklaive.

Upon this realization Speaker stomped his right forehoof onto the central platform with such a force that the white paint on it cracked and flew away, revealing the etched orichalcum underneath: “I assume you all know the dance of the keening edge?”

The ponies around him nodded and got up from their seats, taking position in marked spots on the polished wooden floor. The unicorn forepony gave Speaker a respectful nod: “You’ve done this before”

“I built this place” Speaker said with a smile that radiated confidence. The unicorn’s expression changed into one of mild confusion, disbelief and surprise… but then again, Speaker did seem to know what he was talking about… and so the forepony bowed out, leaving Speaker to direct the ritual of making, while muttering something to the effect of “I guess the battleaxe wasn’t kidding… what do you know”

Now, back in the first age Speaker had at first been ridiculed when he had made a musically themed factory cathedral. To waste magical materials and other exotic construction materials on such a seemingly vain effort looked foolish – but when Speaker began cranking out singing staves and other musical artifacts that brought tears of joy to those who listened made the Solar Deliberative changed its tune accordingly. That the place remained after so long pleased Speaker to no end, as the ponies around him began the ritualistic dance that invoked and praised Autochton – though they likely didn’t know of that – the bits and bobs for the magical sword floated up into the air and began to slowly take shape, all of it sped up greatly by Speaker’s essence and the potent magic of the manse the whole place was part of.

Come sundown Speaker returned to the Gens Yushoto compound in the residential district under great fanfare. Lookshy had never seen so much progress made on such a project in one day. Speaker wasn’t surprised and regaled to what appeared to be a growing number of fans: “Factory cathedrals, despite how fancy their name sounds, aren’t necessarily grand cathedral. The first ones were quite humble. When Autochton saw to the creation of his first temples, it was the workshops of ponies who worshiped him and sought his guidance in the sacred act of artifice. He taught ponies how to harness geomantic powers to create demenses, to raise manses and to outfit such manses with temple-workshops in his name”

“But why make one centered around song and dance?” A young colt wondered.

Shimmer saw Speakers expression – one that clearly signaled his desire to reveal his singing staff – to which she stated: “Not all unicorns are warriors. Similarly, not all Solars or Lunars are warriors – and making a temple-workshop that a Solar who is good at singing and dancing allows them to create magical wonders as well”

“But why are they so special then? I can write calligraphy in my study… I don’t need a library cathedral for that?” another foal asked innocently.

Speaker shrugged: “Working with magical materials is very different from working with mundane ones. Jade, Orichalcum and Moonsilver – it all has to be worked very slowly and many times over. You only polish a steel blade once, but a jade daiklaive you polish ten thousand times to make sure it remains sharp forever – the factory cathedral allows us to get blessings from the gods of artifice, which speeds up that process greatly…”

“So you don’t have to spend a year polishing a single sword?” the foal asked again.

The next day Speaker returned to the gazebo. The air around it was as calm as ever – you couldn’t even hear the nose of the surrounding industry in the district, nor did the noxious fumes of the foundries and metalworks penetrate into the garden around the gazebo. The beautifully pained porcelain flowers that hung under the gazebo roof looked amazing as the last gardeners finished their daily maintenance of the manse garden the helped power the factory cathedral.

As the sun slowly peeked over the horizon Speaker saw the forepony approaching: “Hey, that was amazing work you did yesterday. I have never seen jade melt so quickly”

“Solar crafting charms and factory cathedrals both reduce build time. I think we’ll be done in a little less than two weeks. Could you arrange so the intended recipient of the blade is there on the last day to name it?” Speaker said, basing his estimate on what he could remember from the first it taking his Solar apprentices to make their first daiklaives.

The unicorn – now only with a slightly scarred face and two working eyes – gave Speaker a look utter disbelief: “Look, you do not make a daiklaive in just two weeks. Even with a place like this it takes months, at least two, maybe three to make a daiklaive. There’s the thousand-fold polish, the weeks of…”

Speaker gestured for the unicorn to stop: “If I can’t have this blade ready in three weeks then, I’ll… I don’t know – but I’m staking my reputation as a Solar endowed with first age memories on it”

One and a half week later, as Speaker looked dangerously close to being able to finishing the blade one week ahead of his projected schedule, Cash, Sunrise and the Lookshyan delegation returned triumphantly.

Thus, on the eve of what looked to be the last day of the Daiklaive build, the circle celebrated that Sunhill had been commissioned to treat 7th legion wounded – assuming of course that they could make the journey there.

“Well the point of the contract is to help the average legionnaire, as well as Lookshy’s dragonblooded. With our limb regenerating treatments we can see and grand staff of medical experts Lookshy no longer has to fear theft of its few remaining operational healing artifacts” Cash regaled during the dinner party at the Gens Yushoto compound.

Among the ponies at the party Speaker was… well… missing. Shimmer kept dropping out of the party to check on him – but he kept fiddling around with making a scabbard for the blade he was hoping to finish tomorrow: “Won’t you come down and join the fun. They’re celebrating Sunhill, that’s your creation – come on”

“Nope. This needs to be perfect” Speaker grunted, utterly engulfed in using essence to form etchings into the scabbard lacquer coating as it dried – without making the lacquer crack. He was so absorbed into his little side-project that he didn’t even see Shimmer leaving in a disappointed huff.

The next day Speaker showed up to the Gazebo of Pasiap at dawn and found several hundred ponies, many of which were unicorns, waiting for him in what was obviously dress uniforms. It seemed that word had spread that Speaker was almost done with the sword – in record time.

Taking a deep breath and straightening out his worn and faded red uniform, Speaker strode into the center of the gazebo without saying a word. A buzzing of murmurs trailed the Solar as he raised a hoof demonstratively and struck it down upon the central platform. The white paint was all but gone at this point, revealing the full orichalcum disk with its beautiful sunburst etching. What a pathetic attempt at covering up a Solar creation.

Flaring his anima as the last of the sun crept over the horizon, Speaker turned to the dancers. They were ready and seemed to have dressed extra nice for the occasion. The looks on their faces as Speaker dismissed them was a mix of shock and outrage.

“Calm yourselves – and join the audience instead. This will be my performance to finish” Speaker said, like a surgeon telling a team of nurses to step away from a critical patient that he might have room to operate.

Taking two steps backwards, then spinning, retracing the ancient dance-steps that activated the gazebo’s forges and enchanted workbench, Speaker added a flourish that activated a feature that the unicorns didn’t seem to know of: A small indentation in the center of the platform revealed itself, and as Speaker floated the almost finished blade up to himself, along with a chunk of alchemically treated white marble and the gem meant to become the pommel.

The last few day’s work on the impossible geometry of the thousand-faceted sapphire for the pommel was about to conclude: All it needed was an obscenely accurate set of cuts to allow the marble fitting to hold it.

Speaker know of only one tool worthy. Pulling Gift from elsewhere he floated it before him, above the unfinished blade that gleamed and crackled with archs of lightning.

In absolute silence Speaker suddenly raised a hoof and furiously gestured at Gift. The gyroscoptic chakram burst to life with a huff of steam – but instead of spinning its blade, it instead spun itself – and in doing so it exploded into a million pieces for an instant, freezing in place a split second later like an orichalcum halo above the blade. The crowd around the Gazebo gasped.

The cutting blades of Gift spun inwards, and as Speaker floated the cherry-sized sapphire up the blades closed in.

Through the clarity of the light of his anima Speaker saw every detail of the gemstone as the spinning blades neared it, and observed with a steely gaze as the setting cuts were made. The moment the last cut was made Speaker floated the gem down to the sword again.

Now was time for the final step: Securing the sapphire onto the tip of the handle. This would require manipulation of stone, and Speaker had to bite his tongue not to summon his singing staff forth to do this part… the indentation in the central platform practically screamed for it – but he resisted the temptation: He knew that Lookshy would not let him keep such a priceless artifact…

Thus, channeling his frustration into a whirl of essence Speaker floated the chunk of marble upon the handle. With Solar fury the marble began to chip away as if a thousand tiny picks of light chipped away from it. Three hours later the head of a dragon of air, with its fanged beak and feathery scales, had emerged from the white marble – with the sapphire held tight in its maw.

The internal lights, the glow from the forges, the radiance of the delicate gem polishing gear… it all faded as the gazebo sensed that it was no longer needed. Light returned to the gazebo a moment later as the skylights opened up, letting in the dim light of the cloudy sky come in from above.

The crowd erupted into cheers – some more fervent than others – some less so.

The recipient of the blade stepped forth, a very nervous looking junior officer. It wasn’t a unicorn that Speaker had ever met before, but he bid the mare take good care of the blade, and finally: “Now, you must name it”

Floating the blade out of its beautiful blue and white scabbard, which showed a dragon of air soaring to the heavens, the mare looked at the long straight-edged blue blade with white lightning pulsing up its length: “I… I don’t know what to call it”

“I think it looks like a Cloud Piercer” Speaker whispered.

The unicorn nodded and grasped the blade firmly with an obviously hooficured hoof, holding it aloft: “I name you Cloud Piercer!”

As was ancient tradition the unicorn ‘paid’ Speaker with a single coin – one of white jade no less: A real realm Obol. Speaker had never really seen realm currency before. It weighed a lot more than a normal silver coin – though it was the same size, with very fine workmanship.

With that done the crowd cheered once more, though this time more for the wielder of the blade than Speaker. Getting your first daiklaive was a rite of passage among unicorns, indeed across creation possessing such a magical weapon was the hallmark of an exalt.

As the crowd began leaving along with the new owner of Cloud Piercer, Speaker saw Taimyo Feldspar, along with Cash, Shimmer and Sunrise approaching him. This was it.

Taimyo Feldspar, dressed in a ceremonial uniform that was as brightly green as her coarse and thick mane was gravel-grey, looked conflicted. Speaker saluted her as she briskly trotted up in front of him.

“I have seen a lot of dumb shit pulled by green legionaries fresh out of hoof camp, and among them every now and then there is a gem of genious…” she began, the tone of her voice clearly showing that she wanted to shout, that she wanted to be angry: “…but this? Lookshy’s finest artificers and bladesmiths… you know what they’re doing right now?”

Speaker knew damn well not to actually say anything to that question. Cash seemed pleased with that, while Shimmer appeared oddly amused by the situation. Sunrise had hidden her face under her hood.

“They’re crying, Speaker. They’re crying so hard that we could put the damned Saltspire League out of business! I haven’t heard of this much salt since my grandfather told me about back when they closed down the House of Thousand Needles” Feldspar noted.

Speaker didn’t what the House of Thousand Needles were – but he would later learn that it was an atelier manse that was damaged irreparably due to realm sabotage. One could apparently toss a load of cloth or yarn into the place and the flying enchanted needles there would produce whatever clothes the hearth-stone bearer desired. Back when it had worked it had been popular for Nexus and Great Forks fashionistas to buy production cycles there to craft their designs.

“Well that’s too bad for them – How does this reflect on Speaker getting time in one of these places?” Cash inquired, cutting to the chase.
Closing her eyes for a moment and sighed: “I have… the general staff has deliberated on this, a lot. Speaker, the speed at which you made this daiklaive, I assume that any artifact you make would be done at a similar pace?”

Speaker nodded. Feldspar nodded in turn: “Very well – Abut that: the general staff has three requirements for whatever you wish to make”
“I hope they’re reasonable” Cash cheerfully and somewhat sarcastically quipped.

The Taimyo shot Cash a mean frown, then looked over at Speaker: “The general staff requires that whatever you want to make first has its design reviewed at Valkavsen. Secondly, Lookshy will not provide you with any materials. Finally the general staff wants a copy of the design of whatever you make turned over to Valkhawsen”

“Hold on, what is walk-house?” Cash wondered. He had heard mention of it at the Gens Yushoto compound, but it had never come up in conversation. 

Feldspar shot Speaker an annoyed looked, and a split second later Cash perked up as his social charms allowed him to intuit the information he needed, informing him that Valkhawsen was Lookshy’s academy of sorcery, arcane science and magical artifice: “Ah ok, I understand. Now, this review process, would this include giving approval for the design to be built? It would be terribly petty if Speaker finds that he is only allowed to make something that the general staff feels that the 7th Legion needs”

The stone-grey maned unicorn was about to speak when Cash continued: “Oh, and including a vague and potentially unreasonable stipulation simply so we won’t question the other requests? I personally favor honest negotiations, though if deception is to used I prefer the subtle kind, not this kind of amateur stuff”

For Speaker it was difficult to tell if Feldspar was simply pleasantly surprised, or shocked and outraged. The battleaxe had always been known for being slow to anger, but holding grudges like nobody’s business. Her face seemed to oscillate between forced smiles and looks of worry.

“When I… how did you – argh screw it: Yes, there’s no veto power in this, but the remaining stipulations are non-negotiable and we won’t let you make anything that would harm Lookshy as part of making it. Lookshy can’t be caught resourcing Solar ana- Exalts, not with how things are right now” Feldspar forced herself to say, looking annoyed – but not as much in an angry sense, but more in a begrudgingly respectful way, like trying to graciously admit defeat to a superior general who just outmaneuvered you in battle.

Cash nodded, Speaker nodded and Feldspar breathed a sigh of relief: “You have two weeks to present a design. The Gazebo of Pasiap will be on standby for you to begin, otherwise we’ll start something else here and you’ll have to wait in line”

The Taimyo left as Speaker was about to question Cash’s tone against the Taimyo, but a sudden burst of intense strayberry scent suddenly overwhelmed them, as a round and fuzzy winged messenger sprite appeared before them with a scroll in its mouth. It spit the scroll into Cash’s face, wetly so.

Skimming the scroll Cash’s expression changed from bemused smugness to one of frustration: “We just can’t win this, can we?”
“What is… ok, running” Speaker said, as Cash had already galloped off, shouting for Sunrise and Shimmer to follow suit.

At the yeddim stables in the market district Cash finally explained what was going on: “Ok, the good news: Chung Onyx has apparently hired a court sorcerer, so he has someone on staff who can send us magic messages”

“…the bad news?” Shimmer wondered out loud.

Cash frowned, deeply: “Do any of you remember the three Fu Daimyo? And Daimyo Lang Tung Ting? It seems that the three got their shit together,  had Lang Tung Ting and his heirs assassinated, swept in with their troops – and then Fu Yu, the eldest of three, she had her brother and sister imprisoned. She now rules both Tung Ting and the Fu lands… and has split her forces. She has most of them camped outside Chung Do with an ultimatum to Chung Onyx that he’s to step down and let Fu Yu take over. The forces from Daimyo Jade Anemone garrisoned in the city won’t hold more than a few days if they attack”

“If Sully was here we could just send him to assassinate Fu Yu…” Sunrise noted.

Cash leapt up on Nah’s howdah and floated the reigns over to himself: “Speaker, if you want to stay and make nice that’ll be fine – just don’t agree to anything long term without consulting us first”

Sunrise climbed up to Cash, who gestured for Shimmer to come as well: “We’ll need something to halt their army – without Red that’s you. You can fly back to Speaker when that’s done – I should be able to talk Fu Yu down once her army is routed”

“You be ok now” Shimmer said to Speaker, giving him a big hug.

Speaker gave Shimmer a kiss on the forehead: “I’m in good hooves here. Try not to kill anyone – remember levied troops are just armed peasants  - they probably don’t want to be there”

“I know. And you be careful too: There are still ponies here who don’t like Solars, plus I think I smelled a sidereal the other day…” Shimmer warned, as she shapeshifted into a seagul and flew up on the howdah to the others.

It was with no small amount of frustration that Speaker saw his friends fly off. He had hoped to see the circle help convince the general staff to attack the Bodhisatva – but hey… he wasn’t doing so bad himself, right?

Returning to the Gens Yushoto compound, Speaker occupied an office there and began working on proper detailed schematics for his artifice project. True to his caste name he worked well into the wee hours, with several days worth of work still ahead to refine the design – and then he would have to somehow find the materials himself? Maybe he could ask around in Valkhawsen and work out a deal with them for some of the things he would probably need… and what was the time? Gods… it would be dawn soon… better go to bed.

A short while later Speaker awoke groggily in pitch darkness, chained to a very uncomfortable iron chair to the sound of an iron door being slammed shut not far from him. The echo of the sound hinted that he was underground.

“Fuck” Speaker said to himself.

> Chapter 78: Breaking Out and Breaking Down
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Having been awoken and finding himself in chains in a dark and dank… place… Speaker first opted to shed some light on the situation. Flaring his anima revealed slightly glossy light-blue stone bricks, which told Speaker that he was in a place built from the grey-blue stone native to the territory around Lookshy, but the bricks had quite obviously, judging from various errant streaks, been infused with white jade – this would have made them damn near indestructible… it also meant that his singing staff wouldn’t do anything to them, since the staff couldn’t affect jade.

The light metallic gray color of the bars on the door to his cell equally looked to be some kind of jade-steel alloy. So was the chains and shackles fixed around all four of his hooves. Gift wasn’t going to be cutting through them any time soon… though with what he was designing, now that would be able to go through the chains and the bars, at least with a bit of effort and repeated cutting.

This was clearly a cell for exalts – that much was clear. The scorch and scratch-marks around the cell door and where the chain was sealed into the stone-brick floor supported the conclusion, indicating that unicorns had also been imprisoned here. The hallway outside was of similar construction, but empty. There weren’t even any lights… nor were there anywho who responded to Speaker’s attempt to call attention to anyone. At least there weren’t any remains in the cell from any previous occupants – though whether that was because ponies usually got released, rescued or because there was a good clean-up service for the place was not readily evident.

With a deep breath Speaker resigned himself to the fact that he wasn’t getting out of the cell by his powers alone – at least not at the moment. Sitting down on the cold stone floor, Speaker closed his eyes and simply listened.

Sullen Hoof and his sensory-enhancement charms would likely have allowed for the detection of… something – but Speaker neither heard nor felt anything of note.

The only thing Speaker found himself certain of was that he was still in or around Lookshy. No other place used this kind of stone. It difficult to reconcile this fact… who would dare imprison him? Especially with the general staff paying all kinds of attention to him!?

With a face of quiet anger, Speaker looked intently at the chains around his forehooves and activated his crafting charm, but even his essence did next to nothing to the jade-steel chains. Grunting in frustration as his elemental immunity charm kept him safe from the heated shackles, Speaker turned to his first age memories: In the ancient times solars mastered artifice and construction in ways that made the very gods weep… but to remove the horrors of the primordials they also mastered deconstruction and the art of swift and elegant disassembly. Yes… there was a charm, oh yes.

Having absolutely nothing else to do, Speaker began practicing the essence forms and inverted mudras of making that informed the disassembly charm… it would probably take a while to figure out entirely, but time was something Speaker had plenty of right now, though not because he wanted it. He also took the liberty of applying his training charm, opting to improve the only skill for which he could reasonably perform a corresponding training activity in his tiny cell: His marksmanship with thrown weapons, by using various random pebbles found on the floor and tossing them around at small essence flares – it was the closest thing to a fun activity he could distract himself with when taking breaks to regain his essence when not working on figuring out the disassembly charm.

As time passed, being a Solar gave Speaker a unique intuitive sense of the position of the sun, and thus the exact  time of the day relative to sundown and sun-up. This gave Speaker the horribly annoying knowlegde of exactly how long he had been incarcerated. This also meant that he knew that it was around late afternoon into the second day of his capture that he finally got a visitor to distract him from his mounting hunger and grand thirst:

The sound of a metal cell door slamming loudly in the distance, echoing through the likely underground prison Speaker was in, signaled that something had entered. Speaker didn’t bother looking up from his disassembly charm practice… but when Shimmer whispered from the other side of the cell door: “Hey, what’s up with hiding down here?”

Speaker shot Shimmer a very annoyed and indignant look: “I haven’t had anything to eat or drink in almost two days. I had to poop in the corner”

Taking his angry response as an answer, Shimmer shrugged and shifted into her beast-pony form: “Right, not here because you want to – go it. Let me get you out of here”

Tugging at the cell-door, Shimmer heaven and huffed, but Speaker quickly noted: “Tried that. Its jadesteel – It would take my charms weeks to go through it, Gift even longer”

“Oh please, I just have to use a bit of muscle” Shimmer retorted, activating several charms that caused her already muscular beast-pony form to ripple with muscle growth, her claws turning into foot long silvery talons just the same.

Slashing wildly with claws shapeshifted into something akin to the mandibles of rare diamond beetles which burrows through the heart  of the imperial mountain and at the same time suffusing those claws with the shell-crushing might she would use back west to combat giant emperor crabs and other crustacean sea-monsters, Shimmer reduced the jade-steel cell-door to a pile of rods and sharp bits of metal.
Speaker was impressed – and hungry: “Amazing! Now get me out of here!” 

“Ya… about that… I found you by following your scent through a very narrow vent. I don’t actually know where we are right now… we’re too far underground for my spacial-awareness charms to actually tell where we are – I just know that we’re under Lookshy” Shimmer noted, as her muscles deflated.

Frowning, Speaker looked around outside his cell. It was the same jade-infused brick all around… and more jade-steel from the vent Shimmer had entered: “Ok hold on – there is no way in or out from here for a pony”

Sniffing around, Shimmer nodded: “Now that you mention it… but I am smelling something, essence, from that cell over there!”

The other cell in question turned out to be empty – but Shimmer was quick to point out that the dust in the cell had been disturbed within the last few days: “That fits with you going missing… in fact, there are traces of your scent in here too, but they lead into the cell I just found you in”

“So I arrived here in that cell? Hmmm… how did I get in here?” Speaker mused, looking around for signs of secret doors or hidden seams in the stone. There was nothing to be found.

Shimmer went over to the vent and had a go at it in the same way that she had undone Speaker’s cell door… but to no avail: “Damnit, this thing has active essence hardening – Speaker, do you know how to disrupt that?”

“No, but you just gave me an idea to how I ended up here: Sorcery – teleportation magic is the only thing I can imagine that explains how this place is meant to work, and I’m not seeing any wards with essence sight” Speaker noted, scanning the corridor walls with glowing eyes and caste mark.

Pounding the vent in frustration, Shimmer suddenly stopped: “Wait, unicorns can’t do teleportation magic. That’s celestial circle sorcery. Only Lunars, Solars and… oh…”

“Sidereal. Didn’t you say you smelled one back when we arrived?” Speaker pointed out, trotting up to Shimmer and the now thoroughly scratched up vent.

Shimmer nodded as Speaker examined the vent. It was an incredibly fine-meshed vent, almost like woven metallic cloth. Shimmer noted that she had seen similar designs in old Shogunate dungeons: “It’s made to muffle the sound of prisoners calling for help – and I did, chased whoever that was for a couple of hours down in the sewers, but he got away. Won’t forget the scent though… but I’m not sure if it’s the same – it’s weird, probably from some kind of charm meant to veil or alter it”

“You sure it’s the same scent as here?” Speaker wondered. Shimmer shook her head: “I’m smelling essence-use here… even if it was the same stallion who brought you here, then he masked his scent here very thoroughly. But I’ll be able to recognize either in a heartbeat if I ever get a fresh whiff of either of them” Shimmer explained, sounding thoroughly annoyed that she didn’t have any better answers to give. 

Nodding, Speaker took a deep breath and poked the vent: “Fair enough… and this vent is too fine for even fleas – how did you fit through?”

“Shapeshifted into air – it’s not a comfortable thing to do though, lethal in high winds, and it wouldn’t work on you… you’d… oh hey, now I know” Shimmer first said with anger in her voice, but ended on a very gleeful tone.

Waving her hooves about, Shimmer brought about the portal to her elsewhere-den.

“Of course! Shimmer, do the thing!” Speaker said, leaping through the portal.

Inside Shimmer’s elsewhere-den, as the portal closed, Speaker found himself the same western-ish tavern that he had previously seen a large number of captive western sailor-ponies enter… only now they were gone. Wandering the tavern, sampling the somewhat briny ale and enjoying some of the salted fish and dried fruits that Shimmer had stored in the den, Speaker wondered when Shimmer had dropped off the sailors… and where. Maybe on her way back from Chung Do? Would make sense… find a ship going back to the west, help the sailors get hired on.

“Hey, you coming out from in there?” Shimmer’s voice suddenly rang out surprisingly clearly, the portal to reality having silently opened while Speaker had been eating and thinking.

Exiting into the Gens Yushoto compound courtyard, the two quickly alerted the Gens and other relevant authorities to what had happened. Risotto was quite relieved to see Speaker back, as Gens Yushoto had apparently suffered a massive embarrassment from Speaker having disappeared without trace… while other parts of Lookshy had been busy blaming each other for ‘stealing’ Speaker – Indeed it seemed that Speaker was more sought-after than had previously been let on.

“We would do wisely to capitalize this interest” Shimmer noted after the debriefing from the local Security Inspectorate examiner inferior. Suffice to say that the unicorns were very unhappy to learn of a secret prison in the Lookshy underground – even more so that Speaker had seen marks from unicorns imprisoned there… though they did take some solace in the fact that Speaker hadn’t found any messages or graffiti on the cell walls – although that didn’t mean that such things hadn’t just been removed before Speaker got there.

Trotting through one of the nicer parks in the north-western part of the residential district, Speaker couldn’t help but find it amusing how Shimmer sounded so very much like Cash with that line she had said earlier – though he also found the suggestion itself quite reasonable.
“Oh you” Shimmer laughed as she bounced over to a bed of particularly fragrant flowers.

Following her, Speaker enjoyed the little moment of quiet. Considering how busy the circle had been since the Sunhill manse had been built, then this was quite nice. The open air and clear skies were also a nice change.

It was then that the alarm horns sounded to the west of the park. Speaker instantly summoned Gift and reared up to defend himself: “The rebel! That’s three times in three weeks!”

Looking around to see where Shimmer had gone, Speaker found that she was running towards the direction of the blaring alarms… of course.
Speaker caught up with Shimmer at the security checkpoint at the western park entrance – apparently the travel-pass Shimmer had been given by Gens Yoshoto didn’t mention Shimmer being covered in moonsilver tattoos, and she had forgotten to hide them under an illusion like she normally did following her rescue of Speaker.

Just as Speaker thought he had a moment to get a word in edgewise Shimmer suddenly looked like a dog who had caught a whiff of bacon – from somewhere beyond the checkpoint: “He’s here!”

“Who? The sidereal?! Get him!” Speaker barely had time to say, before Shimmer leapt past ponies at arms like a snake coiling through the air. To prevent the guards from going after Shimmer he quickly used Gift cut their spears in half as they were looking in Shimmer’s direction.

As the guards spun around in response to the sudden noise of Gift, even if it was only there for a split second, Speaker used his jumping charm and did as Shimmer – leaping over the two mortal ponies before him, leaving them very confused while he effortlessly stepped off the tips of their severed spears.

Using his jumping charm to also cover ground faster, Speaker leapt up on the sturdy tiled roofs and began to scan his surroundings with essence sight, looking for Shimmer but also signs of Sidereal essence use.

This turned out to fairly easy, as one block down Shimmer’s bright silvery anima suddenly flared. Arriving several seconds later, Speaker found Shimmer digging herself out of a pile of ruble next to a collapsed wall with a massive crack and dent in her: “He went into the sewers again! …and he’s armed with some kind of flail or something”

Looking around, Speaker spotted a sewer-drain that looked… off… at least when viewed with essence sight. It didn’t have the same muddled essence pattern as a rusty old sewer grate – for it had a perfect essence flow, so well that the rust on it were peeling off to reveal cast-iron fresh from the forge.

Now, Speaker didn’t remember that much about how Sidereal charms worked – but he remembered that their charms typically revolved around manipulating fate and reality… or resetting something’s reality, such as making a sewer grate be as new once more after having changed it into something else- like a sneaky trapdoor.

Sure enough the sewer grate wouldn’t budge – but Gift made short work of it. Shimmer was the first going down the hole, calling out from the darkness below: “I can smell him! It’s him for sure!”

Quickly following suit, Speaker and Shimmer instantly found themselves tracking an impossible quarry. With his reality-twisting charms the Sidereal was able to make the sound of his hooves appear to come from a different direction, or to come half a minute later than they should have… once he even left a decoy shaped as himself, that actually ran, to confuse the two.

It became evident very quickly that Speaker was only slowing Shimmer down, so the two split up. Tracking Shimmer for a bit with essence sight, Speaker found that the Sidereal was clearly making them around in circles. Was he trying to delay them? Buy time for something? Or maybe just loop back to an exit?

Not wanting to find out, nor give the Sidereal a change to escape, Speaker recalled what he could about the sewer controls of Deheleshen. There should be a maintenance panel somewhere around here, unless the place had been rebuilt too much… oh yes – oh, clogged with shit, of course, but a quick wash of essence undid that. Lovely, someone had replaced the gemstone controls with stone panels.

Using the maintenance controls of the sewer, Speaker sealed off several of the passages that led to other parts of the city, forcing the Sidereal to loop back towards Speaker – who quickly moved to ready an ambush, fashioning a trap of sharpened sticks and nails that he found in the sewage, using charms to speed up his search and trap-making.

The shrill howl of Shimmer in her warform barreling down the sewer tunnel heralded her and the Sidereal’s approach. Speaker couldn’t see or hear the Sidereal, but he suddenly noticed that his traps had all been disabled… and there was Shimmer, looking really annoyed: “Damnit, I thought you were him – he did something to his scent…”

As Shimmer sniffed around forcefully, amazing Speaker with how she wasn’t gagging from the lovely odor of sewer, the two ultimately concluded that the Sidereal had give them the slip. 

“Do you think he escaped topside?” Speaker wondered.

With a very frowny beak, Shimmer said that she doubted it – there weren’t any exits to the surface in the area they were in.

“Good – then take a deep breath and brace for deep sea pressure” Speaker said, resetting the sewer controls and punching in a high pressure cleansing-cycle.

There was a low rumble as first age water pumps that hadn’t really been used in millennia sprung to life, siphoning water from the inland sea up to the city sewer…

The two-yard in diameter circular tunnels began to flood within moments – and second later the a cry of horror rang out in the sewers ever so briefly, before it drowned in a tidal wave of piss, shit and ocean water.

When the water levels receded Shimmer couldn’t help but laugh: “Hehe, wait – how did you know this would get him?”

“I figured that if the Sidereal could use sewer grates as doors, why not also have some hidy-hole down here we can’t see using the same trick? My theory is that it was carved out of the sewer tunnels, not built there originally… I mean, I would have remembered if I had built something like that down here – and I just guessed that whatever hidden door the Sidereal used wasn’t rated to withstand this much water pressure because it really doesn’t look like the flush-controls have been used since I was around… and I got lucky” Speaker stated in a mirthful tone that very much displayed his barely suppressed laughter.

Shimmer had to admit that that was quite sneaky: “Alright – but he still got away… “

“Not for long. Remember that god of shit we prayed to when stopping that rebel army heading to Chung Do? He likes me. Why don’t we pray him a message, asking what Sidereal in Lookshy just got hosed down in shit and if he could tell us who that is Oh, could you also ask him to relay this information to the Gold faction, and mention that this sid is likely connected to the rebel?” Speaker suggested,
Upon realizing the brilliance of Speaker’s plan, Shimmer found herself laughing quite hard for a brief moment: “Oh that is beautiful  - with the name we can petition for a formal inquiry in heaven, or just threaten one to force him to stop whatever he’s doing here… that’s sneaky like a Denzik merchant”

“Well I’m hoping that the gold faction might be able to make him stop – perhaps they could do the inquiry instead of us having to press the issue” Speaker noted.

One quick prayer later and within seconds a name began to form as the shit around them congealed and crept up the sides of the sewer tunnel – apparently the number of Sidereals that have recently been flooded with poo was a short list to go through. The divinely-influenced crap began to spell out a name, one “Six Heavens Hunter”, spelled out in beautiful calligraphy.

“Hey Six Heavens Hunter, chosen of the mares of destiny – reveal yourself or know that we will demand a public inquiry in heaven regarding your activities!” Shimmer shouted into the darkness of the sewer tunnels, beyond the part that her and Speaker’s anima illuminated.

There was a moment of silence, followed by a sudden and low rumble. Speaker was quick to point out that the rumble ‘moved’ upwards: “He smashed through to the surface!”

“Well then let’s go!” Shimmer said, galloping off towards the nearest pony-hole cover exit.

With about thirty seconds head-start Shimmer and Speaker weren’t really sure if they had much of a shot of catching the sidereal once they got back to street level, but that turned out to not be that big of an issue: As they got up they were greeted by the rebel alarm horns and panic in the streets.

“Gotta hand it to him – that is a great way of hiding… but I just have to get a nose or three out to counter the many scents” Shimmer said she shifted into her beast-pony warform, now with an extra long beak with multiple nostrils.

Quickly picking up the sidereal’s essence-scent with her enhanced sense of smell, Shimmer gave chase while Speaker followed suit.

The situation this time was clearly different compared before the two had chased the sidereal into the sewers: Ponies left and right were screaming about multiple rebels – it seemed that the sidereal was using whatever sorcery or curse that brought fourth rebels was trying to set up even more distractions.

This quickly led to several confrontations with various rebel monsters. True to what Speaker had said previously, then they were quite easy to kill: There was nothing supernatural about them with regards to toughness or how much you had to slice into them before they fell over dead compared to a regular pony - the only difference was that by being made up of multiple pony bodies smushed together, as if the victims had all been fused together by unholy madness, then there was more than one heart to stop, but Shimmer’s claws made short work of all of them none the less.

The justicars in the… upper part of the port district… right, they were apparently as panicky as the rest of the ponies in the area, due to the dozens of rebel appearances: They were clearly afraid of being made into part of one, while at the same time having trouble keeping panicky ponies from making things worse.

Indeed, as Shimmer led a merry chase through crowds of panicky ponies, past rebels of flesh and nightmarish anatomical horror, the two passed several instances of forming rebels… which allowed Speaker to observe such events first hand, with essence sight once he came by one in the very early stages of forming.

Having seen enough to form an idea on how to counter the thing, as he saw in essence vision the otherwise invisible strands of sparkling green essence pulling at half a dozen ponies that had taken refuge behind a fruit vendor’s stall screaming into a vortex of doom, Speaker leapt at them just as their bodies had begun to fuse together, striking the forming central mass with a hoof blazing with golden essence, using his order affirming blow to quickly reassert that this was meant to be six different ponies, not one muddled mass of pain and howling fury.

Six quite surprised and elated ponies dropped to the ground among groans of pain and continued screams of fear that momentarily died down, Speaker not staying around to see if they were ok: If he could reach other forming masses  that would become rebels and undo them, then could save a lot of lives.

While his little stunt with the un-rebelization had put him a few seconds behind Shimmer, then it wasn’t difficult to find her: Shimmer wasn’t trying  to be subtle in her hunt, having shapeshifted in additional legs and a second pair of wings to grant her even more speed, which had also resulted in her anima leaving her aflame with silver light.

Leaping across a group of ponies huddled around a street lamp, Speaker finally found Shimmer catching her breath at the entrance to a short street that terminated in a small plaza where she seemed to have the Sidereal cornered – and lo and behold, there was the sidereal… or something indicating his presence anyway: A prismatic swirl of light and shadows that moved erratically down the street, past six fully formed rebels which appeared to have to been busy trying to demolish the surrounding buildings, all of them looking at Speaker and Shimmer with hateful and malformed eyes. At this point Speaker had already tried to use his order-affirming blow on other fully formed rebels – it hadn’t worked… so those ponies were lost for good, but at least now the culprit could be brought to justice.

“I’ll handle these rebels, you catch the sid” Shimmer howled, throwing herself at the rebels with all of her far too many limbs out in front, claws ready to strike.

Speaker galloped past the monsters after the sidereal, ignoring their manic screams of “Down with Lookshy!” or “We must rejoin the realm!”
The sidereal was at this point strangely easy to follow – though at the same time impossible to pinpoint: The dancing lights and shadows around him made it impossible for Speaker to tell where he was, which made throwing Gift after him equally impossible. It didn’t occur to Speaker that he hadn’t been able to keep pace with Shimmer and the Sidereal previously…

Chasing the sidereal up a flight of stairs through hastily abandoned workshops, following the very hard to miss lights, Speaker emerged onto a rooftop where he finally caught up with the Sidereal.

Indeed, it seemed that the Sidereal was waiting for Speaker as he came out on the roof.

Not even bothering with asking questions – for a pony so vile as to turn other ponies into monsters deserved no trial – Speaker instantly reared up and called Gift to him: “Six Heavens Hunter, prepare to die!”

“Your hubris shows. The realm is the only long-term way of keeping Creation safe” the Sidereal stallion said, his face hidden behind what appeared to be a rather featureless mask of polished ivory, indeed it didn’t even have holes for eyes. The rest of the sidereal was covered in a loose-fitting garb of sky-blue silk, except for the stallion’s ears and curly brown tail.

Speaker threw Gift at Six with all his might, the speed of it so great that the moisture in the air blasted away from it, like the trail of a comet of water vapor.  That, combined with all the other charms that Speaker had put into the attack, made Gift glow like a small spinning sun as it trailed hot and expanding water vapor behind it.

The Sidereal didn’t even try to dodge – instead flaring his bright blue anima, briefly revealing it to be a blue light with an afterimage of a blue flower in it, but then he struck it with a hoof, shattering the light into that same light and shadow display as before… but this time Six Heavens Hunter also exhaled forcefully, his breath expanding into a massive kaleidoscope of swirling lights, rendering him effectively invisible behind the appearing and disappearing lights, with Gift passing through where he had been without anything happening.

Guarding himself and holding Gift ready to parry anything thrown at him as it returned to him an instant later, Speaker managed to block the first few blows that came his way from amidst the sensory-overload of the intense lights and unnatural contrasts – but it quickly became too much: One moment there would be nothing, the next it would be as if the sidereal was striking at Speaker simultaneously from all sides, with a charm-enhanced force far greater than what Speaker’s defensive charms could handle… the sidereal’s apparent weapon of choice, a weighted rope of some kind, striking him from below and behind somehow, knocking Speaker over, while a second simultaneous strike knocked Gift away from him, over the edge of the roof.

Speaker never got the chance to get up: His foe had a solid hoof on back within a blink of an eye: “Pathetic anathema… you’re lucky my orders require you to live… for now”

“Hold it!” A familiar voice called out. It was that of a mare, clad in ornate heavenly silks, with a dark-brown coat ,a well-coifed black mane and a bright green caste-mark that was the symbol of the mare of secrets, the same color as her eyes.

The masked sidereal threw Heath Rose a brief glance… well, he turned his head for a brief moment – the mask made it impossible to see where he was looking, then he stepped down from Speaker’s chest.

“Six Heavens Hunter, by order of the Convention of Wood you are to come with me to Yu-Shan and explain exactly what you’ve been doing in Lookshy without notifying the convention – and then you’re going to pray to the mares that Ayesha Ura doesn’t demand a full audit of your activities here” Heath Rose called out, looking quite angry.

Speaker struggled to get up, though his pain subsided as he managed to use his anesthetic charm on himself: “He… he’s been conjuring up the rebels – I don’t know how – but he’s doing it”

“I can hear it – whatever the hell you’ve got tied to that starmetal string, hoof it over!” The chosen of secrets shouted.

For a moment Speaker wasn’t sure what Heath Rose had meant by hearing ‘it – then he recalled that Sidereal essence-sight came in the form of being able to hear the presence of essence as music, insight that he had once used to help craft the singing staves.

Six Heavens Hunter remained silent, but slouched ever so slightly into a proper martial stance…

“Don’t even think about it – we have an official complaint from a Solar claiming that you’ve kidnapped and wrongfully imprisoned him – you’re already in deep shit for that. Don’t compound it by trying to run” Heath Rose said, waving a stern hoof at Six Heavens Hunter.

Leaning towards Heath Rose, the stallion Sidereal hissed: “I will get you for this someday – in this life or the next!” then he disappear in a flash of multicolored lights and shadows that hung in the air.

Heath Rose made a frantic gesture at a speed that Speaker simply could not perceive – evidently she tried to catch the other sidereal by yanking on a string of fate, but that strand was evidently cut in that same instant, causing a single row of tiles on the roof to change from bright blue to dull grey as their reality was damaged. Heath Rose then twisted around and reached with a hoof, no she threw something. There was that sharp sound of a small pointy metal object striking a heavier blunt metal object, but the escaping Sidereal seemed to get his way… well, the weighted rope fell from the sky, hitting the tiled roof right next to Speaker quite hard.

“Oh well… I’ll get him later – are you ok?” Heath Rose said with a sigh as she turned to Speaker.

Looking at the weird iron ball with the thin braided starmetal tied around it that had dropped from the sky, Speaker nodded: “I’ll live – right now I’m more curious at what this thing is and how it hit me so hard”

“Beats me – but I can tell you that it’s from outside fate, because I can’t feel its connection to the loom – and Six Heavens Hunter running around with a weapon from outside fate? Oh he is in so much more trouble now” the Sidereal said in a first worried but ultimately bemused tone.

Removing the starmetal cable from the iron ball revealed a deep crack in it, from which bright emerald light shone. Apparently the starmetal cable held the light in somehow – perhaps it was a stabilizing effect?

Speaker instantly felt the effect of the light and put up his shaping defense charm: “The light – this is what pulls ponies together to create a rebel”

“Rebel – I’ve heard of those. But that light, that’s malfean essence, yozi essence!” Heath Rose noted, looking intently at the otherwise quite unassuming iron ball.

It was clear that the starmetal cable had been used to make the sphere safe to carry around, but it also somehow worked as a means to release its power in a controlled fashion, though how that worked was unclear. The only thing essence sight told Speaker for certain was that the crack in the ball was unnatural… it was broken.

His repair charm quickly sealed the hole, which had the unintended effect of suddenly making emerald green old realm glyphs appear around the ball. Upon seeing these Speaker instantly recognized the device for its true horrific nature: “This is a relic from the primordial war… a flesh-forging sphere. How did this… fuck… probably the same cache that they got the crystal-fire device from – and this fiend stole it”

“Right – well, is that it? I need to get to the loom and track Hunter down” Heath Rose asked in an insisting tone, though it wasn’t exactly clear from her statement if she had understood what Speaker was referring to or not.

Nodding, Heath Rose moved without moving, moving to somewhere else. Speaker shook his head… that was a close call – and now he was floating a primordial flesh golem catalyst in front of him.

Going down the stairs to street level, Speaker found the passage leading back to the small plaza where he had left Shimmer with a little over half a dozen rebels was awash with blood… the plaza even more so.

It was at this moment that he found Shimmer sobbing in the middle of it all, her coat caked with blood and clumps of sliced flesh. Taking a few steps towards Shimmer, Speaker realized that something was off: The bloody chunks that littered the ground were too… small… and regular.

These were normal pony limbs and bits – there was no melded flesh nor grotesque fused bones in the remains.

“I killed them… I thought they were rebel monsters, not ponies…” Shimmer slowly said in a tone of utter disbelief as she gazed upon the left half of what had once been a young filly’s head.

Speaker didn’t really know what to say. Had this been some kind of fiendish trap by Six Heavens Hunter? He could have sworn that he had heard and seen the rebels just like Shimmer had. 

The General Staff was not going to like this…

> Chapter 79: Monstrous Behavior
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The sinking feeling in Speaker’s stomach over the trouble Shimmer was going to be in was only barely countered by the nauseous gagging sensation spurred on by the sight of a plaza full of what had to be the sliced and diced remains of about a hundred or so ponies. There wasn’t a single living creature in the chunky piles of torn flesh.

Feeling understandably sickened by the sight, Speaker momentarily turned his gaze to the buildings surrounding the plaza. When he had found Shimmer and the Sidereal at the plaza the buildings looked as if they were being attacked by the rebel monsters – but now… sure, there was damage, but it looked a lot more like something you would get from whacking a starmetal-wrapped iron sphere of demonic power into the building, as opposed to monstrous horrors tearing down the walls.

The buildings themselves were nice tenements – well, they had been nice tenements. What a lovely way to trick all the ponies living in them to come running out. One thing still nagged Speaker: How did the Sidereal make it appear as if the crowds of ponies were rebel monsters?  Probably some Sidereal trick of fate. It annoyed Speaker that he could remember being able to detect such alterations in fate, as well as effect minor ones himself, back in the first age but not now.

With no apparent solution in sight Speaker felt sorely tempted to just sit down in the blood and gore and wait for the justicars to arrive and start asking questions. This would no doubt ruin most if not all of the goodwill Speaker had built up with Lookshy, that much was certain.

The sound of panicky screams and explosions from elemental essence blasts were still audible from beyond the deadly quiet plaza, indicating that other rebels were still rampaging. The only sound in the small square was the drip of blood – and there was no mistaking the bloody remains from that of rebels: There was no fused flesh, no misshapen body-parts…

Looking at the demonic flesh-fusing orb Speaker wasn’t really sure if it was a good idea to show it Shimmer – but then it occurred to him: The orb was just the thing he needed… well maybe… he couldn’t quite remember what the orb would turn ponies into, but anything was better than the carnage strewn around them.

“Shimmer, get up – warform – You can still save face” The Twilight caste Solar said, trying to sound brave and inspiring.

Turning her head and giving Speaker a truly miserable look, Shimmer tossed the half foal-head away from her, it making a nasty hollow thud as it impacted a bit of slashed leg and hoof before sinking into the pooling blood.

Holding the orb up high, Speaker forced the device to obey him – despite the demonic artifact not really wanting to cooperate – but in a matter of seconds its emerald green sigils floated outward, spinning around the flesh of the dead ponies in the square, floating them up.

It was at this point that Speaker realized that he couldn’t quite let go of the orb… and that it was floating up in the air as well, along with all the bits of dead pony from the ground.

“Speaker? Speaker what’s happening!? Is that the rebel making thing?” Shimmer cried out in confusion.

Speaker could only cry out: “Yes, now kill whatever this turns into before it consumes me!” before he was swallowed up by the flesh clumping up around him.

In a matter of seconds the entire square had been sucked clean and dry of blood and loose bits of flesh – it had all been combined into a monstrous form that resembled a giant demonic monster, but this time with no randomly misshapen limbs or half-fused heads: This was quite well made, and all the more horrible… especially to Shimmer since Speaker was stuck inside.

It was then that a dozen heavily armed justicar’s swept into the square, led by a grim-looking unicorn stallion with an ugly scar over his nose and forehead: “The hell is that?!”

“It’s the source of the rebels! We tracked it down but it swallowed Speaker up as it formed! We have to kill before it digests him!” Shimmer shouted frantically as the severity of the situation suddenly washed over her like a cold bucket of water to the face.

With a mighty howl and reckless fury of the likes that only the truly bestial lunar warform afforded, Shimmer leapt up at the massive twenty yard tall flesh monster that seemed to be taking on the shape of some kind of horned blood-hound. The justicars held back, only armed to take on pony-sized foes, but the unicorn leading them charged ahead with a battle cry of “Ever resolute!” while blasting at the monster with jagged razor-sharp elemental stone blasts.

Inside the monster Speaker found that his elemental immunity charm allowed him to breathe and protected him from the pressure. That was nice. On the negative side then the lattice of bone that had formed around him held him tightly, and the orb seemed to be siphoning essence out of him to fuel the monster. Was this how the orb was supposed to work, or was this some kind of anti-theft response to non-demonic essence?

The weak jerks and mild shockwaves that passed through his bindings told Speaker that the fighting was still going on outside – but he could also feel that his essence reserves were dropping… and he didn’t want to know what happened once he ran out. If only he had Gift… Hold on, the Great Maker had made Gift so it could be recalled through elsewhere!

Willing Gift to appear, Speaker felt the flesh around his right forehoof yield ever so slightly as something metallic and familiar-feeling appeared. Willing Gift to activate had much more of an effect: The flesh around Speaker’s right forehood was blended… along with that hoof, but Speaker was still on his anesthetic charm, so he barely noticed.

Floating Gift around himself, Speaker was ultimately able to free himself – after a fashion. He was still inside the flesh monster, only now he could swim around in the blood and flesh pulp Gift had made.

Orienting himself, Speaker aimed Gift up and applied the flesh-rending gear technique, causing Gift to positively liquefy the flesh and bone it encountered as it carved a path for Speaker to hopefully escape via.

Outside, the battle against the grand rebel raged. Apparently the massive flesh monster came with demonic powers, such the ability to emit searing beams of emerald light, or fire of prismatic crystal from its strange limbs. To the half-dozen unicorns that had showed up to help fight the monster this meant that they had to dodge and keep moving to avoid being reduced to cinders, though Shimmer found that the unicorns were quite adept at having some play decoy, while the rest would focus their elemental and magic attacks on a single joint or limb, to try to reduce the mobility and offensive capabilities of the monster.

Speaking of Shimmer, then the Lunar had found that whatever power the orb had to attract flesh meant that whenever she clawed at the monster it would simply reattached those bits a second later.  At least the flesh-attraction effect didn’t seem to work on ponies with enlightened essence, so Shimmer and the unicorns seemed safe – with the mortal justicars evacuating all other mortal ponies in the area quite efficiently.

Thus, with little ability to harm the monster directly, Shimmer had taken to using her bone-armored warform to help shield the unicorns playing decoys, helping them stay alive while they drew the monster’s ire.

Between the devastation of the monster’s various magical attacks, or its attempts to stomp on the unicorns playing decoys – something they did by targeting their elemental bolts at the monster’s face – then the battle quickly spilled from the small plaza to the rest of the upper port district. Buildings were being reduced to rubble left and right as the monster mindlessly blasted and struck at the ponies around it, indeed Shimmer and the unicorns quickly concluded that the monster wasn’t very good at coordinating itself or planning its attacks, which made baiting it around all the more easy, but also made it all the more destructive.

“Get it down to the harbor! Bring it range of the port citadel essence artillery!” one unicorn officer shouted from under her jade lamellar armor.

Shimmer nodded and flew up to the monster’s face. Its eyes were like that of a fly, only it was pony eyes arranged on the surface of a sphere instead, all of them looking at her angrily as she slashed at them.

The monster turned to her, shifting its massive bulk around just as a massive geyser of pulpy blood erupted from a spot between the monster’s left shoulder and throat. Among the bits of pureed meat and gore Speaker spilled out on the monster’s shoulder, completely drenched.

“Speaker!” Shimmer cried out, overcome with joy as she dodged the monster’s massive clawed paw swiping at her.

Getting up, Speaker coughed a little, then took a deep breath before looking around: “What the… what’s going on here? Why haven’t you killed this thing yet!?”

“The orb, it just pulls back whatever bits we cut off the monster – can you stop it!?” Shimmer shouted.

Looking at his cut up hoof, Speaker realized that the orb was still somewhere inside the monster: “It’s still in the monster – but can you go in through the hole here and do what you did to that tyrant-lizard?”

Diving in towards the monster’s throat, Shimmer landed next to Speaker while the monster turned its attention back to the unicorns blasting at it. Looking at the blood-pulp filled Speaker had come out from, Shimmer shook her head: “If I turn into a fish I would choke in that… and I won’t fit in there in my beast-pony form”

“Ok. Look, the monster isn’t regenerating the bits I had Gift pulp up – what if…” Speaker began, but Shimmer interrupted him, telling of the unicorn’s plan to get the monster in range of the port citadel’s weapons.

Looking south-west towards the cliff-edge that led down to the lower port district and the Lookshy port, Speaker frowned for a moment: “Is the lower port district evacuated? And this thing doesn’t seem stupid enough to just fall over…”

“You’re right… hmm… oh I know – keep it distracted!” Shimmer said, leaping away and flying off.

Speaker sighed and shook his head as he saw Shimmer fly down to the unicorns on the ground. He couldn’t tell what they were saying, nor make out much detail of what they were really doing due to the monster moving around, but moments later Shimmer flew off to somewhere Speaker couldn’t see.

Oh well – if nothing else Speaker trusted that Shimmer had a good idea of what she was doing, so he instead looked at his options and revved up Gift before plunging it into the monster’s neck with all his might.

Gift chewed through the outer layers of the monster’s blood form easily enough, but getting that damage to remain permanent seemed to be the problem: It was just like Shimmer had said: Anything cut off was just sucked back into place by the orb’s power a second or so later. Of course, being situated where he was, Speaker couldn’t tell that the unicorns down on the ground were having far more success by having some of their numbers cut into the monster, then having other unicorns blast the monster’s wounds with elemental fire and ice to cauterize the wounds and thus prevent regeneration.

Back up on the monster’s shoulder not even slow and meticulous pulping of the flesh worked for Speaker – to which end he came to the conclusion that it was likely that the only reason the path he had carved out of the monster hadn’t healed was because it was still inside the monster… it was only the bits that were removed from the whole that were fixed. How to exploit this?

Ultimately the best way Speaker could think of exploiting this apparent weakness was to dive back into the monster and try to weaken it from the inside… but depending on what Shimmer had planned, then that might be a really bad idea. Sighing heavily and almost absent-mindedly fixing his cut up hoof with a bit of Solar medical  magic and essence, Speaker walked over and looked into the hole.

With his balancing charm ensuring that he wouldn’t slip and fall off the monster, Speaker took a few careful seconds to choose his aim, then he threw Gift back into the monster. The direction he had aimed at was meant to strike at the monster’s spine. Having done that Speaker found that there was little else he could really – if Gift at some point got to the monster’s spine then that should be that – but until then he couldn’t really help with anything while stuck up on the monster.

Looking around for a suitable place to jump to, Speaker used his jumping charm to cross the distance – though his timing turned out to be rather poor: Just as he leapt the monster swung a massive limb into the very same building, demolishing most of it, and leaving Speaker with no safe place to land.

This resulted in what would have been a very painful landing, if not for the anesthetic charm still working on Speaker. To the unicorns that rushed to his rescue, they found a pony with a broken left hind-leg, who’s entire left side was one big bruise, and yet Speaker acted like he wasn’t even hurt: “Let go of me! I’m fine! Just get me to a field hospital and I’ll patch myself up”

The two armored unicorns that had come to Speaker’s aid, home guard soldiers if judging from their purple lamellar armor, looked at each other, then at Speaker with a somewhat condescending smile.

Speaker protested loudly as he was floated up in the air and carried away from the battlefield like some useless old wounded veteran.

A few minutes later, the two unicorns were pausing to helping some other ponies get out of a damaged building. It was clear that it was going to collapse fairly soon from how the thing was leaning, groaning and crumbling at the edges. With a big part of the end of the tenement knocked down, it was missing a lot of structural support, and there were other home guard soldiers running back and forth, helping sailor families evacuate. It just wasn’t quick enough…

Having been put down in a fairly comfortable resting position that didn’t put pressure on any of his injuries, Speaker saw how the roof, third and second floor of the building began to dip. Collapse was imminent.

Speaker knew that he could call in his singing staff instantly – but the rosined bow needed to play the damn thing would take too long.  Looking around, he spotted a trio of frightened looking street musicians. One of them, a grey-coated mare with a nicely done black mane and a large string-instrument that Speaker didn’t know the name of, had a suitable looking bow.

Looking back at the near-collapsing tenement, the home guard soldiers had pulled back, leaving several families stuck up on second and third floor, all of them screaming for help as they could feel the floor under them slowly begin to give way.

Recalling Gift from the monster via elsewhere, Speaker threw it with a level of precision in mind he had not really done before: The mare with the instrument and bow didn’t know what hit her – or rather, hit her bow – as Gift banked, swerved and spun perfectly to strike the bow out of her hoof, causing it to fly in a nice arch right over to a spot in front of Speaker where it broke on impact.

Speaker didn’t even miss a beat as he floated the broken rosined bow up, using his repair charm in the same instance to mend its broken wood and snapped tail-hairs. His singing staff was ready as the bow came up against it, to which Speaker hurried off a quick rendition of the Earth Dragon Claw Jig, causing several broad stone spikes to rise up and poke into the tenement. With the new make-shift supports the collapsing parts of the building came to a precarious rest, plus the ponies stuck up too high to jump down were able to carefully walk down the broad stone spikes to safety.

The ponies down on the ground cheered at the home guard ponies, thinking that it was one of the unicorns who had performed this miracle, while the home guard ponies looked at each other with some confusion.

Trying to throw the bow back at the mare he had ‘borrowed’ it from but failing, having spent pretty much all of his available essence over the last few hours of having been a captive, getting rescued, fighting rebels, fighting a sidereal, getting swallowed up by a meat-monster, and now powering the singing staff’s stone-shaping magic, Speaker collapsed, barely managing to send his singing staff back to elsewhere.

From the ground, Speaker was barely able to look up to see the gigantic beastpony form of Shimmer rise up a few blocks away as he had the noon-day sun in his eyes, her taking to the sky with massive wing beats which saw hundreds of roof tiles blow all over the place – a few of the nicer blue granite bungalows where Lookshyan naval officer families usually lived even collapsing simply from the force of the gusts of wind from her wings.
Shimmer was as massive and gargantuan as she had been back at that battle with the Water Walkers at that farm. Coming around she slammed into the giant monster, using the massive strength of her form to hoist the beast up into the air, all the while the monster gnawed, clawed and blasted away at her, but her enlarged form’s equally enlarged bone-armor looked yard thick so it had little effect beyond making it difficult for her to fly due to its weight.
As the monster howled in terror, the volume and pressure from flesh-beast shattered every glass window in the district, the five wondervolt warstriders swooped in and helped push Shimmer and the monster out to sea. 

About half a mile out Shimmer suddenly dropped the monster, and from the massive port citadel two dozen lightning ballistae, other flavors of fight age essence artillery and probably a few of Lookshy’s more blasty sorcerers unleashed their might, blowing the monster in half in a spectacular multi-colored kilo-mote detonation that sent shockwaves out in every direction.

Coming around once more, still in her gargantuan form, Shimmer flew into the falling debris and took a huge bite out of it before flying back to the upper port district and landing in a sufficiently large area of already flattened buildings. The home guard soldiers present didn’t really look sure about what to with the enormous Lunar, but when she began to shout for Speaker, they were fairly quick to begin to look for him – for an ornery Lunar is not a being to be trifled with.

His exaltation-given sense of time told Speaker that it was later afternoon, which meant that he had passed out for at least four or so hours. To his relief there no longer was any sound of battle, only the shouting and noise of dozens of work-crews hauling off debris. Oh, and apparently Shimmer was still in her emperor-ox sized beast-pony form and she was cradling him in her… what do you call forelegs with claws and digits for fine manipulation? Arms? Something like that.

“You can let go of me now” Speaker said, looking up at the massive three-eyed bird of prey head looking down at him.
Shimmer roused herself, releasing Speaker: “Yay – you’re back!”

“Inde- ow” Speaker lamented, having discovered that the side he had landed on when he had originally fallen was still quite messed up. Another application of his anesthetic charm, plus some additional medical charms saw that fixed a few seconds later – or at least healed to a point that the remaining bruises would face over the next few hours.

“Ok – now, tell me why you’re still in your warform. It looks like the monster is gone, so why are you still scaring the locals” Speaker asked quizzically, not really seeing any reason for Shimmer to have remained as such.

Pointing into her beak with a massive claw, Shimmer said: “Ah gak sangsan stak ang mah tath”

Smirking, Speaker looked into Shimmer’s imposing maw. He had treated enough soldiers with tooth-aches to recognize when someone was saying “I got something stuck in my teeth” in even the most awkward way. Of course, he didn’t expect to find the flesh-forging sphere stuck between her rows of curiously shark-like teeth inside her beak.

“I’ll have to come inside to yank it out – you might lose a tooth as well, it seems to have cracked on” Speaker said, climbing inside Shimmer’s beak.

For obvious reasons Shimmer didn’t respond, at least not to begin with – it wasn’t until a mouth and an eye appeared at the tip of her hulking tongue that she was able to respond, as well as weird Speaker out quite thoroughly: “Ah, thank you – I tried to just swallow the thing, but I didn’t know exactly where it was when I took the bite – oh, and we have company outside”

With his anesthetic charm and a swift buck Speaker knocked the cracked tooth, causing the now inert flesh-forging orb to drop down – Speaker spun around and caught it with a careful hoof: “Alright, time to face the music I guess”

Leaving the mouth with the tooth and orb, Speaker found a large gathering of ponies-at-arms, seventh legion officers and other unicorns assembled outside.

The moment Speaker stepped off Shimmer’s beak she began to shrink, though she did note that it would be about ten minutes or so before she was properly pony-sized again. The assembled unicorns and other ponies expressed a mix of various states of being impressed as well being non-plused over Shimmer’s appearance and nature: “Now that you’re both in an approachable state, I would like an explanation” the unicorn in charge said.

“Sure, once I know who you are so know who I’ll be directing to the general staff if you’re here to give us grief” Shimmer snarked as she slowly shrank.

The unicorn, a short and stocky stallion with a bright green mane, an even greener coat, slitted eyes and a very officious looking uniform with al lot of insignia on it, looked positively agitated at Shimmer’s quip: “I am Taimyo V’Neef Oilygear, Secretary bloody General and Examiner Superior of the port district. I am ON the general staff you tribal nitwit – now show some respect and do as you’ve been told!”

The fact that the clearly very purebred dragonblooded unicorn had no apparent qualms with talking down to a Lunar who was still in the process of scaling down from ‘towering above any remaining four story buildings’ spoke volumes about Taimyo Oilygear’s resolve. Shimmer was quick to pick up on this, especially since it didn’t come off as recklessness or any kind of underestimation of what she herself was capable of. To this end she recused herself, albeit in a somewhat spiteful tone: “Right, sorry – Speaker, show him the thing”

Sighing, Speaker displayed the flesh-forging orb and simply stated: “This is the source of the rebels of Lookshy – the pony who wielded it escaped, but it was an agent working to weaken Lookshy in order to further the Realm”

No pony in earshot said a word. There were a few small scuffles and rattling of digging gear as ponies gathered to see the source of the rebel – but none dared even ask how it worked.

“Hey must be nice getting a visit from home right V’Neef?” Shimmer said in spite, referring to the painfully obvious fact that House V’Neef of the realm was one of the five biggest noble houses there, founded by the youngest daughters of the now missing empress.

The look on Oilygear’s face turned quity thorny as his anima flux fully manifested in the form of spinning green flowers – something that usually only manifested if a unicorn either used a lot of essence, just like other exalts, but also if they got very emotional, due to the fact their powers were more closely tied to their physical bodies, namely their blood.

Seeing the Taimyo looking ready to break to Lookshy’s ban on duels, Speaker very leapt up to Shimmer’s face with a few charm-fueled jumps, landing on a shrinking shoulder, and slapped the beast-pony across the beak: “Don’t you have something to feel really bad about? Why don’t you go think about what you’ve done back at Cash and Sunrise”

Jumping down from Shimmer before she could get a word in edgewise, Speaker gave her a look that very clearly stated that he wasn’t interested in discussing this any further.

It was with tears in her eyes that Shimmer shifted into a seagul and flew off east-wards.

With that done Oilygear requested that Speaker come with him for a proper debriefing. This took a few hours, and the Security Inspectorate officers present during the event were very unhappy to hear of this mystery agents working to further the realm by weakening Looksy, though they were mostly upset that Speaker was unable to identify the pony. It was very difficult for Speaker to convince them that this pony was veiled in such a way that it would be forgotten after every encounter.

“Right... you keep saying that – but how come you remember him?” officer Hard Case asked, for the sixths time.

Speaker, feeling that the debriefing had long since turned into an interrogation, finally sighed deeply and stroked his long beard. He knew quite well that he couldn’t simply orate this pony away, but why not simply question his motives then? Speaker had always been good at asking the right questions: “You keep asking that in a tone that implies that I simply do not want to inform Lookshy of this pony’s identity, as if to put my loyalty to Lookshy into question. What if I told you that I have already told you the identity of this pony several times over, and that I’ve seen it fade from your memory before my very eyes?”

The cream-coated unicorn mare shot Speaker a dirty look. Readjusting her white lamellar armor with blue officer trims, she looked Speaker straight into the eyes: “Do you think I’m stupid. We have recorders of everlasting glories running here – crap like that wouldn’t work”

It took surprisingly little to convince Hard Case to bring one of these recorders forth and replay the ‘debriefing’. After the fourth instance of the recording fading out during the times when he had tried to explain Sidereals or mention Six Heavens Hunter Hard Case quite thoroughly disappeared. She had been with Speaker throughout the interview – so she knew that he couldn’t have tampered with the recorder… by every right it should not have been possible to make alterations to the recordings like the ones she was seeing. 

Finally released, with Hard Case going off somewhere for a really stiff drink, Speaker finally returned to the Gens Yushoto compound and checked up on the designs he had been making prior to being captured.

He found the study tidied up and all his scrolls and designs gone – instead he was greeted by a young unicorn mare: “Hi – I’m Maheka Ruby Star, I have been assigned as your armiger”

Speaker looked at the grey-coated unicorn, in the typical Valkhawsen student uniform robes, the green colors of the robes and the bright yellow trims making it clear that this mare was a student of sorcery and artifice. Her bright orange eyes, and mane of short ruby-red hair both sparkled ever so slightly like broken granite, indicating that she was an earth-aspected unicorn. The combination of these two aspects of his so called armiger – the special bodyguards assigned to important Lookshyan sorcerer-engineers – made Speaker wonder: “Are you meant to be my bodyguard or my apprentice?”

Ruby shrugged: “A bit of both I guess – I first got the assignment the day after you went messing, and after word spread that you had reappeared here I’ve been looking all over for you”

“Sure – but why not assign me a master? Why a student?” Speaker couldn’t help himself but ask. Part of him felt genuinely insulted from having had a lowly apprentice put upon him, when he knew damn well that the scope of his abilities and powers would test even the greatest of Lookshyan artificer master.

Bowing her head, Ruby gave Speaker a serious look: “First of all, I have worked for sixteen years as armiger for legion sorcerers. It was when I had to escort an artificer to Chiaroscuro that I discovered that I was quite good at artifact construction and repair, and I’ve studied at Valkhawsen ever since. So maybe the Battleaxe wanted to set you up with someone who can both protect you and learn from you”
Blinking for a moment, Speaker found himself nodding as the weight and stress of his captivity and the stress of the day’s events washed over him: “Good point – in that case the first thing you can do is fetch my schematics and notes. I don’t know where they’ve been put, but I will need them back”

Ruby smiled and floated out some scrolls from a pocket inside her robes: “You mean these?”

> Chapter 80: Cloak, Dagger and Phantom Horn
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The day after the emergence and defeat of what the ponies in Lookshy called the mega-rebel, Speaker walked through the port district with his newly assigned armiger – his legion assigned bodyguard – in the early morning hours, just as the work crews began to arrive to haul away the remains of demolished buildings.

The damages were quite extensive. Sure, the clean-up process was already underway, but it seemed clear that hundreds, if not thousands of sailor families would be homeless for the time being. A sizable tent city had sprung up over night outside the city walls – something that the general staff probably disliked greatly, for it would be a great way for Lookshy’s enemies to sneak spies and things into Lookshy via it, that much Speaker was sure of.

Ruby was more curious about the rumors she had heard the evening before about Speaker’s involvement in the destruction of the port district, to which Speaker could only say that he was going to destroy the thing that caused it, so that it couldn’t happen again.
“What? No, you can’t. Give it to the legion. A weapon that powerful… it would be such a waste” Ruby pleaded.

Giving the red-maned unicorn mare a very frowny glare, Speaker yawned as the morning sun tickled his eyes: “Waste? This is not a weapon meant for ponies to wield – it is meant to be wielded against ponies. The monsters that this thing can make will be hostile to all ponies, including the one that activates the orb!”

Ruby didn’t appear to buy Speaker’s explanation, at least if judging by her expression, but at the same time she seemed to understand that it wouldn’t really be possible to get Speaker to hoof over the orb unless he really wanted to relinquish it.

Amid the massive paw-prints of the flesh-monster in the rubble from the day before Speaker sat down and assumed a meditative position. He explained to Ruby that during his captivity, prior to his rescue, he had been working on figuring out a charm that disassembled things very well.

“Makes sense – would it have let you break out?” Ruby asked, flicking a broken stone brick aside with a hoof.

Speaker nodded: “That and once I’ve figured it out, I can destroy this infernal orb for good – it is a relic of a time when true evil roamed creation. It simply should not exist”

Looking somewhat puzzled as to what Speaker had referred to – her knowledge of history, like so many other scholars in this age, only reaching back to the great contagion and the changeling crusades that followed.

Ruby was about to ask exactly what Speaker was planning on doing when he began floating ruble up and reassembling the building who’s remains he was sitting in the middle of. He did so at a frightful pace, so much so that Ruby had to gallop away to outrun the expanding swirl of rubble, broken furniture and anything else that hadn’t been retrieved from the piles already.

A few minutes later a large crowd had assembled to watch the now almost finished building that appeared to be reassembling itself by the power of a wondrous golden light. When the tenement had finished itself Speaker emerged from a door, carrying the crushed remains of a dead pony that hadn’t made it out during the battle.

Looking at Ruby, who appeared genuinely dumbfounded, Speaker shot her a grim look: “What are you waiting for? We’re not done yet – there are others inside, down in the basement” 

After another dozen dead bodies had been retrieved Speaker solemnly continued on to the nearest destroyed tenement, purposely seeking out demolished high-density residential buildings to restore – and then clear out of dead bodies that were revealed.

“Are you going to do this to all the wrecked buildings here?” Ruby asked, as she sat down next to Speaker right after he had begun his third round of architectural restoration.

His face, an intense grimace of concentration, Speaker didn’t even bother opening his eyes as he focused on reaching out with his essence to piece back together every shattered wooden beam, every brick and every tile: “No, this one will be my last today – I can’t keep this up much longer”

“Ok, what about tomorrow? Will you start working on your designs then?” the unicorn mare asked, trying to mask the fact that she was quite bored.

With a deep breath and a strained expression, Speaker guided his essence as the roof of the tenement was threaded back together, each newly restored tile interlocking perfectly: “I will not. This is multitasking: I’m feeling each piece of ruble to figure out how they came to be – how they broke”

“To figure out that disassembly charm you mentioned? You know, us unicorns known some fairly good unmaking charms” Ruby noted, to which Speaker quickly retorted that the orb would be difficult enough to break with celestial-grade essence: “…terrestrial essence is too weak for this.”

Now, Speaker wasn’t looking, but Ruby’s expression in response to Speaker’s statement was quickly becoming one of grand disapproval: “Hey! We have the powers of the elemental dragons! Don’t come here and say that unicorn powers are too weak to break some stupid iron ball”
This wasn’t the first time Ruby had brought up the topic, with the same outcome of her sounding insulted – but by the heavens she was persistent, as befit an earth-aspected unicorn. Aiming by the direction of her voice, Speaker recalled the flesh-forging orb and tossed it. The surprised gasp and lack of sound of the orb hitting the ground hinted that she caught it.

“Right, then break it – and for heaven’s sake don’t activate it unless you want another monster stomping around” Speaker said. He didn’t get a reply, but heard Ruby trot away.

Sighing, Speaker wondered if his armiger truly would try to get the orb destroyed to prove her point – or whether she would just turn it over to the Seventh legion. Oh well, it was a moot point: The secrets of the Shattering Grasp Technique had already revealed itself to Speaker… he was just finishing the current tenement so all the more ponies could move back in all the sooner – and he was still attuned to the orb, so he could feel the rough direction of where it was.

About an hour later, as the last parts of the inner brickwork was falling into place and the old bits of crumbled mortar was knitting itself back together, Speaker got up and left. He ignored the cheering workers outside… well… he would if there had been any: It seemed that the head of the district, the Examiner Superior, was keeping everyone busy: There were still plenty of warehouses and other structures that needed to be rebuilt. With a bemused look on his face Speaker couldn’t help but imagine how Cash would just love to sell Speaker’s services for reconstruction. Resisting the urge to help construct a warehouse or two, Speaker trotted off in search of the orb.

As the he continued further away from the residential parts of the port district, Speaker finally found himself among teams of ponies filling carts with carefully sorted salvaged building materials picked out of the neatly gathered up piles of rubble. Most of the ruined buildings with sections that were beyond saving were in the process of having those sections carefully torn down, while bamboo scaffolding had shot up like weeds everywhere. 

At the construction sites for the demolished warehouses, Speaker noticed several patrols of Justicars roaming the area. Seeing the exposed warehouse goods waiting to be housed again this made perfect sense.

Turning a corner Speaker came across a young Lookshyan priest holding a somber ceremony at a cleared lot where one of the collapsed tenements he hadn’t gotten to rebuilding had stood. The decorations and flowers put on the ground indicated clearly that someone died in the collapse:

“Just as the dragons gave the gift of wisdom and enlightenment to ponies without us at first understanding why, we must recognize that the gods still move in mysterious ways. This was a terrible tragedy truly, but tomorrow the dents in our armor will be beaten out by the sweat of our brow, and our wrath be turned on those responsible – the anathema that has brought the fury of the rebel spirit upon us!” the unicorn priest said, his voice intense but without shouting, with an earnest and very relatable feeling.

Nodding as he passed by, Speaker sighed and rubbed his temples. Solars and Lunars might not qualify as anathema any more, but he could easily imagine the bronze faction sidereals being lined up and shamed for their actions – for truly, if judging from the state of creation as a result of their actions, then they were anathema to all that is good.

It was then that someone yanked hard on Speaker’s old faded uniform – nearly making him stumble and fall over. 

“Wha-“ Speaker barely managed to say as he snapped back into reality. The priest was gesturing angrily at him and saying something along the line of “…and there he stands. The shame of Lookshy, a fallen one who sold his soul to darkness, that he might appear bright and alluring to our eyes. He might have fooled the general staff with his powers and gifts to them, but those of faith know better!”

Getting a proper footing and wrestling off the young colt who had bitten onto his uniform, Speaker turned to the preacher and shook his head: “What in blazes are you talking about? I’m just trying to give the ponies who live here their homes back”

“It would bribe us with gifts of things that it already stole from us – how disgusting” the priest said in a self-aggrandizing way, while holding his horn high and snubbing his nose at Speaker. It pained Speaker that the unicorn was actually right – but the dirty and hateful look that the unicorn was giving, it was pure venom.

The ponies around the unicorn didn’t exactly give Speaker any kinder looks either.

Taking a deep breath, sighing just as deeply, Speaker shook his head and turned to leave. He had no interest in a theological debate – that was for Sunrise or Cash. Hell, Cash would probably have the priest sucking his dick by the end of it. It was then that Speaker was struck over the head with something very heavy.

Dropping to the ground, the world spun for Speaker as he reeled from the massive blow. Turning over, he barely managed to see the steel mallet come down on him and swat it away so that it struck the cobble next to him with a massive thud – it only cost him a broken hoof.

The massive stocky mare wielding the mallet was quickly joined by others as Speaker found himself mobbed. His defensive charms protected him from most of it, but as they pinned him and held his hooves out to bash them with that big old steel mallet… well… one thing is turning a blade, but the force of a mallet is something different.

Thanks to his anesthetic charm Speaker didn’t really feel it as his hooves were systematically cracked – if anything it mainly annoyed him as they bashed his right forehoof into a bloody mess of pulpy meat-sponge with mighty mallet blows, as he had just fixed that hoof yesterday. His lack of expressing any kind of pain only seemed to enrage the mob, as they took it as proof that dark forces were protecting him.

Despite struggling to the best of his ability, the mob began to reshuffle Speaker so the pony with the mallet could have a go at his legs.

The priest just kept egging the mob on, spouting hate and encouragement: “Strike at the anathema! Let it feel the pain it has put us through! Its death will appease the cruel spirit of the rebel, that it might leave us be”

Oh how Speaker wanted to just buck that priest something fierce – but at the same time he couldn’t help but feel horribly conflicted: The ponies actually doing harm to him were clearly being manipulated. With essence sight he could see the charms the unicorn was using to make his encouragement irresistible to mortal ponies – but he had no means to counter or stop it… at least not without hurting the ponies around him, and that was something he really didn’t want to – and where in blazes were the justicars? This kind of violent mob attempted execution shouldn’t be possible! 

It was the loud snap of his left thigh-bone cracking that snapped Speaker out of his hesitance against retaliating with force. The situation was simply too wrong, too absurd! He had been lauded by the general staff, by the Examiner Superior of the Port district – and yet he was now being mobbed by three dozen ponies with hammers and picks trying their damndest to kill him?

The epiphany that followed this train of thought was not an expected one: Broken things had their use – to some a warning, to others a deterrent, and to some a call to restoration. With this epiphany in mind Speaker called Gift from elsewhere.

The sudden appearance of a golden disk floating in the air above Speaker surprised some of the ponies wailing away on him, but it didn’t deter the others. It was first as Speaker employed the new insight he had attained: He made Gift spin into activity, its blades unfurling – but this time he had it misalign the blades, so they ground against the orichalcum casing of the gyroscopic chakram: The shower of white-hot sparks that came in the wake of this left manes smoldering and more notably boiled out the eyes of all who didn’t manage to turn their heads away in time, leaving half a dozen ponies writhing and screaming in pain on the ground next to Speaker.

The ponies attacking Speaker instantly pulled back, Speaker using the breathing room to get up – not an easy task with a broken leg and smashed hooves – but his perfect balancing charm helped greatly.

Rearing up, albeit with a left hindleg that dangled lifelessly in a very wrong angle, Speaker gestured furiously at the priest: “I do not take kindly to cowards who trick others into killing for them – face me if you want me dead”

Even in his injured state Speaker must have appeared quite fearsome, for the unicorn seemed quite hesitant at engaging him direct combat. Speaker had no such reservation, flinging Gift with another new twist: The insight from the use of a broken machine had lent him another epiphany: Sometimes you only needed to break something just enough, while leaving the rest functioning – and so Gift was revved in a way to produce a greater torque, allowing it to chew through tougher materials, such as bone, without doing any additional overall harm to its target.

This seemed to surprise the unicorn greatly, as Gift swung under him and amputated his left leg just under the ankle. The look of shock and surprise on the unicorn was without measure, and yet in the blink in the blink of an eye and a flash of light the priest was gone… or maybe it was bloodloss on Speaker’s part… it certainly was difficult to remaining standing, or conscious...

At this point Justicars swarmed the scene and began hauling ponies away, just as the mallet-wielding mare – now with a half-singed face and a burnt out left eye-socket, was about to take another swing at Speaker.

The next thing Speaker knew he was back in the Gens Yoshoto compound, on a stretcher, being taken back to his room. Ruby was also there, and from the looks of it she seemed quite upset, though from how dizzy and woozy Speaker was feeling then it was difficult to tell what was happening.

Some time later Speaker found himself conscious enough to work enough medical charms on himself to get out of bed. Gods, what a mess he had been… broken femur, all four hooves cracked, his head a mess of contusions and welts. He couldn’t even begin to imagine how much it would have hurt he hadn’t used his anesthetic charm – though at the same time it also struck Speaker that with the anesthetic charm he had been far less aware of just how hurt he had been: It wouldn’t have taken that much more before his injuries would have become lethal.

Outside his room Speaker was met by Ruby who seemed incredibly embarrassed and sorry that she had left him: “I failed you as armiger… I’m so ashamed – can you forgive me?”

Feeling far too tired to bother with this would-be apprentice, Speaker simply ignored the young mare and made for the dining hall. All that healing had left him very hungry.

Ruby followed him, continuing her begging for forgiveness – again with that persistence born of the earth dragon. It was difficult to just brush her off, so ultimately Speaker simply looked at her: “If you let me finish this meal in peace – then yes – you are forgiven – now scram!”

Sufficiently instructed, Ruby did as requested and left. She returned about an hour later with the orb – much to Speaker’s surprise.

“And here I thought you had turned it over to the legion” Speaker chided, not really feeling that much positivity left in him, as if it had been pounded out of him with a mallet.

Giving Speaker a stern look, or rather appearing as if for a moment she wanted to and then deciding against it, Ruby dropped the orb down on the thick wooden table before Speaker.

The loud thunk made Speaker look up, if nothing else. The orb was scarred with scratches, scorchmarks and indentations of various shapes and sizes – though nothing more severe than what a good round of polishing could fix: “We tried everything. The largest jade hammers I have ever seen, the hottest flame that Valkhawsen could produce, the sharpest edge… nothing could hurt it – and you were right about it being infernal. Is that why it’s indestructible?”

“It’s not indestructible – but it is primordial… from before they were cast down and their spawn branded demons – so it would appear infernal when you look at it today” Speaker mused.

The unicorn mare looked at with some suspicion: “You keep saying that you can destroy it – when are you going to prove it?"

Speaker pointed at the food before him – the half-eaten chicken-fried rice and steamed veggies – then shot Ruby a somewhat knowing look. She got the message.

“Right, when you’re done… but you’ve been eating for an hour” Ruby noted, pointing to the stacks of plates surrounding Speaker.

Opting not to reply, Speaker finished his meal and dropped his chop-sticks: “Between being kidnapped and being beaten half to death… I don’t know why it’s making me hungry, but it’s one of the few things that comfort me right now. For weeks I was telling my friends that Lookshy isn’t like the Realm, that here we do not judge ponies purely based on dogma, and yet look what happened to me?”

The red-haired unicorn could do little but express a deepfelt disappointment that matched Speaker’s: “You’re right – but it’s being looked in to. The ponies you blinded are suffering enough as is, and the others that attacked you are being rounded up… though, the priest that started it all has vanished”

“I got his leg…” Speaker noted, wondering if Ruby knew about it.

Nodding, Ruby said that a leg had indeed been recovered.

Perking up at the mention of this, Speaker quickly inquired into the legs location: “Where is the leg? Has it been destroyed?”

“It’s on ice at the Dragon’s Mercy Hospital – in case the owner wants it back” Ruby noted. Speaker nodded – that was standard procedure for any accidents involving amputations. He just hadn’t thought of it because it was a criminal who was involved.

This changed the planned order of events. The two quickly made their way to Dragon’s Mercy and retrieved the leg – under no small amount of protests from the doctors there – but after Speaker ‘convinced’ them with a little work in the ward for terminal patients, which suddenly found itself quite empty… well, suddenly they were very cooperative. Indeed, Speaker’s old master, the now Chief of Medicine Ba-Wan, who had taught Speaker most of what he knew of medicine and surgery was duly impressed. Arrangements were quickly made for Speaker to come by the hospital later.

Leaving the hospital with the leg of the offending unicorn Speaker first made a quick statement: “This leg… is not that of a unicorn”
“What? Did we get the wrong leg? How many legs did they have in there?” Ruby wondered, looking suitably confused.

Suddenly laughing quite loudly, Speaker realized that the residual essence he could see in the leg wasn’t dragonblooded essence: It was sidereal. Oh the delicious irony: “This is the leg of the… well, probably the same pony that used the orb yesterday”

“Serves him right – but didn’t you say you saw him as a unicorn?”

Shaking his head, Speaker shrugged: “Could have been part of a disguise. A ceramic horn dusted with jade to react to essence use so it glows like a real horn.

“Pathetic. But now it’ll probably be a while before he’ll try something similar” Ruby said, sounding just a little too happy for the misery of this other pony.

A sudden thought occurred to Speaker as he stopped, who’s expression turned to a somewhat more worried one: “Wait – is Valkhawsen still producing jade prosthetics for crippled unicorns?”

“You think he’ll try to steal a new leg?” Ruby said, turning towards the direction of Valkhawsen without even thinking about it.

Speaker didn’t answer – instead he broke into a gallop towards the nearest district gate. The residential district was in the second ring, and Valkhawsen – appearing more as a fortress with heavy buttresses and jade-steel reinforced battlements than that of a house of learning – loomed tall in the third ring.

Getting in was surprisingly easy – apparently then Ruby was still officially a student there, and as such could bring visitors along. The medical ward was small, with barely a single hall of beds for ponies awaiting prosthetics or still learning to use them correctly.

Getting access to the medical records of the current patients there turned out to be a lot easier than getting access to the leg over at Dragon’s Mercy – this time the two simply explained that they were tracking a realm agent who lost a leg yesterday, who had likely snuck in with false papers. The head nurse was furious at the very thought, and cooperated fully.

Looking at the pile of scrolls with permits and signed orders from the various patients’ superior officers, Ruby wondered how they were supposed to find the fake ones.

“Well, that assumes that our pony hasn’t just killed a legit patient and assumed their identity” Speaker said in a worried tone.

Between Ruby, Speaker and the head nurse the three all agreed that in all likelihood the realm agent probably wasn’t interested in waiting around too long, so replacing and impersonating someone on top of the prosthetics list indeed seemed quite likely. The head nurse quickly pointed out the ones scheduled for new prothstetics that day, which narrowed the number of ponies down to three.

One was a unicorn mare who lost a hoof to a demon. Speaker quickly ruled her out, since the injury didn’t match. The second was a similar dud: A young scion of gens Amilar who’s pelvis had been crushed when a pile of crates had fallen on him down in the lower port district. The third one… well, it looked right, but it was a unicorn stallion who had lost his right hindleg in battle.

“Could you have been wrong about what leg you got from him?” Ruby wondered as Speaker paced about the small head nurse office.
Shaking his head, Speaker frowned furiously: “No, but this has to be him – the pony we’re after… his sort has powers that affect fate. It’s difficult to explain… revealing too much of his true nature makes you forget him”

“Oh, I was briefed about that – but how do you fake what leg you’re missing? An illusion?” Ruby noted, looking at the medical scroll of the unicorn in question. His name was Karal Gai Fan.

Speaker tried to explain the idea of altering fate and ‘swapping labels’ so that a pony with the right powers could effect small changes in reality: “Like, making it so that it’s one leg not the other that’s missing”

“But wouldn’t that change the leg you have then?” The head nurse wondered out loud, as she fidgeted nervously with her white nurses uniform.

A great big smile grew on Speaker as he nodded fervently: “Oh it would – it would also mean that if I have a right hind leg now, then this confirms it”

Half a minute later and both Speaker and the head nurse confirmed that the leg that Speaker had stored elsewhere was a right hind leg – you could tell from how the hoof was worn, and from how the coat was a little different on the side of the leg that had faced inwards and the one facing outwards.

“So… what are you going to do now? Should I go get backup?” the head nurse wondered, throwing a nervous glance out the window of her office door to the other nurses that were going about their work, blissfully unaware of the killer hiding in the ward.

“Is there an armory nearby?” Ruby wondered, figuring that she might as well gear up if they were going to take this pony down.

The prospect of a full on exalted level fight on her ward did not seem to please the head nurse one bit. With a look that very quickly went from nervous to furious, she stomped her hoof and clearly stated: “I will have no fighting in my ward!”

“I don’t think that’ll be necessary…” Speaker said, asking the head nurse to describe to him in great detail the layout of the room that the fake patient was in, what bed that pony would be in, where that bed was, and how the pony was most likely positioned.

About ten minutes later Speaker had produced a very detailed sketched of the ward and where his target would be. Using this to ‘aim’ in advance, Speaker figured that he should be able to catch the pony unaware and incapacitate him by throwing something heavy in from outside the patient dorm hall.

At the door to the patient dorm hall Speaker reviewed his sketch. The hall would be roughly ten by ten yards, with several load-bearing columns, and rows of beds with patients. The bed he was to aim for would be bed eight.

With a hastily made weapen wrought of four iron paperweights that he had moulded into a very blunt chakram, Speaker took a deep breath and took aim – it was then he felt the disc suddenly gain in weight, and turned to see Ruby use a charm on it: “What are you doing?”

“Imbuing it with earth essence – duh. Unicorn charms are all about working together and enhancing each others’ charms – this isn’t any different. Now it’ll hit all the harder” Ruby quietly stated.

Speaker thought about it for a moment, then shrugged. Sure, what he remembered of unicorn charms in the first age didn’t say anything about being able to enhance the charms or attacks of non-unicorns, but that was a long time ago: “Alright – be ready to burst in when it connects”

Taking another deep breath, Speaker steeled himself and assumed the martial pose that informed his Thousand Wounds Gear Style form. With a strong and sturdy posture, his muscles tensed, he nodded and Ruby opened the door into the patient hall ever so slightly – and Speaker flung the chakram into the room. 

At first there was silence, then there was a dull thud – the chakram hitting something – and it wasn’t the sound of metal hitting stone or wood. Seconds later there were several alarmed voices calling out, shouting that they were being attacked or something – the general sounds of confusion.

Speaker and Ruby burst into the room, finding the pony in bed eight knocked out cold. The other patients in the hall didn’t exactly look happy that Speaker and Ruby had seemingly attacked one of them, but moments later several armored ponies and unicorns arrived, declaring that they were with the security directorate and that the now unconscious pony was an enemy of the state, so nobody should be alarmed.

As the security directorate ponies began to haul the crippled pony away Speaker recognized the unicorn mare in charge – the thing was just that last time he had seen her, she hasn’t been a unicorn: It was Heath Rose.

“Where are you taking him?” Speaker inquired. His first age memories bid him not mention her true identity. He couldn’t remember why, but it made sense.

Ruby, having no clue at what kind of Sidereal deception she was currently subject to, asked what one might expect any Lookshyan unicorn ask: “Where are you taking him? He’s dangerous, and a master of disguise”

Speaker didn’t bother to notice what Heath Rose told Ruby. It was some flavor of lie about taking him where secure, where he couldn’t escape. For Speaker a deep sigh of relief was all he felt like looking into.

“You, Bright Machine Speaker, you told informed us that he might have fate-based charms and sorcery operating on him” Heath Rose said, sounding very much like a random official who had simply been briefed about Speaker without ever really meeting him.
Nodding, Speaker acknowledged the statement.

“Very well – would you be so kind as to use your order affirming blow technique on our captive? You’ve made us understand that it disrupts and breaks the kind of sorcery that makes him fade from our memory” Heath Rose reqested. It was difficult for Speaker to refuse, despite the last couple of days straining his mental stamina greatly, and the Order Affirming Blow being a very taxing charm in that respect.

The only thing Speaker could think of that annoyed him about the request was that he hadn’t really ever mentioned that charm, or its potential uses, to the general staff or the Lookshyan security directorate – and he didn’t really fancy such a powerful charm becoming that well known via such… casual circumstances.

Doing as requested, Speaker struck the unconscious pony. To the gasping shock of the Lookshyan nurses and patients in sight, as well as Ruby, the pony stallion’s missing leg faded into view, while his seeming good left hindleg faded to a half-healed stump.

“So he really was hiding the wrong leg… holy shit” Ruby blurted out.

Speaker looked intently at Heath Rose. It was difficult for him to choose the right kind of words that wouldn’t blow her cover: “You be careful with him. By my count, as a chosen of the most high, he has caused the untimely death of hundreds of ponies, and at least one unicorn. I would personally like to see him punished greatly for this”

“Your request will be taken into consideration” Heath Rose said, her voice dripping with cold bureaucratic apathy – though Speaker was certain that it was just a front. He had no doubt that Six Heavens Hunter would suffer for his acts, especially with a Solar expressing his grievance.

As the security directorate ponies left, and a nurse screamed in the distance as she suddenly found the corpse of a dead unicorn in a supply closet – likely the poor soul that Six Heavens Hunter had replaced – Speaker and Ruby left the prosthetics ward of Valkhawsen.
“Well that’s one way to spend your morning” Speaker casually noted, sounding quite pleased with himself.

Ruby appeared more shaken: “I don’t know… this is sounding way above my pay-grade. Heavenly spies you can’t remember, and ponies who can fake being a unicorn so well you can’t tell”

“I wouldn’t worry. There aren’t many of his ilk – and trust me, some of them are on our side” Speaker noted.

As the two journeyed into one of the open garden areas of Valkhawsen, shielded on all sides by tall walls and thick jade-reinforced buttresses, Speaker and Ruby talked briefly about Ruby’s studies at Valkhawsen. Apparently she had been getting artifact manufacture when she was tapped to become Speaker’s armiger.

The two were about to break for lunch when a messenger bid them report to the headmaster’s office. Ruby at first appeared quite enthusiastic: “Holy dragons…  Drip-Crank’s office, what an honor!”

Speaker nodded. He had heard that Headmaster Drip-Crank was the wisest artificers and occult lore-keepers in Lookshy. It was then that Ruby’s expression changed into one of hesitance: “Wait… he probably just wants to see you, not me – can’t I sit this one out?”

“Are you an armiger or a common student? Come on – we’ve been summoned” Speaker chided Ruby, who had just spoken of the honor of meeting the headmaster.

Ruby, looking afraid in a whole new way that Speaker had never seen on a unicorn before, stammered: “Yes, he’s brilliant in lectures – but meeting him up close? He’s… how do I put this… he’s not really a pony anymore...”
> Chapter 81: A Battle of Minds and Flesh
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Speaker had heard  the rumors. He had heard the stories of how Amilar Drip-Crank had taken over the then Valkhawsen seminary on sorcery and artifice over seventy years ago and transformed it into Creation’s greatest house of learning with regards to artifice, arcane science and artifact maintenance... but that clearly wasn’t all.

What Speaker evidently hadn’t heard was the part of the story that had led up to that take-over. Ruby tried to fill him in as they journeyed across campus to the headmaster’s office, though the story clearly troubled her as she kept playing with mane ever y so often, forcing Speaker to urge her to keep telling the story.

“Ok, uhm… so after this silver anathema kidnapped his brother, Drip-Crank went to rescue him. I don’t know how long he was gone, but in the end he returned with his brother and some very nasty magical injuries” Ruby told, sounding quite uncomfortable at the thought of having to describe Drip-Crank’s mystic malady, and appearing even less hot on the idea of any of the students or teachers in earshot hearing her retell the tale.

“While fighting, Drip-Crank was cursed by the anathema. His body basically decays… every year another bit falls off, no matter what he does to prevent it – so he is really creepy to meet up close. He’s a lot more interesting to listen to at a distance in a lecture hall” Ruby forced herself to say, her expression betraying the fact that she had indeed seen the Headmaster up close, more than once even.

Nodding, Speaker had to wonder if this ‘curse’ was akin to what Shimmer had done to that abyssal back at Birdstone. Though, it also made him wonder how Drip-Crank had compensated for the parts of him that would have failed during those seventy years – it would likely depend on how quickly or slowly the curse was working on him. Oh this was sounding very interesting.

“Look – just promise me you won’t embarrass yourself by making light of his condition. It was by his recommendation that I was allowed to study here, so I cannot express how much I owe him” Ruby explained, impressing Speaker with how much she seemingly both feared and admired this unicorn they were about to meet.

At the headmaster’s office Speaker instantly realized what headmaster Drip-Crank had done to replace his failing anatomy: Jade prosthetics –lots of them – and many of them appearing quite invasive and non-standard, compared to the artifact prosthetics that Speaker had seen earlier at the medical ward for injured legionaries…

Drip-Crank’s head was half-covered in a polished metal casing, with one eye replaced by an intricately faceted yellow gemstone which was capped in gold and ensorcelled to dilate and contract like a real eye. All of his limbs were replaced partially or entirely by magical prosthetics one way or the other, and the lumpy uneven shapes under his ornately embroidered robes hinted of extensive organ-prosthetics, which was something that Speaker had never really heard of or seen before. Even Drip-Crank’s blue horn appeared to have polished bronze fittings holding it onto his head, though its color did match what remained of his coat, so it likely was his real horn.

“You sent for us headmaster?” Ruby cautiously asked with a bowed head, trying not to look at the headmaster, all the while Speaker couldn’t stop gawking.

The headmaster turned, the sound of tiny gears in his neck whirring, and two mechanical nostril vents let out a small puff of steam. Speaker found it difficult to formulate any kind of questions – he mainly wanted to see how exactly the headmaster ‘worked’ – it was just too much of an enticing mystery.

Speaking with a voice that had a distinctly unnatural and mechanical resonance, due to his blue jade and orichalcum prosthetic voice-box, the headmaster acknowledged Ruby’s question: “Indeed. I do prefer to be notified when security inspectorate agents are hunting realm spies on my campus. Additionally, I find it quite crass when my students bring anathema on campus without notifying me either, as I find their presence an abomination. Explain yourselves”

Had Cash been there he could probably have said something smart that would have defused the situation, but Speaker came up blank. Ruby similarly appeared to be frozen in terror.

After about fifteen seconds of uncomfortable silence, Speaker finally frowned and decided to say something – even though it had nothing to do with the headmaster’s questions: “Your curse… a Lunar did that?”

The headmaster’s gemstone eye took on a bright red and quite furious glow at the mention of Lunars: “Indeed – and I can assure you that I have heard of your medical exploits, but no, you cannot help me. Even using the rarest and most secret of medical artifacts to regenerate my limbs fails on me: The curse withers them away in an instant”

“Perhaps – but have you heard what I did to the matriarch of Gens Yushoto?” Speaker inquired.

The headmaster’s head buzzed for a moment, making Speaker worried of just how much of this pony’s ‘inner workings’ had been replaced with arcane devices, before the headmaster spoke: “I have been made aware of the rumors regarding your connection to the resolution of her condition. Again I would point out that my condition is very different in nature, not simply a chakra corruption-cascade brought on by a century of intense recreational drug use”

Speaker had not been told about the root cause of Yushoto Risotto’s former illness, but at the same time then headmaster’s insistence that his condition was incurable rubbed Speaker the wrong way: “Sure. I still think I can fix you, I just need to consult a Lunar friend of mine about how to end this curse of yours, because I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it in use before on someone else – though I wasn’t aware that its effects could be this persistent”

His stomps sounding decidedly metallic on the ceramic tiled floor, Drip-Gear demonstratively trotted right up to Speaker: “I have already explained: I consider your very presence an insult to Valkhawsen and myself. I would never and will never consent to any kind of ‘treatment’ from you. That I am not having you thrown out right now is the greatest courtesy I am willing to extend towards you”

The wheezing from the headmaster’s voice box as it spun down was the only sound one could hear in the expansive office, aside from a few ticking mechanisms and clocks, but most of them were muffled quite well under stands of papers and piles of scrolls.

Frowning, Speaker dismissed the urge to take a step back from the rather intimidating unicorn up in his face: “Amilar Drip-Crank, we are both scholars. We base our wisdom on observable facts, correct?”

His mechanical gem-eye’s ocular lens at its maximum dilation, Drip-Crank matched Speaker’s deep frown on the non-mechanical side of his face: “As already stated, I base my dislike of anathema on the fact that your ilk caused my condition. Furthermore, then your feeble attempt at a rhetorical trap is pathetic and transparent”

“Master, please – he can help you” Ruby pleaded, but Drip-Crank simply swiveled his gem-eye and shot Ruby a baleful one-eyed glare without ever moving away from his forehead-on-forehead action with Speaker.

Ruby quickly shut up, stumbling backwards in fright.

“As for you, Bright Machine Speaker, the only reason I would have anything to do with you would be to oversee a dissection of you and your souls, to try to find out how your dark powers are bonded to you” the headmaster sternly stated through gritted teeth, as he slowly pushed Speaker backwards towards the door leading out of the office.

It would be an understatement to say that Speaker found Drip-Crank’s refusal to play ball annoying – infuriating even. He was just trying to help!? And if the Lunar curse on Drip-Crank worked similarly to the shaping charm that Shimmer had used on the Deathknight called Typhon, then his order-affirming charm should fix Drip-Crank with but a single touch… though, depending on how Drip-Crank’s prosthetics were attached, and exactly what bits had been replaced, then doing that without removing them first might end up harming Drip-Crank needlessly.
…and again: Drip-Crank’s stubborn refusal to accept honest no-strings-attached help annoyed Speaker endlessly.

Ultimately Speaker chose to treat Drip-Crank for what he clearly was: A unicorn who’d wallowed in his own self-pity to the point that he had given up hope of ever finding a cure – only working towards alleviating his symptoms as they came.

As Speaker put a firm hind-hoof down, Drip-Crank suddenly found it quite difficult to push him back any further – Speaker’s strength was great, and even with essence-fueled might from his jade limbs could not match this. A forehead-shove forward from Speaker made Drip-Crank take a step back: It was clear who had served in the special forces, and who had been a scholar all his life.

“Tell me, just how much of your insides have been replaced? I’ve never heard of artifact organs” Speaker asked, standing tall to point that he appeared about half a head taller than Drip-Crank.

Drip-Crank’s gem-eye snapped to a tight focus on Speaker: “I fail to see why I should divulge such information”

“Moot point. My essence-sight and medical charms have revealed it now: You have an eye replacement, several patches of jade-treated leather and hide working as skin-grafts, all of your legs up to your shoulders except on your right fore-leg were its only up to your ankle. Your throat is plated in jade and your voice is clearly a work of jade artifice as well. Finally, judging from the weakened chakras and essence flows I can see in your abdomen and torso then I’d say that you’re missing a kidney, between three and five feet of small intestine and your liver is in the early stages of failing – and your horn is solid jade socketed into your skull” Speaker said, having used his charms to quickly diagnose Drip-Crank.

The headmaster gave Speaker an impressed nod: “Very perceptive. Now, if you would be so polite as t…”

With a quick swipe of his forehoof and a glimmer of golden essence Speaker applied his disassembly charm to Drip-Crank’s voicebox. With a churning and coughing noise Drip-crank’s metallic throat exploded in a mess of sticky greenish oil and tiny gears, strangely cut gems replete with tiny runes on every facet, and bits of tubing.

Drip-Crank twisted and leapt towards his desk – probably towards some kind of alarm or something – but Speaker had Drip-Crank’s horn and limbs disassembled in a flash of light, leaving a more or less quadriplegic pony flopping around on the floor, gasping for air.

Ruby stood frozen in horror. She had never imagined that Speaker would attack her beloved headmaster like that – and she had even less of an idea of what to do in the situation, especially considering her orders to remain on Speaker’s good side unless he began to pose a danger to Lookshy: It was obvious to her that Speaker thought he could help Drip-Crank here, but this… this was her father Speaker was killing.

Speaker was taking a quick breath to evaluate Drip-Crank’s new reduced state. Apparently the clockwork voice-box and its essence-coiled springs had also supported the unicorn’s failing wind-pipe. This greatly reduced the amount of time he would have to check Drip-Crank over before order-affirming quadriplegic pony.

It was then that Ruby finally tackled Speaker, the two tumbling around in a struggle to gain a hold over the other.

“You fool – he’ll suffocate if I don’t finish this!” Speaker shouted, as Ruby flared her anima-flux, causing ruby shards to coalesce in the air around her and spin around like a razor vortex. The scratching noise alone from the shards ripping at the floor tiles was painful enough, but after getting cut quite severely and having his clothes shredded, Speaker finally managed to get his shield charms up.

In turn he was able to get a strong grip on Ruby and use his Rearing Crane Release Technique to toss the unicorn mare up into the air – where she stayed, thanks to Speaker’s magical martial arts.

Hurrying over to the gasping Drip-Crank Speaker used his instant-diagnostic charm once more. It didn’t look good: Drip-Crank still had foreign objects in his eye-socket and in the back of his neck, likely remains of disassembled prosthetics. Maybe there had been some kind of spinal-reinforcement? These were tricky to remove – especially as Ruby dropped down to the ground and tried to blast him away from Drip-Crank with a heavy bolt of earth essence and concussive force.

Carefully floating bits of metal and jade out of Drip-Crank’s otherwise empty eye-socket while also fending off Ruby’s increasingly desperate attempts to get him away from her headmaster wasn’t easy – especially since holding Drip-Crank’s still to prevent him from struggling meant that he didn’t have that many hooves free to swat away Ruby’s elemental blasts, and just throwing Gift at her wouldn’t really be nice either: Speaker had no desire to see Ruby get hurt as part of this, but the option was becoming increasingly tempting.

Ultimately Drip-Crank was completely liberated of the remains of his prosthetics – most of him looking like a gaping wound – but this came at the cost of Ruby getting Speaker into a surprisingly strong choke-hold. The good news in turn was that all Speaker needed was a quick nose-boop on Drip-Crank with his order-affirming charm to undo the Lunar curse and restore his body… well, hopefully.

Drip-Crank wasn’t able to object: His face was turning blue from asphyxia – the fact that he hadn’t passed out yet a testament to his ability to endure in the face of his failing body, though that quickly changed as Speaker’s charm undid the curse.

Strands of flesh exploded from every decayed part of the unicorn stallion’s body in a shower of blood. Drip-Crank convulsed in shock as his skin bubbled around every abscess and open sore, stretching and knitting together with golden light. His stumpy limbs sprouted fresh bones that should have been there all along, and muscles, sinew and hooves faded into view as Drip-Crank’s true form returned. The most startling part of the restorative effect was when the unicorn’s horn reappeared, coalescing from strong swirls of air essence that caused furious winds to roar around the office, making a mess of all the papers and scrolls as most of them were covered in blood spatter. It actually looked quite a lot like when pony foals exalt as unicorns in the first place, though with a lot more blood going around.

While now whole, Drip-Crank no longer moved. Ruby released her hold on Speaker, instead rushing to her headmaster. It was clear to Speaker that Drip-Crank had simply passed out from the shock of the experience, so he smiled to himself as he felt quite satisfied, but Ruby quickly shot that down with a really nasty glare as Speaker tried to move in to check on Drip-Crank.

Speaker was about to say something in his defense, but Ruby got up and shooed him out of the office: “No, you don’t get to justify this. Go away. You’ll be lucky if don’t end up arrested and executed for this!”

Ruby’s tone was one of tearful fury, her jaw clenched and more than one angry vein looking ready to pop. Speaker recognized it as how Shimmer had looked before he had told her to leave and simply shook his head at her: She was clearly just an overly emotional fool who didn’t know any better – though the fact that she wouldn’t let him check to see if Drip-Crank did annoy him.

Leaving Ruby to work out whatever her problem was, Speaker breathed a deep sigh of relief and wandered down the halls of Valkhawsen.
Amid a sea of students sought out a dining hall. The sun was high in the sky, a little over noon, and Speaker was feeling hungry following the last couple of hours worth of hectic events.

In a dining hall filled with rows upon rows of benches, most of which were empty since it was past the official student lunch hour, Speaker found sustenance. The few students present didn’t appear to eating either – most sitting with books and scrolls, or rehearsing sorcerous incantations. It was a bit amusing to see young unicorns and the odd godblooded pony waving their hooves around and making lights appear, or seeing their attempts fizzle in sputtering of sparks and essence – ok, it was actually quite amusing.

Speaker sat down with a tray of bread and cheese and snickered at a group of unicorn students who appeared to be rehearsing some kind of basic conjuration of summoning. They did not take this well.

“Hey geezer – are you a student here?” one of the unicorns shouted in a tone that was clearly that of a frustrated and annoyed young colt.
Speaker shook his head as he ate, munching contently on the bland but chewy bread before him.

“Well then you shouldn’t make light of our hard work – if you’re not a sorcerer you have no business here!” the colt shouted again. The other hooded unicorns around him nodded. The other students in the dining hall appeared to actively keep their noses to their books, not wanting to be dragged into this.

Recalling having performed feats of sorcery that was the stuff of legend even back in the first age, Speaker found it difficult to take the annoyance of a mumble of sorcery students serious. This didn’t help quell their ire.

Apparently taking great offense to Speaker’s lack of humility in the face of their arcane craft, perhaps combined with a bit of youthful hotheadedness, the three students quite loudly got up from their benches and began to make their way towards Speaker.

Just as much as he simply wanted lunch, Speaker had no interest in a fight – and he knew well enough that he had yet to spend time dabbling in sorcery and rediscovering the wondrous spells he had used in the first age – and he was still feeling just a tad annoyed from having been ordered out of the headmaster’s office by Ruby.

Thus when the three students neared him Speaker called Gift from elsewhere, and in the blink of an eye had it spinning quite furiously, close enough to shave the fuzz off the brash colt’s upper lip.

The reaction from the three was not what Speaker had expected: They were amazed.

“Dragons – that’s the thing I saw at the… are you the pony who broke the speed record at the gazebo?” the unicorn colt asked, starry-eyed and in awe.

What followed was the three students gushing and marveling at Speaker’s knowlegde of primordial artifice, until Ruby suddenly showed up.
“Speaker?” she said, calmly, right behind Speaker who had been too busy with first age anecdotes on divine artifice to pay attention to anyone sneaking up on him, not that Ruby had intentionally done so.

Turning to see who was addressing him, Speaker found himself decked – hard. The blow connected quite well, making Speaker spin in the air briefly before falling to the ground.

Looking up, Speaker saw a furious looking Ruby. Her coat around her eyes were stained with tears.

Staggering up, Ruby helped him up on his hooves and embraced Speaker, locking him in a passionate kiss as he got up.

…with little to no clue what was going on, and his head still spinning from the very strong blow from but moments ago, Speaker found himself quite confused: “The fuck is going on?”

“Thank you Bright Machine Speaker – now promise me you’ll never do that again” Ruby said, sounding both genuinely appreciative but also angry.

Shaking his head, Speaker wasn’t really sure what to say. Ruby caught on to this and led him away, saying that the headmaster wanted to talk to him again.

Part of him wanted to ask into what the headmaster wanted to talk about, but too much of him was still dazed and confused. It had been a strong earth-essence amplified blow, and his medical charms told him that he had a few lose teeth at the moment – though thanks to his exaltation then that would heal within the hour  - and why in hell had Ruby kissed him?

“Oy, the fuck you think you’re doing?” the unicorn colt Speaker had been showing the inner workings of Gift to said out loud, sounding quite upset.

Ruby shot the colt a murderous glare as she dragged Speaker off.

As Speaker finally came too fully he found himself back in the headmaster’s office. A pale but otherwise whole looking Drip-Crank was there to greet him, along with a very chipper Ruby.

“I believe I owe you an apology” Drip-Crank said, extending a shaky and very ‘new’ hoof to Speaker in a friendly gesture.

Nodding, Speaker accepted the hoof and shook it, noting that the solid parts of the hoof proper hadn’t hardened entirely just yet – to which end he suggested that Drip-Crank lie down and rest until his body caught up fully with its new parts.

Shuffling over to a couch filled with scrolls and books – and cleared it with a swift gust of conjured up wind – Drip-Crank flopped down onto it.
“Alright then – was there anything else?” Speaker asked, not entirely sure what else there was to talk about.

Ruby looked at Drip-Crank, and mouthed something that Speaker couldn’t quite make out. Drip-Crank nodded: “Right. Your designs, Speaker, they intrigue me”

“Anything in particular you want to know?” Speaker said, somewhat relieved that Drip-Crank wanted to talk about a subject that he was far more at home with, as opposed to continuing any kind of discussion or apology on the topic of anathema and Drip-Crank’s previous behavior towards Speaker.

It should surprise no-one that the headmaster of the foremost academy of arcane science, engineering and artifice would be interested in picking the brains of a pony who most of the first age secrets of those fields – especially now that Drip-Crank didn’t seem to consider Speaker a demon-possessed anathema.

Apparently Speaker’s designs had hinted of things that simply weren’t considered possible, such as the edgeless-cutting field of force and heat or the proposed propulsion method by way of something Speaker had simply scribbled in old realm as ‘false-weight anchor throwing’.

Ultimately Drip-Crank and Ruby talked Speaker into writing much of what he knew into a series of tomes for Valkhawsen’s library, in exchange for Valkhawsen sponsoring most of the materials needed for the creation of Speaker’s gizmo. Cash Charmer could without a doubt have negotiated a better deal, but Speaker truly loved the idea of being allowed to share his knowledge.

“One thing though… what exactly are the designs you’ve made for?” Ruby inquired, her head held low in embarrassment for not having figured out exactly what Speaker was trying to make.

Speaker summoned Gift and floated it before the unicorns: “A long overdue attempt at a better version of this”

“A mechanical chakram… interesting” Drip-Crank noted, scratching his chin.

With all of that settled there was but one last thing Speaker needed to do while at Valkhawsen – the thing he had originally set out to do that day: Destroy the flesh-forging orb.

The students and teachers alike in Valkhawsen gawked at the sight of their now fully in-the-flesh headmaster as he, Ruby and Speaker strode through the halls towards the lower levels. Judging from the few whispers Speaker caught as they walked by, then most of the ponies were shocked not to hear Drip-Crank rattling or whirring mechanically as he walked anymore.

In what Drip-Crank described as a subterranean containment chamber of the highest order, five teams of five unicorns were called, each of them taking up pre-determined positions where they all began to cast potent – for unicorns – warding and containment spells around the edge of a massive pentagram etched into the cold stone floor.

Taking position in the middle of the ten yard in diameter pentagram, Speaker recalled the flesh-forging orb from elsewhere and floated it before him: “Be aware everyone – once I break this thing we’ll likely have infernal fire and trapped demons spilling out – so prepare to cast banishment spells”

As a precaution, Speaker called Gift to his side and sheathed himself in his own defensive charms.

Striking the orb with his disassembly charm, Speaker denounced the wicked thing: “I decry this mockery of malice and pain – back to bowels of Malfeas from whence you came!”

The orb at first didn’t seem to react – but after just enough seconds to make the unicorns channeling the warding spells waver, the orb erupted in a brilliant explosion of emerald green fire.

Speaker’s elemental immunity charm protected him from the fire, but the swarm of neomah demons that followed were less orderly: They poured out of the now broken orb, the remains of emerald shackles of fire disintegrating from their forms.

Now, of the three most common demons known in Creation, the Neomah were known as the infernal harlots, the whores of the demon king: Their shapeshifting abilities, informed by their flesh-crafting powers, allowed them to take on any form one desires – and they will please any lonely summoner in exchange for payment… payment in flesh, which they collect and shape into unholy hellspawn that help populate the demon realm.

The inner circle of the pentragram, the ward prime, very quickly overflowed with neomah. Like fish in a barrel they strained against the wards – which held, for the time being – but it was obvious that such wouldn’t work for very long.

Speaker, at the bottom of the hundred sensual androgynous pony-shaped demon pile, was wondering if the unicorns outside the holding circle would be able to banish this many demons before the wards failed. What he couldn’t tell was that the banishment was already under way – but indeed there were simply too many to banish in a timely manner.

Ultimately feeling that he had waited long enough, Speaker revved Gift and began to plow through the demons around him. Sure, the few of them that could move tried to either climb away on the bodies of those around them, while others tried to bite with needle-teeth or scratch with shapeshifted claws – but there simply wasn’t room to move… the pile was at least six neomah deep, with everyone pushing and shoving – and with Gift at the bottom it soon became a blender.

From the outside it was clear that there was demon blood flowing at the bottom of the pile, but at the same time the outmost demons were busy trying to seduce the unicorns holding up the wards into releasing them… so little heed was given by those on top to those of their kin deeper in the pile.

As minutes passed the wards miraculously held and the layer of blood at the bottom of the holding circle went from but a few drops deep to an inch or so, Speaker attained enlightenment: One of the principle functions of a machine is to function continuously, without stopping. With this wisdom he no longer needed to constantly will Gift to function as it simply remained static while blending the demon flesh and bone around it, new demons flowing into its deadly reach constantly as they were pushed away by the others who tried to flee to no avail, Gift cutting through them effortlessly thanks to Speaker’s spirit-slaying charm enhancing its blades.

It was quite disgusting – the muffled screams of dying demons mixing with the even unluckier few of them that ended up drowning in the blended remains of their kin, but at the same time the demons’ complete disregard for the wellbeing of their peers in favor of their own immediate survival made the whole process run like clockwork.

Ultimately there enough room inside the circle was made that the blender tactic didn’t work anymore – and strangely enough then the remaining neomah were now quite upset about Speaker having destroyed their kin, though they first had to shapeshift longer limbs to stand above the otherwise neck-deep broth of demon blend.

At this point the neomah began to breathe emerald fire at Speaker, but the few times they managed to hit their flames weren’t not strong enough to overcome his defensive charms, most of the time – and their flesh still yielded to Speaker and his spirit-slaying charm without fail, resulting in Speaker getting only minor burns from the fight.

With less than a few dozen demons left several unicorns leapt into the warded circle, their horns aglow and daiklaives poised to strike – including Ruby with her hooves wreathed in razor stone, and Drip-Crank wielding a jade staff with a massive gem set at the tip. It wasn’t even remotely a fair fight, more akin to hunting for sport. The demons certainly didn’t enjoy it, though between the shrieks of dying demons they didn’t have much room to voice such objections.

About ten minutes later, the last two neomah demons slumped lifelessly against the invisible wall projected by the wards, as Gift’s rotating blades cut through them – Gift erupting through the belly of the second one in a fountain of purple gore and blood.

Ponies with casks, essence-powered pumps and hoses made out of alchemically treated leather arrived shortly thereafter, beginning to pump out the demon-blood out over a rough grate first and then a fine filter, so bits of shredded  demon wouldn’t clog anything. It didn’t surprise Speaker that Valkhawsen had cleanup protocols for messes like this, though the efficiency of it did impress him.

With the wards thusly lowered down to the point that only four unicorns were needed to maintain the spell, keeping the ward-wall only high enough to keep in the remaining blood and gore sloshing around, Speaker finally leapt out.

The ponies outside the ward gave Speaker many a nod of respectful acknowledgement – indeed, few of even Lookshy’s best would have been able to remain calm if buried three layers deep in demons, let alone kill most of them and come out relatively unscathed.

Returning to the Headmaster’s office, Speaker gave Drip-Crank the remains of the iron orb. They were twisted and broken, and their insides still glowed with an infernal emerald light, but they had no power now.

“Thank you – these will make an interesting addition to the academy’s exhibition on dangerous artifacts. Now, I asked you to come back here because I have to ask you exactly how you disassembled my prosthetics…” Drip-Crank began.

“Why? Speaker quickly asked, not really seeing any reason to wax on how exactly he had taken the headmaster’s jade prosthetics.
Presenting Speaker with a neat pile of bits of jade gears, rods, plates and bolts, Drip-Crank explained that the sum was greater than the parts – and unless taken apart carefully the bits and pieces could well have lost some of the magic imbued into them, which was what made them work like real hooves and legs and whatnot.

Shrugging, Speaker said that he had no idea if his disassembly damaged any of the parts: “Only one way to find out I guess”
Swinging a hoof over the pile, Speaker casually enacted his repair and crafting charms at the thing – the gears and rods springing to life in a golden glow as they slid back into place, in seconds recombining into all of the previous disassembled prosthetics without Speaker even having to give much thought to guiding his essence in the process – for a Solar craftspony was peerless, assuming that he knew the right charms.

Ruby and Drip-Crank both looked absolutely awestruck, but then Drip-Crank suddenly reached for his right eye and cried out in pain… apparently the magical link between the gem-eye and Drip-Crank was conflicting with his new right eye – the solution was a swift disassembly of the eye prosthetic once more.

With the revelation that Speaker could repair things with so little effort Drip-Crank quickly presented Speaker with a dinner-plate sized sapphire lens. It had a big ugly crack in it: “We’ve tried all kinds of known sorcery to fix it – but it’s magically hardened, so nothing we’ve done works on it – and it’s the last one Lookshy has. Without this we’ll have to retire the essence cannon that this was in”

Examining the lens it was clear to Speaker that the damage was very fresh – less than a few days old. Indeed, he was told that the crack had come from firing the essence canon it was set in at the mega-rebel – and sapphires of that size simply didn’t exist anymore: “Well, for all we know they might be mining gems of this size down south around Gem, but they likely cut them into smaller ones to sell each of them for a better price” Ruby noted.

To Drip-Cranks absolutely ecstatic joy Speaker’s repair charm fixed the lens almost instantly, the crack pulling together as it had never been there.

“You know… we have a lot of broken things in storage that we simply don’t have any spare parts for…” Drip-Crank said, failing horribly at veiling his request for more repair charm work.

Giving the headmaster a knowing nod, Speaker smiled: “I will gladly help – but I will require two things in exchange for it…”

“Anything – The general staff will be tripping over themselves to contract you to fix everything once they learn of this” Drip-Crank eagerly stated, his professional and otherwise sophisticated exterior having peeled away to reveal a pony who’s fascination with arcane science and strong patriotic leanings would have him do anything to restore the magical arsenal of Lookshy.

> Chapter 82: Duty Above All Else
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The deal that Speaker worked out with Drip-Crank was simple, and yet Speaker figured that Cash would be quite happy with it: First of all Speaker was given more or less unrestricted access to most of the tomes of arcane wisdom that Valkhawsen held, for Speaker wished to relearn sorcery. Secondly, and more importantly, Speaker asked that come time for it to be discussed that Drip-Crank exert what political influence he have to make the general staff support Speaker and his circle’s request for armed support to take down Deep Rot.

This of course included explaining much of what Speaker knew of the Deathlords and their schemes, a topic that Drip-Crank and Ruby both found quite interesting. Valkhawsen did not in any way teach necromancy beyond the wisdom of “If it’s undead you should destroy it”, so knowledge of the underworld was quite limited.

Another topic that Speaker got in on was the plain fact that it wouldn’t be realistic for him to remain in Lookshy for eternity fixing things: It would be far more efficient if Speaker looked into Lookshy’s current means of maintaining its arcane arsenal. For example, the irreplaceable lens, could easily be replaced if one knew how to produce artificial sapphires, emeralds and rubies.

Thus, over the course of a fun and exceedingly productive afternoon, Speaker demonstrated to a class full of sorcerer-engineer masters and apprentices how one could take powdered feather-steel into a hopper, mix it with pure air essence, then funneling it down and mixing it with it with pure fire essence in a continuous conflagration, to produce a molten mass infused with elements.

Since Speaker had rigged up a very big hopper filled with most of the feather-steel dust Valkhawsen currently had in store, the molten mix that resulted from the conflagration produced a massive lump of sapphire the size of a big watermelon so pure that one could see right through the blue gem-blob. It was quickly taken away to the craftspony district to be cut.

“And if you fiddle around with the impurities you put into it, like a tiny bit of iron dust mixed into the feather-steel powder, then you can make rubies or emeralds. This kind of alchemy was used all over in the first age to make giant gemstones – like, to carve out a lifesized statue of a pony or something” Speaker explained, resulting in much taking of notes.

A little later, back in the Valkhawsen dining hall as Speaker got to finish his lunch and talk with a couple of students and teachers about the first age, three of the masters that had been at Speaker’s lecture on artificial sapphire creation showed up with a very fancy scroll. It was an honorary masters degree in alchemy – they also had a very nice black silk robe and hat for Speaker, which in his opinion looked very silly, but he accepted them none the less.

The students and faculty members around Speaker and the three masters erupted in cheers, and Speaker didn’t return to the Yushoto compound until very late into the night, very drunk, wearing his silly hat and robe proudly.

The next day, suitably hung-over, Speaker found himself awoken by a messenger spirit from Shimmer. She had reached the rest of the circle, though they would all soon be returning to Lookshy. Apparently the trouble back in the Chung lands had been resolved – Speaker had no doubt that he would be hearing more about that.

It was with a pleasing feeling of self-satisfaction that Speaker had servants bring him something to eat, while he recalled the big scroll with gilded trimmings he had been given the day before. A masters degree in alchemy. In the late end of the first age that would have been considered an insult to most Solars… but hey, one has to start from somewhere.

Apropos of starting from somewhere, Speaker pondered what bits and pieces of Lookshy’s arsenal that Drip-Crank would have him repair first. Oh it would be fun to have a poke at a warstrider – it would clearly be necessary to test it and see if it worked – or maybe a suit of magical armor? Or maybe just a pile of cracked essence canon lenses.

“Master Bright?” a fairly frightened looking messenger meekly said.

Speaker turned to see the young colt, trembling. Gesturing for the messenger to deliver his message the colt stated, with an adolescent voice that broke several times over: “Master Drip-Crank requests your presence at his office at Valkhawsen”

Nodding, Speaker got up and made his way towards the academy of sorcery.

The late morning commute within Lookshy, especially that of traffic going out of the residential district, was miserable. There were ponies everywhere, and far too many bottlenecks at the various district gates. Too many ponies needed their intercity travel papers checked, too many merchants had to have the contents of their carts checked. Cash would no doubt love butt heads with the examiner inferiors of Lookshy’s districts to work out more efficient procedures… though Speaker couldn’t help but recall that in the first age Deheleshen boasted a very thorough metro-lightrail system, but none of the light carrier pillars seemed to remain.

Finally reaching Valkhawsen, Speaker was greeted by Ruby who led him a spacious workshop that had been prepared for him, instead of taking him to Drip-Crank’s office. One workbench was laden with scrolls and tomes of sorcerous mysteries and wisdom, as per Speaker’s request, while the rest of the workshop was a mess of, as Ruby so eloquently put it: “Stuff we either don’t know how to fix, or don’t have the spare parts for”
“That would explain the sign outside reading Hall of Lost Causes” Speaker noted with a smirk. Ruby nodded.

Shortly thereafter a team of fully fledged sorcerer-engineers arrived to assist as well, though Speaker quickly found that they also very much liked to dictate what order the available non-functional devices were fixed in…

“Ok, brilliant – now this, we suspect that the enchantments on the control crystals have been sabotaged here” one the sorcerer-engineers almost casually said as he passed Speaker a jade-steel helmet from what was likely a very magical suit of armor.

The gems socketed inside the helmet, with their arcane inscriptions regulating the flow of essence in the suit of armor, had been destroyed – and no wonder this had been impossible to repair: The gems had been wyld-made, spun out of the purest potential into an impossible essence pattern that simply did not occur naturally. Still, Speaker’s repair charm restored the shattered gems just fine – he barely even had to wave a hoof at the helmet, which suited Speaker just fine as it let him read his current tome of sorcerous and occult lore on with minimal disturbance. What the unicorns around Speaker couldn’t grasp was that Speaker’s repair charm didn’t as much fix a given thing, as remind its least god of its former glory and feed it enough essence for the god to reform the object targeted for repairs.

Beyond absentmindedly fixing things it was amusing to read how the unicorns had twisted the history of sorcery. Speaker recalled just fine how he, among many others, had attempted to console the young Bridge Gap, the then recently exalted solar mare feeling utterly useless since combat charms just didn’t seem to, for the lack of a better word, stick to her. Many others had suggested that she travel, meditate and explore her abilities more to find a way that she too might be able to fight the primordials, as this had been during the primordial war.

It was than that Bridge Gap had ventured on her epic journey throughout creation, to earn more favorable titles than that of Ungifted and Burden to the Sun, though Speaker did recall that her departure did coincide with the news of her lunar mate having died in battle with demons, so it was likely out of grief as much as in search of enlightenment.

The story, as Speaker recalled it being recounted by Brigde Gap herself upon her return, was that she had first come across a pool in the east, in a glade where the sky wept stars, where a spirit gave her a mantle etched with liquid orichalcum, which spelled out ten thousand wonders unknown to ponies. Next she had slowly journeyed to the north by hoof, where she found a circle of crystals guarded by a blade of of ice.

The blade had posed her fived riddles, which she answered based on things she had seen on her journey from the east to the north, allowing her to claim the sword of ice. In the south she used the blade of cut her way through a storm of mocking sand and screaming wind, finding a circle of cinnabar stone set with crimson amber that displayed her greatest fears. 

Taking the most potent of these fears with her, she journeyed west where she had found a prince in a floating whale-bone castle, where she stayed for nine days and nine nights, only to find the place a phantom – but with her in her boat of ebony and sails of sunlight she found a girdle of wondrous crimson silk, set with nine gems, one for each day and night spent with the prince she had so briefly loved. 

Finally she had journeyed to sacred mount Meru, in the middle of the blessed isle. As she ascended the mountained the mole-ponies, earthen precursor kin of rock and gem to the ponies, came forth from their underground labyrinths and honored her. At the peak she was faced with Celestia herself, who said that the last step was sacrifice, to which Brigid then sacrificed herself and reborn anew: No longer fearful or doubting of her abilities, and wielding a power never seen before.

“That’s how Brigde Gap became Brigded Gap, the root of all spells” Speaker explained, the curious crowd of unicorns and earth ponies around him that had listened intently to him retelling the story of the birth of sorcery.

One of the unicorns frowned: “No, that’s not true. It was Mela who performed the five-fold journey, seeking a weapon to defeat the anathema, before she became the immaculate dragon of air”

“You don’t think it’s more likely that some Shogunate immaculate monks changed the story to fit their world view after the fact? My source is a little older than what I’m guessing yours is” Speaker retorted.

A surprisingly polite discussion on first age sources and fact checking ensued, with Speaker fixing things brought before him while talking, barely even paying attention to what he was repairing: “No no, go to Great Forks, ask the god of libraries. He considers me a very valid source on first age maters”

Later that afternoon, the number of broken things that Speaker had left to work on dwindled to a single set of cracked green jade bracers. Speaker was told that the pair amounted to a set of Essence Talon Projectors. The blood on them worried speaker a bit…

“Oh, that’s because they have to be surgically grafted to your forehooves to work – then they project talons of essence on your hooves, making it much easier to hold stuff and do delicate work. A lot of our best artificers use these, but… accidents still happen – that’s how these broke” Ruby said, reading off the documentation that had come with the bracers.

Nodding, Speaker wondered how the hooves that the bracers had been grafted to had looked after the bracers had been removed… the half-inch thick jade was cracked – that likely hadn’t left the previous wearer in a good state.

“Alright, but why aren’t you repairing this yourself? Lookshy should have more than enough jade to patch the cracks in this” Speaker wondered, tracing the cracks on the inside and outside of the bracers with his hooves.

Shrugging, Ruby could only say that she didn’t really know: “I’m guessing that it’s because the thing is cut from a solid piece of green jade, not pieced together from segments. The newer models that we make are easier to fix like that, but this one is older, probably from the Shogunate or even older if the decorations are any hint”

Once everything was done Speaker and Ruby left for the Yushoto compound. Ruby said that she’d come pick Speaker up the next day, which she did, leading Speaker to another workshop… but this one had only one thing in it: the remains of a device that sent shivers down Speaker’s spine.

Looking at the broken rings, the shattered smoky quartz, the  misshapen lump of dark metal with the screaming faces of a thousand ponies trying to push their way out of its surface to no avail, Speaker saw only memories of first age destruction.

“Is that…” Speaker barely managed to say. Truly, he didn’t even want to think of the things name.

Ruby, clearly not understanding the destructive power of what was before her, casually checked the scroll on the table next to the pile of broken pieces: “Let’s see… oh, this is what beat back the realm during the fourth realm invasion, no wonder the general staff wants it working again”

“…and it created the Mourning Field shadowland” Speaker said, not really wanting to take any steps closer to the thing, even if it was broken and inoperable.

The pile of broken orichalcum rings, shattered bits of smoky quartz, starmetal pegs and misshapen lump of soulsteel were the remains of a Soulbreaker Orb.

“Ruby, do you have any clue how dangerous a thing like this is?” Speaker asked, backing away slowly.

The unicorn mare shook her head: “It’s a weapon. Weapons are only dangerous if used improperly – from what I get from the documentation then it’s quite safe to be around”

Sighing deeply and stepping forth, Speaker shot Ruby a very disapproving look: “A Soulbreaker Orb works by flaying the souls out of every sentient being within five miles, including lesser gods and spirits. You cannot stop it once it has been activated – this could end all of Lookshy if it goes off here!”

“Sure, and the Seventh Legion had it sitting nice and safe for six hundred years until they used it to destroy two whole realm legions at once” Ruby said, giving Speaker a condescending look.

Under Ruby’s gaze Speaker felt his argument fall apart – even with him finding his own arguments against fixing the thing quite reasonable. Of course Lookshy could keep its weapons secure – if it couldn’t then Lookshy would have fallen to the realm centuries ago. Walking up to the pile of broken parts and shattered crystal, Speaker gave them a closer look.

“Hmm… does the scroll say why the Seventh Legion couldn’t fix this? Smoky quartz isn’t that hard to come by, and I’m pretty sure that Valkhawsen has means of reforging orichalcum alloys” Speaker asked out loud.

The unicorn mare skimmed the scroll with a quizzical look: “Hmm… oh here, it says that the quartz encasing the soulsteel orb has to be ‘grown’ around the orb, plus the orb itself was apparently damaged as well as in some way that the last team of sorcerer-engineers who had a crack at this thing couldn’t fix”

Looking at the soulsteel orb, even with essence sight, was unpleasant. It sucked in light, making the dark metal appear even darker. Still, there were… bulges… in the structure – was it possible that the soulsteel  had been fully saturated with souls? Still, his repair charm worked on the thing – not that Speaker was entirely aware of what he had ‘fixed’ with it.

Thinking back to the first age, Speaker tried to recall the few memories he had of such terrible devices being used – but he remembered little in the way of attempts of piecing the remains of such things back together. He did remember that the sidereal who originally designed the devise ultimately committed suicide out of grief over how much destruction his invention had caused, for he could only conclude that the light-sucking effect of the orb intensified and became more even across the sphere.

“Alright – I… I don’t recall the exact procedure for artificially producing the quartz crystal, I think you have to make some kind of liquid and then dip the orb in it, but I know a work-around. We’ll need transportation to a location about a couple hundred miles east of where the river of tears joins the Yanaze, on the south bank – I can make a crystal casing there, and we’ll need to bring the soulsteel orb for it” Speaker said, wondering to himself how Ruby would react to seeing his former incarnation’s tomb.

After being explained what Speaker wanted to do at this tomb of his Ruby nodded, then told Speaker to keep on tinkering while she made arrangements – then she galloped off.

Thinking that she would secure supplies and travel papers for the three-hundred or so mile journey, which would take them through a number of the nearby kingdoms along the southern shores of the Yanaze east of Lookshy, Speaker tried to fix what he could of the Soulbreaker Orb. Fitting the orichalcum rings back together was a bit of a puzzle, while the few starmetal pegs that had broken snapped back together easily – the things seemingly remembering how they were meant to be.

About an hour later Ruby returned and bid Speaker bring the central soulsteel orb. He had already stashed it away elsewhere, so that was easy enough.

To Speaker’s great surprise Ruby had apparently mounted a larger archeological expedition – or, as it turned out, informed one of Valkhawsen’s archeology professors who had been in the final stages of setting out for a big dig with his senior class at a ruined manse somewhere down the grey river, who had then just changed his itinerary to instead bring his archeology students along to Speaker’s tomb.
Thus, about twenty ponies in total, hauling supplies, carts full of digging tools, and everything else one might bring to an archeological dig, plus Speaker and Ruby turned up around noon at the base of the aviary in the old city district.

“Are we flying there?” Speaker, his smirk betraying his anticipation. Flying around on Nah was fast, no doubt, but flying inside a light skyship was fun.

Nodding, Ruby noted that Master Stoneshift had already booked a manta transport for his expedition.

Looking skyward, up along the towering height of the aviary, couldn’t help but feel a little nostalgic. In the first age the aviary had serviced some of the finest flying vehicles the exalted host had devised, be it chariots wrought of soft cloud and framed by lightning, to glorious sorcerous disks of colored glass and bound elementals – that it still served as the foremost hub of maintenance of such flying wonders filled Speaker with a sense of pride that his creation, his aviary, still worked and saw proper use.

“Remind you of your time in active service Master Bright?” a shrill voice called out from behind them.

Master Stoneshift, a gangly, short and rail-thin unicorn stallion with a curly mob of brown hair for a mane, a mottled brown coat and muddy professor robes, approached Speaker. Behind him were two dozen archeology and geomancy students hauling excavation gear and supplies.
“Greetings Master Stoneshift, I am Bright Machine Speaker and this is my armiger, Maheka Ruby”

With everyone present Stoneshift led the way to the main elevator. About two thirds up the aviary tower, roughly half a mile or up in the sky, was their transport: A massive twenty yards wide and thirty yards long manta-ray shaped flying vessel. Its light blue shape clearly revealed the magical nature of its blue-jade alloyed hull, and its two large side-ramps opened up into a single great cargo hold big enough to carry two warstriders or around a hundred and fifty fully armed ponies at arms.

“Isn’t it a bit overkill to only transport a scale worth of ponies around in a transport rated for a talon?” Speaker wondered.

Stoneshift appeared quite amused by the observation: “Not at all – my expeditions have recovered more than enough first age secrets and weapons that the Skylords never denies my requests, but plus I routinely advice the Stores Directorate and the Arsenal Staff on where to get spare parts for these things”

“Impressive. But tell me, where were you planning on going before opting to go with me and Ruby?” Speaker inquired, curious for fairly obvious reasons.

Telling of a complex of manses discovered in the south-east, Stoneshift explained that his research primarily focused on mapping out first age military installations – which he would then seek out, excavate, and evaluate to see if the seventh legion can use it, or if it’s so ruined that its only good for being broken down for magical materials: “…though we usually outsource that kind of demolition work to scavenger lords”

“Hmmm… I think me and my circle came across a scavenger lord doing that down south of Jades almost a year ago” Speaker mused, recalling the ‘fun’ he had experienced there with all the barely working traps and monsters in the area.

As the giant sea-creature shaped vessel’s tail began to crackle with lightning the whole thing lifted off the ground. Speaker couldn’t help but imagine how amused Shimmer would be to see a flying fish in the sky. For himself it wasn’t all that special: Between what Cash could make Nah do, and the fact that during his decades of active service for the Seventh Legion he had regularly been flown around in this kind of transport as medical support for the Gunzosha units he had been attached to, then this was business as usual to him.

Arriving at the Soulforge, Speaker found that he had to get a little creative in order to set up a system where ponies other than himself could find the stairway down to the doorway leading into the hidden manse – especially since they had to be able to do so when he was gone. Ultimately a simple setup with a rope secured in one end outside the manse, and the other end down inside around his sarcophacus (Which Speaker had Stoneshift swear he wouldn’t try to open…) allowed a pony to close his or her eyes, then inch their way down along the path of the rope down the stairs.

“So… you have to not see where you’re going to find this place?” Ruby wondered, Stoneshift having long since descended into the tomb, resulting in him right now making all kinds of weird and ecstatic noises from down below.

Speaker stroked his beard: “No, it’s more like the essence flows of the place veils the entrance from your conscious mind – so you have to not consciously be fully aware of where you going to find it – or be me, since the place is keyed to my exaltation.

While Stoneshift’s students spread out through the tomb, taking etchings of the many wall carvings and studying the impossibly convoluted essence flow of the place, Speaker led Ruby into the chamber of wyrd making – the chamber with the pedestal of wyld energy.

At first Ruby was understandably hesitant to believe that such a feature in a manse was safe to have, let alone sane to have – but as Speaker demonstrated, then it wasn’t some random pocket of wyld tainted land being contained, but the essence of the manse itself being unshaped into a more primal form.

The real fun of course first came when Speaker recalled the soulsteel orb from elsewhere, floated it above the pedestal and used his wyld shaping technique to recreated the smoky quartz casing around the orb.

Ruby was at a loss for words as she bore witness to Speaker molding permanent form and reality from wyld energy into the crystal casing using his wyld-shaping technique.

Later that afternoon as they flew back in the now empty manta transport a very giddy Ruby quizzed Speaker on what the wyld shaping technique could be used for and what its limits were:

“Well, a patch of wyld-tainted land can be reshaped into a different kind of terrain. In the first age we’d use reality engines to soften parts of creation under controlled conditions, then reshape them into better forms – like turning deserts into meadows, or forming hot springs in the north” Speaker noted, recalling fondly the unique geography that such efforts produced.

Clearly awed by the limitless potential of such a charm, Ruby was all smiles – indeed, with her orders of probing and learning the extents of Speaker’s abilities, this was an incredible discovery: “And the crystal casing, it won’t be vulnerable to iron or anything right?”

“Nope. Though, if you only know the basic wyld shaping technique and not the advanced form, then it would dissolve over time if not worked with often. With the basic technique anything made, be it land, ponies, wealth or materials, it will fade unless creation-born ponies are around it often to ‘remind’ reality that these things that they are real. Won’t be an issue if it’s a dress you wear often, but if it’s jade and gold you lock away in a treasury…  though It’s great for pranks that way around” Speaker explained mischievously.

Suddenly looking a bit worried Ruby asked: “Wait… you can ‘make’ ponies?”

“Anything, more or less – but adult ponies, fully formed, armed and armored – During the primordial war Solars wielded impossible weapons that could create entire legions with but a thought, a necessary counter to primordial demon spawning magic” Speaker recounted, sighing silently as memories of truly miserable battles flashed across his mind: Battles where demons were drowned in the bodies of dead ponies that had only known life for mere hours.

Ruby, displaying a keener perception that Speaker, cocked an eyebrow: “More or less? So there are limits to what you can make?”

“Yes – but the rules are a little weird, though anything dealing with wyld energy is weird. Basically anything you make with this shaping technique cannot be completely finished, unless it’s a living creature. The wyld energy makes it impossible to make truly finalized things: You can make a mountain-sized uncut diamond, but you can’t make a completed pony-sized statue of purple stone” Speaker explained, sounding very much as if even he found the limits of the charm strange and nonsensical.

Ruby appeared to share the sentiment: “So… you can’t shape finished coins, but you could shape in silver bars?”

“Pretty much – could make a mountain of silver bars if you give me enough time. I remember when Cash learned of this charm. He was afraid I would single-hoofed end all commerce, but you saw how long it took to make just the crystal casing – making enough of anything to affect creation-wide trade would take too long. It’d be easier and more efficient to go into the bordermarshes and shape up a mountainous land rich with veins of silver-ore” Speaker shrugged, looking out one of the arrow-slit hatches that also doubled as windows. The green and verdant landscape along the river looked nice, and they even flew over the forest region where the circle had helped that unicorn sorceress out with her unbound demons. Ruby found the story of that little event quite interesting.

“See that is why the General Staff is wise to restrict knowledge of summoning magic to the Sohei – only trusted and devout ponies who can resist temptation should even know of such power” Ruby noted, frowning.

Speaker nodded: “Well that’s the thing Ruby. In this day and age ponies a lot of ponies only think of immediate gain and short term solutions. I’m in this for the long run. I want to restore creation to its former glory… that’s why my last incarnation named my tomb Soulforge: With it I can forge a renaissance for all ponies – and I want to use Lookshy as the example for others to follow”

“I would love nothing more than to help you make that dream come true” Ruby said solemnly, sitting up rank like a good soldier, smiling.
Arriving back at Lookshy, Ruby escorted Speaker back to the Yushoto compound where a message had from Cash and the rest of the circle: They were evidently enroute – and anticipating their arrival with a day or so.

Later that evening a unicorn came to Speaker while he he was busy wrapping up his improved chakram design. The unicorn was clad in the worn but officious robes of the senior professors from Valkhawsen, but he was flanked by two other unicorns in stark white Security Directorate armor: “Speaker, come with us please”

Hunched over his designs in his study, perfecting impossible geometry and essence-flow calculations, Speaker looked up: “What’s this about?”
That was the last thing Speaker managed to say or do before blacking out.

Coming to, Speaker found himself up in the air in relative darkness, enveloped by the distinct elementally flavored essence of a unicorn.

Trying to twist around to look at who was carrying him around, Speaker quickly discovered that he was also chained and shackled quite securely, and when he tried to use his disassembly charm on those shackles he found that… he could not.

“He’s awake” a mare’s voice rang out somewhere behind Speaker. The dull echo of her voice told Speaker that he has indoors somewhere, somewhere without windows or torches – and somewhere with really bad acoustics, though the slight echo hinted of an underground location. All he could see was the bright sparkling purple glow that was continually enveloping him in an iron grip that he just could not break.

“Should I dose him again?” A young stallion’s voice rang out, again from somewhere behind Speaker.

The lack of sound from any hoof-steps worried Speaker, though he wasn’t very keen on being ‘dosed’ again – but it wouldn’t matter: As soon as these fools got Speaker to whatever cell they were taking him to they would likely remove the shackles and he would be able to summon Gift and free himself… well, that was the plan.

“Wait until we get there – we don’t want to waste any blood” the mare said.

Ok, that worried Speaker a little more: “Hey, what’s the meaning of this? Let me down!”

There was no reply.

About half hour or so later Speaker finally saw light around the bend of the tunnel they apparently were in and got a glance of his captors by painfully twisting around to catch a glance. He recognized them quickly: It was the Valkhawsen professor and the two Legion Security ponies he had seen briefly before… before they had drugged him, right now he remembered– lovely.

“Ok, what’s the plan here? Lock me away again? Throw away the keys? Chain me up in some secret workshop and use me to repair stuff until I die of old age or starvation?” Speaker inquired – but again, he got no answer. The fact that they had mentioned spilling blood and weren’t talking to him worried Speaker quite a lot, for obvious reasons, but also because he knew that it was protocol in the legion to remain silent to ponies sentenced to death.

The source of light around the bend turned out to be a wall of golden fire, not entirely unlike that of a solar anima. The flames radiated no heat, but had a very harsh spiritual radiance – angrily so.

His captors all donned what looked like cloaks of spun and woven orichalcum, with a cloak draped over Speaker – they then passed through the flames. The experience was by no means pleasant, though Speaker suffered no burns from the fire. Instead Speaker felt as if the fire had chipped away at his very soul, leaving it frayed around the edges… though that feeling quickly went away after they left the flames and the cloaks behind.

Beyond the fire the tunnel began to change. There were glowing crystal light fixtures, and the hallway itself changed from being clearly hewn out of the blue-gray rock of the Lookshy underground, to being made of cracked, dirty and tarnished orichalcum, or similarly dirty alabaster tiles.

It was when the completely oxidized inlaid copper sunburst symbols on the walls became visible that Speaker got a dreadful epiphany: He was in the old Maker Cathedral Prime of Deheleshen, the flying factory cathedral and temple to Celestia… but… they were underground – how could this be? Thinking furiously, Speaker tried to puzzle out what all this meant. 

A manse of any kind suddenly appearing underground was rarely a good sign, even less so a solar-aspected manse built to float up into the sky to receive the light and blessings of Celestia. How could this manse have ended up down here? Ok, that question was actually fairly easy to answer, since Speaker knew that after the Usurpation the sidereals had worked hard to destroy or cover up most of the works of the Solars.

Right, so how did the blood-spilling factor into this? Like any pony versed in even the most basic of the occult secrets of Creation, Speaker knew that there was power in blood. It was the most basic of essence conduits. A solar aspected manse hidden underground, that would mean it was disconnected from its dragon lines – a manse would normally blow up from that: “Are you taking me to fix the manse here by draining my blood?”

The unicorn floating Speaker around paused for a moment. Speaker had obvious hid a nerve – but after a few seconds they continued moving. Great…

At a hole in the wall which seemed to lead deeper into the manse there was an alter, a basin of orichalcum and jade in front of a crystal console – Speaker was certain that the altar was not part of the original manse design… he should know, he built the place. The dark stains around the ground near the altar and on it hinted strongly that this was where the bloodletting took place.

It was the crystal console that turned out to be the most revealing: Flashing gemstone displays warned of essence buildup with old realm glyphs, which said that the essence vents needed a new supply of solar essence to function – essence buildup was already occurring, but it wasn’t critical yet. Bloody hell, they needed his blood to keep the place from blowing up!

With the added force of the two other unicorns Speaker was dangled above the alter and bent so that his neck was exposed at just the right angle. Speaker pleaded once more: “You idiots! You do realize that the medical charms I know mean that I can safely produce any amount of essence-laden blood for this thing – without killing me in the process!”

His head still held tight in a magical grip so he couldn’t see his would be executioners, Speaker had no idea if his plea was even heard – all he could do was wait for them to slit his throat or not… it was then that he heard a familiar bird-like cry of absolute fury, followed by the magical grip on him fading, letting him drop to the ground.
> Chapter 83: The Road To Hell… 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Release him!” thundered Ruby, while Shimmer in her birdlike warform was tossing the two security directorate unicorns hard into the manse wall, sending cracks up the old alabaster walls.

With two very well-aimed burst-shots of essence string, Shimmer stuck the two unicorns to the walls and then rushed to Speaker: “You ok?”
Getting up, Speaker looked around. Ruby had the Valkhawsen professor held at the point of an iridescent white jade daiklaive with a nice ornate dragon-motif on the hilt, while the rest of the circle was just arriving, their breath ragged.

“I’m fine – wouldn’t have been for much longer without you, so thanks – oh and see if you can find the key to these shackles” Speaker said, waving a shackled hoof at Shimmer.

With a few sniffs at the strange soulsteel and orichalcum shackle, Shimmer quickly tracked down the ‘key’ to one of the two unicorns she had stuck to the wall. There wasn’t a physical key – but physical intimidation to make them break their essence-bond to the magical shackles worked just fine. Once the shackles were unlocked and removed Speaker instantly felt control of his essence return to him: “Much better”
“Alright – let’s get out of here” Shimmer said, giving the two unicorns stuck to the wall a mean glare. All they could do was glare back, their mouths bound shut by Shimmer’s essence webbing.

Looking at the old professor, then at the circle, Speaker shook his head: “No, this place needs to be fixed – they needed my essence to prevent this ruin from exploding”

Walking up to the professor, Speaker yanked the old unicorn up on his hooves by biting down on the collar of his robes – forcefully so – and looked the old stallion in the eyes: “Explain exactly how this process works”

The unicorn explained that for as long as Lookshy has existed – heck, for as long as any known records of Deheleshen has existed – this place has been, and it has required yearly doses of solar-aspected essence to not blow up.

This quickly raised the question of how Lookshy had managed to come up with solar-aspected essence in the past. The answer was surprisingly simple: Mutant creatures that spawn in a demense to the south contain enough solar essence in their blood that bleeding one dry into the altar keeps the place working…

“And you’re not just doing that because…?” Cash asked, noting that if the unicorns that held Deheleshen and later Lookshy were able to keep that practice going ever since the usurpation then it didn’t make sense to stop now.

The professor gave Cash a knowing look – the sort of look a teacher might give a student who just asked an obviously stupid question: “The Mask of Winters happened. The Bright Plateu demense is in the southern reaches of the Marukan lands – and the undead from Thorns recently took control of the place”

“So? Why not just have a reserve of the things kept captive? Breed them for our own supply?” Ruby wondered.

The professor sighed: “They don’t reproduce in captivity – trust me, it’s been tried. They’re things of living sunlight. We think the demense spawns them, because there’s always some for us to catch when we go there to get a new stock every four or five years”

“So you do catch more than one at a time? Did you run out just now?” Ruby inquired, all the while Speaker examined the altar and the crystal console it was connected to.

The old unicorn explained that several months ago Valkhawsen’s stock of the sunlight beings was wiped out – saboteurs from Thorns being the prime suspects, judging from the traces of necrotic essence found in the greenhouse where the things were kept. It was then that he had led expedition to the Bright Plateau was sent, one that returned a few weeks ago: “We’ve been scouring our geomantic maps for any solar-aspected demenses ever since – but there simply is no more time, so we turned to the security directorate for help”

“And it didn’t occur to you to simply ask? I told you earlier – I would have helped you with this” Speaker angrily quipped from over at the crystal console.

In his defense the old unicorn claimed that he had prayed at the temple for advice and then talked to the ponies at the Security Directorate, where he had talked to had assured him that Speaker would never consent to being bled to death for Lookshy, to which Cash snarked: “Sure, and the road to Malfeas is paved with good intentions”

Speaker could only derisively grunt at both of them as he ripped the cover off the console and began to dig through the crystal circuitry underneath.

Quickly finding the spiky black jade assembly that would draw essence out of blood, Speaker recognized it as a later addition to an essence relay. With a few swift blows of the hoof the delicate the device shattered, revealing the essence conduit it was attached to. The old professor cried out in horror: “No! You’ll doom us all!”

“No – now tell me how many motes need to be fed into the system” Speaker demanded, holding his hoof to the essence conduit.

The exact measurement of essence was a strange field of study mainly only observed by obsessive sorcerers and the thaumaturges who worked in magical artifice – so the ‘number’ the old unicorn gave Speaker made little sense to the rest of the circle. Only Speaker and Ruby understood the metric fully, but that was more than enough.

With this information Speaker used his essence-transfer charm and added the pitifully small amount of essence into the conduit, all the while giving the old unicorn a very dirty look: “I respire more essence than that every hour – hells, I probably piss out more motes than that on a daily basis”

Bowing his head in shame, the old professor begged for forgiveness: “I only did what I thought I had to for the greater good of Lookshy… I am truly sorry – we didn’t have time to send out other expeditions”

Leaving the three unicorns to get out on their own and heading to the surface, Speaker once more thanked the circle and Ruby for their timely intervention: “But how did you find me so quickly?”

“Oh that’s easy. When we got to the Yushoto place young Ruby here was there to meet us. She thought that you had gone to meet us in the market district, but then Shimmer smelled the alchemical drug that had been used to knock you out – what was it Sully used to call the stuff in Nexus?” Shimmer began.

Cash thought for a moment: “You talking about dream pearls?”

“Ya that’s the ones – when Silver Spoon and her cronies tried to have me kidnapped” Cash nodded, looking as if he reminisced a surprisingly happy memory at the mention of himself getting kidnapped.

Ruby nodded, she evidently knew of the things – how was a good question, but a question for another time – just like the question of when Cash had been kidnapped back in Nexus – but Speaker didn’t want to press the issue, and Ruby continued the story of how she and the circle had tracked Speaker down:

“With the guards at the compound saying that coughers had been there for you and dream pearls in the air, and you missing, it wasn’t difficult to figure out that you were in trouble, and then your marefriend turned into a three eyed bird monster and tracked your scent” Ruby explained.

Shimmer nodded, noting that it was Ruby and Cash who managed to quickly negotiate access to the caverns under Valkhawsen from the justicars and home guard.

Indeed, as the circle and Ruby followed the tunnels back – traversing the wall of golden fire wearing spun orichalcum robes – the motley crew soon found themselves in stairways that led up to the lower levels of Valkhawsen.

“It’s funny – I knew about the fire down here. The alchemy and metallurgy students come down here all the time to purify things in the flames. It’s unique: Burns away both physical and spiritual impurities of whatever you put into the fire. I guess that’s why the general staff approved of keeping the place working as is for so long” Ruby pondered as the circle emerged back into daylight, as filtered by the stained glass windows of Valkhawsen.

Speaker shrugged. He knew damn well that it was a complete waste to have a broken factory cathedral just sitting there, but in turn he knew that fixing it would mean somehow getting it to the surface – and all of Valkhawsen was in the of that.

“I’m sure you could figure something out – Valkhawsen is nothing but classrooms, labs, workshops and underground storage anyway – I’m sure that could be fit in elsewhere in Lookshy while you raise the manse – we can propose it to the general staff as another reason to cooperate with us” Cash said, sounding hungry for delicious negotiations.

Ruby first shot Cash, then Speaker a somewhat worried look – though it was clear that she was angling for an answer from Speaker, not Cash, since she had already figured that Cash would be far more difficult to get a straight answer out of: “Cooperate with you about what?”

Speaker looked at Shimmmer, Cash and Sunrise, looking apprehensive about spilling the beans – showing restraint in the face of a friendly request for once.

Sunrise stepped up: “Maheka Ruby, there are thirteen dread Deathlords that rule the underworld at the behest of the Neverborn, the unliving and ever-dying remains of slain primordials that the Exalted host slew at the dawn of the first age to secure the rule of ponie . Each of them have a plan to end all life in creation, each more vile and cruel than the other – and we’re here to gain the help of the Seventh Legion to stop the Deathlord who’s plan is closest to fruition”

The unicon mare blinked a few times at Sunrise. It was painfully obvious that she was torn between staying with Speaker, as was her duty, and galloping off to report this fact to her security inspectorate handlers who would no doubt quickly relay this news of Solar intent to the general staff.

“Go – we’ll head back to the Yushoto compound and wait for our audience with the general staff” Cash said, having seen Ruby’s desire clearly in the anguish shown in her eyes.

Ruby was off in a storm of hooves, leaving the circle to fend for themselves in Valkhawsen.

“Ok, before we leave I want to introduce you to a friend I’ve made, the headmaster here” Speaker suggested.

Later at the Yushoto compound, after tea with Drip-Crank, Speaker asked if the circle had learned anything new about Sullen Hoof. They had: Sullen Hoof had been caught up in a multi-Deathlord plot to regain control of Stygia. After foiling a plot to kill Unwanted Whisper, the filly ghost queen of the district of Whispering Streets, Sully had been approached by the Bodhisattva to help slay another district lord, a mad ghost who wished to plunge his district into oblivion. This had taken a while, and afterwards there had apparently been some back and forth assassination attempts – all in all the Deathlords were pissed and were currently amassing troops around Stygia to invade it and seize control of the city, since the council no longer supported their plans.

“That’s terrible – do we need to go help him?” Speaker asked in old realm, all the while servants poured the circle tea within one of the nicer tea salons in the Yushoto compound – no sense in letting every in earshot know what they were talking about. The afternoon sun shined warmly through the large west-facing magically transparent wall.

Shimmer laughed: “Heavens no – that’s the beauty of it. Sully has been running around killing ghost generals, so the Deathlords arehaving to tie down their deathknights to lead slow moving zombie troops, instead of being all mobile and deadly, plus the troops that the Deathlords are sending to Stygia mean less troops to defend Deep Rot and other projects, that Sully and the Bodhisatva’s Darklight Heresy have been raiding in turn”

Seeing how that made sense, especially with forcing deathknights to babysit mindless zombie troops instead of being the highly sneaky, mobile and deadly exalted killing machines that most deathknights seemed to be, Speaker found himself a bit more at ease.

“What about you? What’ve you been up to since sending Shimmer to chill out at our end?” Cash inquired, thinking of Ruby and her eagerness to help Speaker.

Thinking for a moment, Speaker took a deep breath and brought everyone up to date on what had been happening with him. From wrapping up his disassembly charm, both to make future incarceration next to impossible, but also now since it would be quite handy to wreck Deep Rot, to the mob that attacked him at the behest of a disguised Sidereal. Ruby was of course also mentioned, Sunrise noted that Ruby had introduced herself already while they had been tracking Speaker earlier, so the circle knew of her being his arbiter.

“Alright, well – after the priest attack and me taking the sidereal’s leg, we tracked the guy to Valkhawsen’s medical wing where they fit ponies with magical prosthetics. He had killed a patient and used sidereal tricks to swap his missing limb around, but we got him! Heath Rose then showed up, in disguise, and took him away to Yu-Shan” Speaker regaled.

Shimmer looked towards the beautifully painted wooden ceiling: “I can only imagine what they’re going to do to him for using a demonic weapon from beyond fate to end or disrupt mortal destinies”

The whole circle agreed that whoever that sidereal was, then he it was for the best that he had been stopped.

“Ok, so what else’ve you been up to? Beyond being taken down to some ruined manse to be drained for blood?” Shimmer said curiously.

Beyond missing Sullen Hoof’s cooking, then Speaker couldn’t think of much beyond the fact that he’d made friends with Valkhawsen’s headmaster by undoing a lunar curse on him – and through that secured help for making the magical device he had been designing.
“Oh, Shimmer told me that you’ve planning something – what are you making?” Cash inquired most curiously.

Explaining that it was to be an artifact similar to Gift, only better, more versatile and even more deadly, Cash nodded in agreement: “Sounds like fun – you think you’ll be able to have it done before we make a move against Deep Rot?”

The long moment of thoughtful silence that followed clearly showed how Speaker had not given any thought to how a long production run might not fit with the circle’s more immediate plans of war against the Barbate Arbiter.

“We’ll figure something out – we still haven’t heard from the general staff about when they can hear us, so you have plenty of time to finish your designs and figure out how long it would take to build” Sunrise remarked calmly.

Indeed, the next day the circle was informed that it would be another couple of weeks before the general staff could be reconvened. It was almost as if the various Taymo had other things to do than sit in council and debate or negotiate things all day: “Running a city state sometimes requires some hoof-on work I guess” Cash noted.

“True, by the way – how’s Sunhill going? I haven’t seen any requests filed in my desk for direct assistance ever since… heavens… since last time we were all in Sunhill for more than a day or so” Speaker mused.

Sunrise responded that while the deal with Lookshy to take in injured and maimed soldiers had been made, then Sunhill was far from any battles that Lookshy was currently engaged in: “And honestly, you shouldn’t underestimate how good the doctors and nurses you’ve trained are – though the number of sick ponies coming to city is making it difficult to avoid having them infect each other as they all come into the city”

“Hmmm… maybe sending out ships with medical crews to help ferry ponies to Sunhill safely?” Speaker pondered.

Cash noted that such a thing might was already planned once the Sunhill wharf and drydock was finished – something Speaker no doubt could speed up – though he also begrudgingly acknowledged that anything with a Sunhill banners going near Nexus was bound to get into trouble, since the council of entities were still pissed at them.

“The fools – they care only about money, not the wellbeing of the ponies they lord over” Sunrise sneered.

The next couple of days went by delightfully uneventfully. Cash taught Speaker and Sunrise his whirling brush methodology, allowing them to write even the most complex of calligraphy at speeds that saw the quartermaster at the Yushoto compound scramble several messengers to the market district to buy more paper. At the end of the week the much anticipated Manuals of Exalted Power were done, detailing all that the circle knew of Solars – what they were, how their celestial exaltations worked compared to the terrestrial exaltations of the unicorns, and what their charms could do. Indeed, in working on doing basic measurements of essence expenditure of his charms Speaker had a wonderful epiphany with regards to the nature of essence itself, which opened his mind to the world of sorcery. Sure, it would take a while longer to learn any kind of spells, but as Speaker happily pointed out: “It’s all part of the learning process – not even Solars master things like this instantly”

With the manuals handed over to the Intelligence Directorate and the Seventh Legion analysts who would no doubt be going over them for months to come, the circle found itself in a rare situation of having little to nothing to do. There was at least another week before the general staff had time to meet them, so there were plenty of time to do whatever.

Cash and Sunrise returned to Sunhill to catch up on things and do some diplomacy with its neighbors. Speaker and Shimmer got the offer to come along, but Speaker wanted to stay: He had a few doctor’s calls to make, or so he claimed, and Shimmer refused to leave him alone this time around due to a very ominous message the circle received from Heath Rose.

The message had appeared as letters of fire written in the fire of the fireplace the evening before Cash and Sunrise flew off to Sunhill, along with a group of curious gens scion passangers who had apparently paid handsomely for a trip on a flying yeddim: “Six Heavens Hunter has friends and minions. They are upset. All attempts at divining Speaker’s future points to attacks from outside of fate. Ward against demons and the dead”

To this end Shimmer resolutely refused to leave Speaker’s side, though this did worry him a bit considering Ruby’s presence as his armiger, which they discussed the next morning just after Cash and Sunrise had left: “I don’t want to see you going off on her like you did Taimyo Oilygear”

“Oh you don’t have to worry about that. While you and Sunrise wrote your big book of Solar lore I went and made amends” Shimmer said surprisingly cheerfully, to the point that it actually worried Speaker a little.

Shooting his Lunar a nervous look, Speaker asked: “You didn’t do anything rash I hope?”

“Nah, just talked, bonded a little. Turns out he defected from the realm some thirty years ago, hates it just as much as me – oh and he apparently used to sail between the isle and Thorns, to V’Neef vineyards there. Did you know that they’re still trying to export wine from those, even with the new… management… there? But it all comes out as rotten fetid grape pulp?” Shimmer reported. She also added that the two of them had, over some really nice Popo – a western drink made from fermented coconut milk, usually made in the western island nation called The Neck – talked about what Oilygear had learned of the realm civil war in the west.

Judging from Shimmer’s somewhat forced smile, Speaker inquired: “Is it that bad over there?”

Biting her lower lip and casually flicking a dreadlock with a hoof, Shimmer let out a deep sigh: “It’s getting worse. The satrap on Wavecrest snuck half a legion in under the Feathered One’s nose, while another realm noble house – not sure which one – is apparently in the process of either enslaving or killing all the ponies on the Coral isles in order to pacify and conquer them, or simply. Its chaos”

“I’m sorry to hear that” Speaker said sincerely.

Getting up and pacing about the grand dinner-table, Shimmer gave off the distinct vibe that she really didn’t want to discuss the subject anymore: “So, what’s the plan for today?”

“We practice medicine” Speaker said cheerfully.

A short while later at Valkhawsen’s medical wing, in the prosthetics department Speaker requested permission to ‘fix’ all the amputees awaiting prosthetics – but the department head was having none of it.

The deceptively young looking unicorn stallion in his plain grey doctors robes, with his short-cropped brown mane and tale, stomped his hoof sternly: “It’s bad enough that you come here chasing priests who kill my patients, now you want to corrupt the poor souls who’re here for treatment? Get out of here you filthy anathema before I call the home guard!”

One short visit to Headmaster Dripcrank later and Speaker had all the permission he needed. The department head protested, loudly to the point of threatening resignation – but the legionaries who got their legs, hooves, eyes and what have you back didn’t protest in the slightest.

It was late afternoon when Speaker and Shimmer left Valkhawsen, though on their way back towards the residential district Speaker recognized a pony sitting on a bench who looked incredibly old: Her face was a mountain-range of wrinkles, her body gaunt and her hooves worn and frayed, and her mane was patchy and showing signs of balding – a rarity for even among exalted mares who reached old age, though this pony was obvious a mortal one close to the end of her life.

“Thundermane, is that you?” Speaker asked out loud, as he approached the old pony.

Thundermane’s appearance made Speaker look down right youthful, but none the less the old pony slowly looked up and ultimately shot Speaker a snaggle-toothed smile with eyes that showed signs of cataract: “Doc, is that you?”

“It’s me. Looks like they took your stones, when was that?” Speaker inquired, giving his old army buddy a thorough look-over.

The old pony nodded and slowly said: “About a year ago. Couldn’t gallop anymore, my legs are even worse now – but the pension is good, and my family is looking to invest it” 

Shimmer looked at the two – it was clear to her that Speaker and Thundermane had served together, though it wasn’t entirely obvious to her what their relationship had been. Had Thundermane been a commanding officer now retired?

“How are you eyes? They look cloudy” Speaker noted, his diagnostic medical confirming that Thundermane’s eyes were well on their way to a state of effectively total blindness.

The aging mare again nodded, slowly: “They don’t matter. The doctors gave me a year or two, tops – I’ll be with the dragons before I’m blind”
“Excuse me, sorry for asking – but are you sick from something? And how do you know Speaker?” Shimmer interjected, her curiosity getting the better of her.

Thundermane smiled, like a grandmother being asked by a grandchild to tell a nice story: “Oh me and Speaker, we go way back. He was our field medic while I served as Gunzosha in the first field force. He would come along on raids and keep us patched up. He would’ve gotten the stones too if he wasn’t so damn sma… what’s happening?” she finished, in a frightened tone, looking around wildly.

Golden sparkles leapt about inThundermane’s vision, as Speaker’s healing charm cleared up her cataracts. Thundermane turned to look at Speaker, her face one big confused question mark, but then suddenly she stumbled backwards off the bench while crying out in horror!
“Whoa – you ok?!” Speaker said, leaping into action to help Thundermane get up – but the old mare kept scooting away from him along the cobbled street.

Waving a worn hoof accusingly at Speaker, Thundermane cried: “How dare you! Anathema!”

At this point Shimmer became all too aware of the other ponies walking about the street were starting to look – and from what she had noticed of the street patrols of justicars in the area, then there would be a patrol coming by real soon: “Speaker, we should leave”

“No Shimmer – Look, Thundermane, I only healed your eyes. I haven’t done anything bad to you. Hell, you’ve heard about Matriach Yushoto’s recovery? That was me as well. Please, I’m not a bad pony – never been, you know me well enough to see that” Speaker implored, trying his best to come off as earnest as possible.

The old mare stopped scooting away, looking somewhat puzzled: “But… the priests said you’d sold your soul to demons – marked by gold on the brow with dark powers”

“Oh… my caste mark – no, that flares up like a unicorn’s anima flares up when I use charms. The powers I got are from heaven, not Malfeas” Speaker explained, helping Thundermane up from the ground.

The old pony gave Speaker a suspicious glare as she staggered up. Shimmer recognized the conflict, having encountered many ponies in the west who claimed to know well of anathema – curtesy of realm-sent immaculate monks – who found their faith conflicting with actual experiences, due to the acts of a kind Lunar or something else that the immaculate texts would name anathema who failed to live up to the anathema monsters of legend.

“I would never throw away what Lookshy helped me built me up as. I’ve always tried to help others – and with the powers I now I have can help so many more so much better. Even you – if you can hold out a year or two more; I swear by all the gods in Yu-Shan, I will turn back the clock itself and see your youth restored, let you take the stones again if you want” Speaker stated, as earnest as a pony ever could.

Thundermane, so moved by Speaker’s promise of the seemingly impossible; a restoration of youth, a shot of ‘the stones’ again – and seeing clearly again despite even unicorn doctors saying that she would be blind within the next couple of years – wiped her tears away: “I will wait for you then – and I’ll tell the others, of the few that haven’t gone to meet the dragons”

“How many from your scale are left?” Speaker almost casually said, brushing off the dirt from Thundermane’s back and checking her for injuries.

Shaking her head, Thundermane lamented: “Not enough”

“They burn so brightly – and yet so briefly” Speaker stated, as if reciting a line from a poem, with tears in his eyes.

Leaving, Shimmer asked if this Thundermane mare had been Speaker’s commanding officer or something.

“Good heavens no – she was one of the gunzosha I served wi- oh I get it – no, she’s barely a day over 30” Speaker explained.

Shimmer looked at Speaker incredulously: “But… she looks even older than you!?”

“It’s the stones. The magical implants mortal ponies get to use magical gunzosha armor, they drains your life. You age ten times faster than normal when doing that – but you gain power equal to a unicorn with it” Speaker noted somberly.

“Harsh” Shimmer said, noting that she’d encounter many tribes back west as well where young colts would sacrifice themselves in battle or in other situations for their tribe – though, it was a bit disturbing to see a pony who had sort of survived that only to waste away like this… mainly because having to die with an old body and a young mind, it just didn’t sit right with her.

Nodding, Speaker took  a deep breath and looked at his forehooves intently: “I know I can fix it – I remember being able to restore youth to ponies in the first age… but my hooves, I can’t make them do the things I remember doing – at least not yet… I just hope I can get to that point in time”

That night, while Speaker slept, Shimmer turned into a tiny spider and left a frighteningly realistic copy of herself in her bed made of pillow fluff infused with a few drops of her blood – the dummy even looked like it breathed.

As she spun a nice web in the shape of a dream-catcher from the rafters above Speaker’s bed, with a few strands connecting to the door into the room, as well as each window, Shimmer suddenly felt the door-strand stretch and burst: Someone was sliding opening the door… but nothing appeared to enter, and no shadows had been cast through the paper-walls.

Crawling along the ceiling with her long spider-legs, trailing a new strand to connect her web to the door, Shimmer dropped down along the door. The moment she touched the floor she knew that something was wrong: The floor boards were bending down ever so slightly – something was standing on the floor, unseen, weighing it down.

Quickly leaping to the wall, Shimmer shapeshifted into a western prism newt, a tiny little reptile often found on and around island demesnes that fed off motes of essence.  It was a pitiful and dull looking little creature, but it had a unique and subtle feature that few outside of western natives knew of: It had eyes of essence-reactive crystal, that granted it essence sight of a very high quality. Unlike Shimmer’s beast-pony form with its glowing third eye that also afforded essence sight, then the tiny eyes of the tiny newt didn’t glow – thus it was a perfectly discreet little form to be in to spot things of essence… especially hidden things of essence.

To Shimmer, as her vision stabilized from having shapeshifted from a tiny spider to that of the tiny newt form, the essence flows of Creation became apparent. In the room she was in several essence-voids also became apparent – silhouettes of ponies wrapped in partially armored loose-fitting magical garbs, three of them in total, plus two outside in the hallway beyond the opened door, all of them unicorns, all of them effectively invisible.

As the three veiled unicorns in the room approached Speaker, Shimmer evaluated her options. Letting Speaker get hurt was obviously not an option, but simply going all beast-pony on them wasn’t ideal either – assassins like this didn’t just randomly sneak into ponies rooms and set up to kill them: Someone had ordered this hit – and Shimmer wanted to know who.

Checking to make sure that she was still undetected, Shimmer took careful aim, turned into a flea, leapt, and landed on the head of one of the veiled unicorns. Landing in the unicorn’s mane allowed her to see the unicorn - not that flees had much in sight normally – but with a little shapeshifting it had enough to confirm that the unicorn’s mane was orange.

Quickly making her way to the unicorn’s nearest ear, Shimmer got right up to the pony’s eardrum and informed the pony that the jig was up: “…and if you don’t want me to burrow into your brain and take control of you, and go on a rampage throughout Lookshy to kill as many of you unicorn scumbags as possible before they take you down, I suggest you tell your buddies to stop whatever you’re doing here”

The unicorn, understandably enough, stopped right in its tracks – though to Shimmer’s disappointment it didn’t appear to say anything. Usually when she had done her “There’s a voice in my ear saying that it’ll make me kill my own family” routine back west it made ponies call out for others to either help it or stop whatever they were doing – depending on what she had threatened with.

Being a flea in a pony’s ear, Shimmer sadly had a very limited idea of what was happening outside of that ear. It was difficult to even tell if the pony who’s ear she was in was even moving, though not impossible: Detecting that her ‘host’ was moving at speed, Shimmer quickly jumped ship and turned into spider as she hit a tapestry.

It only took seconds to confirm that she was now outside of Speaker’s room – and this worried her to no end:  Not only because she had no idea if Speaker was still unharmed, but also because simply silently running off when you had a lunar in your ear was one of the only wise courses of action to take, assuming that you wanted the rest of the ponies you were working with to be able to continue unfettered… and where the fuck had these unicorns learned anti-Lunar squad tactics?

Throwing caution to the wind, Shimmer turned into her beast-pony form and ran straight back into Speaker’s room – bursting in only to be blasted with a powerful elemental bolt that at the same time tried to knock her down with strong gusts of wind and a boulder-sized sphere of earth essence as well as drown her with water essence. The drowning part failed due to her warform having aquatic-capable lungs for underwater ‘flight’, but she was tossed around like a ragdoll from the combined force of the earth and air essence striking her.

A lunar in full warform being tossed around was not a quiet affair, especially not as she crashed through both paper and brick walls and out into the central courtyard of the Yushoto compound. The veiled unicorns did not give chase – having disappeared when Shimmer and a gaggle of Yushoto pony-at-arms returned to Speaker’s room.

To Speaker the hubbub had mostly amounted to waking up in chains, again, and this time with a bag over his head that he couldn’t float off. At least he wasn’t gagged and he could still use charm, not that he could do much without being able to see anything: “Oh well, here we go again”

> Chapter 84: Unseen Puppeteers
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

To Speaker’s relief then his captors didn’t take him very far from the small fortress that was the Yushoto Compound. To Speaker’s chagrin they took him up on the Lookshy city wall, to a point overlooking the almost mile-high sheer cliff going down to where the Yanaze river flowed into the inland sea and crashed into the shore of the threshold. What his captors aimed to do appeared quite simple at this point: Chuck him in the ocean.

What Speaker hadn’t quite expected was for them to was tie him up his legs with strong iron chains, blindfold and gag him tightly – and then stab him in the chest with what felt like a poisoned blade before tossing him over the wall. They didn’t even stop to interrogate him, or gloat. This was quick, efficient and merciless.

The pain from the stab-wound and the poison spreading in his system was quickly negated with his anesthetic charm – and the disorientation from falling while blindfolded was thankfully negated by his elemental immunity charm and balance charm, though removing the blindfold wasn’t possible. At least they hadn’t gagged him – not that it would have mattered much… for what Speaker had been doing ever since briefly seeing that he would be tossed in near the Yanaze – just before he was blindfolded - was pray to Water Strider, the god of that very river… who owed Speaker and the circle a big favor for that business with the Monkey King.

Speaker finished the prayer about halfway down, not that that made him stop. It was freaking him out greatly that he had no clue how close he was to hitting the cliffs down below due to his blindfold, though it being the dead of night wouldn’t have it any easier to see when and where he’d come down – and Speaker knew damn well that he didn’t have charms that could protect from that kind of impact… unlike striking water at an angle, then Gift wouldn’t be able to soften up the jagged cliffs he was falling towards. Hmm, maybe the device he had been working on designing would be able to do that – hmm… yes, that might actually work, if he had the damn built and with him right now – which he did not, though the designs were thankfully done.

Up on the wall Shimmer had caught up with Speaker’s captors and revealed them with a spray of slimy webbing that glowed faintly in the darkness – and a number of Seventh Legion Skyguard ships that had been coming in to dock at the aviary who had heard the alarms had swooped in as well, though the marines on the skyships appeared a bit torn on whether they should be pointing their implosion bows and lightning ballistae at Shimmer or the three unicorns she had caught – though their orders were to respond to and stop Speaker’s  abduction apparently… and the commanding officer of the ships, a very angry unicorn in a sky-blue armor and a neat little dark-blue skulcap at the stern of the nearest skyship brandishing an oversized jade powerbow trained on the abductors, was screaming at the ponies on the wall to stand down. The most useful thing the skyships were providing  was illumination: Their essence powered gem-lights were lighting up the section of the city wall quite nicely, making the web-stained veiled unicorns stand out as if covered hundreds of tiny sparkling silvery gems.

In Lookshy, to quickly signal around various districts if there was trouble, the Seventh Legion had long ago developed a system of differently colored flags that could quickly be put up. From what Shimmmer could hear from the skyships, having greatly boosted all of her senses to track the previously invisible ponies she was hunting, then the Yushoto compound was flying a “VIP kidnapped” and “Raided” flags. This clued her in on what to say to the skyship captain:

“Did you see their captive?” Shimmer shouted, her entire body tense and ready to go should the abductors try to get away – though at the moment they were cornered on the wall between the skyships and Shimmer.

As Shimmer quickly sealed the doors to the wall towers to either side of the abductors with her essence webbing, the skyship captain responded: “They threw someone over the wall a moment before you showed up, just as we closed in”

The feral howl of anguish from Shimmer was heard miles away, even up in the sky on Nah as Cash and Sunrise approached. Cash quickly concluded that the howl was cry of horror and fury from Shimmer, so something really bad must have happened to Speaker. Sunrise looked to the heavens and pulled back her hood: “We should never have left them, not after what already happened”

Cash agreed, noting that if nothing else they would avenge their circlemate – though hopefully that wouldn’t be necessary.

At the standoff on the wall, Shimmer charged the four half-veiled unicorns who had tossed Speaker of the wall. The four disabled their cloaking magic and took up a collective defensive stance, but Shimmer’s was unrelenting, her limbs undulating and elongating and a mad and formless display of claws and tentacle’d limbs.

The melee that ensued was shortlived, to put it mildly. The skyships opened fire on the five fighters with their implosion bows first, scattering them – which in turn allowed the sky-marines to target the rest of the unicorns individually with the more accurate lightning ballistae, though apparently the magical armor that had veiled the them also kept them from getting hurt too much… Shimmer made up for that with bestial wrath, ripping into the two nearest unicorns, her talons trailing wide archs of blood.

Between the carefully aimed close air support and Shimmer going berserk with grief – especially once she picked up the mixed scents of Speaker’s blood and poison trailing over the wall – meant that that the fight was brutal an short-lived, though at the same time Shimmer’s grief made her fail to prioritize her own defences, resulting in her opponents landing several usually killing blows that only failed to end her due to her obsession with killing them.

An enraged Yushoto Risotto and two dozen unicorns and ponies at arms soon arrived, calling on Shimmer to spare the two abductors that were still alive – though calling them ‘whole’ or ‘intact’ would have been an outright lie at that point.

Having already lived through decades of impotent rage and frustration of being drawn to a heavenly mate that didn’t exist, Shimmer resigned herself with the knowledge that Speaker would probably reincarnate pretty quickly. Hell, with what he’d set up in Sunhill it might even be one of the doctors there who’d become the new bearer of his exaltation. Steeling herself with such hopeful thinking, Shimmer put down the mangled remains of the two now unconscious unicorns she had been savagely slamming into the blood-soaked battlements on the wall for the last minute or so, cocooning them with her webbing for capture... plus it helped stabilize them a little bit.

The grey-blue jade-reinformed brickwork was slick and shiny with the blood of the abductors as Yushoto Risotto led her honor-guard up to Shimmer. The look on her face was one of utmost outrage as she looked at the web-spun unicorns: “Unmask them!”

Shimmer gladly removed the magical silken veils that seemed to form the ‘visor’ of the strange armor the two bound unicorns were wearing, roughly so, with very sharp silvery talons. The armor itself could best be described as sets of articulated, small and carefully padded black armor plates on the wearer’s chest, knees, hooves, flanks and other places made of some kind of magical alloy, though most of their bodies were simply covered in a thick but surprisingly light enchanted black silk that shrouded their identities quite perfectly.

The faces of the two unicorns seemed to spread a good bit of confusion among the Lookshyans present. Shimmer didn’t quite get it: The two unicorns, a mare and a stallion, both had simple short military buzz-cuts for manes, but beyond that they didn’t have much in unique identifiers. They both had slight scaring and whatnot, typical and quite normal for ponies who lived the tough life of the warrior, which was quite normal in Lookshy.

“Who are you?” Risotto demanded, her fury having brought her anima flux to bear – the wood essence around her causing tiny blue-speckled mushrooms to spout on the stone around her, erupting into green-blue puffs of poison spores that swirled around the old unicorn in the form of a gaseous wood dragon.

To Shimmer’s surprise, then despite their grave injuries the two unicorns turned out to be aware enough of their surroundings to answer, though their answer wasn’t one that anyone seemed to have expected. The unicorn mare first spat out some bloody teeth, then sneered: “Fireblade, rank of Kazei”. The stallion followed suit: “Gai Fan, rank of Shozei”

Name and rank. Name and Lookshyan ranks. Lookshyan troops were taught to only give name and rank when captured by enemy forces…
Risotto’s left ear and right side of her mouth began to twitch a little: “How dare you…  Yushoto Gai Fa, my own blood, attacking your own house?! Who ordered this!? I demand to know! Who ordered this!?!”

“Fireblade, rank of Kazei”

“Gai Fan, rank of Shozei”

Every pony in Creation knew well enough that unicorns, being dragonblooded, had their emotions linked to their essence. Thus, when angry, sad or even very happy a unicorn’s anima flux would activate. Her face was a contorted parody of smoldering fury, the green gaseous dragon swirling around her and the very stone brickwork she stood on was withering ever so slightly… every pony around her could easily see that she was about to blow up – even Shimmer found the sight intimidating, as Risotto’s horn glowed and her ancient jade daiklaive Lotus Edge was slowly unsheathed.

“You know, I’d like to know who ordered this as well” Speaker said.

There was a clatter of steel of on stone as three dozen ponies dropped their weapons in surprise, plus one of the skyguard gunnery crews accidentally let off a lightning ballista, but managed to yank it up so the shot just flew up into the sky.

Speaker was standing on the surprisingly flat top a plume of water, which slowly moved towards the battlements of the wall. As he got close quick hop, skip and a jump landed him on the wall, between his abductors and Shimmer, who quickly got in front of him.

Yushoto Risotto, thrice-enraged over someone attacking her home, someone kidnapping a valued asset to Lookshy and learning that it was Lookshyan unicorns who had perpetrated the foul deed, stood conflicted: She was both happy and angry all of a sudden… dragons, why couldn’t this just be a couple of obviously realm spies she could publicly execute?!

The two abductors, looking suitably confused, did not seem to fully grasp how Speaker was still alive and able to toss the poisoned blade over to them.

“Darling?” Shimmer said tentatively, struggling to hold back three eyes worth of tears of joy.

Speaker looked up to the towering beast-pony beside him: “Yes Shimmer?”

“How are you still alive?”

Speaker shrugged: “Divine intervention. Water Strider owed us a favor, I cashed it in”

“Oh” Shimmer nodded.

A moment later another officer arrived with raged breath and a scroll. He was from the Stores Inspectorate: Five suits of Armor of the Unseen Assassin had been requisitioned for a first field force ranger op earlier that day – but nobody in the Operations Directorate had ordered anything.

To Speaker, knowing that it was a team of Lookshyan Rangers that had captured and tried to kill and dispose of him told him… a lot of things. Risotto seemed to be on the same level: It was obvious to her that it had to have been a high ranking officer who had ordered this, and ordering a a smash and grab on the home of a member of the General Staff? Heads would roll for this.

The two rangers were stripped of their magical armor and weapons they still had and were taken away in chains similar to the ones that had been used to prevent Speaker from using charms, while Speaker, Shimmer, Risotto and her guards returned to the Yushoto compound for some very early morning jasmine tea to calm the nerves.

“Oh I’m going to feel this in the morning” Risotto complained as the aging unicorn was helped from the battlements as everyone returned to bed or their night-shift duty stations.

Not long after did Cash and Sunrise arrive, with everyone settling in for the night – with triple the guards plus a few other countermeasures in case of any other attempts on Speaker or his circle.

The next morning a grand inquisition was convened by the general staff, as a form of emergency meeting, to find out exactly how a fang of rangers could end up ordered to assassinate the guest of a Taimyo in her own home. This clearly wasn’t something the leaders of Lookshy was taking lightly, as the implications were dire to put it mildly.

Cash had even looked forward to hearing how the investigation would go down when dire news arrived about an hour before dawn: The two rangers had been found dead during the night to day shift change at the hospital: They had committed suicide.
“Are you serious?” Shimmer angrily proclaimed her mouth half-full of oats.

As the messenger, now coated thoroughl in half-chewed oats, nodded, Speaker inquired into the exact nature of their suicide. The messenger had little information on that to give: “…but Nurse Redheart said that something was off, so an autopsy has been ordered”
“You think you can snag that Speaker?” Cash asked, looking sly.

Speaker nodded, noting that it would be fun to meet his old master Smooth Stich, assuming that the old fart still worked and taught at Sextis Jylis Mercy. The messenger was sent off to inform Ruby where the circle had gone, to let her know that she should meet up with them at the hospital.

Leaving the compound quietly, so as to not wake anyone up – especially with Risotto not having felt well when she had gone to bed, Speaker led the circle to the district of schools.

Aside from the medical wing at Walkahavsen, also known  asDragon’s Mercy, then most of Lookshy’s medical work was either done on small local clinics strategically placed throughout the fortress city, or in Lookshy’s District of Schools at the grand Sextis Jylis Mercy where pretty much anything more complicated than turning your head to cough was seen to.

The hospital did not look like one. It looked like a small fortress within a district otherwise full of salons, learning centers, schools and most of the city’s absolutely most exclusive and prestigious dojos. Among several blocks of bookstores, reading halls and studios the hospital was a massive grey mass of buttresses and fortifications, clearly meant to withstand heavy siege, while everything else looked like it was simply meant to close down during times of strife. The old scorchmarks and indentations on the south and west facing parts of the hospital were a testament to the justification of the fortifications: The grand ivory and lapis statue at the main gate into the fort paid homage to the brave healers who for centuries had been a cornerstone of Lookshy’s siege-response plans, keeping the city alive as the enemy was held off – at the cost that every time the realm had laid siege to Lookshy the hospital had always been a key target by long range magical artillery and foul sorcery.

The circle quickly made its ways past the fairly large bronze plaques at the gate that listed all the doctors, nurses and orderlies that had fallen in the line of duty. Cash remarked that just on their way from the residential district to the hospital they had passed three other similar memorial plaques at various Lookshyan civic centers and Seventh Legion buildings.

“They honor their dead, what did you expect?” Shimmer quipped back.

Cash shrugged without much though: “They could use the space better. Lookshy’s layout makes expansion pricy and risky – they’re dedicating a lot of space on statues and stuff for ponies that aren’t around to enjoy them anymore”

“Perhaps, but at least they don’t wallpaper un-used facades with tacky adverts like in Nexus” Sunrise noted.

With a pleased sigh, Cash agreed: “It is prettier, I’ll give you that – I just find it a bit morose. I would rather celebrate the living”

At the ward where the late rangers had been admitted there was a full detail of Security Directorate-led home guards-ponies. The circle quickly recognized one of the ‘coughers’, as Ruby had previously called Security Directorate ponies, as the mare from the pair of coughers that had been part of Speaker’s kidnapping into the underground depth of Valkhawsen.

The unicorn recoiled in horror when she spotted the circle, but they were all over her like flies on a honey-pie.

“Well well well, I never did get your name last we met – but I was under the apparent misconception that Lookshyan unicorns were smart enough not to make the same mistake twice” Cash stated sternly as he approached the mare with a menacing grin.

The light-blue coated unicorn mare in her white-painted lamellar armor and helmet did her best to just ignore Cash. Her scrunched up lip in the face of Cash taunting her, but when he floated her helmet off to reveal that her mane had been all but shaven off completely, leaving but a patchwork of ugly and uneven tufts of purple mane, she burst out: “No, give that back!”

“Gods, what happened to you?” Cash said, shocked at the unseemly mane styling.

Shimmer chuckled: “I happened. Damn girl, you didn’t just wait for my webbing to fade?”

Looking from Shimmer to the unicorn, Speaker quickly pieced together what had happened: The circle had left the unicorn mare, along with the other cougher and the old Valkhawsen professor, down in the ruined manse – and the two coughers had been cocooned by Shimmer’s essence webbing. Clearly they had tried to free-themselves, only to find just how sticky that webbing could be if messed with, resulting in the mare’s mane being ruined.

This led Speaker to ponder on the exact nature of Shimmer’s essence webbing: Was it based primarily on the non-sticky structural threads that spiders built their web from, or the sticky threads that spiders put in their web to actually catch insects?

Suddenly feeling poked, Speaker turned to look and saw Shimmer nodding towards the part of ward that the cougher had blocked off – Cash and Sunrise was debating the unicorn in the other end of the ward. Shimmer said: “Come on, Sunrise got her away – let’s see if we can’t find something in here”

The home guard ponies at arms didn’t seem to mind Speaker and Shimmer looking around, and it quickly became apparent why: The beds where the rangers had been in had obviously been cleaned – there were even a pair of orderlies busy washing the bloodstains off the floor and going back and forth from a nearby water fountain to get clean water for cleaning up with.

“Great – the cougher probably got them to clean this up quickly to cover up what really happened” Shimmer complained.

Speaker nodded, looking around. There was nothing out of place – the beds and the small tables next to them had been cleared out and cleaned up. Shimmer dipped a hoof in what little remained of the blood-stains on the floor: “Tastes… murky, herbal sedatives, but a lot of stress when this was spilled”

“Sounds normal for a pony committing suicide… and they would have been given something for their pain when they arrived here” Speaker sighed.

Shimmer held her breath for a moment, as if tasting the very air, before inquiring to the two orderlies about how much blood there had been on the floor to begin with. They pointed out the large area of ceramic tiles still damp with soaped up water… so there had been a good deal of blood.

“How did they kill themselves” Speaker asked curiously, his lips poised and brows furrowed in a skeptical expression.

The two orderlies had to stop and think for a moment, but then one recalled that a pair of scalpels had been recovered: “Right, they cut themselves”

“Cut themselves where? They were barely alive when they were scraped off the wall. They couldn’t have cut themselves – and with what?” Speaker wondered, finding the idea of the two gravely wounded rangers having had the ability to do anything other than remain unconscious as their wounds healed.

Shimmer asked into the scalpels. The two orderlies had no clue where they had been taken from: “There are scalpels in some of the emergency kits – but this a recovery ward, not a surgical ward, and the kits are accounted for”

“So they got the scalpels from somewhere else? They were stripped when they were brought here” Speaker noted, pondering whether they could have been stolen during a brief moment of the rangers being lucid while being wheeled in through the hospital.

Cash, with Sunrise and the cougher coming along behind him, sucicincly stated: “I think it’s more likely that the blades were smuggled in – plus you said that the two wouldn’t have been in a state to kill themselves anyway, so I’m leaning more towards them having been killed to keep them quiet”

“That explains the stress” Shimmer not, looking like she just had an epiphany: “If they were happy to kill themselves I wouldn’t have tasted that much stress in them when they died – this was sprung on them”

“Nonsense. They were rangers – they could make knives out of anything. This was suicide over the fact that they were too mangled to return to active service” the unicorn mare with the ruined mane proclaimed.

The whole circle gave the unicorn a look proclaimed quite loudly, without a single word spoken, that none of them found the unicorn even remotely believable or trustworthy.

The mare appeared to take offensive to the unspoked insinuation and trotted off demonstratively.

“Ok, so murder is a definite possibility. Who could have done it? Sunrise said, asking the obvious question.

Speaker found it unlikely that any of the doctors or nurses could have be done it, for all Lookshyan medical personnel was sworn to never intentionally a fellow Lookshyan in the line of their duty.

“That doesn’t that they can’t break that promise…” Cash quickly pointed out.

Looking at the two orderlies who were back to scrubbing the floor and mopping up blood, Shimmer said: “What about them?”

“Hey, leave us out of this – we’re day shift. This happened during the night shift” one of the orderlies said, sounding reasonably offended.

Asking around for who was on duty during the night shift when the deaths occurred, the circle was quickly shut down by the cougher mare: “I’m not allowing you to waste the hospital administration’s time. Now leave before I have you escorted out”

“I used to work here. It would be no hassle for the ponies here to look up who was on duty last night” Speaker insisted.

“Sure, and considering what the two were accused of, then letting you lot dig up dirt, make stuff up and tamper with records makes perfect sense. No, now get out of here” the unicorn mare crossly stated in a haughty tone.

Cash shook his head as his caste mark lit up: “Young lady, something terrible happened here. Good ponies that Lookshy and the Seveneth Legion has spent a lot of time and resources training have died. We’re seeking the truth. You want what’s best for Lookshy too, right?”

The unicorn mare, who suddenly sported a dazed looks, nooded meekly. Turning around quite abruptly, she marched up to the nearest nurse and demanded last night’s roster. A few minutes later, with a copy of the roster and the sign-off sheet of things that had been done during the night in hoof, the circle set forth to track down the night shift and see if they had anything to tell.

On their way out of the ward Speaker noticed the ward’s incident list on a big bulleting board: “This says that there wasn’t anything beyond the two deaths, so we can cross off the doctors on call for the night shift – they were never summoned here until after the fact”

With that out of the way Cash pondered the list: “The dozen nurses on duty would have been checking up on the two constantly throughout the night – a perfect opportunity to slit a throat or something”

“I don’t know… helots are picked for nursing jobs based on your compassion and drive to help others. It would go right against that kind of profiling for a nurse to do this” Speaker said, sending conflicted looks around between the circle and the nurses bustling in, out and around the hallway they were  walking down.

“If the nurses are chosen for their compassion, then talking them into killing anyone would be needlessly difficult – what about the orderlies who worked the last night shift?” Sunrise wondered.

Speaker scratched his forehead for a moment: “We could check them first. Orderlies aren’t chosen for any special criteria, they’re menial labor”

That Speaker had said ‘chosen’ instead of hired led to a brief but somewhat heated discussion on the nature of what a helot was – apparently then only about one out of ten ponies in Lookshy could call themselves citizens, with most of them being unicorns. The rest were called Helots, who could not own real estate nor speak at the civil council or general staff. Their education (if any) and jobs were picked for them by Lookshy and they needed permission to travel abroad or otherwise go on leave from their job.

“So… Helots are basically slaves or serfs?” Cash casually remarked.

Speaker shot Cash a murderous glare.

Ever quick on the uptake, Cash quickly realized his social faux pas – unfortunately so had a couple of ponies visiting someone else who had been in earshot, and they had taken far greater offense, resulting in Cash getting smacked over the head and shouted at quite profusely.

The very angry ponies, helots by their own admission, introduced Cash to the concept of Metic – that is, ponies who weren’t native to Lookshy or its territories - and the fact that foreigners in Lookshy had far fewer legal rights than Lookshyan helots or citizen… with the added threat that they would of course rough Cash up even more so if they ever caught him badmouthing helots again.

Moving on, Cash shuck off the unkind remarks from the two helots and commented that it was exactly that kind of xenophobia which kept the rest of the hundred kingdoms in a near constant state of internecine warfare: “And honestly – neither Nexus or Great Forks has a tiered citizen system. I mean, not allowing ponies to freely seek the work they want? Nexus might have plenty of flaws, but that’s one thing it would never allow”

“Cash...” Speaker said in a somewhat exasperated tone.

Cash stopped, causing the rest of the circle to halt along with him. He turned to Speaker, looking at him: “Let me guess, you’re a helot?”

Nodding, Speaker noted that citizen rights were usually granted post-humorously to most Lookshyan helots who fell in the line of duty on the battlefield, or those who showed the wisdom and maturity for such privileges through many years of steadfast work for the Seventh Legion, as he moved on: “To most ponies in Lookshy the only land they’ll ever own will be a burial plot – and frankly, few need more than that: We all share Lookshy, from the baths, libraries, and dojos to the fact that Lookshy is one of the only places outside of the Blessed Isle where everyone has access to running water and first age sanitation”

Looking both crestfallen and annoyed as they passed a pastry shop, Cash frowned: “I get your point, and I respect the fact that Lookshy’s community spirit isn’t just the usual boasty propaganda that most hundred kingdom warlords spout, but a sword that can be swung at any foe who dares threaten you. None the less I hold that the system could be improved”

“Give them some slack – You shouldn’t hold Lookshy to the standards that you’ve set up yourself using Solar organizational charms. Unicorn charms are much more basic than those of the celestial exalted” Shimmer added.

Cash sighed deeply and shook his head: “Nexus is run by mortals – I don’t think the issue is that its unicorns who’re running this show. It’s a question of what philosophy you put behind your governance”

“Moot point – we can discuss this another time. We’re at the tenement where one of the three orderlies on duty last night lives” Sunrise pointed out.

Rousing the tired night-shift worker was a bit of a bother, but Speaker quickly reinvigorated the poor soul with some medical essence. After that the young and not that tired stallion was quite forthcoming.

“So, what I did last night? Well… did my rounds when the shift started, emptied bedpans, refilled the water fountain, emptied dustbins… went by the chapel to pray for those who needed, snack break, then did rounds again” the young stallion explained, happily munching on some of the honey-coated rice cakes that Cash had brought along as bribes.

“And what were your feelings towards the two rangers that were brought in during your shift?” Sunrise inquired sternly.
The young stallion looked at her with a blank gaze: “Who?”

“The two suicides your colleagues were cleaning up from when we got to the ward” Speaker said, sounding rather disappointed that the orderly didn’t seem to know who they were talking about.

“Oh them… I had no idea who they were until the coughers and guards showed up – you want to talk to the nurses if you want to be kept up to date on admissions. I just empty bedpans and move stuff around” the young stallion explain, shooting Cash a pleading look for another honeyed rice cake.

As Cash forked over another rice cake, he asked: “So, your second round – you did exactly the same as before?”

“Ya, bedpans, check the bins, hit the chapel”

With an inquisitive and slightly bemused look, Cash inquired: “What about the water fountain?”

“Second round is like… dead of night. Nobody needs water there – I mean, we’ll refill it if needed, but usually it’s untouched from last round. It’s the day shifts that use it a lot for sponge baths and washing” the young stallion noted.

“Ok, so when you checked it – there was nothing to see?” Cash wondered innocently.

The young stallion thought for a moment, but came up blank: “Look I don’t remember… it was really late”

“The ward had just received two thoroughly messed up unicorns during your shift. They would have needed a thorough wash before being bandaged – that should have been ample reason to refill the fountain” Speaker noted.

Cash pointed to the copy of the sign-off sheet he had been given back at the ward. There it said that the orderlies had indeed refilled the water fountain twice.

The young stallion looked perplexed: “Hey look, taking the jugs down to the well in the basement and hauling them back up on the fourth floor, you don’t forget having done that… if I had done it my back would be aching”

One quick medical diagnostic charm confirmed that the pony’s back was indeed suffering from at least two periods of very heavy strain. At this point the young stallion became almost panicky with the realization that there was part of the night that he couldn’t remember…
With this apparent, Cash finally asked: “So, did you talk with anyone at the chapel afterwards?”

> Chapter 85: Lookshy Burning
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Leaving the memory-addled orderly, the circle conferred on what to do next at an alehouse as the sun slowly dawned.

“Why did you ask if he had talked with anyone at the chapel? He said he had just prayed there?” Sunrise inquired while sipping on some rather bland tea.

Enjoying the last of the honey-covered rice cakes, Cash explained that so far it was the only common thread among the attacks on Speaker were Lookshy’s immaculate priests – the Sohei.

“Hey, the first one was a sidereal in disguise” Speaker pointed out, still not that hot on the idea of Lookshyans conspiring against Lookshyans like what Cash was suggested.

Shimmer poked Speaker: “Maybe, but Heath Rose’s message… it said that Six Heavens Hunter had friends – if he had been parading around as a priest, then his buddies might be among the Sohei. Immaculate priests tend to bond over scripture when they cloister up and stuff”
“…and the Sohei are initiated into most of the restricted sorcery that Lookshy knows of. Memory-erasing spells are probably on the restricted list” Speaker noted, recalling what Ruby had told him on their flight back to Lookshy on the manta transport.

Speaker’s statement on Sohei and their access to sorcery taken into account, the circle debated on what to do next. Cash wanted to interview the remaining orderlies together with Speaker – for his truth-telling charm – just to be sure that they weren’t dealing with a single absentminded pony. Sunrise said that she had a few ideas on where she could ask around to get a proper feel for the Sohei.

“Ok, but then I want Shimmer to go with you” Speaker insisted.

Shimmer shot Speaker an accusatory look: “You wound me – plus now that we know for certain that someone is out to get you, you need all the protection I can give you!”

“No. Now that you’re all here, and with Sunrise being the least combat capable of us, it would be obvious to get at me through you” Speaker said, looking at Sunrise.

The young mare gave a displeased nod, followed by flipping a stray lock of her bright orange mane away from her eyes: “Understandable – though you’ll have to keep a low profile Shimmer, be a fly on the wall”

“I have many fly-forms” Shimmer said with a coy smile.

Having mulled the topic of Sunrise as a potential target over for a moment , Speaker noted: “If the ponies out to get me… or all of us for that matter… really were behind the rangers coming after me, and honestly you do not falsify orders like that, so they have to have been given by someone legitimately in the chain of command, then today most of the coughers will be tracking that original order down. That really shouldn’t take long…”

“Your point being?” Cash wondered, looking dejectedly down into his empty cloth bag that had been full of honey-coated rice cakes.
Speaker looked around the ale house, trying to get a read on whether any of the ponies in earshot were listening in: “It means that whoever gave that order will be found within the next day or so. I’ll bet you that the city gates are closed for outgoing traffic until the ponies responsible are found. This means that the conspirators will have to make their next move really quick before they’re tracked down”

“All the more reason I should come with you two” Shimmer noted, her voice tinted with a rare tone of urgency.

Dismissing her fears, Speaker explained that by forcing the conspirators to act quickly they had already limited the scope of what they could do. The attempt to kill him with the rangers had likely taken weeks to set up: “Plus, now that we know to be cautious it’ll be all the more difficult to catch us off guard”

“Hue and cry is a powerful tool when you know what to look out for” Cash added.

Splitting up, Shimmer and Sunrise returned to the Yushoto compound to tell Risotto of the circle’s discovery, leaving Cash and Speaker to hunt down the two remaining orderlies.

This hunt was surprisingly brief: The other orderlies both lived close by, so all Cash needed before they went to interview the two was to buy some more cakes.

“Oh come on – do we really have time for that?” Speaker wondered, as Cash scouted intently for open bakeries to no avail.

Giving Speaker a purposeful look and standing tall, Cash admonished: “My dear friend, where are your bedside manners? We’ll be disturbing their sleep, we must compensate them – plus, didn’t you see that our first orderly completely failed to see that he was being interrogated while he was being fed cake?”

“Very well… let them eat cake” Speaker said with bemused incredulity.

One problem: This early, just past dawn… there were no open bakeries. Cash despaired.

“Oh don’t fret – look at the chimney above this one: They’re baking the bread they’ll be selling in an hour or so when ponies come to fetch bread for breakfast. Just go knock” Speaker noted, having used a quick charm to find a way in.

A few minutes later, after a tiny amount of coin had changed hooves, the two Solars sped off to talk to the two remaining orderlies.

Sure enough, both of the orderlies told fairly similar stories  - though their reactions to the realization that their memories had holes in them did vary a little. One of them also noted that she usually chatted with a friend who worked in the hospital kitchen on her way back from the chapel – but she couldn’t remember doing that, which was weird. She freely gave Speaker and Cash the address of this friend, which a while later gave the two a solid witness to support their theory that the memories of the orderlies had been tampered with.

Leaving via the rooftop accesss to the home of the friend of the orderly and looking out over the other rooftops of the south-eastern residential district, Cash mused: “Ok, so now the question is whether the orderlies committed the murder – or if they were just witnesses” 

“Even if they did kill them, then I would rather focus on rooting out the sorcerer behind taking their memories. They didn’t do this alone, if at all – and the sorcerer behind this is probably linked to giving the rangers those orders” Speaker said with a pained expression. The fond memories from his youth of seeing Sohei perform grand and spectacular feats of magic, stories of them banishing terrible demons with a single gesture and the inherent trust one had with the steadfast clergy Speaker had grown up with were clashing in his mind with these new terrible revelations.

“You ok?” Cash tentatively inquired, putting a calming hoof on Speaker’s shoulder.

Looking at Cash in his beautiful heavenly blue silk jacket, his perfectly done up blond mane and his disarming smile, Speaker sound it difficult not to take hearth in the company of his friend, but there was still something else nagging him: “How many times do you think they’ve done this in the past?”

Shaking his head, Cash threw Speaker an apologetic smile: “Let’s focus on this incident right now – without sidereal backing I’m sure they’re on their leg already”

In a puff of silvery smoke, a messenger spirit suddenly appeared. The tiny sprite of essence and language bound together jittered for a moment and assumed the form of Shimmer’s head, speaking in her voice as the head shot Speaker a worried look: “Get to the Yushoto compound right now – It’s really bad – Stay out of sight and come around the back from the port district side, there’s a mob protesting at the front gates”

Cash looked at Speaker: “You did say that they would have to make their next move quickly”

Not knowing the jumping charm that Speaker had learned from Sully, Cash was forced to remain on the street while Speaker leapt up and traveled along rooftops to remain well out of sight.

Taking a slight detour into the port district, where Speaker couldn’t help but notice that a lot of the work crews at the construction sites were missing, Cash enjoyed the benefit of blending with the foreign merchants that lived in the district. Speaker used his balancing charm to perfectly  nail the ten or fifteen yard leaps he had to pull off to move among rooftops and construction scaffolding.

At the gate into the part of the residential district where the Yushoto compound was Cash couldn’t help but notice the dozen or so ponies armed makeshift weapons made from construction equipment.

“Greetings esteemed Lookshyans, may I pass?” Cash inquired innocently enough.

The burly construction workers glared at Cash: “Beat it. This part of the residential district is off limits right now”

Nodding, Cash shot a quick glance up at where Speaker was hiding. Thirty seconds later the burly construction workers were trotting behind Cash and telling him everything. A priest had arrived an hour earlier and explained to them that the time of reconing was nigh: The rumors that everyone had heard about anathema raising Yushoto Risotto weren’t true: “She said that the anathema cured her but did it in exchange for her soul. She’s in thrall to him I tell you, and through her he got to the rest of the martial staff” a frightfully earnest construction-pony blathered to Cash.

With the level of mind-control charms Cash had spread around these ponies, if he asked them to kill themselves they wouldn’t just do it – they’d set it up so they didn’t make a mess that would inconvenience Cash in any way or form…

“Tell me, this priest, do you know her well?” Cash asked.

The construction ponies had to be told to quiet down as they began talking over each other to be the first to tell Cash, so eager were they. The priest one they had known all their lives, a unicorn Sohei who had spread the good word of the dragon for well over half a century.

“So what’s the plan? Why were you stationed at the district gate? Where are the usual guards?” Speaker quickly inquired.

The construction ponies, under careful essence-fueled instructions from Cash that ‘This is not the anathema you’re looking for’, said that they had just been told make sure that no civilians got until the all-clear was sounding, or justicars came to disperse them, at which point they should just got home or go back to work.

“So what’s going on in there?” Cash wondered.

Speaker closed his eyes and furrowed his brows: “The only thing you can do when the government has been compromised. Replace it – Cash, this is a coup!”

Quickly looking to the towering aviary further up in the old city, Speaker tried to see if the Lookshy Manse had gone active. The great bulbous minaret was still out of sight beyond the walls separating the residential district and the old city district – that was good. This meant they still had time.

“…good why?” Cash calmly asked, certain that the answer likely wouldn’t be reassuring.

Looking his fellow Solar, Speaker gritted his teeth and steeled his himself: “You don’t want to know – now, Shimmer said there was a mob at the compound?”

Sure enough, even a block away from the compound the mob came into view. It had spread almost all around the place – and Speaker recognized the signal banners flown from the walls: The entire martial staff was present, and the “siege response plans active” flag was also up… which meant that the compound was locked down and was considered under attack.

The flickering lights closer beyond the mob, at the gates to the compound, revealed that a fire had been lit in an attempt to burn the wooden gate down.

“Hold on – if this is a coup then a simple mob of civilians won’t do it. They would need to help from parts of the Seventh  Legion to pull this off, what if we-” Cash began.

A series of explosions at the gate cut him off.

“There are no justicars out here trying to reign in or disperse this mob. That was unicorn elemental blasts at the gate, that won’t hold for long” Speaker said despairingly: “Are we too late?”

“Hey, don’t give up yet – we need to do something!” Cash admonished, not at all feeling interested in giving up just yet.

Getting into the compound turned out to be reasonably easy. Cash shot a claw up into the compound wall battlements, then reeled himself up, then shot a claw down to Speaker and pulled him up. Up on the battlements there was a brief tussle with some very frightened ponies at arms, but luckily they recognized Speaker before sounding any kind of alarm.

“How is the gate holding soldier?!” Speaker ordered.

The fearful legionnaire snapped to attention, instinctively recognizing the bark of an officer: “Won’t hold for much longer sir, the fire has softened the hinges, and whatever they’re hammering the gate with from the outside is gonna break them soon, sir!”

Speaker motioned for Cash to followed, then leaping down towards the courtyard, landing on a roof with a heavy crunch of breaking tiles, then on to another rooftop a bit further down, then down on the cobble of the courtyard.

“And of course they didn’t get you – now they’re not just shouting nonsense out there!” a very angry Yushoto Boribap shouted, approaching Speaker and Cash.

In full on lamellar armor and with a sheathed daiklaive hanging from a belt, the unicorn stallion looked ready to defend his home: “Where the hell have you two been? Ever since your two friends came back a mob started forming outside demanding your head!”

Cash began explaining what the circle had uncovered, displaying the evidence him and Speaker had collected. Apparently Shimmer and Sunrise had tried to explain the same, but without Cash’s recorder of everlasting glories to record and play back the statements from the various ponies interviewed, then Baribap hadn’t believed a word of it.

Speaker meanwhile retrieved his singing staff from elsewhere and went to work on the gate. The sturdy steel-reinforced gate had several cracks in it, and the battering from the outside had already opened several small holes and cracks big enough to fit a hoof or something through. This gate was falling within minutes if by nothing else then once a hole big enough to fit an adult pony through was made.

Drawing up the stone in the cobble that covered the courtyard, Speaker played a swift tune of bulwark reinforcement. The stone rose like a storm being called over the ocean and flowed in waves upon the gate like waves upon an oceanside-cliff.  In seconds the holes were plugged and as Cash revealed truth to Baribap Speaker made a thick and heavily reinforced wall covering the gate. Sure, the courtyard look like a plain dirt-covered lot, but it would be a while before the gate would go – and if even the stone was made to crack, then it would be very easy and quick to fix that.

Turning back to Baribap and Cash, Speaker noticed that Cash was… backing away. Was he afraid? Was he… no wait – Baribap had been on the martial staff, as Yushotto Risotto’s replacement – if Risotto was deposed as part of a coup, who would take her spot? Who had initially been against Speaker being allowed to treat Risotto?

…Baribap was in on the conspiracy. It had to be what Cash had found out.

“Hey Cash, get over here – quick!” Speaker called, trying his damndest to make it sound more like a casual order and not an urgent ‘get away from that pony’ type request.

Cash stepped back from Baribap demonstratively, ending their conversation, and rushed over to Speaker where he quickly and quietly said: “Hey, Baribap is in on this – we aren’t safe here”

“I figured the same. Any idea where Shimmer and Sunrise is?” Speaker wondered, thoroughly dissatisfied with the lack of updates that Shimmer was magically sending to him. Why hadn’t she sent another message sprite?

Cash agreed that Shimmer not being up in the sky to relay them information was really bad: “But there’s something else… its about Baribap”
What bothered Cash was that, well… Baribap wasn’t doing anything to the two of them: “If he’s in on the conspiracy, and my sagacious reading of intent is screaming at me that he is, then why isn’t he having us arrested and executed?”

Closing his eyes for a moment Speaker considered all the current tactical and strategic information he had on the situation – though honestly it really bothered him that he didn’t have a better idea of what exactly was going on in the rest of the city… his worst case the scenario – the coup, which seemed to be confirmed by Cash’s social charms, required that there were co-conspirators throughout the seventh legion because otherwise there should be all kinds of loyalist versus coup fights going on.

“Speaker, don’t you get it… they don’t need that – the assassination attempt yesterday on you, it wasn’t just to kill you… it was to make the entire general staff convene an emergency meeting so the martial staff could be taken out in one fell swoop” Cash said, marveling at the elegance of the whole scheme. It reminded him of a couple of similar takeovers done in Nexus.

Nodding slowly, Speaker stomped his hooves, hard: “Of course. With Risotto not feeling well they probably moved the location of the martial staff meeting to the compound. This was a trap from the very beginning”

Cash threw a quick glance back at Baribap, who seemed to be conferring with some officers: “But why isn’t Baribap then throwing open the gates and letting the mob rush the martial staff?”

Speaker’s best guess was that Baribap was buying time. There had to be fighting going on elsewhere in the city: “It has to be to buy time to take out the rest of the loyalists. It just doesn’t make sense: There would be city-wide alarms going off everywhere if something like that was to happen”

Cash shrugged. He had passed by enough battles while touring the hundred kingdom trade routes to know that battles could usually be both seen and heard at quite a distance – but Lookshy was Lookshy… maybe there was some kind of city-wide noise-dampening spell at work that Speaker didn’t know of?

Suddenly the very ground heaved, and the courtyard cracked and bulged. In multicolored explosion of elemental essence and silvery feathers Shimmer burst through in her telltale beastpony form, followed by a throng of ponies, some unicorns, some not.

Wreathed in her charm-made bone-shell armor, Shimmer quickly tumbled around to face her foes – albeit on her back, no wait – her limbs flowed around, along with her eyes from one side her head to the other, effectively flipping her around without doing so with her entire body. This caught the two unicorns out in front off guard, allowing Shimmer to make a couple of hard silver-talloned swipes at them – but the unicorns were clad in strong jade armor, leaving them largely unharmed.

“Now this is more like it!” Cash blurted out strangely cheerfully. Speaker wasn’t sure what to think – namely because he had no idea why those unicorns were fighting Shimmer.

For Shimmer, she was quickly aware of Speaker and Cash’s presence, but equally aware that she under a constant barrage of wind and water that prevented her from explaining what was going on.

Indeed, her foes were very well coordinated: One or two unicorns would attack fiercly, threatening to either cut Shimmer down but also opening themselves up to attack once Shimmer inevitably dodged or parried their daikliaves – but as Shimmer would then try to attack, the other unicorns would repeat the process, locking her down in a constant struggle to keep her defences in the face of a very well coordinated staggered series of attacks.

Shimmer’s solution was using a charm she had previously mainly only used underwater, where speech wasn’t much of an option anyway. It was a simple charm, but it enhanced her body-langueage in a way that allowed her to speak without using words. The message was simple and to the point:

“Staff cornered, more assassins still down with them, Sunrise holding them off – oh, and how did the investigation go?”

Speaker nodded, finding that the message oddly… calm. Sure, Shimmer was fighting quite fiercly with her quintet of… no, quartet of unicorns, as soon as she could get that dead one unstuck from her claws – but the way in which she had spoken to his mind had not communicated any kind of urgency.

“So… Sunrise holding down the fort with the martial staff? Neat” Cash commented.

Looking at Baribap, Speaker couldn’t help notice how frustrated and annoyed he looked. Pointing this out to Cash, Speaker noted: “You were right… look at him – he probably expected to be able to hold down the gates while the assassins did their work”

“Oh it’s better than that. By holding the mob off he can feign being unaware of what happened to Risotto and the others. That would give him legitimacy to join a new general staff once the old one is decimated and the dust settles. The cheeky bastard, bet he didn’t expect us to show up here” Cash noted gleefully.

Speaker couldn’t really see what Cash was so amused by. He was intent on watching Shimmer fight. She was down to three opponents at this point, having knocked out a unicorn by catching the poor soul in her webbing, then swinging the armored pony around like a long-chained morning-star or flail. 

Baribap was looking appropriately torn, almost comically so, as per Cash’s theory on Baribap’s involvelment in the coup – he couldn’t order the archers on the wall to fire on Shimmer lest he reveal his part in the plot, but he didn’t seem to want to commit troops to help. Suddenly a guard from the battlements above the gate shouted: “Master Bright, the crowd is calling for you”

“Well if they’re here because they think you’ve mind-controlled the general staff they probably want your head on a stick” Cash went, looking mildly amused as Speaker as Shimmer wrapped up her two remaining opponents in her essence webbing and stuck them to the tops of nearby flagpoles.

Shaking his head, Speaker trotted towards the stairs that led up to the battlements: “Cash, make Baribap have a change of heart. We’ll need witnesses to expose the truth when the dust settles here”

Cash nodded as Shimmer sped past him towards Cash, who used his jumping charm to quickly reach the battlements overlooking the wide street in front of the compound.

Shimmer reached Speaker moments after he had gotten there, but he was strangely unresponsive: “Hey,  what’s…. oh…”

Down before the gate, just beyond the dozen or two ponies and unicorns who were working to no avail to breach the gate, the crowd had parted to reveal a macabre display: Two dozen ponies, all horribly bruised and battered, tied up and with crude wooden signs strung around their necks that read “Traitor” in big red letters.

Shimmer recognized one of the ponies, a very old looking pony, as the old ex-gunzosha pony that Speaker had helped with her eyes – which were had been gouged out, courtesy of the frothing mob. No wonder Speaker was horrified.

Thinking quickly, Shimmer leapt over the battlements and howled as she dived towards the ground. In the few seconds that her dive lasted, she shot out two dozen essence strings that caught all of the mangled ponies with signs around their necks. Yanking them to her, she managed to catch most of them as she opened a portal to her elsewhere-den, pulling the last one in right behind her. The crowd barely had time to respond, the few armed ponies among them looking as if they had expected Shimmer to simply land and try to pick up the ponies – not disappear into a hole in reality that also vanished.

Recalling what Shimmer had said about not being able to open her den-portal anywhere other than where she herself entered it, Speaker realized that it might be a really good thing if Shimmer got some cover if she was to exit and get back into the compound.

Quickly throwing Gift into the cobble under the spot where the portal had been, Speaker had his magical clockwork chakram throw up a dirty great plume of stone-filled dust. A moment later Shimmer shot out of the cloud, amidst a hail of rocks that the mob threw at her.

Back beyond the battlement, Speaker joined Shimmer down in the courtyard as she retrieved the injured ponies from her den.

It was terrible: The ponies that Speaker had treated at the Valkhawsen medical wing, the ones that had been waiting for prosthetics, all had broken limbs… and not just the ones that Speaker had fixed. Thundermane was the worst off: Dirt had been kicked into her eye-sockets, and her frail body simply did not have the strength to handle this kind of pain anymore.

In tears, Speaker begged Thundermane to hold on: “Don’t give up on life… hang in there”

Cash found it difficult to understand why Speaker simply couldn’t heal the old mare, but as Shimmer explained: “You have to want to live in the first place… and Thundermane’s life has been leeched from her – she doesn’t have anything left to give”

Restoring Thundermane’s eyes, only to close them on the mare, Speaker looked up and gave Cash a livid glare: “Has Boribab been made compliant?”

Nodding, Cash apologized: “He has, but he only said that he too was convinced by a priest that this was the only way to prevent Lookshy from falling to anathema rule…”

“Not good enough. I want to know why Thundermane had to die. I demand satisfaction!” Speaker angrily proclaimed, stomping hard into the ground.

Looking around, between the unsure archers on the walls and the sad sight of Speaker waffling about the broken-legged ponies on the ground as he administered his anesthetic charm to them, Cash compared notes with Shimmer. According to her the quintet of unicorns had been leading five dozen demon warriors: “Sunrise sang them a cute little tune, smote the demons quite spectacularly – I took on the unicorns. I think they were expecting reinforcements, but they hadn’t bet on me and Shimmer being down there”

“What do you think their backup plan would be? Have the mob storm the place? The general staff, half of them are sorcerers and they’re all senior officers and competent warriors. I can’t imagine that there isn’t a contingency plan in place” Cash pointed out.

Baribap, appearing a bit confused for a moment, looked back towards the hole in the ground that Shimmer had burst from: “I think I know what the contingency is… maybe”

With everyone all ears, Baribap noted that the saferoom under the compound connected to tunnels that led into the port district, with one that led all the way down to the harbor: “The tunnels are usually barred and sealed, but I was instructed to have them ready to be opened from the inside… before I thought it was to have an exit ready in case the gates fell, but now… I don’t know”

“What could they bring up from the harbor district?” Cash asked, thinking furiously if he had overheard any merchants mention anything relevant, like talk of arms shipments or something.

Looking intently at Boribab, Speaker asked: “Any new residents in or around the Hexagon recently?”

The unicorn looked absolutely incredulous: “What? No. You think they would try to move mercenaries all the way around the city to get them in here? It would be painfully obvious”

“Sure, but if they said they were going to the harbor district to ship out?” Speaker proposed.

Catching on to the idea that it was relatively easy to get from the district of trade and the mercenary district known as the hexagon, down to the harbor – which honestly made sense – Cash proposed a different scenario: “Anyone can get entry into the trade district. Instead of trying use mercenary companies that have shown decades of loyalty to Lookshy, why not just sneak in an assassin from out of town?”

That was a definite possibility as well – but of course, what could the conspirators have brought in? Unicorns? Lunars? Abyssals?

“We’re making an awful lot of assumptions about the reach of the ponies who masterminded this…” Shimmer noted, pointing out that if this was indeed engineered by unicorns who’s devolution to Lookshy was so extreme that they were willing to kill its current leadership, then it really wouldn’t make that much sense to involve potential enemies of Lookshy like abyssals or even other lunars, or any other outside powers.

It was then that the hole that Shimmer had come from erupted with water. Everyone looked at the overflowing hole in the ground in disbelief and confusion, when Boribab blurted out: “Dragons… they’re drowning them!”

As Shimmer, Cash and Speaker ran t the hole Boribab explained that the door to the saferoom had enchantments that sealed it if it was pushed on from the outside, but it wasn’t watertight: “They won’t be able to get out!”

“But aren’t a couple of the Taimyo in there water-aspected? They can breathe underwater?” Cash quickly asked.

Boribab looked like he was standing on hot coals. Drowning all but one of the martial staff… now that was a tad excessive. 

“Shimmer, get to the door, if you can – get on the other side of it – then seal it with your webbing” Speaker commanded. Shimmer didn’t need to ask twice, jumping into to the water with gusto.

Cash frowned: “That won’t hold forever”

“No, but I’ll go down and try to capture whatever is creating this water. There’s probably elementals at work here, summoned elementals” Speaker stated willfully, looking at Boribab to see if the unicorn could spot the idea he had.

Boribab’s eyes lit up: “Interogate the elementals, find the summoner?”

“Exactly. The priests are behind this for sure, but catching the one that actually summoned elementals to drown the martial staff will give us a reason to officially investigate the Sohei after this” Speaker said as he jumped in, activating his elemental immunity charm.

The waters were murky and full of dirt, prompting Speaker to activate his anima. With the light of his soul showing the way, he called forth Gift and held it before him, mentally rearranging the blades on the weapon so it would pull him forward in the water.

Back on the surface Speaker’s light disappeared into the murky depths. Cash looked at Boribab: “So, why don’t we go address the crowd a little?”

> Chapter 86: Broken Magic
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The flooded tunnels were far too long for Speaker’s liking. At least the water in the tunnels wasn’t moving – though that could also mean that the saferoom where the martial staff was holed up had flooded entirely.

Finally, down by the exit to the harbor district Speaker found a trio of Brine Curs, large lion-sized dog-elementals of water with manes of kelp and strong fins instead of legs. They were funneling water up from the harbor to the tunnel, though at moment they were just holding the water in the tunnel up in the tunnel so it wouldn’t flow back.

Approaching them, the curs did not respond. Thinking for a moment, Speaker recalled that most curs weren’t any more intelligent than regular dogs – and being summoned, they were bound to their summoners. Passing out of the water and walking up next to the curs, Speaker couldn’t help but notice that there weren’t anyone questioning or stopping the elementals. This would certainly warrant investigation later.

Shouting at the curs in Old Realm, Speaker demanded to know the identity of their summoner, hoping that they were intelligent enough to know how to respond: “By mandate of heaven, I demand an answer!”

One of the curs turned to Speaker and threw him a tired look. It then moved out of the water its two brethren were funneling and faced Speaker: “We are summoned by the sorceress Jui Niang – now leave us be that we may finish our work and be free once more”

“Not happening. Stop now, or I will destroy you” Speaker said, rearing up and readying Gift for battle.

The elementals seemed either oblivious or careless in the face of such threats. Still, Speaker had the information he needed, so he threw Gift with all his might, its blades enchanted by his spirit-cutting charm. It sailed perfectly into one of the curs, ripping into its kelp mane and its green-blue flesh. The water around it quickly took on the color of elemental ichors as Speaker willed Gift to simply keep on ripping around inside the elemental until it was dead… and moments later the spirit collapsed in an explosion of kelp and water plants. 

The two other curs seemed oblivious to the destruction of their third. It was difficult to tell if the elementals didn’t care for their kin, or if the sorcerous binding that bid them flood the tunnel prevented them from reacting to outside distraction – though if that was the case, why did one of them tell of their summoner? It thusly pained Speaker to kill the two other elementals, for they were simply doing the biddings of others, not flooding the tunnels out of malice.

Once the last brine cur was cut to shreds by Gift, dissolving into the water around the floating stream of water that went from the harbor to the tunnel collapsed all together, splashing water all over the place, brine cur remains and all. From the tunnel, water also began to gush; no magical power holding it up anymore.

As Speaker watched the water pour out of the tunnel a pony trotted up to Speaker, introducing himself as an assistant to the examiner inferior of the harbor district: “So, they’re finally done refilling their wells?”

“Refilling what?” Speaker inquired, giving the uniformed pony an incredulous look.

The pony explained that earlier, just before dawn, a Sohei had summoned the three elementals and said that it was to refill certain strategic water reserves up in the residential district using the restricted tunnel access point.

“The name of this priest shouldn’t happen to be Jui Niang?” Speaker asked tentatively.

Nodding , the pony quickly found itself asked for name, rank and address – and telling these to Speaker the solar ran back into the tunnel, closing and sealing the entrance behind him. Now he had a witness and the investigation could continue!

Racing back up the damp tunnel, using his balance charm to negate the slippery and wet stone floor, Speaker hoped that Shimmer had been able to seal in enough air to save the martial staff. The death of the military leadership of Lookshy would be disastrous, and would likely allow for any goodwill that Speaker had built up to be wiped away… and Creation needed Lookshy’s help to stop the Barbate Arbiter.

It was thus with tears of joy that Speaker arrived to the hole leading up to the courtyard. A pair of very wet ponies, Shimmer and Sunrise, along with a number of other Yushoto guards and Boribab, were helping the martial staff up to the surface.

The seven members of the martial staff, including Yushoto Risotto and Karal Linseed, all looked like half-drowned rats, but they were none worse for wear and quite grateful.

Up on the courtyard Speaker was called over to Cash, who was sitting on a pillow with his head bandaged: Apparently the mob hadn’t been very talkative – and he had been struck, hard, by a rock that someone had thrown. Speaker quickly patched Cash up, then helped him over to the martial staff where the circle, Boribab and the staff conferred on what to do next.

With the Sohei name that Speaker had learned, which turned out to be the name of a unicorn mare who usually preached in the upper harbor district, the martial staff quickly issues orders to have her brought in for questioning – and officially deputized Speaker and the rest of the circle to carry it out: “Make sure to get them alive. We want answers, not corpses”

Other messengers were also dispatched to seek out reinforcements to quell the riot outside the gate.

“We’ll see about an official promotion and citizenship once this is over – I’m certain that your family here would take great pride in that” Maheka Feldspar noted, as a pair of servant ponies helped dry her off.

Speaker gave the old mare a horrified look, and let out an inchoate grunt as he gestured for the rest of the circle to join him in their hunt for Jui Niang as Risotto called for the martial staff to gather up around her and move to the battlements over the gate to address the mob.

Following Cash up to the battlements, away from the gate where the mob was assembled, Speaker stomped his hooves hard against the stone bricks as if wanting to quash the very words that had been spoken moments earlier.

Sensing Speaker’s emotional turmoil quite clearly, Cash didn’t ask anything, but Shimmer lacked that supreme finesse – plus her tribal roots had taught her to care deeply for familial ties: “Wait, you have family here in Lookshy?”

Cash quickly pulled Shimmer aside: “Perhaps, but he never mentioned them – not once – to us, and he certainly does not appear to want to speak of it. Why not let sleeping dragons lie?”

With an exasperated sigh, Shimmer skipped up to Speaker: “I’m sorry… It’s just that Lunars mainly only exalt when they have lost everything and have endured great hardships alone, but unicorns get to keep their families and be happy with them. Cash doesn’t have any living relatives that he knows of, Sunrise was an orphan… none of us have any living family, but you do – why not offer them to move to Sunhill? Share in your blessing?”

“I am dead to my family” Speaker said slowly through gritted teeth, followed by: “Never speak of them again”

Crestfallen, Shimmer lacked behind until Cash and Sunrise caught up to her. Looking at Speaker up ahead, she couldn’t help but feel that this was something she shouldn’t spoken up about at all…

Climbing, jumping and flying down on the far side of the compound, the circle went out in search of this Jui Niang priest. Their first stop was the western immaculate temple in the residential district. The circle didn’t expect the wanted priest to be there, indeed she wasn’t, but after Cash waved a hefty bribe at the young monks managing the temple outside of officially scheduled prayer sessions and gatherings, the circle was quickly let in to search the archives.

There wasn’t much information to found, outside of listings of local births and the results of cutesenara naming ceremonies, but thanks to Speaker’s investigation charms an invitation to a debate was found: “Found something! Jui Niang hosted a debate at the shrine she manages in the upper port district”

Getting to the upper port district meant dodging riot outliers. Speaker wanted to use the charm he had learned to use against mercenaries in Nexus to scatter the mob, but as Sunrise noted that would simply mean more looting and destruction elsewhere in the residential district – especially since the justicars seemed to be suspiciously missing for the time being.

“Oh it’s not just the justicars that are missing – there should have been alarms and reinforcements from all over the place. There are chains of communication that would send requests for help all over the city” Speaker exclaimed, while Cash ‘negotiated’ their passage past another  helot militia guarding this particular gate between the residential and upper port district.

The shrine that the circle sought had been among the many demolished structures that had been completely flattened by the mega-rebel earlier, but it had also been among the first things that had been rebuilt. With very nice blue-lacquered tiles and stone carvings on the outside that depicted the elemental dragon of water, patron to all sailors who adhered to the immaculate texts.

Structure-wise the shrine was but a small hut, just large enough to have a dozen or so ponies and a priest or monk inside, with the shrine proper inside appearing as a sea-shell held by a coiling water dragon, made in black jade. It was scratched up pretty badly, likely courtesy of the mega-rebel stomping on the last shrine, but was otherwise serviceable.

“Are you here for a blessing?” an old unicorn mare who was sitting on a small chair asked. She had been reading a large scroll, one likely containing immaculate proverbs and ritual instructions.

For a dragonblooded pony she was of middling breeding: Instead of fetlocks she had patches of blue-black iridescent scales, and her eyes were slitted like that of a lizard or dragon. Under more normal circumstances her draconic features would likely have been enough to put her above any suspicion. In the realm such features were thought of as signs of a pony being blessed and having supernatural spiritual purity, which usually meant that accusations of foul deeds would be a grave insult – though that only really applied to peasants and common ponies who simply didn’t know any better.

In Lookshy everyone knew better – and Jui Niang quickly picked up on the accusatory look she was getting, floating the scroll over to a rack.
“Amilar Jui Niang, You summoned Brine Curs as part of a plan to kill the martial staff. By orders of the general staff you’re to turn yourself over to us and submit to our interrogation” Speaker stated in a stern and cold voice.

The unicorn craned her neck and flicked back a strand of her curly black and blue mane: “I do not answer to anathema”

“Now listen here – you’re standing accused of conspiracy to commit murder, attempted murder and all kinds of other unsavory crimes against Lookshy, I stro-“ Cash began, only to be cut short by a furious blast of water-essence from Jui Niang’s horn.

“Shimmer, cocoon her please” Sunrise calmly asked, not even trying to move amidst the shattered pottery and torn tapestries flying all over the place as Jui Niang fired a frenzied volley of essence blasts at the circle in a rather blatant attempt to kill them.

As an essence-blast struck Sunrise head on, shredding most of her hood and the top part of her robes, Shimmer managed to catch Jui Niang with her essence-webbing and cocoon her accordingly. With that done Sunrise asked that the rest of the circle leave the shrine.

“Oh come on, I want another shot at her first – I’ll make her listen to reason” Cash suggested, but Shimmer shot him a terrible and glorious glary, her eyes and her entire body radiating with a heavenly fury that simply could not be denied.

Leaving the shrine and closing the door on their way out, the circle could only listen to Sunrise’s muffled shouts from within, and the flashes of light that came out of the keyhole and from under the door.

“Wow, sounds like she had some issues she needed to vent on someone” Cash noted.

About twenty minutes later Sunrise opened the door to the shrine. The inside of the shrine had been bleached white from overexposure to the bright sunlight of her anima – and Jui Niang… she was sitting in her chair, the tattered remains of Shimmer’s webbing hanging off her, rocking back and forth drooling as she mindlessly and quietly repeated: “Praise Celestia… Praise the dragons…” over and over.

“Damn, anything actually left of her in there?” Shimmer asked in a slightly coy tone, but with a notably worried expression. Sunrise didn’t deign to answer, instead explaining that Jui Niang had received her marching orders from a Teresu Morning Dew, another Sohei from the western residential immaculate temple.

“I’m pretty sure we walked past that on our way here” Speaker pointed out, not sure what to feel about Sunrise’s treatment of the priestess inside the shrine.

Heading back to the residential district, Shimmer remarked on just how empty most of the upper port district seemed to be as they trotted past several unattended construction sites.

“We ran into another group of ponies blocking the a gate into the residential district when we first arrived. They were all construction ponies. I’m guessing that the priests drew ponies in to form the mob from the surrounding areas” Speaker figured.

Sunrise noted that if the general populace of Lookshy had a legit fear of their general staff having been put under mind control by Speaker, then it probably wouldn’t have taken much to whip them into a riotous frenzy. Shimmer agreed: “Ponies who’re afraid are usually very easy to control, as long as you play on those fears. I’ve had more than one lynch-mob come after me on that account, simply because ponies were afraid that having a spooky Lunar anathema help them with something would damn them somehow…”

“I just hope that the messengers that the martial staff sent out come through. Don’t want to see the Yushoto compound burnt to the ground” Cash remarked as the circle passed under the same gate into the residential district they had come through an hour earlier.

As the circle moved deeper into the residential district it became apparent that the rioting had spread. Groups of several dozen ponies roaming around on their own little witch-hunts, seeking out anyone they suspected of being sympathetic to the anathema they so feared. Shimmer, Cash and Speaker had to fight down several such groups – with Cash and Shimmer having to take special care not to use lethal force on the poor misguided fools.

“Oh thank you, thank you so much – I don’t know why they attacked me…” the baker pony exclaimed, brushing himself off.

Having just knocked out the ponies that had been dragging the poor baker out of his shop, Speaker shook his head: “Cash, wasn’t it him  you bought those honey-coated rice cakes earlier?”
Indeed it was.

“Great, so every pony I’ve bought anything from here is in trouble? The nerve of these ponies” Cash snorted in a notably infuriated tone as he washed his bloody hooves off in a nearby fountain.

Making haste to the immaculate temple, the circle found it cordoned off and heavily guarded by a unit of heavy infantry and a unit of archers.
“Halt, this temple is off limits until the riots ends” a unicorn mare in full lamellar stated firmly, the glowing light of her horn showing quite clearly that she was meaning business.

Speaker stepped forth, calmly trying to explain the orders that the martial staff had given him and the circle: “We’re under orders from Taimyo Yushoto Risotto and the martial staff to find the instigators of the rioting. We have evidence that Sohei Morning Dew is involved, we’re here to bring him in for questioning”

The mare gave Speaker an indifferent and unimpressed look: “Sure, but I’m under orders to keep this place locked down, so you’ll have to look elsewhere for him”

Turning to the circle, Speaker looked at them quizzically and shrugged. Shimmer was about to step up when Cash motioned for her to stand down before addressing the officer: “Milady, we’re all here to help maintain the peace, but if you would give me a moment…”

The legionaries around her eyed Cash suspiciously with some reaching for their weapons as Cash pulled something out of his jacket: The jeweled orb that was his recorder of everlasting glories. With a hint of essence it quickly displayed a transclucent illusion of the martial staff giving the circle its marching orders. With the veracity of their plight confirmed quite convincingly, the unicorn ordered a legionnaire to check the temple and bring Morning Dew out.

Looking at the legionare galloping into the temple, Shimmer remarked: “I don’t think Morning Dew’ll come along willingly… the other Sohei we’ve tangled with so far just wanted to kill us or wreck the city”

The officer gave shimmer a very disaprooving glare at the mention of a Sohei wanting to destroy Lookshy: “Do not come here and accuse our priesthood of crimes against Lookshy – not on my watch”

“Calm down, please – what she meant was that the realm agent found to be controlling the rebel monsters had been disguised as a priest. Haven’t you heard? I thought everyone knew this” Cash quickly interjected, causing the purple-coated unicorn mare to take off her helmet.
Shaking her head and tussling her crew-cut mane, the unicorn mare gave Cash a look that was both incredulous and curious: “Wait? That was for real? I thought that was just more cougher bullshit” 

“It is, sort of. We don’t know the exact nature or allegiance of that pony, but Shimmer and Speaker here fought him just before he spawned the mega-rebel that leveled most of the upper port district – but who other than the realm would have the power and influence to pull something like that off?” Cash eloquently half-lied to the unicorn.

The legionnaire sent into the temple returned seconds later, stating that Morning Dew wasn’t there.
“Well where is he then?” The officer demanded.

The young legionnaire, a young mare half a head shorter than her commanding officer, gulped: “Sorry Taizei. The monks said that he has class at Valkhawsen until sometime this afternoon”

“Damnit, if he puts up as big a fight as Jui Niang we’ll be in trouble there – he’ll have all the weapons and sorcerous gizmos stored in Valkhawsen to use against us” Speaker said in an obviously frustrated tone.

Nodding, the mare ordered the infantry and archer talons to each split into five scales. Two scales of each were ordered to maintain the lockdown on the temple until she got back or someone else came to relieve them, while the rest she ordered to come along to help apprehend Morning Dew.

Grateful for the backup, the circle and the troops marched on Valkhawsen.

Leaving the residential district meant running into a couple of other helot militias ‘guarding’ the district gates, but against twenty times their numbers of legionnaires and archers those militias scattered the moment they saw what was coming. Upon exiting through the gates a lot of noise suddenly became apparent… the sound of riots and fighting in the streets all across the city. The massive park district, the Green Hunt, was in flames, as were many buildings throughout the city.

“Good grief… why didn’t we see or hear any of this before?” Speaker blurted out, horrified.

The unicorn officer, her face grim, scanned the surroundings for movement: “Muffler spell around the residential district, put it in five years ago. Didn’t you notice that you couldn’t hear anything from the craftspony district at night?”

Excusing himself with having retired to a place outside of Lookshy before that, but in retrospect the Yushoto compound was awfully quiet… you’d have thought the many construction sites over in the upper port district would have been more noisy.

Approaching Valkhawsen, the circle and the officer– Speaker never did get her name – was flagged down by the armigers guarding the campus. Cash quickly explaining the situation, with the unicorn officer vouching for them as well, resulting in the circle, the officer, her troops and a dozen armigers making their way towards the grand demonology auditorium.

The students and teachers made way in the halls without a second thought, though many did look a good deal relieved when the whole procession marched past them: It wasn’t entirely uncommon for sorcerer-students and professors alike to be brought in for questioning, under heavy guard, if they suspected of dabbling in forbidden magic… or worse yet: consorting with demons or other evil creatures.
“Whoa, did another realm student try to sneak a neomah lover in here?” a student quipped as the mass of troops and exalts rushed past them, though Cash didn’t seem to notice – he was more distracted by the water fountains that dotted the halls of Valkhawsen, for they were full of coins, as if they were sacrificial alters to river gods.

At the hallway that connected to the large chamber in which demonology was taught the armigers signaled for everyone to stop: “We need eyes inside – suggestions?” armiger-Taizei Spellshield stated.

Shimmer quickly turned into a fly and made her way inside, returning a few tense minutes later: “They’re barricaded themselves inside with demon slaves”

“They? How many are there?” Speaker asked, wondering who or what Morning Dew had helping him… perhaps the true architect behind the coup? Could it be Six Heavens Hunter? Maybe Morning Dew had been seduced by demons? Abyssals? Deathlord agents? Or was he just another chain in a line of patsies and pawns?

Shimmer explained that there was a dozen or students behind a spiky barricade of firmin demon resin, and one Sohei who looked like he was in charge: “…the place also reeks of demons”

“How could they know we were coming from them?” Cash wondered, looking suspiciously at the armigers and legionnaires around him.
Pointing at a water fountain down the hall: “The coins in the fountains… the coin of sorcerers always spy on you”
“That and there’s so much ambient essence here that spotting them with essence sight is damn near impossible” Speaker bemoaned, adding that it would be impossible to tell who had enchanted such a coin.

Lookshyan battle teachings would have it that attacking a fortified opponent that was supported by demon slaves, sorcery who also knew you were coming, was roughly the least desirable kind of thing you could ever find yourself faced with doing. None the less, the legion officer ordered three fangs of infantry and two fangs of archers to form up scales in attack formations at each of the wide doors that led into the chamber, the armigers dividing up into teams of three to stand among the legionnaires to lend them sorcerous protection.
The circle got the main door into the chamber. With a charm that used silent air essence the armiger-Taizei gave the countdown to breach the doors.

Bursting through, the hundred and fifty or so ponies that barged into the vast semi-circular amphitheatre-like auditorium were almost instantly assaulted by a series of deafening pulses of sorcerous sound in the form of terrible wolf howls. The legionaries and arches that all came in from the side entrances were shielded by the armigers among them and their counterspell wards which created spheres of calm silence that the howl could not penetrate.

The circle and the archers positioned behind them were similarly warded by Shimmer’s counterspell ward which she had conjured infront of the circle before they burst in, but a split second later several of the infantry and archer scales were swept away by tidal waves of water as some of the students behind the barricades summoned endless waters. It took a few seconds before armigers from the other scales were able to swat these summons with more counterspells, causing the waters to fade.

At this point the unaffected archers each loosed a volley of arrows at the barricades, but icy mists rose up among the brown resin barridades and blunted the arrows in thick coatings of ice that made the projectiles drop to the ground. Even Gift suffered this fate, though it was able to get free by adjusting its fall to break the ice when it landed on the ground, zipping back to Speaker.

There was a brief second as everyone sized up their next target. The infantry legionaries were under orders to simply screen and defend the archers behind them – for they would likely be no match to the sorcerers in close combat. It was then that from behind the barricades the students floated up yellow apple-sized crystals and tossed them out and their opponents.

A few of the armigers threw their counterspells at the crystals, but they did nothing – however, when the crystals landed at their hooves and shattered demons sprang out from the shards and began to attack them!

“They’re tossing Yasal crystals! Catch them before they hit the floor and crack!” the armiger-taizei yelled, as some of the armigers and infantry 
legionnaires struggled to fight the foul demons appearing among them.

Amidst the joyous howls of towering bloodhound demons, or the emerald fire-breath of neomah demons, the circle rushed to catch the remaining yasal crystals being tossed around. Shimmer shot webbing out to wrap the crystals in something that would cushion their fall, while Cash, Speaker and Sunrise all struggled to focus their essence to catch all the crystals being tossed to float them down gently.
“Bloody hell, how many of those things do they have?” Cash shouted, as legionaries leapt around him to catch incoming crystals.

As the archers behind him sounded off that they were ready for another volley, Speaker pointed out that there were probably dozens if not hundred more of such crystal-kept demons and spirits: “…here they’re research material – they were never meant to be used as weapons”
As an armiger managed to pop off a counterspell at the frost barrier the archers loosed another volley, which sailed overhead as Shimmer wrestled with a massive demonic lion made of jade and infernal porcelain.

“Sunrise, do the thing!” Speaker shouted as he threw Gift out to bounce back crystals so they would fall and shatter among the barricaded sorcerers.

The volleys of arrows, no longer hindered by the frostwall, came down on the sorcerers only to be stopped by a swirling wall of quartz crystal  that chopped up the arrows effortlessly. A few of the archers found this frustrating enough to call out a couple of less than polite remarks, as Sunrise held up a yasal crystal and let out a series of high pitch notes, until she settled on a tone that began to make the crystal vibrate… and then shatter – all of them.

Sunrise’s anima blazed about her like golden fire as the swarm of all kinds of demons rose behind the barricades, in the air, and all over the auditorium Sunrise quickly switched to a different kind of singing – one that smote all the demons with intense fire and holy sunlight. The deafening cacophony that the burning demons let out was almost worse than the wofl howl from earlier, but as the last of the demons were reduced to a dust-caked slime only two of the dozen or so sorcerers behind the barricade still stood – the rest having collapsed with massive third degree burns covering most of their body, as revealed by the smoldering remains of their robes – they had evidently bonded with perronele demons as means of shielding themselves.

The two remaining sorcerers began to cast once more, but Shimmer was upon them in an instant – though that simply meant that she became the first to suffer from their spells:  One of the two unicorns erupted in colorless fire that flickered with elemental hues, causing everyone who looked at her two feel a most intense burning pain in their eyes – making it pretty much impossible to aim anything at the two sorcerers or attack them. 

Shimmer fell to the ground, writhing in pain as she pawed at the three eyes of her beastpony form – for her third eye could not close…
The second sorcerer used this distraction to blast out a wave of cool mist that made almost everyone fall asleep instantly, though the circle and the few other unicorns among the armigers and the legion officer managed to remain awake – but they still couldn’t really look at the sorcerers.

Capitalizing on the reduction of active opponents, the two sorcerers began to blast their foes left and right with horrible barrages of sorcerously made razor obsidian in the form of butterlies. Most of the armigers, unable to see the attack coming and raise counterspell wards in time, were reduced to shredded flesh and chipped bones.

Fighting through the pain – mainly because she didn’t have a choice due to her unblinking third eye – Shimmer managed to counterspell the magic that made everyone’s eyes hurt – but the reprieve didn’t last long, as the sorcerers were conjuring up long sinuous fungal vines from the tiny bits of mold growing between the cracks in the floor tiles, vines that began to seek out the enemies of their makers to strangle them.
Between being blinded whenever looking at the sorcerers and now being strangled while at it, the sorcerers did… something – it really wasn’t easy to see how, but they evidently replenished their essence somehow. It shouldn’t have surprised Speaker that there would be means of quickly topping off your essence reserves at an academy of sorcery.

As the two sorcerers prepared to conjure up something else that was probably just as nasty Shimmer, working through the pain of her eyes burning and the constricting fungal vines tightening around her throat, managed to grab hold of the unicorn with the active burning eye spell… and with a series of very crunchy chews began nomming his head off. It looked roughly about as messy as it did not look tasty, but at least now everyone could see – but just as Shimmer was about to peck into the unicorn’s cracked skull the sorcerer unleashed a desperate spell, inverting his own essence in a horrible mangling of the art of sorcery, causing his essence to attain a critical concentration that resulted in a massive explosion that incinerated the sorcerer and left Shimmer in a bad shape: chared and ashen all over, including inside her mouth and throat.

The pain in his eyes fading with the sorcerer now dead, Speaker threw Gift at the final sorcerer – but the unicorn spoke a word more akin to the cry of a bird, though it was impossible to say exactly what bird, for it was the Word of Ten Thousand Birds, the word that all birds across Creation speaks when they sing, causing the unicorn to briefly transform into a flock of birds that flew off to one of the doors out of the auditorium amphitheatre among a pile of sleeping legionaries and then reformed into the unicorn. Gift of course did not really care, for its automaton nature simply make it swerve and redirect itself, swooping in for another go at the unicorn who quickly found herself without time to cast another spell… and as Gift struck her through the quartz crystal shield with its flat side, hard, the unicorn was sent tumbling down into the middle of the amphitheatre, straight into the grip of very smug and toasty Shimmer, her feathers and bone-armor still smoldering from the other sorcerer blowing himself up.

As Shimmer held the terrified unicorn with her serrated silver talons, her terrible and chared maw opened slowly to take a bite out of the mortified sorceress – but one of the few surviving armigers leapt down and slapped a set of familiar-looking orichalcum and soulsteel shackles on the unicorn… and gestured wildly for Shimmer to not to eat this one too.

With a disappointed frown Shimmer threw the shacked sorceress, collapsing on the ground as the pain of her massive burns no longer had any distractions to keep her from paying attention to it.

With the fight over the survivors rallied, with the armigers going around trying to wake the surviving sleeping legionaries up – only to find them seriously disorientated and feeling very bad, as if they had all been drugged with a powerful narcotic. Speaker didn’t bother with any of them: Of the ponies that the sorcerers and their demon slaves had killed there were none who were just injured – no half-measures had been taken – instead he rushed down into the amphitheatre to check on Shimmer who looked like burnt shit.

“You  ok?” Speaker asked, knowing damn well from his diagnostic charm that she wasn’t – though the exact level of her discomfort was first revealed when she let out a bestial whine and rolled over on her side, revealing a giant smoldering hole in her throat under her beak. Immediately giving Shimmer release from her pain in the form of his anesthetic charm, Shimmer made a less pained crooning bird-sound and seemed to fall asleep.

“Can she move?” one of the armigers asked.

Speaker gave the armiger a look that said ‘If you try to wake her up, she will likely eat you’ – the unicorn got the message, though he wasn’t happy about it: “There is class in here in two hours. She has to be out of here by then”

“Gotta give it up for Lookshyan discipline – even with half the city rioting the other half just keeps calm and carries on, no matter how heartless that seems” Cash remarked, earning some disapproving albeit groggy glares from a couple of legionnaires.

The old and thickly bearded Armiger-taizei Spellward perked up at the mention of riots, straightening out his officious white with red-trim armiger robes: “What riots? We haven’t been notified of this”

It turned out that nobody had informed Valkhawsen or the armigers guarding it of the riots in the city.

“Were the messengers from the compound meant to come by here?” Sunrise asked, her eyes still recovering from the painful burning sensation from earlier. 

Speaker looked at Spellward, who in turn shrugged: “I think whoever orchestrated this, be in Morning Dew or someone else, severely compromised our messenger-system”

“Why not just send magical messages? Why use runners? That doesn’t make sense…” Cash noted, figuring that with all the sorcerers around town it shouldn’t be that difficult to alert anyone and everyone.

Speaker tried to recall the reason, for he knew there was one, as Spellward gestured at Cash: “Lookshy’s walls, even the district walls, are warded against most forms of spirits and demons to prevent anyone from sneaking in. That includes the kind of spirit you conjure up with the messenger spell – if a Realm spy got into an arsenal and began informing the Realm of what we have…”

“Hold on, we were able to message Speaker just fine, right? You got our messages from Chung Do right?” Cash quickly reminded Speaker of.
Spellward did not look happy to hear this – and long after the whole coup and whatnot incident was over it was found that Lookshy’s spirit wards didn’t stop messenger spells sent with celestial essence. Sidereal involvement was suspected, though at that point such things was the least of their worries, but that’s for another scroll.

Leaving Shimmer to sleep off her injuries - her beastpony-form’s regenerative features already in effect – the rest of the circle and the few surviving armigers looked to interrogate the captured junior sorcerer, who in turn looked none to happy about the situation: “Release me you fools! The anathema taking over Lookshy, can’t you see!?”

“Cash, Sunrise… make him talk” Speaker requested with no small amount of anger in his voice, as he glanced at the dead ponies scattered about the auditorium and the legionnaires working on moving the bodies of their comrades away.

> Chapter 87: Unforgivable Duty
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The captured sorcerer had to be held by Speaker, Spellward and a second armiger to simply keep the unicorn stallion still, such was his frantic thrashing.

Cash sat down in front of the unicorn, silently observing the sorcerer as his robes frayed.

Speaker couldn’t tell if the guy was a senior student, a junior teacher, or just a random scholar who had happened to be studying something at Valkhawsen at the time, but as Cash remained silent the need for immediate information became all the more pressing – Morning Dew could be escaping for all they knew: “Cash, you can start asking him questions now!?”

“Oh don’t worry. With every twist and kick he’s telling me everything: Him and the others promised Morning Dew to kill us once he saw us coming – he left for his office…” Cash calmly stated, appearing more focused on watching the demon blood that had stained his heavenly silks vanish in golden puffs as his collar of dawn’s cleansing worked its magic.

The old Spellward shot Cash a look of utter disbelief as he struggled to hold on to the sorcerer: “Wha- what? Are you reading his mind or something?”

To Speaker’s knowledge then Spellward’s confusion and disbelief belied in the ‘fact’ that among unicorns then there simply was no such thing as mind-reading charms or sorcery, beyond that one heavily restricted spell that fully yanked memories out of ponies – So by that logic, then Cash shouldn’t have been able to learn anything from the sorcerer. Of course, he didn’t know of Solar charms, like the ones that grants its user a most sublime and sagacious reading of intent, be it the intent behind vicious glares, frantic thrashing or absolutely venomous threats and swearing.

Cash seemed quite well aware of this, but like Speaker had pointed out then Morning Dew might very well be escaping, so he opted not to explain how his charms worked and simply point out that so far the circle had been dead on with regard to rogue sorcerers being up to no good – and that the intelligence that had led the circle to Valkhawsen had been obtained by similar means.

“Alright, if he’s making a run for it we need to be quick. Spellward, do you know where his office is?” Sunrise asked, looking around at the doors leading out of the auditorium.

Spellward quickly led the circle to the Sohei offices nearby, all the while quizzing Cash about what else he had learned from the sorcerer. Cash happily obliged: “It seemed that our captive shared a similar worry to that of Jui Niang: Fear that anathema was secretly taking over Lookshy by mind-controlling the general staff – but you know what the really fun thing I learned was?”

“Do tell” Speaker urged.

Cash noted that from what he could tell from the sorcerer – which admittedly was limited on the specific topic since the sorcerer had quite preemptively stated that he would ignore any questions asked – was that this fear of anathema taking over had been informed by Morning Dew’s preachings, with Jui Niang similarly having acted based on the same information.

“So Morning Dew is looking like the architect behind this coup – interesting” Spellward noted, his thick bushy beard hiding a grim frown.
Speaker quickly pointed out that Morning Dew could still very well just be a go-between: “Being an immaculate priest he could just as well be acting on secret orders from the Mouth of Peace or some other foreign influence – maybe demons? I mean, usually its ponies who perform a coup who set themselves up as the new rulers, but Dew would never qualify for a martial staff position since he’s a Sohei”

“No but he could get on the civilian staff… but to your knowledge they haven’t been targeted, right?” Spellward noted, his breath ever so slightly ragged as they galloped to the Sohei offices near the campus chapel.

Cash was quick to point out that as far as he knew then that wouldn’t matter: “Don’t the martial staff appoint your civilian council members?”

“Civilian staff, but you’re right – that would be his ticket in if that’s his plan” Speaker said, hoping earnestly that Morning Dew was just another go-between or misled patsy – even entertaining the notion that this could all have been set up by a fellow born and raised Lookshyan made him sick to his stomach.

The chapel offices turned out to have nobody in. Only a fat mare sat at a front desk, as she was chapel secretary, and she cheerfully said that Morning Dew had just been by to pick up something, then left for the day, after Cash had flirted a little with her.

“Ya been a quiet day here. Master Dew only had a visitor today, an armiger was asking about some magic something – you know, business as usual really” the mare said with a giggle, batting eyelashes at Cash.

Spellward knew of no armigers sent to Morning Dew: “…but armigers are trained to operate independently. It could have been for any reason”
“Who was this armiger?” Speaker asked the secretary.

Thinking for a moment, the secretary shrugged: “No idea what her name was – but she had the most gorgeous mane, like it was washed in powdered rubies"

Cash tentatively pointed out that this description sounded a lot like Speaker’s armiger… but Speaker had already broken into a gallop towards Morning Dew’s office, fearing the worst.

Inside the office, which was plain and quite unassuming, there was little out of the ordinary for an immaculate priest: On the worn wooden desk were writing tools, inkwells and blank sheets of paper, along the walls were woefully plain bamboo filing cabinets, some bookcases and rows upon rows of neatly archived scrolls. On the few bits of wall not dedicated to storage there were beautifully caligraphied scrolls with wisdoms drawn from the immaculate texts.

Speaker quickly pointed out the scorch-mark on the floor: With essence sight there were traces of an arcane sigil. Quickly tracing it on paper, Spellward identified the ward: “The sign of essence consumed – for the ravenous fire spell…”

“I’m going to guess that this fire smokelessly burns anything away…” Cash inquired, Spellward nodding in return.

“It doesn’t burn the living – but it’s great for making corpses disappear” Spellward added grimly.

With the exact line of events leading to Ruby seeking out Morning Dew and subsequently getting killed and incinerated, the circle and Spellward could do only one thing: Keep hunting Morning Dew.

Getting Morning Dew’s home address wasn’t difficult either: A visit to the armiger archive on campus to check his file was all that took – though that did assume that Morning Dew had gone home, not run off to somewhere else…

“It’s all we got – and baring that we should return to the Yushoto compound to update the martial staff. They need all the protection they can get right now” Speaker suggested, looking from the apologetic clerk with Morning Dew’s file over at Cash, Sunrise and Spellward.

Getting to Morning Dew’s home in the eastern residential district turned out to be surprisingly easy: In this residential district there were no riots and the justicars patrolled the streets like normal… though it quickly turned out that the justicars also thought that Speaker, Cash and Sunrise were wanted in connection to a recent assassination attempt on the martial staff.

“Gee, I wonder who put that idea in their heads” Cash sarcastically quipped as a fang of five justicar ponies advanced on the circle, swords drawn.

Between Spellward vouching for them, and Cash once more using his recorder of everlasting glories to show how it was the very martial staff they were accused of trying to kill, who had sent them out to find the real culprits, the justicars at least sheathed their swords, but they were still somewhat skeptical.

Apparently the justicars had been ‘informed’ that the circle had tried to kill the martial staff during a riot in the western residential district shortly after dawn by a messenger who arrived from the Gens Yushoto Compound about an hour earlier: “The messenger just stayed long enough for a clerk at our blockhouse to copy the scroll she was carrying, before leaving for the rest of the city”

“If the message she is bringing around has been altered to blame us for the coup-attempt then the rest of the city will think we’re… aw shit” Cash groaned, not looking forward to having to explain this a million times over to ponies thinking he’d tried to kill their heads of state.

Spellward, looking disgusted by this turn of events, wondered: “Wait, so why didn’t the messenger come by Valkhawsen? If she was by here an hour ago she should have been by us as well, before you lot arrived to find Morning Dew”

“The conspirators likely think that we have fully subverted Valkhawsen, thanks to Speaker healing Headmaster Drip Crank. Why waste time trying to convince him that a friend has turned evil when the rest of city, if fooled into believing this lie, would just pressure him into accepting it as the truth after the fact?” Sunrise pointed out, eliciting a respectful nod from Cash as he agreed with her assessment.

The justicars weren’t really sure what to think. They had apparently more than once been exposed to local Gens youths falsifying recorder footage, but at the same time Spellward was vouching for the circle and saying that Morning Dew’s co-conspirators had already tried to kill them once back at Valkhawsen.

With subtle charms that ferreted out the five justicar’s preferred hobbies, as well as a charm that ever so slightly altered his behavior to fit that of a local pony, making his mannerisms and accent come off perfectly as a local Lookshyan, Cash engaged the five justicars in a conversation about duty, honor, the ways by which one might find if justice truly has been achieved, banana plantation management and zen meditation, all at once – and he did so without any of them even even consciously noticing that he had changed the topic from whether the circle should be brought in for questioning to figure this supposedly false attempted regicide charge out.

Sunrise, Speaker and Spellward wasn’t really sure what to make of it, until Cash somehow produced a little flutter of essence behind the five justicars that spelled out: “Get going you idiots – they won’t notice you leaving”

Quickly hurrying away, though doing so while trying to avoid making too much galloping noise, the three ponies arrived at one of the many gated communities that made up the nice and quiet western residential district. Beyond the gates were hundreds, if not thousands, of two or three family homes, built artfully in accordance to solid geomantic principles to yield safety and good health – ideal conditions to raise a family in.

It was in one of the smaller of these houses that Sohei Morning Dew lived alone in, occupying half of a two family home. A group of foals were playing around in the communal garden shared by the circle of homes built around it, one of which being Morning Dew’s.

“Should we evacuate the ponies here first?” Speaker quickly asked, looking at Spellward for hints of how armigers would normally handle situations like this.

Spellward shook his head: “No time – plus he’s clearly trying to escape, not make a last stand, otherwise he would have remained with his co-conspirators in the auditorium”

“I’ll herd them away from the house” Sunrise volunteered, telling Spellward and Speaker to go as she broke into a brisk trot.
Speaker took a second to see her anima light up in a particularly calming and attention-drawing light, effects afforded by her charms no doubt. He had to poke Spellward a few times to make the old unicorn look away from Sunrise: “Come on – lets go before he realizes we’re here”

“Oh he’ll know that we’re here already – catching a seasoned sorcerer off guard isn’t really possible” Spellward mused as the two approached the house.

His thoughts on whether the other half of the house had anyone home were quickly disrupted as his essence-sight told him that a lot of essence was being thrown around in the house: “He’s shaping sorcery!”

With an experienced and almost instinctive maneuver, Spellward moved up to the front door of Morning Dew’s house and reared up and pulled a hoof back, aiming to punch the door down. His horn glowed with bright white earth essence, his punching-hoof shimmering as it was wreathed in concussive force.

The punch didn’t just break the door it – it made it explode into a hail of splinters going into the house, which was quickly followed by a line that Spellward usually only used around the Valkhawsen dormitories when raiding it for forbidden magic, all the while his horn blazed with white light as it projected a counterspell ward in front of him: “Armigers! Cease all sorcerous shaping and banish anything you have summoned!”

That was also the last thing that Spellward managed to say, as beyond the door was a glowing light in which the words of a mystic koan was written – Speaker was too far to the side of the door to see the thing, so he avoided the effect of the spell, but Spellward’s mind was trapped an unable to do anything but ponder the impossible words of wisdom put before him. This also meant that Spellward dropped the counterspell ward he had been holding up in front of himself…

Thus It was while in this fugue that a brilliant saber wrought of bright flames shot out from the house, right into Spellward’s chest. Now, Speaker would have been able to save Spellward from simply being stabbed through the heart – but the sword was made of magic fire, incinerating the contents of his chest and abdomen.

Spellward instantly snapped out of his fugue from the intense shock of pain, but as his stomach bulged out from the steam and ashen gases created from his internal immolation, he barely had time to look over at Speaker and gasp before collapsing in a smoldering heap, the flaming sword tugging at his mass as it seemed to be trying to dislodge itself. Speaker quickly struck at it with Gift, augmented with his spirit-cutting charm,and the sword disappeared in a puff of burning essence…

Looking at the smoldering remains of Spellward in disbelief, Speaker turned to the doorway: “Morning Dew! By orders from the martial staff you’re charged with conspiracy to overthrow the government of Lookshy, murder, and anything I can come up with once we figure out exactly how many of the attempts on my life you’re connected to! Face me!”

From within the house the calm voice rang out – it was just tad higher pitched that Speakers, but it had that wonderful warmth one might expect to hear from a favored grandfather or wise uncle: “Calm yourself, please – and do remind yourself that duels are illegal in Lookshy”

Speaker seethed with rage. Looking at the blue-grey stone brick walls of the house, the alchemically treated timbers visible under the shingled roof and a few other places on the house Speaker deduced the structural weaknesses of the building in a matter of seconds – and then applied his disassembly charm, bringing the entire half of the structure down in a giant plume of dust that gushed out to cover the area in a grey haze that was painful to breath and keep your eyes open in, unless you had an elemental immunity charms.

Whatever Morning Dew had been doing had clearly been interrupted. The muttered swearing that came from the pile of rubble that Morning Dew began to emerge from certainly seemed to indicate that Morning Dew was upset.

“Calm your, please – aren’t priests supposed to set a good moral example to other ponies? Swearing doesn’t fit that” Speaker spitefully remarked in the general direction of the swearing, though he couldn’t quite see the unicorn yet.

Morning Dew didn’t dignify Speaker’s comment with a reply, instead a giant hound wrought of magic wind leapt from the ruble and attacked Speaker, who had no means of dispelling such a conjured creature – though with Gift he was able to fight it, but the damned thing was a lot tougher than a being made of up enchanted wind had any business being so hurting was surprisingly difficult.

As Speaker fought the hound of five winds he knew that he needed to end the fight quickly: Every moment given to Morning Dew could result in some terrible spell unleashed on him – and without Spellward or Shimmer he had no means to protect himself against such things. In the first age the Solar host, faced with similar challenges against the reality-twisting powers of the primordials, deviced a martial technique Speaker remembered as that of the Spellshattering Hoof technique, but for the love of it he could not remember how that charm worked.

Of course, the hound was a conjured being – not a real one – so if Morning Dew could be defeated, then he could be forced to terminate whatever essence the unicorn was using to maintain the hound. To this end Speaker adopted a defensive strategy against the hound, using his jumping charm to leap around the ruble as a means to avoid it – and then swat it aside forcefully whenever it would get close – all the while looking for Morning Dew who seemed to be manipulating the air around him to cloud himself in dust from the collapsed house.

The hound, fast as the winds it was made of, was easily able to keep up with Speaker as he leapt around – and at the same time its primitive and instinct-based attack patterns made it easy to handle, wrestling it aside when he would land and then jump away again. No doubt a less mobile Solar would have had to face the hound on more directly, but Speaker opted for the path with less resistance, seeking the true threat instead.

Morning Dew, having extracted himself from the ruble, now found that the dust that gave him cover also prevented him from killing the Solar who had brought his house down around him. Calling on elemental winds Morning Dew drew the dust down the ground quite suddenly, giving Speaker a very good look of the unicorn.

Tall and very gaunt, Morning Dew was clad in slightly torn and dusty immaculate monk robes. His coat was plain light brown, as was his horn, with the only hints his dragonblooded nature being the slight aquamarine highlights in his otherwise black mustache and goatee. His mane was shaved off, as was the norm for immaculate monks, though the one thing that really stood out to Speaker was an ugly scar that ran up the bottom part of Morning Dew’s throat, the rest of which was covered up by his monk robes. All in all Morning Dew did not look very impressive for a dragonblooded pony: No draconic features at all, with even his green eyes weren’t slitted, no bits of him covered in scales, nothing.

Speaker landed not far from Morning Dew, having thrown Gift so that it would hit the hound just before it could bite him – impacting the magical wolf-beast in a way that it was flung about twenty-something yards away, impaled partially on a broken wooden beam, leaving the creature squirming to free itself so it could keep hunting its designated pony quarry.

“Who put you up to this? Six Heavens Hunter? Did you listen a little too closely to a demon you had summoned? Why? Why try to get the martial staff drowned?” Speaker demanded, his expression livid and his body taught and ready to fight at a moments notice.

The priest beheld Speaker intently. Cash or Sully might well have been able to make all kinds of curious observations on the exact meaning and implications of Morning Dew’s furious gaze, but such was not among Speaker’s abilities. What Speaker did react to was the unicorn’s horn lighting up with a grey and silvery haze as essence and reality was shaped into a new sorcerous pattern – Gift was sent, striking the pony with force just like that of the impact on the hound, meant to send the pony flying… but Gift passed right through the pony!

“An illusion? Come and fight me like an honorable pony!” Speaker shouted, Gift zipping back to his right hoof.

It was a slight rattling sound that made Speaker look to his left, and it was Gift’s primordial nature that made it respond preemptively, it zipping up to parry the spinning length of conjured metal chain that seemed to trail off in an edge of sorcerous nothing that Morning Dew had just shot at him.

There stood the real Morning Dew, his flesh magically transformed into bronze – causing Gift to harmlessly bounce off him as Speaker threw it with great force.

The pathetic whines from the conjured hound of five winds terminated abruptly as Morning Dew recalled the essence bound to keeping the beast’s form coherent – Morning Dew had better things to use that effect than let it wasted on a impaled on broken wooden beams.

“Just tell me damnit. Who put you up to this?” Speaker implored, wanting nothing else than to hear Morning Dew pass the blame to a deathlord, or the realm, or something else – anything. To countenance the idea that Morning Dew was the mastermind behind this… it simply couldn’t be.

The priest, about as tall as Speaker, but gaunt and slim to the point that his limbs seemed to be more bone and sinew than muscle, merely shook his head: “Show some respect anathema. I have merely followed protocol for when an enemy of Lookshy compromises the general staff. You should be the one brought up on charges for consorting with dark powers, to gain the healing abilities you have acquired”

It was difficult for Speaker to comprehend what he was hearing: “So… you really don’t think you did anything wrong? Arranging my assassination to lure the martial staff into a trap? Getting Yushoto Boribap to trap the martial staff? Getting Jui Niang to summon brine curs to drown the martial staff? Just how many Lookshyan ponies have died from the results of your actions?”

“This is Lookshy. To die for the greater good of this glorious city-state is the greatest honor any of us can aspire to” Morning Dew stated plainly, with great conviction.

The image of Thundermane with her eyes gouged out flashed before Speaker’s eyes: “Does that include the mob at the Yushoto compound that gouged the eyes out of a retired Gunzosha veteran because I cured her cateracts? Or the ponies who’s limbs they broke because I had given them an alternative to being fitted a prosthetic when they had been amputees?”

With a derisive smirk and a slight huff Morning Dew craned his neck: “Like the general staff then you corrupted these ponies. The gifts you gave them were obviously tainted. To let them keep and display such mockeries would have been sin”

“And Ruby? My armiger? Those two  Just how quick are you judge a pony not fit to live?” Speaker shouted furiously with tears in his eyes.

The priest stood unphased and unimpressed: “Do I need to repeat myself? Has your infernal dealings addled your senses? It is sin to let the tainted live - even more so fail killing tainted”

At this point Speaker was quite ready to stop talking and start fighting – he had heard more than enough. As much as it pained him to accept that it genuinely sounded as if Morning Dew had somehow masterminded this, then he had to take action… only problem was that Speaker knew that he couldn’t make a dent in Morning Dew because of that bronze flesh spell he had on – and it appeared as Morning Dew was well aware of this, as he shot Speaker another derisive snort and began clearing away debris, likely to resume whatever Speaker had interrupted by crashing the house down.

“You seem upset. Kindly spare Lookshy any further embarrassment – of all the anathema I’ve helped kill you’re by far the most oblivious” Morning Dew continued, his horn glowing with bright blue light and sparkles.

One quick flick of Gift later and Morning Dew was flying about twenty-some yards up in the air – and then he remained hanging up there, floating helplessly.

“I might not be able to hurt you – but I can sure as hell prevent you from escap-“ Speaker barely managed to say before having to leap out of the way from the brilliant eagly of diamond and ruby fire that launched itself from Morning Dew’s blazing horn, exploding with a furious shriek that lit most of the ruined house around that spot on fire.

Throwing gift and using the technique he had deduced while buried in neomah demons to make it keep attacking on its own, along with augmenting it the force-imparting charm that let Gift’s attack throw struck targets around, Speaker called his singing staff to himself.

Morning Dew, floating up in the air, quickly found himself battered around – no longer floating, but instead being bounced around by Gift striking him like a foal running around keep a ball up in the air. This kept him unable to shape up any new sorcerous attacks, while Speaker used his singing staff to draw in stone from the bricks of the rubble to make a big ‘ol nasty spike.

Speaker followed this up with giving new orders to Gift: Instead of bouncing Morning Dew around randomly, bounce him upwards quite a bit… which Gift did, sending Morning Dew well over a hundred yards up into the air. Finally, Speaker had Gift do the opposite: Slam Morning Dew down again and then return to Speaker, the unicorn quickly reaching terminal velocity…  down towards the spike.

Even with his flesh enchanted and magically fortified, then falling at terminal velocity and just upon impact being struck again by Gift in a brilliant flash of golden light – its strike augmented by the Linear Flight Principle, as known to Speaker via his strange mechanically inspired martial art, was far more than Morning Dew could hope to survive…

> Chapter 88: Excuses
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

A key part of special forces training is the art of deception. For example grunts can and will always be taught to march in locked step – but for the special forces, a discordant and non-rythmic trot is taught, to better mask their numbers. In many other ways Speaker had learned at least the basics when it came to face a foe with seemingly impenetrable defenses: You trap your foe in a situation where their defences do them no good, or even work to their detriment.

For Morning Dew, then Speaker had felt great weight when he had tossed the unicorn up into the air – the unicorn’s weight reflected the fact that his flesh was made magical bronze. Exploiting this, Speaker had played a deceptive tune with his singing staff, employing a deceptive cadence. This had created a hollow spike to draw Morning Dew’s attention and defenses, but had also hollowed out the ground under the spike.

Just before impact with the spike, Morning Dew put a desperate shield spell – though casting anything while tumbling through the air was quite difficult – and at first the spell seemed to work, as the spike seemed to crumble and yield as he fell down at it.

For Speaker, seeing the weak shield plowing through the hollow spike would mean that Morning Dew wouldn’t get as stuck in the ruble as his plan required – but there was a simple solution: Throwing Gift, Speaker forced Morning Dew to direct his defenses elsewhere, lest he be thrown around once more by Gift's impact – or at that was at least the implied threat that Speaker wanted Morning Dew to react on.

His shield diverted, the crumbling stone spike was now crushed against Morning Dew’s very bronze flesh, his humble immaculate robes ripping and tearing as they were put between the rocks and the hard place that was Morning Dew’s ensorcelled body.

It all happened in but a few seconds, but Morning Dew plowed down through the spike without deviation, slamming into the ground hard a bit slower than terminal velocity due to the hollow spike having broken part of his fall – but then again the ground was hollowed out as well to give way, absorbing much of the remainder of his fall… but also burying the priest quite effectively.

Speaker hurried to bring about his singing staff to properly encase Morning Dew, liquefying the rock around the unicorn and then hardening it, so that he would be properly stuck – and of course moving his stuck body up so that his head was the only thing above ground…

This didn’t go exactly as planned: From the debris the giant clawed limb of a wood dragon sprouted, flailing wildly as Morning Dew tried to pull himself up by his enchanted forelimb. Racing against time as Morning Dew began to haul himself out of the debris, Speaker hastily played his singing staff to flow rock up to encase the unicorn – but there were limits to how much rock the singing staff could move that quickly, so this strategy quickly failed.

The limit for moving around dirt though, was less so – and thus Speaker was able to pile dirt on Morning Dew until he ran out of breath, passing out from suffocation.

The instant Morning Dew relinquished his struggle and consciousness Speaker double-checked with his medical charms: It could be a ruse – but no, he was passed out inside the mound of tightly compacted dirt around him.

Using his singing staff to extract Morning Dew and ensure that he would be able to wake up again, Speaker searched Spellward’s remains for a pair of those magical shackles… he didn’t have any. This presented a bit of an issue: How to prevent Morning Dew from trying to escape once he woke up again?

Looking around at the rubble of the now utterly wrecked house – it no longer merely a pile of rubble, tile and timbers from a demolished house, but now most of it was on fire as well. Spotting some cast iron cookwear, Speaker used his crafting charms to refashions bits and bobs from the rubble into a suitably escape-proof getup that he fitted onto Morning Dew. This wasn’t particularly difficult: Morning Dew had apparently never been one for physical strength – so him breaking out of these shackles wasn’t going to happen any time soon and the helmet Speaker fashioned out of ablative layers of spun ceramic and bronze fibers should keep Morning Dew from being able to use his horn without first having to slowly work through the thing.

As the last of the dust settled Sunrise approached, a dozen or so foals too young for school following her: “Is it over?”

“No… there’s still figuring out how the hell Morning Dew managed to pull this off”

The foals were shocked to see Morning Dew, their friendly neighborhood priest, tied up with metal and… dinner plates? Speaker began to play his singing staff to move earth over the burning rubble, to prevent the fire from spreading, Sunrise began to sing along to the mournful tone as each flame was reduced to an ember, only to be fully smothered by fresh cold dirt. This display of strange magical powers and song was more than enough to distract the foals, causing them to simply sit down and enjoy the show.

Once done, his singing staff stored elsewhere, Speaker remarked that he was both surprised and happy that Sunrise could remember that particular tune: “I don’t even remember what name the song has… I just remembered that it was good for putting out fires, but it sure was pretty”

“Dying Light, I believe it was called” Sunrise said with a smile.

Speaker found it difficult to return the gesture, as he looked at the corpse of Spellward – which he had strategically obscured with a thin shell of rock to avoid the foals freaking out over it: “If only Lookshy was that pretty now”

“I’m sure the damages can be fixed, and the dead put to rest honorably” Sunrise said in a comforting tone.

Shaking his head, Speaker felt tired: “The Lookshy I remember from my youth is dead. No, it never existed. It’s ugly and full of ponies both full of themselves and too prideful to see crap like this coming”

“You make it sound as if Lookshy is beyond repair. Why not work to better it, to make it into that idealized version you have in your mind?” Sunrise said, evidently able to still see a positive outcome of the situation.

Taking a deep breath and turning to Sunrise, who’s very shining caste mark seemed to radiate a calming aura, Speaker nodded: “Alright. But like I said, then this is far from over… there are probably still a lot of ponies out there who believe the lies that Morning Dew spread. We’ll need to steel ourselves and be vigilant”

Indeed, over the next few days, as several priests turned themselves in after whatever charms Morning Dew had put on them to talk them into instigating the riots, an official investigation was launched.

A second parallel investigation was also launched, led by Speaker and the circle, on the condition that they relay any findings to the martial staff – so they could compare the results with the official investigation.

“Unofficially…” Yushoto Risotto groaned from her sickbed: “…then we have no fucking clue who was in on this with Morning Dew. He clearly disrupted the intercity messengers, the justicars, somehow made the garrisons around the city and in the port citadel not respond. Hell, the entire barracks district had been vacated on bogus orders for an exercise just south of the city! I want to know how that little shit pulled this off!”

For the circle’s investigation Sunrise probed the remaining Sohei. Many of them had already come forth and admitted that they had, on Morning Dew’s orders, instigated riots – but there was a very plain reason for this: Being immaculate priests they had all been trained at Passiap’s Stairs, the grand temple of the immaculate dragons on the Blessed Isle. Indeed, they were all native to the Blessed Isle and the realm, freely (and in more than one case proudly and defiantly) admitting that they had thought that this had been an attempt to install a realm-friendly theocracy to rule the city. Clearly they had been deceived as much as everyone else – though they weren’t escaping punishment either, being banished from Lookshy and all Lookshy-friendly territories, and being put on the first ship back to the Blessed Isle.
Meanwhile the official investigation floundered: False orders had seemingly come from no-where, many claiming to have received them via magical messengers which weren’t possible to trace, and the messengers who had delivered false information claimed to merely have delivered what had been given to them – at least according to the official investigation. Justicars and garrison commanders similarly excused themselves with having acted in good faith and on orders they had not seen reason to doubt or question.

The overall mood in the city was approaching ciritical mass: The martial staff had ordered all but the most agregrious rioters pardoned, but those still under arrest were passing their blame to the priests – who had already passed their blame again. The ponies of Lookshy wanted someone to blame: Those who had been loyal to the martial staff throughout the ordeal wanted all responsible punished, while those still not convinced of the general staff being of free will clamored for more conclusive evidence or full pardons to everyone – fights were breaking out everywhere, and the justicars were having trouble keeping the peace, especially as among the justicars opinions and loyalties were evidently just as divided… there just wasn’t any conclusive pattern as to why.

It was Cash Charmer’s investigation into Morning Dew’s that revealed the actual way that the coup had been set up – or at least how Morning Dew had gained the ear of so many co-conspirators: Initially upon review of Morning Dew’s destroyed household – especially after Speaker, at Cash’s request, used his charms to fully restore the place – Cash concluded that there was a big discrepancy in Morning Dew’s home and humble lifestyle, compared to how muc h money the Seventh Legion was paying him.

Apparently then his knowledge of restricted sorcery, including demon summoning, as well as other spells and charms that aided in general spirit management, meant that Morning Dew had been one of Lookshy’s chief exorcists as well as an often used consultant to the Operations Directorate when it came to dealing with spirits and gods – and all of that had meant that Morning Dew had been paid quite handsomely.

Tracking all that money on the other hand, that was rather difficult: The Legion Bank wasn’t particularly cooperative when it came to giving Cash access to Morning Dew’s financial records – even with Cash’s authorization from the martial staff – enough ponies in Lookshy knew that Cash was a Solar just like Speaker that few would willingly deal with him, for all that most ponies knew were the rumors of Speaker and his circle being connected somehow to the coup and assassination attempt on the martial staff. It of course didn’t help that the ponies still either loyal or just siding with Morning Dew kept those rumors alive and flourishing.

Despite all that, then Morning Dew’s payment records pointed to several secondary schools, dojos and salons in the district of schools. Poking around at them revealed an interesting fact: Morning Dew was currently paying for about seven dozen ponies who were taking classes or otherwise receiving tutelage there.

“So… he’s being charitable with his money? He’s a priest, aren’t they all supposed to do that?” Sunrise said as an offhand remark. Having spent several days trying to talk her way into Lookshy’s most religious communities had evidently tired her.

Whirling up a small tornado of documents with his essence, frayed scrolls and ledgers Cash sought out older records from the same district connected to Morning Dew. With a zen-like precision Cash snatched a worn book out of the whirl, letting the rest settle down again on the large table before him.

Speaker shot Cash a curious glance from across the room, sitting in a nice recliner by a large window overlooking the small garden in front of the town house the circle had rented in Speakers name, now that he had been ‘promoted’ to citizen: “Anything interesting”

“Yes, I think I finally got it… sort of – Dew didn’t leave nearly as much of a papertrail as I would have liked” Cash grumbled, deep furrows having spread over his forehead, the locks of his mane only partially obscuring them.

The circle assembled around Cash, as he presented his findings: “Ok, so he did his ‘charity’ thing, right? Well, he didn’t write to what he gave to, only how much…”

Pointing to the worn ledger he had picked out of the while moments earlier, Cash continued: “This is a list of fees from the Legion Bank. Delivery fees for bringing around money – though they don’t say what the money is from. These documents over here, financial records from the few dojos and salons that still had records with his name on it, match those sums, as payment for lessons that other ponies received. That’s how he pulled this off!”

Speaker looked at Cash incredulously: “So… his charity was paying for training and remedial schooling to various ponies?”
Shimmer and Sunrise couldn’t see the big picture either.

Cash pointed intently to the bank ledger: “There are records here dating back almost a hundred years with his name on it for this stuff – similar sums when adjusted for inflation, delivered once a month for periods for either a few seasons at a time to some being paid for years. Speaker, you tell me who takes this kind of classes..”

Skimming over the salon and dojo financial records for payments from Morning Dew, Speak used a charm to quickly absorb the knowledge in them: “This pattern… it’s hard to tell, but advanced mixed unit tactics, entry level magical martial arts, logistics and management… they’re never being taken at the same time, but if you combine all of these then this is the kind of stuff you learn when you start in the officer academy, but he’s also paid for lessons in arcane science, applied thaumaturgy and alchemy… that’s for sorcery students”

Looking around at the rest of the circle, seeing that the dinar hadn’t quite dropped yet, Cash explained: “So, when a young officer-in-the-making, or sorcerer-student comes to a priest, seeking help due to stress because she’s failing classes… the helpful priest offers to pay for extra tutoring, free of charge – or perhaps in exchange for a future favor?”

“Wait… he’s been doing that for almost a hundred years? Just how many officers in the Seventh Legion owe their career to him?” Speaker blurted out, horrified of the implication of this realization.

Cash shrugged: “No clue – a lot of the masters that have run the dojos and salons in the District of Schools take their records with them when they retire. I only have a patchwork of records, but more than enough to establish a pattern of this kind of ‘charity’, plus the bank’s records are spotless”

“He doesn’t help everybody” Sunrise noted, adding that of what little she was able to get out of the other immaculate priests, then Morning Dew would often turn hopeful charity-cases away… the other priests would refer those in need to him, but they said he was always a stern judge of character”

Shimmer chortled derisively: “Sure – he’s been cherry-picking who gets to become an officer, seeding the legion with ponies in dept to him”
“Correct – also, you’re still drooling” Cash quickly pointed out.

Wiping her mouth, Shimmer tried to smile – but it wasn’t easy: Having a sorcerer blow up in her unarmored mouth had left her severely burnt and now quite numb. Speaker had done what he could, but Shimmer’s body and soul needed time to regenerate from such massive trauma.

With more or less conclusive evidence on how Morning Dew had been able to influence young sorcerers and legion officers, the only big question was what to do with those very ponies. Due to the lack of records from many of the dojos and salons it would be impossible to track everyone who benefited from Morning Dew’s help…

“That would only be an issue if all the ponies the priest helped weren’t still loyal to Lookshy” a familiar voice said out of nowhere.

Everyone looked around in confusion. Had the Security Directorate sent an agent to spy on them? Was it Heath Rose? The voice was difficult to pin down… but as the illusion veiling the pony who had spoken receded the circle rejoiced.

Before the circle stood a brown and mottled grey-coated pony clad in a fine white uniform. Holstered on his left was a white jade rollin pin, on his right a cleaver of gleaming orichalcum and on his head an angular segmented orichalcum mask encasing his entire head.

“Sully!” the circle erupted.

Detaching his helmet, revealing his horribly burnt and somewhat melty-looking face, Sullen Hoof asked that the circle keep going.

“Uhm… ok – so what did you mean with the ponies and being loyal to Lookshy” Cash asked tentatively, barely able to hold back his joy at the thought of soon being able to try Sully’s sublime cooking.

The night caste Solar explained that for the last few days his observations and profiling charms had told him that Morning Dew’s work wasn’t really malicious: “The ponies he picked to help were ones he judged to be the most selfless, the ones most willing to put their loyalty to Lookshy  as a whole above themselves. Sure, he played on that same loyalty to convince those ponies that the rulers here needed to go, but he did it all for Lookshy… in that sense his intentions were quite benign – it was you lot showing up and wooing the martial staff that made him feel that he had to take action, lest Lookshy fall from the grace of the dragons”

“So… are you’re implying that the ponies he helped aren’t a threat? Are you kidding? Did you see what they did here?” Shimmer blurted out, her numb mouth making her words sound a tad drunk.

Elaborating, Sully noted that with Morning Dew busted the debts owed him would effectively be forfeit: “That way your problem solves itself”
“Maybe… it’ll need to be combined with a public awareness campaign targeting legion officers and Lookshy’s sorcerers, simply to make them aware that they owe Morning Dew nothing and that they should report anyone trying to exploit them like that in the future” Speaker added.
Cash looked impressed at Speaker’s suggestion, nodding: “I’ll add that in our report. I’m sure the martial staff will love to see this”

Later that evening, as helot work crews swept the streets of the last bits of trash and debris from the riots, the circle celebrated Sully’s return at the Yushoto compound. Risotto, Boribap and everyone else who got to try Sully’s cooking for the first time wept tears of while, while the compound cook staff prostrated themselves before Sullen Hoof, begging to learn the secrets of his culinary arts.

Later on after dinner Sully regaled the circle with stories of his adventures in the underworld. They were grand, filled with danger, lies, epic adventures, daring assassinations of Deathlord minions and intense duels with Abyssal Deathknights… but that’s for a different scroll of Exalted ponies.

Over the next week Lookshy recovered from the riots, and quiet inquiries were made regarding who had received what kind of help from Morning Dew – and rumors quickly spread that officers and sorcerers who refused to step forward and admit such themselves would be barred from future promotions if discovered to be hiding such things. For what was obviously completely unrelated reasons, about five dozen high ranking legion officers and five legion sorcerers resigned their commissions in this period as well, with no questions about why being asked officially.

During the same period the martial staff was given the circle’s report on the Deathlords and their activities, Sullen Hoof having learned quite a lot while in and around Stygia. This led to the fateful meeting that Cash had originally requested, the plan being for the circle to petition the Seventh Legion to aid in destroying Deep Rot.

The council chambers were dimly lit, with thick curtains drawn to keep prying eyes out. Glowing wards of privacy prevented magical scrying were set on the walls, and the martial staff as a whole appeared skeptical.

“And this information on Deep Rot is up to date?” Taimyo Maheka Feldspar wondered, her face clearly displaying her dislike of the idea of any kind of military action in the underworld.

Sullen Hoof’s intelligence on Deep Rot had been compiled just days before he had left for Creation. According to him then the Barbate Arbiter was maybe six or seven months from completing the final design calculations of the Eschaton Key – and to make matters worse, then once they were done then the actual making of the key would only be a matter of days.

“…and then what? I read your report, but do you honestly expect us believe that some gizmo made in the underworld can doom all of Creation?” Taimyo Karal Linseed inquired, knowing plenty about the most advanced magical weapons currently available in Creation as she was the commander of Lookshy’s special forces – but a thing that would make the sun explode? That was too implausible for her.

“We understand your apprehension, but we have several individuals prepared who would speak to the truth of our claims” Cash explained, Speaking earnestly.

The unicorns looked curiously at the circle in anticipation of who they would call in, as the circle yielded the floor…

At first there was a swirl of dust, then several sets of funeral garbs materialized along with spectral ravens sitting on the shouters of the garbs that caved wildly. Such was the complete coverage of the funerary robes and veils that they completely obscured the nature of the being inside – if there even was anything – for the being quickly announced its presence, the spectral ravens falling silent: “I am Hran-Tzu, The Raven King, god of Decay. The ponies who stand before you are righteous and has through my authority in Yu-Shan been charged with combating the scourge of the undead, for it is an affront to my part in the eternal cycle of reincarnation. I have vetted the information they have gathered and found it true through my own heavenly agents. To this end I demand that you assist these Solars in their ambition to put an end to Deep Rot”

The god thus from view again before anyone could get an wor din edge-wise, leaving only dust and echoes of caving ravens.

The martial staff looked… suitably shocked. To be visited by a celestial divinity… few unicorns would even dare dream of such an honor. Though because of this surprise the impact of what the circle had lined up next was somewhat lessened.

Stepping forth from the immaterial, clad in moonsilver-laced black jade armor so magical and divine that it was truly difficult to see where the armor ended and the star-studded night-flesh that the goddess within the armor was wrought of began.

Hushed whispers broke out throughout the room, both among the armigers at the door and the martial staff, for this was Tien Yiu – goddess of Lookshy.

With a metallic mane of silver, gleaming like a thousand spear-tips, and pale green eyes, Tien Yu spoke softly with a whisper: “Lookshy’s fate is dear to me – and I can say only this: As all things must eventually come to an end, so must Lookshy one day…”

There were worried murmurs among the martial staff as Tien Yu seemingly paused to let the gravity of her statement sink in.
“…but if this Deathlord’s work is terminated, and the daystar remains as is, then Lookshy will stand for the time being. If not, then Lookshy will not see its next calibration” the goddess prophesized.

For the next minute few minutes, one could have heard a pin drop, such was the eerie silence as Tien Yu faded to return to her godly duties, manging the spiritual nature of Lookshy.

“Did we mention that Deep Rot is fueled by kidnapped ponies who’s brains and eyes are put into jars there? Thousands upon thousands of them?” Cash finally added, trying to add outrage to the shock of this prophecy of doom.

Taimyo Karal Linseed nodded: “You did, though personally I find your claim that this Deep Rot installation is aiding The Mask of Winters more interesting”

Sunrise bowed her head in a very slow nod: “Indeed. We have been told by underworld sources and survivors of the process, that most ghosts that form here in the east are initially captured by the Mask of Winters and interrogated. Of course, such a vast operation generates thousands of knowledge reports, many of them useless. These documents are fed to Deep Rot, using its many minds to sift through the information and generate useful intelligence reports. Destroying Deep Rot would thus also greatly impede his operations”

It was no secret that Lookshy – and the rest of Creation – was a lot more worried about the Mask of Winters than any other Deathlord, mainly because to most then the Mask of Winters was the only Deathlord known to exist. For Lookshy, being so close to Thorns, then worries about what this lord of the undead would do next after having conquered lands so close to them, were a lot more pressing than that of strange machinasions by unknown entitites further afield… though distance-wise, then Deep Rot was actually closer to Lookshy than Thorns – but Deep Rot was purely set in the underworld, while Thorns still existed in Creation, albeit as a shadowland.

Ultimately the martial staff asked for time to deliberate. They made it clear that circle had presented a frightful case that would require the weighing of quite a lot of pros and cons.

Outside the council chambers, as the circle waited, there was a continuous stampede of messengers going to and fro, as intelligence reports, arsenal inventory ledgers and the likes were being called into the council chambers. At one point Boribap, acting as aid to Risotto, popped out – he looked frazzled.

“How’s it going in there” Speaker asked hopefully from the bench he was sitting on.

The unicorn wiped his brow, his pale green military style short-cropped mane looking as if it was ready to wilt, with his green uniform being just about the only thing on him that looked proper: “Look, I can’t talk about that just yet – they’re still…”

Cash shot Boribap a brief look that wordlessly communicated: “You know that we know how you were complicit in Morning Dew’s coup”
After a nervous shiver, Boribap complied: “…it’s the salt. We can’t tell if it’ll be possible to get enough salt to secure ourselves while in the underworld”

“That doesn’t make any sense – Creation’s biggest salt producer is just at the other end of the river of tears from Lookshy. You can get enough salt there to drown out every shadowland in Creation if you wanted!” Cash admonished, rejecting the notion that such a petty hindrance should hinder the Seventh Legion.

Boribap groaned and rubbed his eyes: “Look, our latest reports from the north say that the Bull made a move on the Saltispire league. The guild’s reports say the same. There have been no salt-barges coming down the river of tears for well over a month”

“Hold on – you’re saying this a recent development? Because to our knowlegde the Bull has held the biggest city of the saltspire league for well over a year at this point” Speaker said, recalling that back when the circle had asked the Bull for help with their little mind-controlling Deathknight issue he had mentioned Plenilune and some assassins causing trouble or something.

It didn’t appear to surprise Boribap that much that the circle knew well of the Bull, but sadly he knew little beyond what he had already said.
“Very well. Is that the only big hang-up the martial staff has about committing to this?” Sunrise asked from out under her hood.
Thinking for a moment, Boribap noted: “More or less. They’re of course talking about potential losses and how much this operation will reduce Lookshy’s overall arsenal, but they seemed fairly optimistic about that – but I think they’ll want to work those details out with you directly once they’re-”

There was a knock on the door. Boribap sighed: “Ok, they want me back – they’ll probably call you in shortly”
Indeed, a few hours later the circle and the martial staff had worked out a deal, of a sort: The main issue was indeed getting enough salt to secure the path back to the Mourning Fields shadowland, as well as to secure whatever siege-camp that might be necessary to set up around Deep Rot.

Regarding this salt issue the circle promised to travel north and confer with the Bull and restore the salt supply. If this was done expediently, then the martial staff promised swore – though not in any capacity that Cash was allowed to sanctify – to commit the first first and third field force to the assault on Deep Rot, though they also judged based on the circle’s report that if the other Deathlords, the Mask of Winters in particular, were so invested in the continued aid of Deep Rot to their operations, then they would likely intervene and assist as well, to which end the second field would also need to be on stand-by to intercept any.

Now, this massive committal of forces would mean that it would take a while to retrieve and ready them all, to which end an excuse was needed as explained by Taimyo Linseed: “Activating three legions at once is rarely done – I don’t even remember we last rounded up two legions here at once… it will be obvious to anyone that we’ll be gearing up for something big – we will need a plausible reason to bring this many forces to Lookshy”

Risotto, looking sly, inquired: “When was the last time the Lookshy Games were held?” 

As far as Speaker could remember, then the last time the games were held was about four years prior to Thorn’s trying to invade the scavenger lands – and that was about fifteen years ago…

For Lookshy, the games was a grand sport and cultural event where contenders from all over Creation could come and compete, provided that one could qualify. For obvious reasons the games had a strong martial bent, with quite a few fighting tournaments in all maner of disciplines, as well as spectacular war-games where contenders in the games would lead Lookshyan troops in mock battles. The only catch was that Lookshy only held these games in times of – relative to the hundred kingdoms – peace, so if the Intelligence Directorate warned that the Realm was marshalling its legions for an invasion, or if a large gathering of barbarian tribes were raiding up from the far south-east, then there would be nice games.

Most Lookshyan ponies considered themselves lucky if they got to see more than two of such events in their lifetimes – this would be Speaker’s third.

Another common and popular feature of the games would be the many parades and public demonstration of first age weapons – this would be used to veil the activation of the first and third legion to combat readiness. The second field force was already stationed at Lookshy, as it usually was, doing exercises and waiting for dispatch orders, it being Lookshy’s primary frontline field force – and since Lookshy wasn’t at war with anyone at the moment... officially… then it was simply waiting for something happen.

There were of course millions of other things that would need to be set up. Food and water supplies that wouldn’t spoil when taken into the underworld would have be arranged – no small feat by any standard – and inventory of the Seventh Legion’s hearthstone supply would also be needed, since only the abyssal exalted could respire essence in the underworld, less all the unicorns in the forces going to Deep Rot run out of essence to power their charms, which would be bad in so many ways.

For the circle the priority was securing salt for the campaign: Ghosts cannot cross lines of salt, and ordinary material ponies cannot strike immaterial ghosts… but immaterial war ghosts can strike material targets – so salt would be critical to keep lines secure, both of the supple and battle variety.

“So… that just leaves us with the two small matters we discussed earlier, but the rest of you are free to leave” Maheka Feldspar noted as the rest of the martial staff began to pack up their scrolls and whatever other documents might have been put out before them for the discussions.

Cash looked curious: There weren’t any other topics on the official docket and the scribes taking notes of what was being said were leaving – what did they want to talk about off the record?

Once the scribes, as well most of the staff were gone, leaving only Feldspar, Risotto and a few guards – as well as the circle – things were explained:

“We figured you would like to know the fate of Teresu Morning Dew, seeing as your investigation weighed heavily on our judgement” Taimyo Feldspar explained, sounding just a tad non-plussed.

Nodding, Speaker briefly looked at the rest of the circle: Cash appeared eager, Shimmer looked pleased with herself, while Sunrise’s face was shrouded in shadows due to her hood – and Sully was off giving lessons to some Lookshyan chefs.

Risotto cleared her throat, her voice a tad raspy: “We have reviewed the Sohei’s actions and your quite thorough analysis of his motives behind them, as well as compared them to established protocols on the subject. It has been decided that Morning Dew will not be punished for his actions related to the attempted coup”

“What?!” Speaker burst out.

Shimmer looked furious, while Cash simply awaited Risotto’s elaboration. The Taimyo gave Cash a knowing nod, recognizing that he had seen that there was more to it.

“Calm yourself Master Bright. For repeated conspiracy to and attempted murder of your person, as well as the forging of orders which resulted in the death of four elite rangers, Morning Dew was given the option of either a public denouncement followed by an equally  public execution, or an honorable death by seppuku in the privacy of his family home” Risotto elaborated, sounding pleased in a quite sinister fashion that she had been able to force this pony she had despised so, to commit ritual suicide.

> Chapter 89: Salt and Tears
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

It struck Speaker that he was actually sad to hear of this turn of events, even as Shimmer cheered and Cash shared Risotto’s malevolent smile.
He could understand why Risotto had wanted Morning Dew put to death – for arranging the kidnapping of a welcome guest from her house and trying to have him murdered; it was a grave insult to her hospitality and honor – but at the same time then the circle had determined through Morning Dew’s statements to Speaker during their fight, Cash’s revelations of the Sohei’s finances and Sullen Hoof’s evalutation of his character that Morning Dew had ultimately only tried to replace the general staff out of a zealous loyalty to Lookshy, even if it had become misguided through immaculate dogma.

It was to this end that Speaker came to the uncomfortable conclusion that death was pretty much the only sentence that could have worked. Anything else would simply have bred resentment and allowed any remaining coconspirators to regroup and form a new cabal around him.
“Shouldn’t the Teresu Matriarch be the one to tell us this?” Cash wondered, though his tone hinted of something else…

Taimyo Feldspar sighed: “Matriarch May Lily washed her hooves of Morning Dew the moment word got out of what he had done. Gens Teresu does in merchant shipping – import and export – they have nothing to do with him, the immaculate faith or the Sohei. That he was allowed to commit suicide in her house was pretty much the only thing May Lily was willing to give him…”
“…because?” Cash inquired, sensing something left unspoken.

“Because sailor-ponies who travel the high seas, like ones that do merchant shipping, can’t swim. No sense in learning it – you’re screwed if you go overboard out at sea – I’m guessing she really took the attempted drowning personal” Shimmer interjected, recounting a bit of western wisdom and common knowledge.

Risotto nodded: “Almost – May Lily is water aspected. She would have seen the rest of us drown around her. The very thought of it still haunts her”

“I might be able to help with that” Speaker noted quickly.

Risotto chuckled: “I’m not sure it would be politically expedient for you to ply your healing on another member of general staff just yet – we’re still trying to weed out the worst of Morning Dew’s supporters. Best you and your friends go sort this salt business out with the Bull”

Nodding, Speaker rose from his chair and bowed to the two Taimyo: “Very well. With your leave we’ll set out tomorrow at dawn”

“Sounds reasonable – but there is one other small matter before you all leave” Taimyo Feldspar noted.

The small matter was that of Speaker’s singing staff. It had become just a tad too obvious that Speaker had one – and the Seventh Legion had a standing policy of offering to buy any potentially useful artifacts that they became aware of. The offer Feldspar gave would, if tallied in jade, be enough jade to crush a pony to death under its weight. Still, it surprised no-one that Speaker politely declined the offer. He insisted that he could make better use of the device, though he had no doubt that Seventh Legion combat engineers would have loved to fiddle around with it.

Both Taimyo accepted this, though Risotto did request that once the campaign into the underworld started Speaker should agree that if he fell in battle that the staff be given to the Seventh Legion, at least until he reincarnates.

The next morning the circle set off on Nah to the north, with Shimmer having sent a sorcerous message in advance to notify the Bull of their arrival – along with a few curious Lookshyan representatives: Apparently the chance to meet with this already legendary Bull, the anathema warlord who broke the Vermillion legion, was just a tad too tempting, plus the circle had at least convinced parts of the Seventh Legion’s intelligence services that other anathema might be worth looking into.

Having left straight from Lookshy, without swinging by Sunhill first, the circle tracked down the Bull’s location. The massive army encampment looked a bit smaller than last, plus it had moved about three hundred miles east, just across the river of tears, but beyond that things looked more or less as they had been last the circle had visited, at least from a distance.

Approaching the encampment, the circle and their Lookshyan passangers quickly spotted the hot air balloon up in the sky the place. It appeared to have been made out of stitched-together animal hides, held aloft by… some kind of magical something. Speaker could only tell that it involved a mix of air and fire essence at the distance it was from them.

Landing the circle found itself – in a word – cold enough to crack coconuts with their rumps, for they had left in such a hurry from Lookshy that they had not remembered to bring any kind of winter-clothing with them. This was quickly remedied by the local quartermaster, though Cash found the barbarian pelt and animal-skin style of fashion somewhat not to his liking.

“Well of course you don’t like it – you look like puny pony” the gruff and muscular quartermaster pony chided in his native northern tribal dialect, standing among his fellow icewalker ponies, all of which looked like their morning training regiment involved tossing yeddim around and then likely eating them as well. Only Cash had really understood what the quartermaster had said, though it was clear to the rest of the circle that it hadn’t been kind words.

“Come on – you can wrestle him later if you want revenge – we have more important things to do here” Sunrise admonished.

The Bull… wasn’t there, though the message Shimmer had sent in advance had been received by him. Something had apparently come up requiring the Bull to run off, but he had left an advisor to update the circle.

The faint stars in the advisor’s bright red eyes revealed instantly to Sullen Hoof that the pony was a sidereal…

“How observant – I see that the Bull’s high praise of you are not unwarranted” the Chosen of battles noted in rivertongue, bowing to the circle.

While she wouldn’t give the circle she name, she did explain the situation with the salt-spire league in her thick northern accent:
As the Bull had noted back when the circle had originally met him, then he had been having trouble maintaining the peace in a lot of the territories he had conquered – the Bull might be a brilliant and unparalleled warlord – but he was not a skilled organizer or lawmaker.

“The Bull’s main issue are his barbarian roots and his pride. In most civilized places up here it is considered a sign of wisdom to be able to criticize your ruler…”

Cash smirked, as the sidereal continued:  “I know that where you are from, that warlords just cut out the tongues of ponies who mouth off at them, but up here resources are too scarce for foolish rulers to waste them – but the Bull and the Solars in his circle, they do not listen much when told that something cannot be done, or should not be done”

“…and this relates to the salt issue, how?” Shimmer interjected, feeling that the sidereal was just belly-aching at this point.

Giving Shimmer a disapproving look, the sidereal quickly said: “The Bull’s behavior reflects on the rest of his circle. In Plenilune you will find a pony by the name of Raneth of Ice Hearth, he is of the Twilight caste. The Bull gave him the city to rule for reasons he won’t tell, though I assume it has something to do weapons development or construction. Raneth is an even worse administrator than the Bull, but would never admit it. He’s making a mess of things. That’s why the salt trade has stopped…”

None in the circle looked happy to hear that – Shimmer in particular dreaded facing an actually cruel Solar.

“Any ideas on how to fix things there?” Speaker asked tentatively, figeting uncomfortably with his beard.

With a dismissive shrug, the sidereal mare said: “Sorry – no dice. The few divinations I’ve thrown Raneth’s way mainly hint that he’s the cause of his own misery, he’s just too much of a dick to admit it – though I’m sure that the bull will be very happy if you can fix things there”

With the briefing on Plenilune over, the circle quickly introduced the three unicorns from Lookshy: All three were from Gens Yushoto, and mainly seemed interested in setting up basic diplomatic and trade relations with the bull… perhaps to make a big order of salt to avoid the price-hike the guild usually puts on the cargo of their salt-barges. With the circle vouching for them they were allowed to stay, though the three did look a little nervous when the circle flew off to Plenilune, leaving them behind.

Enroute to Plenilune, which according to Cash’s information was placed at the origin of the river of tears, the region of the white sea known as malice bay, the circle briefly discussed what they knew of the place. Cash knew the most, since Plenilune was renowned for being the biggest producer and exporter of salt in Creation, with several smaller city states further up the bay and it having originally comprised the eponymous Saltspire league.

“Sounds like a fun place – how do they make that much salt?” Shimmer wondered.

Cash explained that, based on what little he knew, then the answer to that was in the name of the league: The saltspires – they were supposedly magical towers that drew in salt from the bay waters and rendered it into fresh water.

Approaching Plenilune around the afternoon, the truth of the matter turned out to be just that… with some modifications: The city of Plenilune looked like a massive slum that sprouted out of a mile long harbor on a jagged cliffy shoreline, all of it shrouded in a thick mist. Just beyond the harbor, connected by a rickety-looking bridge, was a small island with a tall tower on it. The tower was surrounded by fortifications and northern-style palatial structures – and above the tower a dense white haze pulsed with jagged lightning, the haze raining down over the city to supply it with its thick mist.

“Well this place looks fun” Sullen Hoof sighed.

As Cash made Nah descend, the circle observed a strange phenomena around the city: While the landscape around it was shrouded in snow, then for several hundred yards around the city there was no snow, though there were plenty of ponies milling about out on the ground, even though it wasn’t clear what kind of crops they were tending.

Over the harbor a few barges were moored, though it was quite evident that there were also over a dozen scuttled half-sunken barges along the piers. That… probably had something to do with the salt trade issue.

A fortress set at the north of the city had the Bull’s colors and sunburt on its banners, to which end Cash decided that landing in its courtyard was a reasonable idea. The ice-walker soldiers guarding the walls of the fortress didn’t seem to agree, losing arrows at Nah as they approached – though they stopped the instant they saw Sunrise’s anima flare up majestically in the dimming afternoon light.

Having established that there was on – no, four Solars – and a strange silver Solar  (Shimmer found this hilarious) – the icewalker barbarian ponies began to bow and scrape…

Despite all of the icewalkers being taller and more muscular than Speaker, looking like they ate lesser, weaker ponies for breakfast, lunch and dinner, they seemed thoroughly terrified at the presence of the circle.

Cash tried to calm them, getting the fortress commander to present himself. The gruff and scar-covered icewalker pony, clad in thick furs and piecemeal armor plates, eyed Cash suspiciously, but none the less introduced himself in very broken skytongue, Cash translating for the rest of the circle: “Me is Captain-Thane Spear Bucker of Grey Mammoth tribe, second to King Raneth – who are you?”

Nodding, Cash introduced the circle, saying that they had been sent from the Bull to help and restore the salt shipments. Speaker Bucker nodded: “That will be good – hay and grain stores are low, and the shiny merchants won’t send more until they get salt”

“Perhaps an audience with Raneth might shed some light on the situation? Can you set that up?” Shimmer wondered, smacking her mouth a lot.

Spear Bucker looked hesitant, bordering on panicky as he tensed up – which looked almost comical on the armored icewalker. Cash and Sully both quickly picked up on the true reason for this due to their charms.

“Fear not – we won’t mention you to him – just tell us where we can find him” Cash said in a calming tone.

The icewalker Captain-Thane dropped his shoulders relaxed noticeable, looking incredibly relieved: “He is on castle island, at his workshop, or holding court. Your light will open the gate there”

Nodding, Cash gestured for the circle to move towards the gate out of the fortress.

Outside the fortress, in the small no-pony land between the slummy city and the outer buttresses of the fortress, Speaker finally couldn’t help but ask: “Ok, what was that about? Are they all just terrified of this Raneth pony?”

“It’s more than that. The loyalty they have to the Bull and Raneth as a Solar is part of it too – it’s a bit like…” Cash began.

“…like when I went nuts and started to mess with everyone’s head back in Chung Do” Sunrise quickly stated in a stern and decidedly disapproving tone.

Sullen Hoof didn’t agree entirely with Sunrise’s observation: “Those icewalkers weren’t under any kind of mind control – it was fear – but beyond that you’re right. Let’s go see just how bad this pony is”

“Well, at least this place looks quite clean – there are ponies sweeping the streets everywhere” Cash noted cheerfully.

Shimmer was less impressed: “They’re also sweeping the dirt… it’s the salt… its everywhere, in the air, on the ground…”

“That haze over the saltspire – it’s not fog, its salt… it’s raining down over the city like snow” Speaker concluded incredulously.

It was a strange sight: salt crystals falling down like snowflakes, and ponies everywhere working to sweep up newfallen salt into small bags. Several times the circle observed fights in the streets, evidently between ponies fighting over ‘salt turf’ or something to that effect.

Between the icewalker patrols and the ponies everywhere scurrying around on the roofs, in the gutters, everywhere, the city gave off a distinctly pony-eat-pony vibe: There was little evidence of ponies working together.

The bridge to the castle isle turned out to be a tad sturdier than expected: A thick braided set of cables hung from saltspire, anchored to some house-sized boulders on the shore allowed for a half-mile long suspended bridge that wouldn’t obstruct barges passing underneath.

Crossing the bridge was a strange experience: Approaching the saltspire it became quite obvious to the circle that the saltspire was a manse… the air was thick with water essence, but at the same time it was all wrong. The saltspire wasn’t working right.

“Well, that might explain why all the salt is going up in the air and raining down over the city” Speaker noted, wondering how the saltspire was really meant to work.

The icewalkers guarding the gate looked on edge, but they stepped aside without a word as Cash flashed them his caste-mark. 

Inside the castle walls it became quite evident that the palace built around the base of the saltspire had been built in iterations. It was a mishmash of architectural styles, one more opulent than the other – with a common motif being large silver, gold or even jade statues shaped like salt crystals. There were also a few paintings on the walls with regal-looking ponies that had some quite noticeable frog-like features.

“Did lunars rule this place?” Shimmer casually asked as they were led to Raneth by a quite skittish servant. The servant didn’t answer, likely because he didn’t know riverspeak.

As the grand door, decorated with alabaster and richly painted carvings, swung open to the grand court-room, the circle was greeted by the loud rattle of shackles and sound of desperate struggle. Only Cash understood the skytongue being throw back and forth – though the sudden flash of light and very brief scream that was cut quite short was something the whole circle understood.

Stepping into the royal court, Raneth of Ice Hearth sat on a massive gem-encrusted throne. His crown looked a tad big on him, for the Solar appeared quite young. His mane was a few shades more red than Cash’s blond mane, but it was wild and curly – and while his coat was a plain shade of light brown, then the robes he wore were of exquisite white furs with small black dots on them, along with bright blue silk and velvet, obvious garbs of royalty.

Before the throne was a pile of steaming ashes, and to Raneth’s side, gripped in his golden essence, floated a small but highly decorated bronze tube, replete with red jade and orichalcum fittings and filigree – it was obviously some kind of weapon…
Seeing the circle enter his court, Raneth barked something angrily at the group.

“He’s wants to know who we are – just light up your caste marks when I gesture at you” Cash Charmer said as he stepped forth and threw aside his fur coat, revealing his heavenly silks underneath.

The introduction was brief, and just as they had been warned then Raneth didn’t really come off as a pony who liked having ponies sent to him to fix his problems. Indeed, Cash quietly noted to the rest of the circle that Raneth seemed quite insulted that the Bull or his advisor had sent anyone to meddle in his affairs.

“…so he doesn’t care about the scuttled barges along the harbor? Or that the city’s food supply is running low?” Shimmer wondered, confused as to how such a poor leader could stay in power.

Sullen Hoof, from somewhere unseen yet still in earshot, whispered in reply: “Obviously it’s the icewalkers… he controls them, and they can still control the city to some extent – though clearly not very well”

As Cash eventually signaled for the circle that they were done and were to leave, and circle soon after found itself in of the many halls of the castle chatting, Cash informed the circle of what the situation now was: “Ok, so… if we weren’t all exalts, he would have sent us right back to the Bull, so that’s one thing”

“Alive or in pieces?” Sullen Hoof wondered, briefly appearing next to Sunrise before fading from sight again.

Not able to answer the question, Cash could only shake his head: “No clue – but ok, so the city is going to shit. He apparently came to the city about three seasons ago, to enforce the surrender oath that the now late king of Plenilune had previously sworn to the Bull when his icewalker legions had swept through the league”

From what Cash had gathered, several years ago, when the Bull had first arisen and united the icewalkers, the saltspire league had been one of his first conquests as they had moved south along the white sea, but since the Bull at the time couldn’t spare any troops he hadn’t left a garrison to enforce his will – so the league city-states had all reneged on their oaths the moment the Bull was out of sight: “Raneth was sent to collect taxes and punish the league – but there was something else… something he wouldn’t tell me, but it’s what he’s spending all his time on instead of trying to govern the city”

“But will he let us try to help?” Shimmer asked, feeling that the situation was just getting worse with each new revelation.

Nodding, Cash said: “We can do whatever – He said that he’ll let it be known among his icewalkers that they’re to take orders from us, as long as we do not interfere with his work”

“Well that’s nice… but honestly: He doesn’t look a day older than me when I exalted. With so much power, and an unruly city and some kind of secret project he doesn’t want to be distracted from… I don’t think he’s particularly suited as a ruler of ponies, at least not yet” Sunrise mused quietly.

Sullen Hoof noted that he would poke around to get some more information about him, while the circle go poke around the city.

Cash suggested that the rest of them seek out some guild representatives – someone who knew the local salt trade and could tell them exactly what was happening with that, and maybe who was causing it.

Leaving the castle, with Cash as the only pony among them who could talk to the locals, Speaker, Sunrise and Shimmer all just tagged along as Cash asked for salt merchants. It was surprisingly easy to get this information, though quite a few of the ponies in the streets they asked also tried to sell them their salt – Cash looking very much like a wealthy merchant…

“They seemed desperate to sell that stuff” Speaker remarked.

Shimmer frowned: “They know that without the salt barges heading out, food won’t come in… this salt rain has probably poisoned the lands around the city”

“Maybe, but weren’t there ponies outside the city working the land?” Speaker noted.

“They were collected salt, just like everyone else here” Sunrise pointed out.

At a very nice-looking tavern, replete with very old-looking wooden carvings, the circle found a gaggle of guild merchants who weren’t exactly looking happy. They were happy to tell the circle of their woes: To no-one’s surprise it was all Raneth’s fault, in the sense that their salt-barges had been sunk by saboteurs from the other league cities. Before that, the other league cities had sent assassins to try to kill Raneth, but he had proven quite resilient and very vindictive – of the ‘kidnapping your family and putting their tortured corpses up on stakes outside the city’
The circle hadn’t noticed anything like that when they had arrived, but the merchants noted that that had stopped about five months ago – that had been when the city officials of the old regime started leaving – like rats from a sinking ship – leaving barely no-one left to work under Raneth’s rule. This had thoroughly messed up the city’s ability to collect taxes and run its courts, as now all but one judge had either left the city… and the remaining judge was recently attacked as well, grievously wounded, so he was out of action entirely.

“What do they do for judging criminals here then?” Speaker wondered.

Cash noted that they had already seen that – just as they arrived at Raneth’s court. Apparently Raneth subscribed to a very strict “If you break the law enough to be brought before me, I kill you” logic. This obviously hadn’t improved the mood in the city, nor the local’s willingness to cooperate with Raneth.

Of course, the merchant’s suggestions on how to fix the situation mostly revolved around getting rid of Raneth – but they did note that the saboteurs and assassins were likely still in the city, picking off anyone who dared to publicly support Raneth, so getting rid of them would be a good start. Salvaging the barges would also be nice.

“Ok, I know what we can do - hell, if we combine them we’ll be done here all the faster” Shimmer noted.

Heading to the harbor, Shimmer instantly leapt into the water to inspect the barges and the extent of the damage done to them. Once she resurfaced, she could report that the extreme salinity of the water had preserved the wooden barge structure – it had apparently been sunk via something having withered away large holes in the hull.

“Ok, Cash – I’m sure there are dry-docks here, go book us one – Shimmer, do you know any shapes that would let you yank the scuttled barges out of the water? I think we can wrap this up by evening if we do this right” Speaker confidently stated, looking at the half-sunken barges lining the piers of the harbor.

“You three manage the barges. I want to check on the remaining judge – being the last law-pony in a city like this cannot be a pleasant experience” Sunrise noted, trotting off. 

Cash returned moments later, having booked an empty shipwright’s dry-dock. The owner of the shipwright had also tagged along, though he quickly ran off screaming as Shimmer turned into her emperor-ox sized beast-pony form, allowing her to grab a half-sunken barge with all four taloned limbs, then basking her wings wildly to slowly rise the barge out of the water.

Setting the first barge down gently, though the force of the winds that her wings were throwing about was whirling up clouds of salty powder, Speaker quickly inspected the hull and used his repair charm to fix the hull with a few extra hull-planks from the shipwright. At Speaker’s signal Shimmer returned the patched up barge to where it had been moored.

A sizable crowd of locals quickly assembled as Shimmer and Speaker repeated their barge-fixing trick, cheering on as more and more barges were returned to working over – though many of the barges were still in need of being drained of water and cleaned of sea-weed, work that began just as quickly: The merchants who owned the barges seemed quite eager to resume their business.

As business seemed to resume, so did trouble start – or that at least seemed to be the plan: Cash knew well enough that the ponies who had scuttled the barges would likely try again, so from a vantage point atop a nearby provisions shop he kept a watchful eye for trouble… and in short order a group of otherwise inconspicuous ponies in matted fur clothing appeared, Cash instantly recognizing their behavior for what it really was: They were scoping out the barges to find a way to sneak on board.

Now, Speaker and Shimmer were busy with the barge repairs, Sully was back at the saltspire castle, and Sunrise was off doing whatever as far as Cash knew… so he would have to stop the saboteurs himself.

“Time to be the hero!” Cash said to himself as he shot a claw from his magic shoes into the wooden tower holding up a cargo crane that loomed above the barges and tossed aside his barbarian furs – a hero should look good at all times.

Swinging himself down and sticking the landing perfectly – Speaker not being the only pony in the circle who had learned a thing or two from Sullen Hoof – Cash found himself down right amidst the suspicious ponies.

“So… sink any barges recently?” Cash quipped in skytongue, as the ponies around him turned to look at him in shock and confusion.
The cold northern air bit at Cash’s ears and hooves, but there was no doubt that he striking an imposing figure in his impossibly beautiful silks, casually smirking at the group of ponies.

The ponies around Cash shot each other nervous glances – and that was all Cash needed, for even without speaking they had basically confessed, thanks to Cash’s charms subtle social-cue detection charms: “Yes, I do know – now, are you going to do this the easy way or the fun way?”

The ponies instantly turned to run for it, but as many demons and changelings had learned so painfully in the first age, then Hoof of the Daystar style is a very direct style that incorporates a lot of very efficient grapples and tosses, which became only more potent when combined with a shoe that let on pull foes into one’s reach.

“Get over here!” Cash shouted, firing a claw into the back of one of the ponies as they ran off down the pier towards the harbor-street. The pony barely had time to yelp in pain as he was yanked back, Cash taking hold of him, swinging him around and tossing him like a curled up pony ball into the rest of the saboteurs. Likely due to some errant error in fate this produced the sound of a ceramic ball striking a dozen or so wooden pins, but nobody seemed to notice that.

Casually striding up to the downed ponies, Cash rested an extended shoe-claw against the nose of sole pony who still seemed to be just barely conscious: “Now, talk – who’s paying you to scuttle the barges... or I will make you talk”

Back at the shipwright, Speaker and Shimmer were making good time on the barges. Some of the the carpenters and other workers there spoke a little bit of riverspeak, as it was a common language for merchants across Creation thanks to the Guild – this allowed Speaker to direct ponies around to bring in materials so the repairs could proceed a little faster.

About an hour’s worth of work later they had restored enough barges that there wasn’t really room for more along the harbor and its many piers – apparently some barges had arrived after the first ones had been sunk. Either way there certainly seemed to be enough barges available for the salt trade to resume, and the owners of the barges had also arrived and had quickly started hiring workers to clean the things up, so there wouldn’t be silt or mud when salt would be loaded on them.

Cash arrived shortly looking a tad disappointed: “Ok, so the ponies sinking the barges? Turns out they’re sailor ponies who’s families are being held hostage in some of the other saltspire cities by their rulers – they’re less mercenaries and more… patsies”

“Perfect – now we have an excuse to go punish them!” Shimmer said eagerly, having reduced herself to pony size and shape once more.

The look on Cash’s face wasn’t one of agreement – that much Speaker could tell – plus he figured that going to war in Raneth’s name wouldn’t really help make peace for the salt trade to blossom again. Cash certainly seemed to share this sentiment: “Shimmer dear, why don’t you and Sully – once he’s done – go and rescue these ponies instead? Bring them here. The icewalkers brought my captives to the south-port blockhouse, go talk about where their families are being held, they have a translator there – in fact, Speaker, you might want to go to them as well, one of them got hurt a bit when I caught them. I’ll stay here and ensure that nobody claims a barge that isn’t theirs. We’ll meet up back at the castle this evening”

Later that day, at the saltspire castle, circle reconvened. Before being called to dinner, Sully briefed the circle on what he had discovered: “Raneth is producing some kind of new bow… I’ve never seen one like it” 

“A new bow? What’s so special about it?” Cash wondered.

Sullen Hoof made a strange gesture, as if holding a bow but doing it all wrong: “No, it’s on a stick, and you don’t draw the bow – they arrows’re in a box on the stick, you just yank the box back with a lever to load it and pull a lever under the stick to fire it. It’s like a small stumpy ballista you can carry, load and fire yourself”

“Impressive… what kind of materials are he using? Jade, orichalcum?” Speaker asked, very curious as to how such a thing might be made.

The night caste Solar shook his head: “Different kinds of wood… good steel, string…. He’s not making magical artifacts: He’s making these for mortal use”

“What’s the advantage of the thing over regular bows?” Shimmer wondered.

Thinking for a moment, Sullen shrugged: “No clue”

“Nah that’s obvious – if Raneth has figured out a way to load a bow without having to draw the string, instead using a lever like you say… if that’s easier than drawing a bow then it would let the Bull train up archers much faster” Speaker pointed out, noting that ponies trained to be professional archers would usually have to train from a young age to properly bite down on drawstrings with an arrow in their mouth, then get on their back and buck back the bow, with the arrow properly notched. It was no small feat.

At dinner the circle inquired into the nature of these devices – but Raneth seemed more offended than anything else, completely dismissing any possibility of him explaining what the ‘cho ko nu’ were for. Indeed, after Cash had tricked Raneth into revealing the name of the devices, Raneth stormed off furiously.
> Chapter 90: A Cold Heart
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Well that could have gone better” Shimmer noted, poking her rice pudding with limited enthusiasm within the rather gaudy grand royal feast hall. There so many gilded carvings and whatnot that it almost hurt to look at anything but the food in front of one self.

Raneth refused to speak to anyone for the rest of the evening, giving the circle ample time to fill Sully in on what they had learned and send him and Shimmer off to retrieve the families of the saboteurs under the cover of darkness. The deal Cash had struck with the saboteurs was that they would testify about who had made them sink the barges once their families were safe – not to Raneth – but to the local guild representatives… sure he could have forced it out of them via charms, but this made it easier to convince others about the truth.

“Let’s see them wiggle out of that – pissing off the guild’s salt factor’s is not wise, especially when you depend on the guild for food imports” Cash had noted while gleefully rubbing his hooves together.

The next day Speaker, Sunrise and Cash began to tackle another issue: The lack of local government officials and Raneth’s one-sentence-for-all solution.

First up there was the judge that Sunrise had met with: Evidently he had been attacked by an assassin a few days ago, though he had managed to fend the attacker off and make it home in… roughly one piece.

“Ok, let’s do this one quick – we don’t know when Sully and Shimmer will be back, but with her flying I’m guessing by nightfall, so Speaker I want your lie detection charm up all the time and Sunrise, I want you ready to lighten the mood… being the last judge in the city where all your colleagues have fled and your new ruler is a murder-happy tyrant can’t be fun” Cash quickly and quietly instructed before they knocked on the judge’s door.

The judge’s home, in the nicer part of Plenilune, where all the houses where covered in colorful well-cut wooden facades painted in salt-resistant alchemical paints, and the roofs covered in ceramic tiles, was just as one would imagine a northern home: Warm, the walls covered in family tapestries and furs. There were several hearths each with a roaring fire: One in the kitchen, one in the dining room, one in the judge’s home office and one in each bedroom – this was not a small house.

Upon entry the three Solars were greeted by the judge’s wife, who recognized Sunrise and instantly bid Sunrise and her friends welcome.
The judge’s wife was a well-groomed old mare dressed in nice woolen clothing lined with fine fur, and seemed quite happy that Sunrise had brought a doctor to see her husband: “So few ponies dare help us these days… we’re called traitors for not fleeing the city like the rest of the old regime’s officials”

“Well that’s not fair – and to be honest, we are working on trying to make Raneth a bit more easy to live under…” Cash said.
A young colt, barely more than three or four years old, peeked out of the kitchen: “Momma, who is it?”

“Just someone here to help your father dear, go play in your room” the old mare said kindly, the little colt bolting up the stairs.

As the judge’s wife guided the three to her husband in their bedroom, Sunrise noted to Cash – in old realm: “Maybe have Sullen Hoof cook a little something up for Raneth… and then force him to behave in exchange for the recipy?”

“A little short-sighted, but you saw how young he is – he’s younger than you – and from what I’ve heard whispered around town so far then he’s from the Haslanti League – they’re raiders from a place even further north than here. Any culture that revolves around taking stuff from those weaker than you tends to produce very rough characters, and to be honest then I suspect that Raneth didn’t grow up in a well-off part of that society. Maybe a former slave?” Cash replied as Speaker did his doctor-thing, patching up the other-wise nicely cleaned up lacerations on the judge’s forelegs and chest.

“So you think he’s overcompensating? If he grew up with nothing, gained powers and now has power over others without the wisdom to properly rule?” Sunrise mused.

Cash shrugged: “Maybe, but it feels more like he doesn’t want to look bad to the Bull – no pony wants to look stupid or incompetent to their lord – like a slave tasked with something he doesn’t quite know how to  do”

The judge’s wife came into the bedroom with a trey with nice ceramic cups. The sweet scent of warm mead quickly spread around the room, and the judge groaned: “Oh Ice Lotus, you’re too good for me”

To Speaker the wine-strength alcoholic drink was far too sweet – but Cash seemed to enjoy it and Sunrise… well, she drank it. The judge’s wounds were easy enough to fix, so the Solar doctor soon turned to his friends and the judge’s wife and reported that everything was going to be ok.

“Perfect – now, Miss Ice Lotus, do any of you have any idea who would try to kill one of you?” Cash asked, knowing quite well that there was a very obvious answer, but it never hurt to ask. Maybe they had gotten threats?

The judge groaned and sat up in his bed, his large bushy beard and thin frame standing in stark contrast to each other, but beyond that then for a pony he looked quite plain: Cream-colored coat, light brown balding mane, though the bathrobe he was wearing was quite nice with little cerulean ice-crystals embroidered into its dark-grey fuzzy fabric: “Take your pick – any crook I sent to prison for the last three years since I made judge, their families if they wanted revenge, or the rest of the Saltspire league for daring to want to maintain some semblance of civilization even if our new king is a right swit”

As Cash translated what the judge had said, Speaker couldn’t help but find the judge’s candor quite amusing and refreshing.
Sunrise commented that it seemed to fit with what they had heard from the merchants earlier.

“And what about you? Any clue who might have done it?” Cash asked Ice Lotus.

Now, Speaker might not have understood what Ice Lotus replied – some flavor of “I don’t know” according to Cash – but Speaker knew quite well what his lie-detection charm was telling him…namely that she was lying.

Giving Cash a poke and gesturing for the two to step away for a moment, out of the bedroom, Speaker spoke in old realm: “Ice Lotus… she is lying”

Cash cocked an eyebrow at Speaker’s claim: “Well that makes things easier…”

The two returned to the bedroom, with Cash straight out of the gate asking: “So, Ice Lotus, did you try to get your husband killed?”

The look of shock and outrage on Ice Lotus’s face told Speaker everything – the words she shouted in fury less so… for they registered as true to Speaker, but did not exactly come off as a confession.

Cash looked at Speaker, who could only give Cash an apologetic look: “She didn’t lie there…”

The judge – understandably angry that Cash would make such a brash accusation – vigorously voiced his displeasure just as his wife had – demanding that the three leave his house at once.

Cash, trying to save face, asked: “Very well – so Ice Lotus, you know nothing of who might have attacked your husband?”
To this Ice Lotus again claimed innocence and ignorance… but Speaker noted this as a lie.

“Ok, well this is interesting – so, Ice Lotus, why don’t you tell us exactly who you think attacked your husband –and please, no lies – my good friend here can tell the difference” Cash inquired in a stern tone, not at all enjoying being misled and accused of wrong-doing.

Ice Lotus backed towards the door out of the bedroom, but Sunrise cut her off. The judge looked confused: “Lotus dear, what are they talking about?”

“Rider, darling – I don’t know what they’re talking about?! They’re just as nuts as Raneth!” Ice Lotus proclaimed. Speaker once again noted that what she had said was all lies, which Cash in turn relayed to the judge.

Struggling to get out of bed, the judge looked at both the circle and his wife angrily: “What the bloody hell is going on here! First my daughter is raped and now you’re saying my wife knows who tried to kill me, but didn’t try to kill me? As true as my name is Paragraph Rider, then I demand that someone explain what is going on here!?”

“Why is daddy yelling?” the colt from earlier innocently asked, peeking into the bedroom from the doorway behind Sunrise.

With everyone briefly distracted, Ice Lotus shoved Sunrise out of the way and ran for it – slamming the door on the way out, inadvertently hitting the young colt, who in turn collapsed on the wooden floor crying.

Speaker instantly leapt to the colt, alleviating his pain and checking to see if he was hurt – but he did so by standing in the middle of the doorway, so Cash couldn’t really get past him to give chase on Ice Lotus…

“Speaker, I know you meant well – but Ice Lotus just got away” Cash admonished.

Once things had calmed down and Speaker had fetched some more warm mead, Paragraph Rider and Cash talked. Apparently Rider and Lotus’s daughter, a mare by the name of Misty Shores, had been assaulted and raped a few days before the circle had showed up, two days prior to Rider getting attacked.

A quick charm-accelerated search of the house yielded nothing to incriminate Ice Lotus. Similarly, then Rider could only give a very rough description of his attacker, as it had been late night when he had been attacked: “Every day at the courthouse is a long day… and those ice-walker fools barely even know how to talk like civilized ponies – they’re hardly any help, but everyone else fled the city like cowards they are”
“Very well – and why exactly did you stay? I’m just curious – most ponies would dread living under anathema rule” Cash inquired politely.
The judge nursed his cup of warm mead and grunted through his thick beard: “Before Raneth came anyone with money could just bribe the king and make him dismiss any charges – you could get away with murder as long as you were on good terms with that freak and his family. When everyone left I approached Raneth, saying that I would stay if he would promise not to be corrupt like that – because then I too would leave, or at least quit my job in protest”

“Living up to your name I see” Cash said in jest.

Cracking a smile, Rider nodded: “I knew from a young age that I wanted to be a law-pony – and enforcing the law to the letter, if justly written, is the best way to do that”

Leaving the judge, with four ice-walkers posted outside his house with orders to capture his wife if she was to return, the three Solars sought out Paragraph Rider’s daughter Misty Shores. Rider had said that she had liked to go down to the docks and lounge around ever since she had returned from boarding school about a month or so ago.

With Rider’s description of his daughter it didn’t take the circle long to spot her sitting at the end of a long pier, gazing far into the distance over the cold waters of Malice Bay. She was a pretty young mare , with a long blonde mane with wavy hair and a mottled light-grey coat.

At first she really didn’t want to talk – when Cash tried to broach the subject of her rape, she really didn’t want to talk. Upon insisting, she said angrily: “Just go away – I already told those idiot ice-walkers about it – damn idiots couldn’t even write the incident report themselves!”

Opting  to leave the young mare alone, the circle discussed its options. Cash didn’t want to bother Misty, but at the same time he felt it necessary to ingratiate himself with the judge, for the legal reforms and restructuring he had planned would require Paragraph Rider’s full cooperation and support. Speaker equally found it salient to solve the rape case since giving that extra ease of mind to the judge would help the healing process – Sunrise didn’t need any convincing, though she wasn’t sure how they were to approach Misty seeing as she didn’t really want to talk.

“Speaker, how are your art skills? Portrait painting?” Cash asked, with the kind of look on his face that just screamed in every way that he had just thought up a clever new plan.

Thinking for a moment, Speaker found himself surprised at the wealth of knowledge on that particular area that he had never realized that he possessed thanks to his first age memories: “First age level?”

With that, Cash returned the circle to Misty and this time didn’t let her brush him off that easy. Insisting that she should describe her rapist to them, so that Speaker could produce an image of the culprit that they could use to catch the pony.

Misty Shores looked somewhat incredulous and even reluctant first, but ultimately Cash’s powers of persuasion made it impossible for her just dismiss him – and evidently she lacked the rhetorical wisdom to come up with a sensible excuse – so with a heavy sigh and a rather miserable expression she began detailing what she remembered:

“…no, his jaw was more square, and his mane was uglier, more unkempt, ya like that, that’s him!” Misty proclaimed, gesturing wildly at the illusion Speaker had conjured before her.

Using a simple charm that allowed him to conjure illusory lights and shapes from pure essence, a charm that Speaker usually only used to make equally illusory 3D-models of things he planned on making or building to help ease his acts of creation, Speaker had made an illusory bust of a burly stallion who looked like one of the hundreds if not thousands of sailor-ponies that came and went with the salt-barges. However, one detail that Misty had mentioned, the tattoo of a large dog on the stallion’s left shoulder, changed everything:

“I think I know where he is…” Speaker mused, after looking at the illusion for a bit.

It had been back when Speaker and Shimmer had gone to the captured saboteurs at the south-port blockhouse. Another of the prisoners that had just come in while they had been there had sported such a tattoo… there was just one problem…

“What? Don’t tell me he’s already been brought before Raneth and executed for whatever you picked him up for?” Cash lamented to the icewalker in charge of the blockhouse at the south-end of the Plenilune harbor.

The barbarian pony gave Cash a confused look: “No chief, but we let him out this morning… we tossed him in the sticky-stinky room because he was drunk and shouting at other ponies – let him sleep it off”

As Cash translated the above for Speaker and Sunrise, Speaker groaned. On one hoof he was actually impressed that they hadn’t brought the pony before Raneth, but he didn’t look forward to trying to track a hungover sailor down in a city like Plenilune…

“Speaker, if they had to bring every publicly drunk sailor to Raneth he’d probably start executing the icewalkers simply for constantly disrupting his work” Sunrise noted.

Outside the blockhouse, the circle agreed to wait for Shimmer and Sully to return – they would be able to track this sailor pony much faster – and indeed, later that afternoon Shimmer and Sullen Hoof arrived, with Shimmer’s elsewhere den full of the saboteurs extended families… apparently quite a lot of them had jumped at the opportunity to get out from under the tyranny of their respective salt-kings.

“Hold on – you two convinced how many ponies to move to a city ruled by a Solar? This isn’t the scavenger lands, ponies here are actually afraid of anathema here…” Sunrise said, sounding just a bit incredulous.

Sullen Hoof bobbed his head side to side – his real expression difficult to tell from under his mask: “Well… not exactly – but you have to admit that Raneth’s main priority clearly isn’t simply making as much money as possible from the ponies he’s lording over and the salt they’re collecting – that’s what we sold them on”

Cash found this quite amusing for some reason, but noted that it probably wouldn’t be too difficult to ensure that the population of Plenilune started to see a slightly bigger share of the profits from the salt trade.

“Raneth will have to – if he wants to build up an arsenal here he’ll have to set up several new industries, from woodcutting and sawmills, to coal and iron production” Speaker noted, trying to map out the exact minimum chain of production needed to make these here ‘crossbows’ that Sullen Hoof had described.

Before going to Raneth with all their great ideas on how to properly retool Plenilune for large scale arms-production, the circle sought out Misty’s rapist. 
Shimmer had a sniff in the south-port blockhouse’s disgustingly aptly named ‘sticky-stinky room’, which was apparently the one cell where drunkards who made trouble were always put in – the floor, walls… none of it appeared to have ever really been cleaned, which meant that Shimmer refused to get her nose anywhere near the place.

As half a dozen grumpy icewalkers began cleaning the room on the circle’s orders, Shimmer caught the scent of the pony they were looking for elsewhere in the blockhouse, and thus the hunt was on… and ended about two hundred yards away from the blockhouse, in a sailor flophouse on a dirty cot.

This is when things started to get weird: Bridge Water, the sailor pony in question, seemed very sad and very confused – indeed, that had apparently been why he had also been found drunk and disorderly… for he seemed under the impression that Misty Shores was in love with him. The really strange part was that he had a stack of letters addressed to him, signed by Misty according to him, which seemed to confirm her infatuation with him.

Looking at through the letters, Cash noticed a few that mentioned ‘helping you to freedom’ – to which the sailor freely admitted that Misty helped him break out of prison – though he also claimed quite adamantly that he should never have been sent there, for he had only been imprisoned because he had burped within earshot of some vindictive merchant who had pulled some strings with the old regime to get him sent away for good: “That’s why Misty started mailing me, see – she wrote here, that my innocence is what made her feel  that we had such a great connection…” Bridge Water said in-between sobs.

Patting the tear-filled and muscular pony comfortingly on the shoulder, Sunrise bid him to continue.

“…then after she snuck me back into the city she told me to meet her at the north-end piers the next day – but she then claimed she didn’t know who I was, but I was so in love… I… I couldn’t help myself – she had been my only light in the darkness the last four months” Bridge Water exclaimed, breaking down in full on bawling.

Leaving Bridge Water to cry himself out, the circle conferred. Speaker said that Bridge Water hadn’t lied, at all, though that didn’t mean that Bridge Water hadn’t been tricked…

“Could Ice Lotus have done this?” Shimmer wondered, perplexed as to how a mother might do something that horrible to her own daughter.
Cash reluctantly nodded, his expression one of disgust: “Yes she could, I guess – but why?”

“…how could she have disguised herself as Misty and kept that up all the way from that prison back to the city?” Sully wondered, perplexed at how an old mortal mare could fake being a spry young one when traveling with an escaped convict.

This last question turned out to have a simple answer: Bridge Water said that the prison had patrols around the outer shoreline – apparently the prison was in the middle of a lake – so they had to be real quiet, plus she had used some kind of magic steed to the pull the sleigh, one as dark as night, that made no noise as it pulled them away…

“Ok, so Ice Lotus is a little more than what meets the eye… this is interesting” Cash mused, pondering where the mare might have hidden herself, if she hadn’t outright fled the city.

As much as Shimmer and Sully agreed that catching Ice Lotus was now a priority, then Sullen Hoof insisted that Bridge Water first be brought to Misty that he might repent and apologize before her. Cash also helped out by ‘removing’ Bridge Water’s infatuation with Misty Shores, and while that did initially worry Sunrise and Speaker that it might make the sailor pony simply rationalize his actions as not being his fault due to having been tricked, then it luckily resulted that didn’t happen: Bridge Water remained absolutely miserable over his actions, even more so now that he didn’t feel any positive emotions towards Misty, leaving him only with the terrible memories of his horrible act.

The meeting between the two at the judge’s home was… tense, to put it very mildly, for obvious reasons, after which Bridge Water was allowed to leave upon promising that he would get work on a barge and sail off, never to return again to Plenilune – but when the judge saw the letters… he was furious… outraged!

They were penned in his wife’s hoof-writing, though how anyone could tell skytongue runes apart from how other ponies wrote them was beyond Speaker – Cash confirmed it, upon reviewing a few cooking recipes Ice Lotus had written down in a book in the kitchen.

“Look at this – she wrote that I beat you, locked you away in the basement – we don’t even have a basement!” Paragraph Rider proclaimed, waving the letters at Misty, who was just as shocked and appalled.

Going through the letters, each more lurid and obscene than the other, some detailing what ‘Misty’ had supposedly wanted to do with Bridge Water once he returned, while others went into gruesome and quite fictional details about how cruel Paragraph Rider was, revealed a simple but monstrous plan.

“It’s obvious: The letters were meant to get Bridge Water to basically kill both of you – Rider out of hate, and Misty from anger over being ‘rejected’ – the only question is why? There is absolutely no motive here for Ice Lotus” Sullen Hoof wondered, even his profiling charms failing him somehow.

“Oh I can think of why” Misty said dejectedly, gently stroking the mane of the young colt sleeping in her lap as she sat on a nice fur-covered couch in the living room, the judge sitting next to her.

Paragraph Rider found this rather impossible: “No dear – she must have gone mad. There’s no possible…”

Misty Shores was nodding towards the colt in her lap.

The rest of the circle didn’t really know what was going on – well, Cash figured it out instantly thanks to his charms that let him understand the skytongue language, but he had also figured that it would be best to let the two talk it out.

“Rock? But… how?” Rider said confused, his bushy brows furrowing deeply.

Taking a deep breath and then sighing just as much, Cash gestured for the circle to leave with him – this was a private family matter, not something they needed to be part of…

In the kitchen, Cash noted that Shimmer and Sully should head out and try to track down Ice Lotus: “At this point I consider it a matter of honor to bring this monstrous mare to justice – we can’t let her get away with this”

Shimmer and Sully didn’t appear to be paying attention…

“They’re both listening in on the two talking in the living room, aren’t you?” Sunrise said in a disapproving tone.

Sully and Shimmer both nodded absentmindedly.

“Ok, spill” Cash said, too curious to not want to know. Speaker frowned and Sunrise.

As it turned out then Misty Shores had recently returned from a boarding school somewhere west of Plenilune, a ‘refuge’ for young mares who had gotten pregnant out of wedlock. The young colt Rock was hers… and Ice Lotus had apparently threatened to poison Misty that she might miscarry if she hadn’t agreed to go there – and Paragraph Rider had known nothing of this, for as is custom in the north then Ice Lotus had been the master of the household when it came to internal matters, which was apparently also why she had tried to prevent it being known that Misty had slept with some random sailor one night and gotten a bun in the oven. It had all been to save the family's honor.

“There’s just one problem with this” Sullen Hoof explained, everyone paying rapt attention.

Removing his helmet and shaking his head, his horribly burnt face and similarly withered ears jiggling unnaturally: “…I can get wanting to protect the reputation of the household, but my profiling charms… that’s not what they’re getting… it’s like Ice Lotus is blocking them from working somehow”

“You would need a lot of essence to veil your intentions. Only an exalted pony would be able to counter a charm like that…” Speaker noted as he put his helmet away into elsewhere.

Nodding, Shimmer noted: “Whatever she is, she is powerful if she can veil herself from charms like that”

“I wouldn’t worry – my skills have only improved while in underworld.  I learned cooking recipes from the ghosts of ancient chefs, and honed my fighting skills against more Deathknights than I cared to count – this mare can’t be any worse than that” Sullen Hoof confidently stated.

Bidding the judge and his estranged daughter good night, Shimmer and Sullen Hoof employed their sense-enhancing and tracking charms, leading the circle on a surprisingly short hunt: Ice Lotus’s scent led the circle to a locked and heavily reinforced cellar door in a filthy back alley, but all locks yielded to Sullen Hoof’s touch, and so the circle descended into what appeared to be the secret hideout of a… lovesick mare?
> Chapter 91: Rebuild to the Buildup
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The secret cellar hideout of Judge Paragraph Rider’s wife Ice Lotus had been hidden at the end of a filthy back alley, that apparently mostly saw use as the toilet of the neighborhood’s homeless. Sunrise opted to be the lookout at the entrance to the alley.

“Well that’s one way to keep prying eyes… and noses… away – you ok Shimmer?” Speaker asked sympathetically.

Still retching from the vile stench of salty turds, Shimmer tried to reign in her urge to puke as her sense of smell slowly scaled back to its normal level, the charm she had been using to enhance that sense being not the fastest thing to terminate: “I’ll… hurp... live”
Down in the cellar Speaker found Sullen Hoof looking at several framed documents hanging on the walls.

“What’ve you got there?” Speaker asked, skimming through the old realm pictoglyphs written on the framed documents.

They were love letters… of a sort. The framed letters were penned in beautiful old realm, using a style that Speaker insisted was particularly artful and often used in the first age to give old realm glyphs erotic undertones, signed by someone called “The Lover Clad In The Raiment Of Tears”
“You think it’s another Deathknight? The title sounds like one” Speaker wondered.

Sullen Hoof shook his head: “No, that’s another Deathlord. She operates up here north… though rumor back in Stygia was that she was staying well away from the Bull and his operations - she's more into seducing and corrupting ponies not picking fights with Dawn caste Solars”
Reading the rather lurid love-letters, which was far more steamy than the stuff ‘Ice Lotus’ – probably not her real name – had sent to Bridge Water, it was clear that whoever the recipient of the letter really was, that she was under implied orders to bring ruin to the saltspire league.

“Hey check this out” Cash called, standing near a pile of crumpled up paper that almost reached the damn ceiling. The first few feet worth of crumbled up papers at the bottom were basically rotted into moldy lumps of goo, but the rest was still legible for the most part.

Between Sully, Speaker and Cash’s combined shuffling through the pile, the three quickly managed to a number of interesting letters – or rather, drafts of letters.

“I got some here that look like they’re written from another saltspire principality. It’s for one of the city officials who left the city… offered him a good deal of money if he’d leave the city and come service this other lord” Cash said, not sounding surprised at all.

The one Speaker was looking at was written in old realm, addressed to the Deathlord, going on about the Deathknight’s scheme in the city: “It’s dated about four months ago, says she found a perfect family of dupes to live with, ‘replaced’ the wife, and get this: "…once I have gotten them to kill each other via this chump I am going to spring from prison eventually, I plan on approaching the Solar ruling the city. He is about as clueless and inept as it gets, and as the wise widow of a judge I’ll offer him my advice and my body. Once I’m done with him he’ll make a nice new addition to our ranks – he will love you as much as I do oh mistress”

“New additions to their ranks? What, do they think they can trick a Solar to swear fealty to a Deathlord?” Sullen Hoof deadpanned, finding the idea utterly ridiculously.

Speaker shook his head slowly in grim despair. It was a rather grim epiphany that the letter had sparked within his mind: “No… it’s because the black exaltations of the Deathlords are somehow corrupted Solar exaltations”
Neither Sully nor Cash found this revelation very pleasant.

“Good grief… but… how? Are you sure that they’re not just trying to flip Raneth? Considering his behavior I could easily imagine him turning against the Bull if pushed in the right direction” Cash suggested, clearly not wanting Speaker’s statement to be true.

Reminding Cash and Sully of their Deathknight acquaintance the Bodhisattva, Speaker noted that last they had seen him he had been able to will forth his caste mark in such a way that it looked less like a bleeding wound, and more like a… blood-covered golden mark, with light trying to shine out from it… it all made sense… terrible, horrible, sense… though how was a mystery shrouded in the darkness of the underworld.
“You think Lytek knows this?” Sullen Hoof asked Speaker, looking just as quizzical as he looked melty.

Tapping an old dried-out blood-stain on the floor as he though, Speaker nodded: “It would make sense if he did, would explain why he wanted us to catch him some Deathknights to examine…”

“Why wouldn’t he have told us this? Warned us? I mean, if any of us got captured... could they turn a live Solar into a Deathknight?”  Cash worried.

The three agreed that this would require further investigation – later – and while warning Raneth and the Bull never to let themselves get captured by the Deathlords right now would be ok, then telling the full details might not be…

“I actually think it would be ok to tell the Bull – and we’ll need to confer with Heath Rose as well” Cash argued, saying that the Bull had always seemed level-headed not to do anything to rash – Raneth on the other hoof…

Investigating the place further, Speaker and Shimmer found essence-traces of necromantic magic emanating from the fresh but sundered remains of a zombified icewalker – it felt strange to creation, and the way that the remains were scattered around made it look as if it had been part of a kind of flesh-ringed portal. Either way it was very clear that Ice Lotus, probably not her real name in any way, had gotten away – for her scent led to the basement and then… nowhere.

Calling in Icewalkers to secure the place, and hiring a few local scribe who could just enough old realm to help sort and index all the letter drafts, the circle left to inform Judge Paragraph Rider and his daughter of the news.

…they didn’t take it well. Ice Lotus had never had enlightened essence, so it was obvious that this deathknight had replaced and impersonated her for quite a while. The oldest letters the circle had found were around five months old, hinting that the swap had happened around then.
“I have several contacts in the underworld” Sullen Hoof said from under his golden helmet: “…I will ask for information on her, as well as put a reward out for her head – she will not get away with this, I promise you”

While having little to offer the judge and her daughter, Sunrise ensured that when the circle left that the two were in good spirits and had open minds ready for reconciliation between the two. Cash also aired his idea of setting up a new judicial system with Paragraph Rider as a new Chief Justice, so Raneth never has to judge another case. Sure, new judges would be needed, but with the revelation from the deathknight’s lair that many of the city’s old judges and other civil servants had been lured away on false pretenses, then if Raneth would allow such ponies to return and resume their old jobs without punishment then much of that could be solved fairly quickly and without the circle needing to do that much.

Raneth was – after a bit of cajoling from Cash – tempted to agree with all of this. Cash pointed out that by letting some of the city’s old administration come back and resume its work, then Raneth could focus all the more on his secret project… which honestly wouldn’t remain that secret once the entire city started working on it.

King Raneth, with all of his impotent and seething rage, was oddly unhappy with the idea that his super secret project couldn’t remain so… 
“In the first age most Twilight caste Solars would have a private factory cathedral or atelier manse to help with stuff like that – but if you want to produce enough weapons to arm the Bull’s icewalker legions, then doing it all on your own just won’t cut it - be realistic” Speaker noted, feeling almost guilty that he didn’t really know how to make advanced manse designs like that…

It was painfully obvious that Raneth, for all his ambitions as a craftspony and how much he liked being in charge, that he couldn’t come up with anything remotely better. Of course, what then became a source of aggravation for him was that the circle wasn’t entirely keen on staying in Plenilune for the required number of months needed to retool the entire city for arms production – plus it would no doubt take time to fix the saltspire. Well, that was the circle’s position until Speaker noted that Lookshy wouldn’t exactly be able to get ready in just under a week: “…so we do have some time – Shimmer, could you send a message to Risotto on what the legion’s status is, and what their schedule for readiness is?”

It was first the next day that the circle got a response: The Legion wasn’t even mobilizing yet – it was waiting for the salt situation to be resolved.

“Can we send them my recorder? I can show that salt is being loaded up and shipped out right now” Cash suggested.

Sullen Hoof noted that it would probably be easier if they could simply show that salt barges were going down the river of tears. Speaker agreed, noting that Lookshy no doubt that observation posts with heliographs along the north-western edges of the hundred kingdoms, so once the first barges are loaded and going it shouldn’t be long.

“Let’s see, barge going downriver, down the Yanaze…. That’s about one and a half month, but they won’t need to go all the way – so maybe a tad less than month before the Lookshy observers spot them and message their commanders?” Cash calculated, trying to calculate the usual how many times a salt barge would usually stop along the river of tears for provisions.

Nodding ever so slightly, Speaker furrowed his brows deeply: “Fair enough, and I can’t imagine that the legion will be able to marshal its forces in less than a few months… so that gives us a small season’s worth of time in total, at the very least – we won’t need more than a few weeks to get this place up and running”

This pleased Raneth and finally ended his foul mood, though he did point out that Speaker’s estimate on ‘getting Plenilune up and running’ didn’t seem to factor in fixing the saltspire: “…and didn’t you say that you would need to do that in order to free up hooves to work in the arsenal?”

Speaker conceded that he hadn’t factored in fixing the manse – mainly because he didn’t really know how it was damaged – but said that he could get on that first thing in the morning.

“Great, you and Shimmer can have fun with that – I’ll poke around town to see about setting up workshops and foundries… ask around for local mines and timber production” Cash noted.

With a grin that was equal parts menacing and equal parts ‘Oh I am so pleased that you have deigned to help me you ungrateful swine’ Raneth agreed to this, turning to Sunrise to ask what she would be doing to contribute to his plans.

“With permission I would like to oversee you working in your workshop for the time being, until the others are done” Sunrise calmly noted, not looking up from her by now lukewarm bowl of soup.

Standing up with a furious expression, Raneth shouted: “What? Never! I tolerate no disruptions when working!”

Her brilliant golden castemark lightning up, it’s simple disk-form shining clearly through Sunrise’s hood as if it wasn’t there, Sunrise calmly noted: “I can assure you, I will be no distraction to you – in fact, I think  you will enjoy having a fellow chosen of Celestia to bounce ideas back and forth with in attendance"

A battle of conflicting thoughts seemed to play out in Raneth’s mind as his face alternated back and forth between an expression of being pleased and offended somehow – ultimately it settled on a mildly content one: “So be it…”

Speaker briefly wondered where Sullen Hoof was, but recalled that Sully had said that he would be stalking around Plenilune looking for Ice Lotus – he had apparently picked up a few things about tracking Deathknights in the underworld, even though Shimmer had given up on the grounds that Ice Lotus had evidently veiled her scent beyond Shimmer’s supernatural tracking charm’s abilities to sniff her out.

The next day Shimmer and Speaker got a tour of the saltspire by a palace servant who spoke Seatongue, albeit poorly – but well enough that Shimmer was to ask the old mare questions and translate to Speaker.

“Ok see these paintings? This is the line of kings and queens that have ruled here… she says that they’ve been doing that for hundreds of years, but… damn, they don’t even look like ponies anymore” Shimmer noted, as the three of them walked down a spiraling hallway that ran all the way up the outer wall of the saltspire.

It was a tad strange to Shimmer that the paintings of kings that had been defeated hadn’t been taken down, new conquerors simply putting up their painting next in the line – usually with even more heavily gem encrusted golden picture frames – but as the servant explained, then in the north pretty much everyone respected the dead, even if one had caused their deaths: “…we have a saying: You never know what corpses might thaw in the summer”

Not entirely comforted by the grim saying, Speaker focused his attentions on the paintings. There was an undeniable patterns: A new ruler would come along, either through military conquest or some other way of taking over the city, and that king or queen would look like a pony in the portrait – no surprise there.

But subsequent paintings, of their descendants, of their hers, revealed a pattern of degeneration… the kings and queen portraits began taking on frog-like features: Their coats would yield in patches ever increasing in size to what looked like moist skin, their snouts and mothers would change shape ever so slightly – the servant even claimed that it was living in the manse for generations that did stuff to you… though it also allowed them to breathe underwater.

“Is that why they built the castle structures around the saltspire base?” Speaker wondered.

Asking the servant and getting a reply, Shimmer said: “No, apparently they just wanted more castle – the first expansions were built centuries ago”

Mutations caused by generations of exposure to the warped essence flows of a malfunctioning manse – Speaker couldn’t claim that it was the worst side-effect he had ever seen from a manse that wasn’t working right – but at the same time it was clearly a very slow-acting effect, hinting that the damage to the manse wasn’t that great: He knew from the first age that most times when a was damaged it would either blow up, quite spectacularly, from essence buildup, or shut down and go inert due to lack of essence input.

With essence sight Speaker and Shimmer went to work, examining the vaulted arches, the dragon-icongraphy of inlaid jade, and all the other components of the manse’s inner workings – the essence filters, the black jade baffles and other strange contraptions that were meant to siphon salt out of water and condense it into giant crystal slabs.

To both of their surprise then everything seemed to be working just fine – the main problem was the salt-extraction parts of the manse simply weren’t being powered properly…

“See these inscriptions on the gems here?” Shimmer said to Speaker, their guide sitting in a corner of the damp basement room looking somewhat bored if not bemused.

Speaker took a quick peek at the gem. It had old realm glyphs on it clearly stating that the strange devices it was connected to were only meant to take in pure water essence…

“Look at how the thing is clogged with stone chips and… goo” Shimmer noted, poking her hoof into a pungent and thick slime that oozed out of the machine.

Essence sight revealed the issue: The essence coming into the device wasn’t pure water essence – of course, that meant tracking the source of that essence flow contamination.

This search led the two outside the saltspire, to the palacial addons around the base of the spire.

“Oh Raneth is not going to like this” Shimmer said dejectedly.

With a smile, Speaker asked: “You’ll keep us safe if he decides to run us out of town over this right?”

“Oh course my love” Shimmer mused, giving Speaker a kiss.

Raneth turned out to not just dislike what the two had to report – he was… annoyed. To Speaker and Shimmer’s great surprise the news that it was the castle structures around the saltspire themselves that were polluting the manse’s essence flows didn’t elicit any kind of outburst.

“Ok, so… what’s the solution? Alter the castle? I think they have some blue and black jade stashed in the treasury somewhere…” Raneth asked asked, sounding for once genuinely curious.

Sadly Speaker could only say that from his and Shimmer’s observations, then nothing short of the complete demolition and removal of the castle around the base of the saltspire would fix the saltspire. Even the bridge leading to the city on the shore would have to go.

“But don’t fret – you can sell this as a great gift of the ponies of Plenilune” Shimmer suggested.

This proposal caught both Speaker and Raneth’s attention, though for different reasons, while Cash just nodded in agreement: The basic gist was to sell the demolition of the palace and the restructuring of the city as a boon to the city: “We’ll simple tell them that their time as defacto salt-slaves are over. You’re offering everything new jobs as soon as the mines, woodcutting and ore smelting facilities are built – Speaker can handle their training. Combine that with saying that we’re tearing down the old castle because it’s a symbol of their old oppressors… they’ll love it, they'll love you”

In lieu of trying to complain or voice any concerns over this scheme, Raneth just threw his forehooves into the air and said that the circle was free to do as it had planned: “…but mark my words: If you fail and this brings ruin to the city, I will make sure that the Bull knows every detail”
“Dear, what did we agree to about passive aggressive threats?” Sunrise admonished, like a disappointed aunt correcting a wily nephew.

To the rest of the circle’s surprise Raneth almost recoiled in horror at Sunrise’s statement. He meekly nodded and left the room…
“What exactly have you been doing to him?” Cash wondered.

Sunrise merely shrugged and smiled: “Polite conversation, that’s all – discussing the virtues of polite society”

With a bemused look Cash chortled and nodded, amused with the idea that Sunrise was likely driving Raneth up the wall with polite but insistent suggestions that he improve his behavior.

Over the next few days Shimmer summoned multiple representatives from local and regional elemental courts. Asking politely, then less politely, then eating two of the representatives, Shimmer was ultimately told about all ore deposits in the region. Speaker equally spent his time evaluating the local timber industry, not that there was much: The few lumberponies in the city mainly supplied the shipwrights which only really did in barge-repair, and a few businesses that did in building houses. Cash equally scouted out several locations throughout the city that would be suitable for moving the city’s administration out to, away from the palace around the saltspire.

Another aspect of the city that would require much work was the shape of the city itself: Most buildings had built in ‘sails’ or nets on their roofs, to catch salt in the wind. Sure, it might be handy for the salt trade at the moment, but for the purpose of making room for ponies to live and expand it wasn’t particularly handy.

Sunrise and Cash devised a plan where various parts of the city would be emptied, demolished and rebuilt for Raneth’s new arsenals, lumber mills and iron works. At first the outer parts of the city would be uprooted, with the ponies there being housed in – of all places – a wing of the palace that had been cleared and made ready for them, until new housing had been built by Speaker with his singing staff.

The grand presentation of the plan went fairly well – Cash, being the only member of the circle who spoke the local tongue, presented it well and managed to sell pretty much every pony gathered in the grand central  square of the city on the idea that ending their dependency on slaving away sweeping up salt. Apparently the idea of offering work in smithies, foundries, lumber yards and all the other industries that would comprise the planned weapon production industry sounded very nice – though Speaker missed the more complex parts where Cash elaborated on how the various new businesses, while initially state-owned, would be able to keep whatever profits they made from excess production and whatever else they could squeeze in, as long as they met their deadlines for the things they had to make for Raneth.

Apparently this was more or less the same setup that Cash had set up in Sunhill, though with the added incentive that the ponies working at most of the various small businesses that Cash had set up to keep the city running could buy themselves out, as a means to become entirely privately owned.

Following the grand speech many of the ponies in the outer parts of the city began packing their things – Cash had promised nice new homes… so Speaker was quickly sent out to sing up some apartment buildings with his staff.

At first Shimmer had to hold off the mob of ponies each trying to claim one of the new apartments long before Speaker had finished the building, let alone strengthen the walls and floors enough to hold the weight of ponies. Next up, once the ponies were let in, a numerous fights broke out as scraps started over who got to keep the apartments. Ultimately the ice-walkers that had come out to witness the miraculous construction had to clear the place, after which Cash organized a slightly more civil distribution of the new housing.

“Damnit these ponies… they’re squabbling over this like their lives depended on it” Shimmer complained, looking bruised and grumpy from all the rocks and other random bits of kit that had been thrown at her while she had been holding off the mob.

Cash shrugged as he checked his list of apartment-desiring families and single applicants, trying to tally them all so Speaker could be told exactly how many more apartment buildings would be needed: “It’s a combination of a lot of things – ponies up here in the north don’t seem afraid of speaking their mind, even against their rulers, plus a lot of them seem to have packed up their shacks entirely, so they basically have nowhere to sleep at the moment… and the nights up here are nothing if not cold enough to kill you”

Shimmer didn’t seem particularly impressed, but Cash followed up with noting that the ponies of Plenilune were still technically serfs who lived only at the whims of their ruler: “This is probably the first time in centuries they’ve been offered something nice that they had to claim through their own effort – the desperation to get a nicer place to live, mixed with this being the first time in their life where they don’t just have to do as they’re told… they’re overcompensating”

“Even western tribals know well enough not to rush in and riot over stuf like this – what if someone got hurt?” Shimmer grouched.

Cash gave his list one last look-over before rolling it up and floating it into a pocket inside his silk jacket:  “Your age betrays you. The ponies here that live off gathering salt only live to around thirty to forty years… they don’t have the patience that your long life has afforded you”

By the end of the day Speaker had produced several more apartment buildings, though they all stood without doors and windows, but that was something which could be produced later.

It was also at that point that complaints that the new buildings were poorly optimized for salt collection began to come in, not that they were acted upon in any way.

Over the following few days the process was repeated, moving much of the city out of the more slummy parts of Plenilune, which cleared more than enough space for the arsenal workshops and warehouses to be built. At Raneth’s surprisingly polite request, Speaker put in a bit of extra effort to ensure that the buildings meant to house actual arms production were a bit sturdier than the rest – though Raneth also complimented Speaker on the ingenious use of trapped pockets of air in the stone walls to isolate the new buildings, especially the foundry, which would cut down on how much coal would needed to keep things hot and molten.

The second last part of the reconstruction effort was Raneth’s new palace – which closely preceded the final step, the demolition of the old saltspire palace. The old palace was gutted of anything and everything that Raneth wanted in his new abode, though Speaker noted that he would only create the overall structure of the new palace: Raneth would either have to hire local craftsponies or do the final decorations himself.

“I’m impressed… he didn’t even raise his voice when I told him that” Speaker said in astonishment.

Cash didn’t appear nearly as impressed: “Sunrise is really having a good effect on him, gotta say I’m impressed with her work”

The demolition of the old palace happened to great fanfare and public jubilation. The symbol of their oppressors crumbling away under Speaker’s disassembly charm, with finally the bridge out to the saltspire giving way, which was celebrated across the city.

The next day quite a lot of ponies across the city woke up to new hangovers and new jobs, as assigned and distributed by Cash based on their previous work and some basic aptitude testing that he had evidently conducted while Speaker and Shimmer had spent days tearing down the old palace.

At one of the mining camps set up based on the information that Shimmer had gotten from local elementals, Cash addressed the ponies gathered there: “Come good ponies – it is time to strike the earth! No longer will your income be based on the whims of the wind and how lucky you are with a brush. Now you stand to profit and prosper purely on your determination and your strength, taking the bounties of the depths and selling that to the city’s new copper foundry on East Sturgeon’s lane”

“But the foundry isn’t ready yet – and none of us have ever worked mining ponies” one concerned voice rang out. A murmur of other voices chimed in with concerned tones.

Cash beamed – the fact that the ponies before him complained about this meant that he could give them even more good news: “Fear not – for now that the saltspire is working properly again, its cranking out so much salt that Lord Raneth will still be paying out your wages for the time being – so consider this your training period for this work”

An old mare with a whole new set of teeth, courtesy of Speaker’s miraculous medical charms, stepped up. Cash introduced her as the new boss of the mining operation. She had been an old retired mining pony living in Plenilune with her family, but thanks to a generous offer from Cash and some medical treatment from Speaker she had agreed to helm the mining operation. A few other retired miners, as well as two that had been simply traveling through Plenilune at the time, had similarly been hired on to help in exchange for generous wages.

All in all the rollout of the city’s new industry went reasonably smooth. A group of fire elementals found the steel foundry that Speaker had made quite cozy and had to be accommodated for, a few panicky riots caused by doomsayers who couldn’t imagine how one could live outside of collecting salt had to be quelled, and the saltspire’s salt block extruders had to be cleaned throughly before they started working properly – but when they finally worked they indeed began cranking out talent-sized blocks of solid salt crystal to the point that it actually became a bit of an issue to move salt-barges in and out of the loading docks quickly enough to keep up with the magical production.

Raneth, grumpy but satisfied that it would take at least a couple of months before everyone had been fully trained for their new jobs and raw materials would start to flow into the foundries, lumber mills and the arsenal, thanked the circle – privately – though he did note that with this massive increase in salt production, the remaining saltspire league city states would no doubt declare war on him out of fear of going out of business.

“Will be the Bull be able to send you reinforcements in time?” Cash asked, not really wanting to see all his work wasted at the tip of the spears of greedy salt-kings.

“He better” Raneth scowled.

As the circle packed up Nah and made ready to leave, Speaker and Shimmer wondered why Raneth was suddenly acting so ornery again.

“…and he was just starting to act so nice, but now this” Speaker lamented as he looked skywards. He was ready to accept that Raneth was just a massive tool, but still… it annoyed him.

Shimmer half-shrugged: “He’s probably just saddlesore that Sunrise is leaving with us – Raneth and her were getting on so well”

It was then that Cash arrived along with a dozen ponies hauling a massive cart on which a huge braided steel cable was laid out. Apparently then Cash had gotten the bright idea of speeding up Lookshy’s committal to war by using the jade-steel cable and Nah to haul three barges full of the giant salt bricks down to Lookshy.

“…and did the captains of the barges agree to this?” Shimmer wondered.

Cash smiled gleefully – explaining that the owners of the barges had left the city long ago when the barges had originally been sunk: “These are ours now – they’ll be taking salt to Sunhill as a regular route once we’ve swung by Lookshy with them”

Hooking up the jade-steel cable to Nah in such a way that it wouldn’t hurt the giant beast, and then figuring out a way to haul three barges without lifting any of them out of the water, wasn’t easy – but it was accomplished, resulting in the decidedly strangely sight of a flying yeddim rocketing down the river of tears, with three barges in tow which each sent up a massive spray in their wake. Oh what must the poor ponies living and fishing along the river not have thought…

Signaling the Lookshy harbor citadel by having Sunrise flare her anima as they  approached Lookshy in the late twilight hour two days after leaving Plenilune, the circle was welcome back to the city with much wonderment. The talent-sized salt bricks were examined closely, and the crews of the barges told the wondrous tale of how the circle had ended Plenilune’s salt serfdom by helping the locals find ore deposits and set up lumber mills and foundries. The weapon manufacturing was not mentioned, per a polite charm-enforced request of Cash, though the circle had no doubt that Lookshy would learn of that at some point.

In a large meeting room in a well fortified structure within the Legion district of Lookshy, the circle was finally told what they wanted to hear from Taimyo Karal Linseed: “The speed at which you resolve these issues are giving the boffins over at the Operations directorate everything from headaches to wet dreams – they can barely keep up with what you keep pulling off. That said, then the martial staff’s promise stands: You’ve secured us enough salt to last us a decade – or at least one campaign into the underworld – so tomorrow I will start sending out marching orders to recall troops to the city. Congratulations, Lookshy is now marshaling for offensive operations on your behalf”
“When do you expect everything to be ready? Speaker wondered.

Linseed smirked: “Everything? Never, but I expect Operations to give me a time-line for the proposed campaign within the next two weeks. I’m guessing we’ll have enough troops marshaled by the late end of Descending Wood to make the initial incursions through the morning fields. Given how close Deep Rot is to Lookshy in the underworld, that’ll give us a wide window to attack and destroy the place before calibration”
There were a few other details – such as the fact that Linseed heavily expected most of Ops’ plan proposals to involve Speaker helping fix all kinds of otherwise mothballed and retired magical weapons, and the planning required for the Lookshyan Games that were to cover for the buildup of troops in the city, but these seemed like minor concerns at the moment…

> Chapter 92: Old Wounds
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

With things somewhat back to normal – with no urgent things to do, cities to rebuild or demonic invasions to thwart – the circle split it up once more. Speaker and Shimmer remained in Lookshy to help with the repairs of ancient weapons and devices that would help with the destruction of Deep Rot. It also turned out that Cash had evidently negotiated things so that part of the circle’s payment for Lookshy’s help against Deep Rot was repair services by Speaker… though at the rate Speaker was going through busted old first age war machines or shaping up spare parts at the Souforge, that debt was quickly covered, not that that stopped Speaker for fixing more things.

Cash and Sunrise had returned to Sunhill, to tend to things there. Cash needed to set up a trade route or two to Plenilune, and Sunrise… disappeared one day. Shortly thereafter a lesser celestial messenger god appeared before each of the other members of the circle, delivering four identical letters.

The letter read, in old realm written in golden ink on impossibly smooth silk paper: 

“Dear Circlemates, this is Sunrise Glow.
I write to you from Yu-Shan where I am undergoing training in preparation of the attack on Deep Rot.
Evidently the Gold Faction of Sidereals have managed to convince the Bronze Faction to actually cooperate, to the point that the Convention of Deathlords has authorized support for us. This doesn’t mean that we get anything from them, but it does mean that others are allowed to help us – which is what the gold faction is doing with me. 
So no heavenly Legions will come to our aid, though I have been made privy to a number of corrupt and ineffective celestial officials that I shall need Sully and Cash’s help to correct and dicipline next time you are here – and I know that my letter will be read by others before reaching you, so that’s as much a request to you my friends, as it is a declaration of intent (not a threat) to the corrupt gods who dare defy Celestia’s chosen and hinder our rightous efforts. Heath Rose did not approve of me writing that, but she can suck eggs.
Yours truly, Sunrise Glow of the Solar Zenith caste
PS: The training I’m getting – singing lessons, in weaponized singing”

“Well that’s nice” Shimmer noted.

Speaker nodded, careful not to slip from Shimmer’s rainslick feathers as he sat on her back. The heavy sack of spare parts behind him didn’t shift, but then again it was secured with Shimmer’s essence webbing – though Speaker hadn’t been entirely happy with putting pressure on the crystals and other impossible objects he had produced earlier that day at the Soulforge.

“Oh and did you see how that unicorn colt with the book cutie mark looked at me when I shapeshifted? Priceless, I thought he was gonna piss himself” Shimmer quipped, still amused by the event.

With a chuckle Speaker agreed: “True, but you were in the form of a slug on the brow of his nose at the time… poor thing though he had discovered a new species of silver and purple slug”

“Honestly – this is the east… every rock you turn over will have a bug or something that no pony has ever seen before” Shimmer said in a more unimpressed tone.

Arriving in Lookshy later that evening, Shimmer flew in over the city to reach their port district town house. It was a nice house in one of the many gated communities within the district, though Shimmer had ensured that all the guards that patrolled the area knew of her and her warform, so nobody would start sounding alarms whenever she arrived.

There was a delightful mood in the area, with servants and home-owners everywhere going about their business and chatting curiously as Shimmer and Speaker landed. Indeed, all of Lookshy was abuzz with the recently announced three-hundred and fourty second Lookshyan Games – everyone was talking about who would participate in what contest, or what foreign contestants might show up, especially now with all these strange Solars and Lunars running about.

Putting the sack full of wyld-shaped spare parts and energy crystals aside, Speaker reviewed what little mail had come in during the day.
“Anything new and interesting? More party invitations? Deaththreats? Lookshy Games event invites?” Shimmer asked in jest, succinctly summarizing the kind of mail that Speaker had been receiving since the circle’s return to Lookshy from Plenilune.

The two party invitations Speaker looked at didn’t seem that much out of the ordinary: “Another tea social invite from the Denansdor Historical Society, and an invitation to a rain-season wrap-up party at some Gens Amilar social club”

“More from the historical society? Haven’t they picked your brain enough about the first age?” Shimmer quipped, having found most of the events hosted by the society dreadfully boring – though discovering that it was a cover for the personal cult of Tu Yu, which made sense since he was the old god of the original first age city that had stood where Lookshy was now, had  been at least mildly interesting.

Speaker tossed the invitation from the historical society in the trash. The rainy season wrapup party looked interesting, though he’d need to run it by the circle’s security inspectorate liason to vet the hosts – not something that Speaker felt was necessary, but Yushoto Risotto’s orders were quite clear: Speaker had to clear his social calendar with the coughers whenever he wanted to go anywhere he hadn’t already been in Lookshy, just to avoid going to any overly pious immaculate believers as that might lead to... trouble.

The official excuse was that Speaker was now a too valuable asset for Lookshy, though unofficially it was now well know that Risotto had become a tad paranoid after the coup attempt, though she mainly expressed it by being paranoid on behalf of others… such as Speaker.

“Is it even something you want to go to?” Shimmer wondered, as Speaker seemed to be looking at the invitation in silence.

Shrugging, Speaker looked at the rest of the rest of the letters. A few status updates on repairs he had initiated, someone had broken some of his wyld-shaped spare parts as part of screwing up a repair procedure – and an odd letter: “Hey look at this… it's for the whole circle”

Shimmer sauntered over to Speaker, letting her hips sway with lustful intent: “What is it? A house Cynis orgy invitation?”

Shooting Shimmer a bemused gaze that read ‘You would like that wouldn’t you’ Speaker said: “It's from the Lookshy Games, the committee in charge of overseeing and arranging the contests. They want to talk to us about… hehe, ok”

Snaking herself around Speaker, Shimmer peeked at the letter: “Oh… they want to know if we’re planning on participating in any of the events – cool”

The meeting was scheduled to take place a few days later, at a cultural center in the market district: It was mostly art gallery space and meeting rooms, though Shimmer found the militaristic art depicting unicorns in glorious battle, or stylized dragon motifs, not particularly interesting - it was bland standard fare for... well... the whole of Lookshy.

The meeting itself turned out to be very short-lived: Entering the wood-paneled meeting room, smelling the over-done tea on the trey in the corner, Shimmer beheld the five ponies that made up the committee from left to right: Two old mares who seemed too fat to compete in anything but cooking contests, a young-ish looking colt with a cool looking scar going from his left ear down over his snout – probably a veteran, a bookish looking unicorn stallion with glasses who appeared about as young as the veteran, so he was probably around seventy or eighty, and finally an old stallion with a nice grey mustache… and Speaker pulling her out of the meeting room.

“Come on – we’re leaving” Speaker said angrily, giving no explanation as he pulled on her leg.

Shimmer had no clue why Speaker wanted to leave so sudddenly – or why he was angry – but her bond to Speaker’s exaltation bid her to not resist him, and she didn’t see any immediate need to question that impulse.

Outside in the hallway Shimmer saw how Speaker was fuming – hard: “What’s wrong?”

“Him.. of course he would weasel his way onto a committee like this” Speaker said bitterly through clenched teeth.

Shimmer glared at Speaker with a somewhat disappointed look, but also one that spoke of worry and curiosity – subtleties that Speaker completely missed: “What? Ugh… come on – lets go home”

Standing her ground, Shimmer put a stern and firm hoof on Speaker’s shoulder: “No, you’re going to explain what the problem is, otherwise we might not be allowed to compete in any of the Games at all”

“I… the pony on the far right, did you notice him?” Speaker said, sighing deeply.

Nodding, Shimmer tried to recall any special details about the pony – but truth be told he had been quite bland for an old stallion.

“That was my older brother Bright Idea, head of my family and all-round living garbage” Speaker said with a dead serious face.

Shimmer was shocked. She had never seen Speaker speak ill of anyone so plainly – well, outside of your usual swearing at foes trying to kill him, but that didn’t really count: “Wait… Bright Idea, Bright Machine Speaker – has he changed his name to fit your exalted name?”

“No, that… hmm… no he chose that name himself at his cutesenara, I guess it was but a cruel trick of fate” Speaker seethed, looking even more angry and insulted at the thought of his name – originally chosen by Autochthon himself – being defiled in a sense by his familiar relations.

Shimmer recalled Speaker having said that he didn’t want to see or talk to his family, which was why they weren’t present at the ceremony where Speaker was awarded citizenship, along with a medal for his actions in countering Morning Dew’s coup attempt: “Ok… but now he’s in there, so we have to deal with him”

Frowning deeply to the point that Shimmer was briefly worried that his brows would tip over and fall down his ace, Speaker gritted his teeth: “I… we’ll ignore him for the time being. I doubt he got on the commute because of me anyway – sitting at the edge means he’s not head of it anyway, that was the legionnaire with the scar. We can just talk to him”

Returning to the meeting room, it didn’t take many moments before the venomous glares exchanged between the two brothers  were so intense that Shimmer could swear she could taste the poison in the air – but luckily the scarred colt was quite agreeable, apparently having chosen to ignore the two’s hasty exit and return: “Ah, there you are – be seated”

Speaker found the young colt’s order amusing – but then again it wasn’t entirely uncommon for legion officer cadets to be given positions like this to give them experience in administration: “Thank you – the letter I got said that the committee wanted to get an impression of what events and contests me and my circlemates were planning on attending?”

“That is correct – Brass told me that you lot can do things that even unicorn’s can’t, and we wish to ensure that… well…” the cadet said, clearly trying to somehow explain that the circle was to keep it down on ‘unicorn level’ – but he simply wasn’t finding the words.

The sweet old granny next to the cadet nodded and smiled, saying: “What I believe the honorable chairpony is trying to say is that the Lookshy Games are geared towards mortals, godblooded and unicorns – not…” and quickly looking at the papers before her before continuing: “…the celestial exalted”

Shimmer was keeping close attention to Speaker’s brother Bright Idea – but he was remaining silent, only shooting toxic glares at Speaker who was returning fire in kind when not looking at the chairpony.

“Very well – I hope you can understand that I’ll have to ask the rest of the circle what, if any, contests and events they plan on participating in” Speaker noted, appearing happy that he had an excuse to look away from his brother as he addressed the old mare and the cadet.

The unicorn, with his pale blue mane, wavy blue mane that seemed to move as if in a constant breeze, nodded: “That’s why we asked you to come so early in the planning process – to give you a preliminary list of planned contests and events, so you can confer with your circle and get back to us. We have also been authorized to consider new events depending on your feedback, in case you or your circlemates have any suggestions based on any unique skills and abilities you would like to see tested.”

Speaker and Shimmer nodded, impressed tha the committee had been given such broad powers.

“Though we can only set up new events if additional competitors come forward – no solo acts” the cadet quickly noted.

With that, the meeting concluded. Shimmer and Speaker were asked to send the circle’s list of events that they each wanted to be part of to the committee by messenger within the next two weeks – Shimmer assured them that it shouldn’t be more than a few days to collect the information.

Back at the town house Shimmer cornered Speaker as he was about to hide himself behind a large tome on sorcery: “This is where we talk about your brother – not read books on magic”

Looking up at Shimmer from the book, his glare a furious mix of dread and anger, Speaker tried to face the Lunar down – but even as her bond to Speaker screamed at her to submit to his implied command Shimmer stood defiant, her desire to bring peace to Speaker stronger than her urge to abide his conscious wishes.

Seeing that Shimmer wasn’t backing down Speaker was faced with the uncomfortable choice of actually doing something to get her away from him – relenting and telling her his sad story…

“You already know that there’s bad blood between me and the rest of my family, especially my older brother, right?”

Shimmer nodded, sitting down in front of Speaker.

With a pained grimaze Speaker gave off a pained sigh: “My older brother, Brigth Idea, he… he chose his name aptly. When he was young he was full of good ideas, made a good deal of money, invested them wisely… but then it got the better of him”

“Made him full of himself?” Shimmer guessed – having seen similar sibling issues turn into armed skirmishes more than once her long life.
Dropping his head down in defeat, Speaker argued heavily with himself whether he should relent or keep up trying to resist – but Shimmer was just… 

“You’re more or less spot on. In his youth he was an ok businesspony – nothing grand, but earned his keep, paid his employees well. Trouble was that he kept dreaming of greater ventures – kept trying to invest money in schemes that never panned out, ruined himself and everyone else he talked into investing, including much of the family… Cash is the only pony I know who can talk your ear off better” Speaker began in a dejected tone.

Shimmer listened with rapt attention, certain that there was more than just bad business advice to explain for Speaker’s feelings.

“I was never asked to invest in anything, never earned enough, but he bankrupted most of the rest of my extended family – but he always managed to come out on top himself, donated a lot of money to political charities to ensure he had friends in the right places – that’s probably how he got to be on the committee here… last I heard he had been voted pony of the year in the hinterland community he was living in” Speaker elaborated.

Nodding, Shimmer inquired: “Ok, so his political friends held a hoof over him to shelter him from the fallout of his bad business deals, leaving the rest of your family to suffer? Is that the rub?”

“Part of it… no, but he would just never own up to his share of the blame! And then there was what he did to mother….” Speaker said, sinking deeper into the lounge chair.

Shimmer cringed as Speaker told the sordid tale: A dozen or so years after Speaker’s father, Ocean Boomer, had died from the usual wear and tear of the tough life of being a mine-sweeper in the Seventh Legion navy, Speaker’s mother had met a retired pig farmer, a wealthy stallion by the name of Pork Rind. He had been nice enough to begin with, even put a very nice ring on her hoof, though they never got around to scheduling a formal marriage: “…after visiting them one day I found odd stains in her chamber-pot”

“Blood? Was he beating her?” Shimmer inquired in a worried tone, shimmying down next to Speaker.

His eyes closed and his face in a pained expression, Speaker slowly shook his head, making his beard dangle slowly from side to side: “No, it was black stains – and he didn’t go bad until after that. Turned out that she had been hiding some kind of sickness of the stomach and bowels. Food didn’t digest right in her. She deteriorated very quickly afterwards… during followups I found her oh so beloved betrothed was feeding her rotten milk and moldy bread, because he was too cheap to buy fresh food for someone who was going to die soon anyway. After that I got leave and moved in with them... lived with them for the last few weeks of her life before she died in her sleep,  more bones than… anything else… I never was that good a cook, but it was better than what he would have given her, if anything at all”

Shimmer wiped the tears from Speaker’s eyes but remained silent, sensing that Speaker really needed to get this off his chest - so this had been why Speaker had retired so far away from Lookshy, from his family.

“It was after the burial that things got ugly with Bright Ideas. He was first born, so he was put in charge of mother’s estate, not that there was much to hand out. He had apparently really liked ol’ Porky, liked his money even more so – the damned fool handed over all of mother’s estate to him, every heirloom, every little worthless bit of knicknack…” Speaker said bitterly through gritted teeth.

Unsure of Lookshyan inheritance customs, Shimmer wasn’t entirely sure of what to say to that – but as Speaker explained, then it was a moot point: “Thing was, three days before her dying, during a brief moment when she was awake and lucid enough to speak, she told me to come close. She told me her will – who was to get what and so on… not that she really had much to part with, but she wanted Currant Delight, her eldest daughter, to get all her cookware for example. I was to get the big wooden spoon from over the fireplace…”

As Speaker trailed off into tears, Shimmer couldn’t help but wonder what in Creation had been so special about about a big spoon, though at the same time she understood well enough why Speaker hadn’t talked about any of this before: It obvious hurt to even think of – and the logical leap from the will to the brother giving everything to Pork Rind meant that Bright Idea had somehow ignored or even claimed that the will Speaker had was false. As Speaker noted it was the later: “He called me a liar in front of the whole family. Some believed him, a few others believed me – but without anything notarized he was the one with the authority to make that choice… and Pork Rind refused to confirm that it was true, even though he had heard it too”

“Gee I wonder why…” Shimmer quiped, giving Speaker a hug.

That had been why Speaker had sought retirement so far from Lookshy – for with most of his family refusing to see or talk to him there simply wasn’t anything left for him.

“Wait, you said that there were some that believed you?” Shimmer asked, wondering what had happened to them.

With a sorry look, Speaker professed that the last Speaker had heard of Currant Delight and her husband then they had moved to one of the other hinterland communities where she worked as a teacher and he a justicar – but they too had basically been shunned by his family to the point that they couldn't really live with them.

“My old master always said that the cruelty of the common pony was the very worst and vilest thing that had ever been put into Creation” Shimmer mused, holding Speaker tight.

The two sat quietly the rest of the evening.

In the morning Speaker woke up to the sight of a large, somewhat worn and scuffed, familiar wooden spoon, its handle covered in simple but pretty circular carvings, hanging on the wall next to the door out of his bedroom.

With a face of concern and mild annoyance, Speaker stepped into the kitchen, from which glorious and wondrous scents emanated – for they signaled Sullen Hoof’s presence – to which Speaker asked: “Did you go out and steal back my mother’s big spoon?”

“It was given freely” Sullen Hoof noted as he directed three floating spoons about, stirring in several pots and sizzling woks.
Feeling too groggy to inquire how that could be, or even how Sully had known to seek the spoon out, Speaker sat down on a chair in the corner and simply sighed – he didn’t complain or resist either when Sullen Hoof presented him with a strong cup of tea to sip on.
The shrill cry of a seagul announced Shimmer’s arrival into the kitchen, to which Sullen Hoof elegantly flung a knife in seagull-shimmer’s direction so that it lodged itself in the doorframe just before Shimmer flew in, causing her to balk, stall, drop to the ground and turn back into a pony: “Oh come on”

“You know the rule – the only animals in my kitchen are the ones we eat”

Speaker chuckled at the exchange, wondering when exactly Sully had felt it necessary to institute such a rule.

Over breakfast Sullen Hoof explained that he had found the family of the evidently recently late Pork Rind via help from some ‘friends’ in the Security Directorate, who as luck would have it, had stored most of the things from Speaker’s mother in a couple of chests. They had apparently tried to contact Bright Idea about whether he or the rest of his family wanted any of the things back, but Bright Idea's response – assuming there even was any – hadn’t reached them yet at their hinterland village.

“Also I came to them disguised as you – they apparently remembered you well, especially that you were the one who cared for your mother in her last days – so they gave me all her stuff, bought a cart from them to haul it back” Sullen Hoof noted.

With a conflicted sigh Speaker expressed his dread for the family drama he would now likely have to suffer because of this: “Can’t we just go back to fighting Deathlords and rebuilding cities?”

As per Speaker’s expressed desire to change the subject, Shimmer brought up the request tha the circle submit what kind of things they would like to participate in.

“Is there a cooking contest?” Sullen Hoof asked Speaker, surprising absolutely no-one. Speaker noted that there was indeed a cooking contest, though it was on who could make the most of field rations, many of which would be spoiled, moldy or otherwise not particularly fit for consumption. Sullen Hoof accepted the challenge.

Shimmer noted that she didn’t really think it would be that good of an idea if she joined any of the contests: “Me against unicorns? I’m not really sure if that’s a good idea…”

“Very well – personally I wouldn’t mind trying to compete in the Locked Horns tournament” Speaker said, explaining that it was the magical martial arts part of the games – and it was always one of the most popular events of the games.

“Neat – I should fight in that one too, you too Shimmer” Sullen Hoof said, giving one of the broths he was cooking up a sniff.

Shimmer shook her head: “Not happening – I heard about that Locked Horns before coming here… they don’t allow you to kill your opponent”

Giving Shimmer a somewhat horrified look, Speaker protested: “Hey, martial arts tournaments aren’t supposed to be deadly – you’re supposed to learn from the fights and better yourself”

“Weak – back west the loser of a tournament would be killed and sacrificed to Siakal” Shimmer remarked, noting that it helped up the stakes a bit and add some legit tension to things.

Sullen Hoof scoffed at how casually Shimmer had revealed that bit of barbaric information: “And I’ve been told by sailors in Nexus that most of the pit fighting arenas and tournaments usually throw in a lame slave or some other sacrificial goat for events like that, to make sure that no pony really gets hurt anyway”

Shimmer shot Sully an annoyed look upon having her boast busted.

After sending a message to Cash and Sunrise about the tournament, the three exalts settled in to wait for a reply. Sunrise’s reply came the next morning, carried by a heavenly spirit who arrived on the sun’s first rays, informing Speaker and Shimmer that Sunrise would not be participating in the games, while a week later Cash arrived with his three barges in tow, though now they were laden with goods with Sunhill and Chung Do – informing Speaker and Shimmer that he would love to join the martial arts tournament.

“You want to… ok – but Cash, you’re not that good a martial artist, you know that right?” Speaker said in a fairly concerned tone.

The transcendent scent of Sully’s latest miracle of southern spices, eastern fruits and northern shellfish made the dinner table divine to look at – but even with that, Cash was more than able to throw a coy glance at Speaker: “What, worried about a little competition?”

“No Cash, he’s worried that you’ll get hurt – Lookshy’s best martial artists will be competing in this, including their most talented celestial dragon styles practitioners” Sullen Hoof noted, himself having also dismissed the idea of participating in that specific tournament on the grounds of his Orichalcum Chef style not being very well suited to leaving survivors, considering the whirlwind of cleavers and the making ponies eat themselves and such.

Cash had only a derisive snort for the Sully: “I checked the rules already – you’re not allowed to kill your opponent. In fact, doing so will get you summarily executed”

“True, no killing, but what amounts of lethal harm is a lot different to exalts than mortals – you have experienced quite well how that works. Amputations and severe crippling injuries are allowed, and yes I can fix those, but that doesn’t mean that you want them in the first place” Speaker pointed out.

At this point Cash looked just ever so slightly conflicted – but he none the less held his ground.

Thus, the Games planning commission was informed of the events and disciplines the circle intended to partake in. Sullen Hoof was signed up for the ‘cooking with spoiled rations’ event, Shimmer was signed up to a cross-country race, Speaker and Cash was signed up for the Locked Horns tournament and Cash was additionally signed up for a debating contest.

A few weeks later the official announcement of the games was sent out across the east, and soon after did the first contestants from outside of Lookshy turn up. Marukan runners, martial artists from various schools and dojos from Nexus, a few contestants from Thorns who were quite thoroughly checked by the security inspectorate before even being allowed into the city and so on. The market district was abuzz with the newcomers, the district of schools’s dojos and salons was a swarm of ponies, as thousands sought trainers and masters to hone their skills before signing up for the games.

Amidst the hustle and bustle Speaker visited Ruby’s grave and left on it a book of sorcery, upon which he made the sign of the mare of endings, as his way of giving thanks and homage now that he had cracked the secret of sorcery once more. He also tried visiting his mother's grave, but it turned out that Bright Idea had stopped paying for that grave-slot years ago, so it had been decommissioned and used for someone else…

> Chapter 93: Locked Horns
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Upon hearing that his mother’s grave had been decommissioned without informing Speaker, Shimmer quickly offered to give Bright Idea a slow and painful death – but to Speaker it simply wasn’t worth it: “It’s such a typical move by him – acting on other’s behalf and doing something stupid. The price to maintain a private grave in the Green Hunt isn’t even that much for a small tombstone like mother’s… greedy bastard”

“I know… but hey, look at his: Another missive from Drip Crank. He probably has some new toys you can tinker with” Shimmer noted, pointing to some unopened letters with Drip Crank’s seal.

The remaining time leading up to the Games was spent by the circle dabbling in various fun private projects.

The amount of assassins coming after had lessened to the point that Shimmer didn’t feel the need to watch his every stop, so she eventually found time to visit some old friends back west.

Speaker made friends in the Stores Directorate, helping with restoring and readying ancient magical weapons of war for the incursion into the underworld, making many trips to the soulforge to shape spareparts into reality. When he wasn't fixing stuff he was reading up on sorcery, tinkering with his strange artifact design and remotely checking in on the Sunhill Hospital to see if they needed help with anything by use of the Sunhill manse hearthstone.

Cash spent his time making an unholy amounts of money, using Nah to fly from the north to the south with salt and never-melting “True Ice”, coming back with unheard of spices, exquisite hoof-voven carpets with exotic and colorful patterns, and gemstones the size of chicken eggs – the amount of money he was depositing in Sunhill’s vaults quickly went from ‘enough’ to ‘we need to contact the heavenly gods of first age math to learn the numbers for this kind of wealth' - though Cash also seemed to have already planned on what to spend all that money on.

Sunrise… was in heaven, getting her singing lessons?

Sullen Hoof spent a lot of time liasing with the Operations Directorate, giving them informationon how to combat the undead, as well making sojourns into the underworld to talk with the Bodhissatva.

As the date for the two week long Lookshy Games came upon the city the buzz around the various markets and residential neighborhoods reached a fever pitch. There were thousands of foreign ponies in the Market District’s hotels and hostels, even more in the large tent-city that had sprouted up around the large arena complex that third field-force combat engineers had set up in record time.

There were well over a hundred events, mainly because there was a strict delineation between events and contests that were for the enlightened, and the ones that were for mortals only – it simply wouldn’t be fair – plus events with exalts competing against exalts had a reputation for being a lot more spectacular.

Now, unlike the Realm Invitational – the Realm counterpart to the Lookshy Games – then the Games were far more humble and austere in how it presented itself: Wasteful pomp and ceremony would eat into the arsenal maintenance budget, though a grand parade with units from every field force in dress uniforms did march through the market district and the arena complex outside the city walls.

To Speaker it was quite a sight: Only twice before in his (mortal) life had he seen such a grand sight, and he had not expected to live to see it again.
From the first field force marched talons of gunzosa in their bright red magical armor, the heavy plating impossible to wield for mortals not prepared properly through secret rites and talisman implants. They were truly a sight to behold, each a hero in their own right for their willingness to sacrifice any prospect of old age to defend creation – well, in Speaker’s opinion they were, for he had served with them. To the rest of the circle they just looked like really heavily armored infantry.

Next up marched market heavy infantry and archers from the second field force, in gleaming blue armor and livery, looking triumphant.
From the third field force rumble a set of parade floats with siege weapons mounted on top. Great ballistas with log-sized bolts, massive catacults with large pony-sized balls of steel ready to fire.

“Say Speaker, why aren’t they really showing any of their magical arsenal?” Cash wondered, looking at the comparably mundane weapons being put on display: “Where are the warstriders, or some skyships?”

Speaker shrugged: “They showed some gunzosa, that armor is about as magic as it gets without being full on jade dragon armor… but beyond that, you know… I never thought about that”

The first event of the games the elimination round for the mortal martial arts tournament. This passed with great fanfare, with as-of-yet unexalted scions from the various Lookshyan gens vied for the attention and enlightenment of the dragons through displays of martial skill. They sought to earn their horn through trials of mortal combat.

A similar elimination round for the magical martial arts tournament was next. With it being possible to sign up at the last minute, and it being fairly common for hesitant late-comers to use this, it was rarely possible just pair off opponents and go from there – there would simply be too many. This was also why the mortal elimination round had taken place.

To Speaker’s less than enthusiastic reaction it turned out that Shimmer had taken the liberty of signing up anyway after discovering that unicorns from the realm had arrived to participate in the magical martial arts tournament – she just couldn’t resist the chance to beat up realm unicorns… or worse.

“Well, let’s hope that we won’t meet each other before the semi-finals” Speaker said with no small amount of hesitance… he knew damn well that Shimmer was a dangerous opponent, especially with her prior admission that she wasn’t entirely sure if she could keep things non-lethal.
Like the mortal combat games, then the ‘enlightened league’ had its elimination rounds in the form of battle royals, each with five contestants. There were twenty in total – a big turnout compared to the elimination rounds Speaker had seen himself from the stands – and down in the fighting rings it seemed even larger… for all around on nineteen other smooth circular stone platforms, each with a lot of other unicorns and other clearly enlightened ponies. Speaker had to wonder if the rumors were true that the contestants from Thorns were also taking part in this tournament, or if they were deathknights in disguise?

The four ponies Speaker was pitted against – everyone being randomly paired via number draw – all looked like they meant business: Two clearly lookshyan unicorns, each in jade armor and with jade weapons befit their martial styles: The husky earth-aspected mare had a grotesquely massive tetsubo by her side, the other - a wiry looking fire-aspected stallion who barely looked old enough to have finished secondary school – had a pair of short daiklaives of red jade flitting about him like two flickering flames. Each weapon denoted the styles that they were clearly steeped in: Celestial earth and fire dragon style respectively.

The two other opponent in Speaker’s elimination round looked just a tad more plain – a gruff unicorn mare with an eyepatch, a definite handicap, who was clad in rough leathers – and an otherwise plain-looking stallion, though his jewelry revealed magical talismans and other shiny things of jade and enchanted gems that the unlightened would probably not be able to use…

The arenas that everyone were positioned on were large six yard in diameter stone circles, raised about a yard above the ground. Falling outside of these would mean defeat – as would yielding or being rendered unconcious, though Speaker’s own experiences in watching these games in his youth told him that usually one lost here by being flung outside the ring… often explosively so, thanks to the volatile nature of the elemental essence of unicorns.

The gong sounding the start of the fights came all too quickly – Speaker had barely had time to look at his opponents in advance! The drums and wooden percussion instruments that followed to give rhythm to the fights were barely noticed by the contestants.

Dropping into a defensive stance, and raising all of his shield charms, Speaker enveloped himself in a golden sheath of neigh-impermeable essence – and just in time, as the mare with the eyepatch came in swinging, her hooves wreathed in a thick wash of water essence – “Damn-it” thought Speaker, knowing full well that the chosen of Danaa’d, the dragon of water, were by far the most skilled martial artists of the dragonblooded unicorns.

Still, her blows were not that hard to fend off – and the few that connected failed utterly to penetrate his shield charms.

Looking to his left – just for a split second – revealed that the burly earth-aspected unicorn mare had barely moved, though her tetsubo was floating in a defensive position – while the bejeweled one was fighting thefire-aspected colt quite fiercely.

Having not even summoned Gift yet, Speaker quickly found himself barely even needing one hoof to ward off the eyepatch-wearing mare – with a swift motion that was much too fast for the one-eyed mare, Speaker had her eye-patch off, revealing  an ugly gaping hole where an eye had once been.

Taking a step back, Speaker to the mare that he wished to disengage. “You yield?” she snarled in heavily accented rivertongue that sounded made her sound like a far-eastern native, her one good eye flitting back and forth between glaring at Speaker and looking for eyepatch.
“No, you will – and in return, I will restore you missing eye” Speaker quickly replied, not dropping his defences – but not making any further moves to engage the mare either.

The mare looked understandably confused at Speaker, but as he flared his castemarks and asked if she had ever heard of the miracle-doctor from Brookside in Nexus her face became a rapid succession of conflicting emotions and careful evalutions, culminating in her bowing her head: “If you’re lying I will have your head”

“You will have to get in line for that – but come, I can do it right now” Speaker said.

Taking a cautious step forward, the mare shot Speaker a curious look: “You’ve done this before in a fighting ring?”

“I once did it while knee-deep in biting demon blood, patching up troops up whiling fighting the river of all torment – this is nothing” Speaker said, casually swatting the mare over the face. The effect was almost instant, her empty socket bursting with white and golden light that seemed to compete for the attention of the tens of thousands of ponies watching in the stands around them.

The now twin-eyed mare happily jumped off the ring, thanking Speaker as she happily trotted off.

Speaker barely had time to congratulate himself as the be jeweled pony was thrown at him, his enchanted jewelry and talismans exploding violently just as he got near Speaker. Using his jumping charm to leap some four yards straight up into the air, Speaker saw the hapless pony with burning talismans fly screaming into the ground next to the arena, where medics, aides and others quickly rushed in to douse the flames and render any medical assistance needed.

The fire-aspected colt stood blazing, his burning anima scorching the stone he stood on: “You better just give up or I’ll burn your essence out of you!” – and with one quick whack over the head with the tetsubo the colt was out cold, bleeding from the head, lying quite still in the stone fighting ring.

Looking at the unicorn mare, Speaker wasn’t really sure if he found her tactic that tasteful – but it was undeniably effective… letting everyone else fight it out and then take out what likely looked like the biggest threat with a surprise attack, leaving a hopefully weaker opponent to fight in the first real round of the tournament.

Without even saying a word the unicorn mare jumped off the elevated fighting ring, the ground quaking as the thick-limbed mare landed with all her armor and massive jade-studed war-club of a tetsubo.

All around him, along the inner rim of the massive race-track, the other elimination rounds were wrapping up as well – with medics and other helpers flocking to whichever ring was resulting in the most messy and bloody fights.

Stepping down from the ring, Speaker suddenly found himself being yanked along by some of the medical staff over to one of the rings where they said that they had a contestant who refused to be treated by anyone but him… it was Cash – who looked reasonably well all things considered, though the multiple lacerations on his forelimbs told a rather bloody story of his ‘victory’

Patching Cash up, Speaker learned that Cash had actually fought a lunar… and no Shimmer. The Lunar had evidently exploded in a mess of fangs and claws – not much of a coherent attack, but its reach had been so that Cash’s dodge charm had been quite ineffective: “So when the thing enveloped me and started chewing, I started punch-stabbing it in the soft innards – I think I hit something sensitive, because it took off like you would not believe it”

“So where is this Lunar now? What did he look like?” Speaker wondered. Those around the two Solars also looked rather curious.
For a moment Cash had the most ponderous gaze – lost in thought, like a poet staring mournfully at the moon: “No clue… I think he used some kind of charm that’s making it hard for me to remember what h- oh what am I thinking”

Cash yanked out his recorder of everlasting glories and had it project an image of the lunar stallion before he transformed. Grey mane and coat, shifty eyes that seemed shaky – the stallion appeared nervous in the few seconds of steady imagery that Cash’s recorder had gotten before the fighting had broken out.

“Be sure to show this to Shimmer  - she might know who that is” Speaker suggested.

That was all for the Locked Horns tournament for that day – it only had one series of fights per day, so no contestant fought more than once a day. This was both so you could recover from your wounds, but also to replenish your essence: No sense in fighting with magical martial arts if you couldn’t power any of it – the exception was for those who were participating in multiple disciplines, though that was usually only done if you knew you could handle doing both…

In Shimmer’s case, the next day had the grand cross country gallop: A race across difficult terrain, water and open roads. A three part race meant to be traveled either by hoof or whichever other way you could… as long as you made it past certain heliograph towers, which in turn would signal your progress back to the arena.

“Oh Shimmer will have this in the bag no contest – she can just fly the whole thing over in no time” Cash quipped from up on the Gens Yushoto spectator balcony.

A large polished silver mirror with enchanted gems set around it showed the image of the contestants as they were making ready – quite a few obviously fire aspected unicorns, but also a number of air and water aspected ones plus a couple others.

Yushoto Risotto chuckled: “You’ve never seen truly advanced unicorn athletics charms have you? Plus, the water post is underwater… they have to yank a rope to ring a bell up on the heliograph tower”

Cash was about to ask what Risotto had meant, when Speaker tugged at his shoulder and gestured to the silver mirror: The fire-aspected unicorns were blazing up, getting ready to run as fast as their fire could burn, but the air aspected unicorns… were jumping in the air… and not falling down.

Levitating on balls of air essence, the floating unicorns sped off at amazing speed the moment the start klaxon sounded. Shimmer set off just the same, flapping her wings fiercely to gain lift in her beastpony-form – but the unicorns of air were just pure speed. The fire-aspected unicorns were a close second, their muscles like like as they galloped, their hoof-prints setting the gravel road on fire as they blazed across it. Finally came the few water-aspected unicorns and the rest trailing behind at slightly more mortal gallop speeds – though it was clear that they were expecting to gain an advantage come the water -leg part of the race.

First up was the difficult terrain part of the race. For the air-aspected unicorns this was mainly an exercise in dodging obstacles – they appeared to be limited to how high up they could fly. Shimmer had no such issues, and took a clear lead.

Well, she thought she had a clear lead… there was a lone pony, no horn, with a race number stitched to her rather drab and plain clothes – she wasn’t even going that fast, merely galloping at a mortal pace.

Out of sheer curiosity – mainly to figure out how such a mortal-looking pony could have navigated the obstacle course so quickly – Shimmer descended, but in doing so her third eye picked up the pony’s aura: Bright yellow essence, the essence of the chosen of journeys… this was a sidereal.

Gliding down silently until she was just behind the sidereal mare, Shimmer asked: “So, bronze or gold faction?”

For whatever reason, be it absentmindedness, knee-jerk reaction, or because she was distracted by the sound of explosions from the firedust-mines back in the obstacle course, the mare said: “That is really rude to ask – I always keep politics out of work you know”

It took a second or so before the mare realized what she had just said – and that someone was right behind her – causing her to stumble, tumble over and take a nose-dive into the by now solid dirt road.

“You ok?” Shimmer asked, landing to help the mare up.

The grey-coated mare, her hood now thrown back – revealing a tuzzled blond mane – looked up at Shimmer. Her eyes were each pointing very much in a different direction: “I… oh you’re not supposed to see me, at all! But come to Whitewall, bring Speaker and his friends”
Before Shimmer could get a word in edge-wise the sidereal just wasn’t there – and there was no trace of her having been there, despite Shimmer’s fresh memories of her being there. Looking around and seeing nothing, not even smelling any trace of the mare, Shimmer flew off to continue the race… bloody sidereals.

The water part of the race wasn’t just easy… it was quite amusing. Despite waiting around for her fellow constentants to arrive, the air-aspected unicorns reaching the lake where the water-leg of the course was set, then they also turned out to have the most difficulty reaching the bottom to activate the bell. The mechanism was dead simple: An enchanted gem that needed a mote of essence to run was wired via jade thread to the bell up on the surface – and Shimmer figured that the ponies up at the bell had some means of scrying to see who was activating the bell…

The amusing part came from watching all the air-essence infused unicorns struggling to not remain hopelessly buoyant.

The fire-aspected unicorns fared better, using their inner flame to boil the water behind them so that they could propell themselves quite fast by being pushed by a continuous jet of expanding warm water.

The water-aspected unicorns simply galloped into the water, striding through the murky fluids as if it wasn’t there, while the few godblooded ponies that had managed to keep pace struggled to dive into the water – you really needed a plan before joining the race… and these poor fools did not have one.

Having long since rung her bell, Shimmer sped off once more – satisfied that her fellow contestants hadn’t just given up despite her superior speed, both above and below water.

It surprised none in the circle that Shimmer won the race, though she did excibit a rare level of sportsponyship in that she waited for the furthest of the other contestants to come into sight before stepping over the finishing line. More than one of the unicorns that had run against Shimmer lodged protests that Shimmer had clearly turned into both birds and fish in the racae, but as the judges pointed out, then their surveillance sorcery in the numbered tabards everyone had galloped around with proved that shimmer had not shapeshifted once, remaining in her warform throughout the race. 

Cash wanted to congratulate Shimmer on her victory, but she declined: “Come on – this was never a fair fight. I just wanted to fly in a race… its been so long since I’ve had a chance to do that”

A few hours later the first of the Locked Horn fights took place. It was one unicorn against another, resulting in a spectacular display of elemental fury – but it wasn’t until the third fight that anyone from the circle was up: It was Shimmer, against a unicorn who seemed quite hesitant about getting into the ring with her… to the point that Shimmer’s opponent conceded the fight before it was even started.
At first Speaker got the impression that this had disappointed Shimmer, but after the results of the next fight she was ecstatic: “He won! The realm unicorn won! That means I get to fight him tomorrow”

“And I wish you the best of luck in that” Speaker said, wondering once more how a mare so old could act so young and energetic still… completely oblivious to himself, as far as he was concerned, was a three-thousand year old pony, at least mentally.

His time pondering the behavioral psychology of ancient exalts was cut brutally short: An official came galloping up to Speaker, telling him that he was up next and needed to get to the fighting ring this instant.

“Very well” Speaker said, activating his balance and jumping charm, allowing him to leap up onto a nearby tent-pole – and from that along the series of banner-poles that lined the inner ring of the vast arena.

Now, the fighting ring for the ‘proper’ Locked Horn fights was just like the ones in the elimination round – a big circular platform of stone bricks, roughly smoothed for great traction and nasty scrapes if you got thrown onto it. The scorch marks and impact marks on it already told of a lot of fighting… the somewhat washed off blood stains told of even more.

Jumping down on the ring from his tent-pole vantage point, Speaker bowed to his opponent: The massive earth-aspected mare from the elimination match, in her equally massive white-jade plate armor. There wasn’t an inch of exposed flesh, with even her eyes being covered in what looked to be a jade-sealed crystal visor.

The announcer said something to the thousands of ponies watching, and the grand illusory projection of the fight erupted above the ring – a somewhat transparent magical image that showed what was happening to everyone. For a moment Speaker contemplated how such a setup worked, but that was quickly ended as the mare addressed Speaker.

“Puke, I am here specifically to smear you across the ring and show the ponies of Lookshy that your gilded freaks are nothing special. Prepare to be broken in every way that it is possible for a pony to break” she said, with such a stony conviction and scathing tone that Speaker had to debate with himself whether he should take offensive to it or not.

Seeing that Speaker wasn’t taking her bait, the mare continued: “You are an affront to everything that my family and the good ponies of Lookshy have worked towards for centuries – you think a quick deal with a devil will get you what you want? No, behold what might and power decades of faith and adherence to scripture have granted me!”

The massive jade tetsubo swung through the air like a boulder launched by a catapult, swinging hard, heavy and with a very good aim – but while powerful, it was also obvious: Speaker simply leapt up into the air, out of reach.

…but he had to come down again, and the mare stood ready in her magical armor.

Speaker recalled the fights the circle had had with the Bodhisattva when they had first met – his armor and ghost-flesh body had been too strong for any in the circle to pierce or damage. This pony wasn’t that different… but she was clearly a student of the dragon of earth and its magical fighting style, which meant that she could render herself steady as a rock if need be – wrestling her to the ground and flinging her out of the ring simply would not be possible… or would it?

A plan formed… a sneaky plan at that.

Calling Gift to him from elsewhere, Speaker flung it at the mare using the special technique that let Gift impart excessive motion onto the things it hit. This had a predictable effect: The mare hadn’t expected that such a small flying bladed disc to throw her off balance… or nearly out of the ring, though by use of that very martial ability that Speaker had dreaded, the mare rooted herself perfectly, preventing Gift from making her budge even an inch. This was all according to plan.

Landing on the other side of the ring, Speaker had Gift simply continue attacking the mare using the simple but profoundly efficient technique he had rediscovered while trapped in that containment field full of demons under Valkhawsen - this forced the mare to keep herself rooted, otherwise any of the attacks might throw her off the ring entirely… well that was the implied threat.

Reaching out into thin air and withdrawing his singing staff and a rosined bow, Speaker brought tip of the staff down to stone ring’s surface… and then he played a mocking little ditty that spun the stone that the mare stood on around at great speed.

Dizzy to the point of wanting to throw up, the mare released her rooting charm, getting off the spinning disc – and she promptly rewarded by Gift knocking off the rings, sending her tumbling almost ten yards down the gallop track along side the ring, spewing puke all the way…

After the mare was done vomiting from the spin-cycle and subsequent tumble she initiated a tirade of swearing rarely heard outside of nexus harbor pubs, to the point the point that whoever was in control of the sorcery that maintained the image and sound projection of what was going on the in the ring to the illusory image above the ring, cut the sound feed… to the which the crowd boo’d , so intensely that the sound was put back on.

Shimmer congratulated Speaker on the creative solution to the fight: “…but once you come up against me it won’t be as easy”
“You mean I can’t just ask you to yield?” Speaker said in jest.

Shimmer chuckled: “You’re assuming that I will be in a farm that can even hear at that point…”

This gave Speaker food for thought: With Shimmer’s control of her body and powers of shapeshifting… how would he beat her should they both advance far enough into the games that they would have to fight each other.

The next day Shimmer came up against her realm unicorn, who like Speaker’s opponent, made a big deal of how he was going to show how truly puny this vile anathema before him was – for before the students of the elemental dragon of fire, all things were but ash.

That was the bark… the bite was a series of attacks on Shimmer’s chakra points, infused with concentrated fire essence. Indeed, so quick had this initial onslaught been that it had barely registered to Speaker before Risotto poked him:

“Oh goodness… she better yield now or she’s in trouble” the old unicorn mare said, sounding concerned in that unique senior officer who just saw the tide of battle turn kind of way.

Speaker, skeptical that anything could really have Shimmer, questioned this logic: “You sure? I’ve seen her weather far worse attacks”

“The Fire Within technique… using both the smoldering would attack and essence-igniting nerve attack at once – unless Shimmer has a way to deaden her sense of touch entirely, then she will now begin to burn up from the inside, no matter how much armor she grows on her outside” Risotto said – her tone undeniably grim.

Shimmer recalled having seen victims of this technique during the battle of Mishaka – still alive, at first, rushing to scribes for something to write their wills or last words to a loved one on… it was absolutely terrible to see them combust from within. It was usually once their bellies burst open in flames that you knew it was all over. 

“Hold on – Shimmer can regenerate a lot of injuries very quickly – and doesn’t… oh wait, look!” Speaker said.

With her essence webbing Shimmer had caught the realm unicorn, who in turn had dug in his wavy – almost flame-like – short daiklaives into the stone ring. It was a tug of war, and Shimmer was heaping more and more webbing onto the blazing stallion, his flaming anima flux barely being able to burn through the webbing before being smothered by more of it.

Ultimately an intense burst of flame scoured away the webbing, but the distraction had worked… Shimmer was gone – or so it appeared, as the dust settled.

“So, what do you think she shapeshifted into?” Risotto asked curiously, as the fire-aspected stallion stomped around the ring looking for his opponent.

The beating drums quieted down, when suddenly the realm unicorn began to flail about, pounding on his left ear.

“Oh… she turned into a flea, how original” Speaker chuckled, though he quickly revised that to something slightly larger, as his medical diagnostic charm told him that the stallion had started to bleed from that ear ever so slightly.

A few seconds later, with the crowd quite amused to see the realm unicorn desperately trying to get the lunar bug out of his ear – lest it eat him up from the inside – Risotto laughed: “Oh this is brilliant…”

Speaker kept his eyes fixed on the fight, but listened to Risotto’s commentary: “I heard her wanted to kill realm unicorns, but this… this is brilliant”

His curiosity piqued, Speaker shot Risotto a brief inquisitive glance. The Taimyo explained, a vicious smile on her lips: “Well you’re not allowed to kill your opponent in these… but there’s nothing in the rules against making your opponent commit suicide – look at how the poor thing is eyeing up his daiklaives. He wants to jab ‘em in his ears to dig her out…”

His curiosity turning to dread, Speaker witnessed in horror as Risotto’s prediction appeared to come true: The stallion roared in pain, bleeding profusely from both ears at this point – and not even fireballs shot into his own now quite scorched ears seemed to do much beyond cauterize the bleeding… those swords sure looked handy as bug-pokers right about now…

“Can’t you stop this? She’s driving him mad!” Speaker pleaded, but Risotto shoot her head with a cruel smirk: “Why would I do that? This’ll send a great message to the realm not to send any more idiots over here to try and embarrass us”

Speaker had to turn his head away – he couldn’t watch… the sound of the bloodthirsty crowd cheering a few moments later seemed to indicate that the fight was over – and Shimmer was the only pony still standing in the ring.

Rushing down to the ring, Speaker met the medics hauling the unicorn off on a stretcher – to Speaker’s surprise the unicorn was actually still alive, hanging on by a thread… though the lacerations and stab-wounds in his left ear told Speaker everything he needed to know, most of which he would rather have gone without.

Shimmer was far too busy bowing gracious and basking in the cheers from the tens of thousands ponies up in the stands to notice Speaker far less than pleased expression as he fought to keep the realm unicorn alive in a nearby field hospital – the main issue was that the unicorn and his friends really didn’t want to be serviced by a Solar doctor, though since neither they nor Speaker was in charge of the tournament medical staff then the lot of them were shooed out of there, though not before Speaker managed to stabilize the patient, not that he got much in the form of thanks for it.

> Chapter 94: Trying Not To Hurt Your Friends
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shimmer knew well enough why Speaker wasn’t talking to her, so she didn’t press the topic that night. Her feelings of guilt she chose to ignore, deciding to spend the evening with some of her new fans reveling in her victory, and the victories of other participants in the games.
The celebrants were barely done partying when messengers arrived the next morning, calling for still active participants in the Locked Horns tournament to report to the arena – apparently there had been a slew of withdrawals from the contest.

For all their boasting of martial prowess and nerves of steel in the face of battle and pain, the Lookshyans sure did wuss out when faced with stiff opposition.

“Oh come on – we’re not that bad… I figure they’re just smart enough to see that they can’t beat you, so no sense fighting you right?” a drowsy and yet surprisingly coherent mare noted from somewhere in the pile of ponies that Shimmer had woken up in.

Feeling good, sticky and delightfully sexed up and ready to fight, Shimmer turned into a snake and slithered out of the pile, turning back into a pony in front of the very intimidated-looking messenger: “So, what’s the problem?”

“No problem ma’am, I’ve just been told to inform you that you ‘re to report to the arena for your next fight” the messenger blurted out just a little too fast to hide the fact that the colt was ready to piss himself.

Amused by the naked display of fear, Shimmer stretched and shook herself, taking a deep breath. The room reeked of sex, half-dry cups of the swill that passed for beer in Lookshy, and the odd whiff of vomit – unicorns sure knew how to party hard, even if they couldn’t all cut the mustard: “Right… I’ll be there before you get back there”

Stepping out into the early morning sun… no, the ‘just before sunrise light from beyond the horizon’  – far too early for the Locked Horns fights – Shimmer looked around in the dim dawn-light. It wasn’t Speaker’s townhouse… didn’t smell like the Yushoto compound’s effervescent fragrance of pine and bamboo flowers… oh well, didn’t matter.

Shapeshifting into her seagull form – her true form, depending on what Lunar philosopher one asked – and flew over to a fountain to rinse off... flying wasn’t easy with her now feathers gunged up in the sticky leftovers of last night’s fun and games.

Coming out of her bird-bath and ascending into the sky Lookshy looked so damn boxy. Every district was walled off, every intersection of walls had a tower bristling with arcane weapons – many of which had a really annoying habit of tracking her as she flew past – still, the air was a lot clearer up at this altitude, though the view wasn’t that much better: From the blue-grey walls of Lookshy, the same colored roof-tiles on damn near everything, or the vast far-too-perfect farmlands to the south of the city. The whole place was just so painfully unnatural. Even the park district, their oh so amazing ‘Green Hunt’ was about as artificial as it got, like how a painter or poet would imagine the ‘perfect’ bit of wooded grassland. They didn’t even let weeds grow there, like, what’s up with that?

Approaching the massive arena complex that the games were held in, Shimmer couldn’t help but be reminded of the hippodrome in Azure, or the racing tracks at Abalone – now the ponies there, they knew how to race.

Down in the arena thingy by the ring, Shimmer saw Speaker, a drowsy-looking Cash, the young event organizer from that committee, the one with the scar, and a few robed ponies with saddlebags full of scrolls…

Landing, with nary a soul up in the stands, it was blatantly obvious that she hadn’t been summoned to fight her next fight.
“What’s up my ‘nathema?” she coyly, trying to break the ice with a little joke.

The stallion with the scar looked at Speaker, who threw a brief glance back at the stallion and the three scribes behind him. Oh come on – wasn’t anyone going to say anything? Not knowing if she was in for a round of praise or lambasting suddenly made Shimmer feel very… fight or flight inclined…

“We’re winning too much” Cash blurted out – having clearly used some flavor of charm to see that Shimmer was getting antsy – not that his statement made that much sense, though it did seem to get the stallion with the scar talking.

Startled by Cash’s claim, the young legion veteran cleared his throat: “Yes, right – good you could come so early Lady Last Shimmer”

It was like listening to a young colt who had been put in way over his head by a  well-meaning elder as the scarred stallion somewhat explained that following Shimmer’s spectacular victory yesterday almost all of the remaining participants in the martial arts tournament had withdrawn from the contest.

“…for real? I spooked them that well? Oh this is rich” Shimmer chuckled heartily.

Yawning, Cash rubbed his eyes: “A few of them, yes – the rest quit out of protest because we are clearly breaking some kind of rule by participating… I mean, it is obviously not right that celestial exalts are allowed to compete against terrestrial exalts – we’re clearly not as bad as everyone else had thought, so they want us to withdraw to make everyone else come back”

The stallion with the scar looked quite shocked – in that delicious sort of “how did you know what I really wanted to say, not what I was going to actually say?” way.

“They can’t make us withdraw – so everyone else left instead, in protest. They say we’re dishonoring the Locked Horns with our participation” Speaker noted glumly, sounding… upset. It was difficult for Shimmer to tell if Speaker was upset because of her from what she had done yesterday, or because of the results of her actions now… and that annoyed her endlessly! That nagging sensation from her bond to him, shaming her, screaming at her that she had clearly done something wrong, even if it wasn’t clear what that thing was…

Taking a deep breath, Cash stepped up to the scarred stallion and gave him a knowing look. The stallion apparently got whatever message Cash was communicating wordlessly, and nodded. Cash turned to Shimmer: “Basically we have a choice: Either we do not withdray, which makes us three and the champ the only remaining contestants – and a lot of ponies will consider us selfish gits, or we drop out and then hope that enough unicorns rescind their withdrawal so things can continue normally”

“What? No. I’m not withdrawing – I want to show these ponies my true power, not hide in the shadows… the Lunar host has hidden away for far too long” Shimmer stated, stomping in the ground hard to accentuate her point.

Looking at Speaker it was obvious that he was conflicted. He didn’t want to upset his kin, the ponies he had looked up to all his mortal life, but it was clear that part of him didn’t want to just up and leave either… Cash looked more pragmatic – he had joined the tournament for fun, not to make a point, but he was probably evaluating what option would yield the greatest political benefit for him.

The issue was ultimately that it was an all or nothing ‘deal’ – a really shitty deal by Shimmer’s reckoning, for it required that all three of them forfeit and recues themselves… otherwise the event committee couldn’t really be sure if any of the other contestants would  come back.
“And what he’s not saying is that there’s no real guarantee if they’ll come back at all if we quit the tournament… plus there are ponies pulling his strings who simply don’t want to a non-unicorn winning this, and they don’t mind seeing the tournament simply ending without a winner to prevent that” Cash groaned, looking and sounding far too tired to want to bother with sensing political intrigue this early.

“I’m not going anywhere” Shimmer said resolutely, again letting her will be known. Broadening her stance ever so slightly, tensing up, flattening her ears – Shimmer did everything outside of growling to display her defiance in the face of the obviously cowardly fools who didn’t have the guts to face a real challenge.

There was no doubt that Cash got her message, and the scarred stallion looked intimidated if nothing else, but Speaker… he just looked annoyed. Had the intimidation display been too much? Was he upset again? What if she withdrew anyway, maybe? The realm unicorn had been her only real quarry – and she had pretty much gotten him to kill himself in front of tens of thousands of cheering ponies… but still…. But if she didn’t, it would probably mean having to fight Speaker. Part of her thought it sounded really fun, but it might mean having to hurt him…

“Allright, then I won’t withdraw either – but we need some way to explain this… the first fight is in less than four hours, and this place will be full of a lot of upset ponies looking for their favorite martial artists” Speaker said, his face grim and words deliberate.

The way Speaker was twitching his beard told Shimmer everything: He didn’t want to upset his kin – which made sense. The scarred stallion looked like he had similar thoughts on his mind, though it was obvious at the same time that he was probably being pressured by others to ensure mutually exclusive outcomes here. He was damned if he did, damned if he didn’t.

With this in mind Shimmer couldn’t help but feel a bit sad for the stallion, but at the same time she wanted to express hear satisfaction that the fights were to continue: “So, who’s in the first fight?”

Speaker nodded towards Cash: “Me and sleepy. Oh and you really should get back in bed”

The drowsy Eclipse Caste pony turned and trotted off, dragging his hooves – just how late had he been up, and going what? That damned collar of his… it cleansed him of any dirt or odors that might have revealed his activities.

Could Cash beat Speaker? Of the two Speaker had been far more outspoken in his use of that weapon of his, Gift, but a lot of the time that seemed almost more to be out of reverence to the maker of the device… Shimmer had to think back to their jaunt to the underworld for an example of Cash fighting, and that had been against those weaksauce undead thingies and that brute of a ghost that had almost killed him. Of course, that had been a while ago… had he improved since then? Who would he have been training with? Speaker had sparred with her a few times, but never in any really serious fashion… that thought somehow annoyed Shimmer a lot more than he had expected it to. Either way the mere idea of having to fight Speaker in the tournament left her with an unmistakable sense of unease.

From atop one of the banner poles that rimmed the arena itself, while in the form of a seagull, Shimmer observed the massive audience filling into the stadium. There were also food and drink vendors milling about, barkers heralding various bits of news, chroniclers writing down stuff about who was winning or losing in the morning events… and of course what Shimmer felt to be an obscene amount of armed guards and security ponies sniffing around. Whatever they were looking for was beyond Shimmer – she couldn’t spot anything amiss, and she could see everything right now.

As time came for Speaker and Cash’s fight, with the two stepping into ring, the crowds sounded understandably confused… and unhappy… for Speaker and Cash had been in two entirely separate brackets, with only the quarter-finals for them to possibly meet in. Of course, with only her and Cash left to fight it really was a semi-final... sort of, with only three contestants left.

The announcer, a young but charismatic unicorn mare, jumped into the ring with some kind of magical gadget – the thingy she had been using to amplify her voice so everyone could hear her – and spoke to the audience: “Ponies, hear this. after Last Shimmer’s dramatic fight with Cathak Ember Dancer yesterday a number of other contestants in the Locked Horns have withdrawn, citing the wisdom of futile blood”

There was a very brief moment of silence as the crowd digested this bit of news – and the implications of it, since Speaker and Cash were now set to fight. This clearly wasn’t just ‘a number’ of contestants – this was damn near all of them! The boos and hisses rose as a dull noise that nearly drowned out the announcer before the poor mare could get another word in edgewise.

It was then that Cash shoved the announcer aside, nabbing the voice-magnifier gizmo the mare had been using and spoke into the device with stern authority as his caste mark blazed: “Mares and gentlecolts – behave yourselves”

Speaker couldn’t have imagined a simple command like that ever working – but then again he hadn’t even bothered looking into what charms Cash had used to amplify his command with.

The crowd fell silent – with curious eyes locked on Cash.

“After what we all saw yesterday, who would want to fight such a beastly opponent? Only mad-ponies and fools, right?” Cash joked, eliciting no laughs but making many in the crowd smile from the self-deprecating humor. That was all Cash needed from the looks of it – with but cracking a smile Cash every mortal pony in audience captivated; Hungry for what he might do, but quiet and eerily well-behaved at the same time.

Many  a unicorn present took note of this display of absolute force – not martial force, but the power that Cash clearly wielded with words alone.

Turning to Speaker, Cash declared his intentions – still speaking into the voice-amplifier: “As for you, I would like it if you woul-“

That was when Speaker threw Gift at Cash, not wanting to give his opponent another second to talk or use hypno-charms on him.

Standing perfectly still, a mere four yards from Cash, Speaker missed, prompting a bout of mocking laughter from Cash: “Come on dear friend, please tell me that you can do better than that”

With a focused twirl and a brief flash  of his caste mark Speaker launched Gift straight out of elsewhere to swing around and cut in Cash, while he himself struck repeatedly at Cash… missing every time, while Cash stood perfectly still.

Ignoring Speaker, Cash addressed the audience once more: “Well isn’t this sad? And I heard he served in the first field force? What kind of pillow-fighting is it they teach you there?!”

Many in crowd laughed, though just as many wondered what secret there was to Cash’s ability to dodge without moving – it made no sense! With unicorn charms you could at least hear the gusts of wind that would turn away arrows, or see the shields of ice forming from water essence to deflect blows…

Speaker – and the few unicorns observing the fight with really good essence sight lenses – knew damn well what was going: Cash’s invincible ego shield used the power of Cash’s confidence to simply make you strike at where he wasn’t. It wasn’t an illusion, as much as it was a strange kind of hypnotic suggestion that made you think your target was where it wasn’t – but Speaker just couldn’t shake it off, for it was less an effect put upon him as it was a change made to Cash’s own nature, making him appear larger than life, both physically and meta-physically, while he in reality was not.

Catching his breath for a moment, as Cash amused the crowds with more witticisms at Speaker’s expense, the Twilight caste Solar did a quick tactical assessment: It was clear that capitalizing on Cash’s pride to distract him was a wise course of action, but… that still required that he could hit him somehow.

Letting Gift continue its seemingly useless attacks on its own – if nothing else then to have the noisy device distract Cash, Speaker called his singing staff in from elsewhere, but Cash instantly spun around and fired a claw at it from his magical shoes – the indestructible chain that trailed from the shoe-claw wrapped itself around the staff… and one quick yank saw the staff fly out of the ring.  With a jiggle of the chain Cash loosened the chain which zipped back into Cash’s right fore-hoof’s shoe, grinning at Speaker.

Speaker looked on flabbergasted at such a display of martial proves – and in that moment of distraction, Cash repeated his chain-snare trick, having fired his left fore-hoof’s shoe-claw directly at Speaker. With a dull sound, nut unlike a sword striking thick leather, the claw had imbedded itself in Speaker’s essence shield – not piercing it, but getting nice and stuck in… and then Cash caused his shoe to reel in the chain.

Being the heavier of the two thanks to his military background and more stocky physique, Speaker remained more or less still while Cash surged forward as the chain reeled in, left hoof first… with his right fore-hoof poised and ready to strike a mighty clawed blow, that hoof trailing bright arcs of white and golden crackling essence.

Recalling Gift to himself as quickly as possible, Speaker just barely managed to catch and hold Gift up before him to parry the incoming blow… but that turned out to have been a rather useless gesture, as Cash used his Heaven Thunder Hammer technique to impart godly strength into the blow, which sent Speaker flying.
Thanks to his Graceful Crane Stance charm Speaker managed to maintain balance during his flight – which allowed him to maintain an overview of the situation – Speaker was painfully aware of having just flown out of the ring – but he hadn’t touched the ground yet!

Throwing Gift, which flew right past Cash like a golden comet, Speaker had the chakram bank and come around behind Speaker – hitting himself with its flat side – and using the Linear Flight principle he had learned via his strange form of magical martial arts, Speaker had Gift hit him in such a way that the golden disc sent Speaker flying straight back at Cash!

Dodging effortless, though he did have to move this time, Cash turned to re-engage Speaker – but having turned to face Speaker Gift came from behind him with its essence engine off, blindsiding Cash with its now silent blades and cutting him along his back and neck quite hard.

Cash’s heavenly silks mended themselves almost instantly, and his collar of dawn’s cleansing made it impossible to see any blood seeping from the gashes, but Speaker ‘s medical diagnosis charm told him the full extent of Cash’s injuries: Nothing lethal, not by a longshot, but Cash cut pretty badly none the less.

“Yield, I took first blood and you need healing” Speaker implored, not wanting his friend to suffer any more than necessary.

Raising a shaky hoof at Speaker, Cash’s anima ignited into golden fire around the blue-silk clad stallion, Cash groaned as he leapt at Speaker, trying to grapple the older looking stallion.

Speaker recalled quite clearly from the first age the legendary feats of wrestling that Solars using Hoof of the Daystar style pulled off. At higher essence purity Speaker had seen Solars wrestle rivers, grab and throw demons twenty times their own size, grab hold to primordial sub-souls and shake their massive soul-hierarchies apart… basically Speaker did not want to get into a close up fight with Cash.

Still, in his weakened state Cash managed to file off a claw again – but even with essence guiding his shot, Speaker was easily able to swat the claw aside with Gift. The real fun came when Speaker caught the chain attached to the claw and had Gift stop spinning but still have its blades out: Slamming Gift down on the chain, into the stone fighting ring, Speaker stuck the chain the ground, preventing Cash from reeling it in.

Well… that had been the plan. Cash apparently ignored that plan and reeled himself in anyway, using the momentum he got to spin around and lash out at Speaker with a vicious spin-buck, his rear-hooves made even more dangerous by the claws extending from their shoes.

Without Gift available to defend him and himself bent over in an awkward angle from having thrust Gift in between a crack in the stone fighting ring, Speaker only had a hoof and his shield charms – and against such a speedy and fierce buck, brimming with essence – augmented even more so by Cash’s martial arts charms – Speaker had no choice but to make Gift release its hold on the claw-chain at the last moment, which threw Cash off balance and allowed Speaker to leap into the air, putting him out of reach of Cash’s claws for a brief moment.
Cash used the precious few seconds to dislodge Gift – it flying back to Speaker’s right forehoof by itself – which in turn freed up Cash’s claw-chain which he retracted instantly, only to point up towards Speaker who… was coming straight at him!

Deflecting a pair of claw-shots with Gift with ease, Speaker body-slammed Cash with all of his bulk and the added force of coming down from a very high jump. The two crashed into the fighting ring which exploded in a plume of dust.

The crowd erupted in cheers at the eruption, because who doesn’t love a good fight – but they fell silent quickly again, in anticipation of who would be left standing. As the dust was forced away by air-aspected unicorns, and grounded by earth-aspected ones, it became clear that the ring had been reduced to a big crater… with only one standing tall.

“Alright – you got me” Cash said, weakly motioning surrender from down in the crater, half-covered in ruble and dust.

Speaker nodded, waiting momentarily for the fanfares to sound – for they signaled the end to a match. As the brass horns sounded Speaker returned Gift to elsewhere and quickly approached Cash, his anima igniting into bright golden fire as he healed Cash of his wounds: “No hard feelings?”

“Nah – I’m frankly surprised I got this far… if Shimmer hadn’t scared everyone else off I would probably have been eliminated before getting to fight you anyway” Cash mused, looking exceedingly thankful for the effects of Speaker’s anesthetic charm.
All around them the crowd cheered – such unique fighting had never been seen before – and it seemed that everyone had been suitably entertained.

Leaving the ring with Cash, Speaker helped his friend over to the medic tent to rest – he had barely gotten out of the tent before Cash started shouting for food, wine and someone who could suck dick well for a reasonable price.

“You know, compared to how utterly wrecked most of the other losers in the tournament had looked after their fights, then he got off easy” Sullen Hoof noted, having appeared out of nowhere behind Speaker all of a sudden.

“Oh, did you watch the fight?” Speaker turned and asked, cracking a smile at Sully’s disguise: The Night caste Solar appeared as an exceedingly old stallion, more wrinkles than anything else, decked out in garish face-paint that matched one of the local popular hoof-ball teams.

Somehow producing even more wrinkles in the form of a mirthless frown, Sully glared at Speaker: “You hurt me – I wouldn’t want to miss watching you fight”

Speaker bowed his head: “You’re right – though frankly, I’m more concerned about tomorrows fight now…”

“Against Shimmer? Can’t you just tell her to stand down and forfeit? Her bond to you should be enough” Sullen Hoof suggested, munching on some kind of steamed veggie on a stick… though his grimace hinted that it wasn’t up to snuff.

Speaker sighed: “That wouldn’t be fair to the ponies who come to watch – we’ve already robbed everyone of most of the tournament fights. Plus I doubt Shimmer would be very happy afterwards”

“I’m glad you think so – because if you do end up pulling that, I’ll make fire-ants crawl up dick while you sleep and bite your nuts from the inside” Shimmer squawked in her seagull form, abruptly landing on top of Speaker’s head.

Shaking his head, making Shimmer fly off him – landing on the ground next to him after a bit of quick wing-flapping – Speaker gave the bird a look of dreaded bemusement: “Please tell me you haven’t actually done that to anyone before?”

“Well… not really… you can’t make ants crawl inside anyone, that just sounds better, but I have tricked anthills into migrating onto into ponies’ homes – it’s a great way to clear out a guard barrack right before attacking a fortress” the sly seagull noted, all the while relieving itself unceremoniously on the ground.

Speaker was about to ask about Shimmer’s plans for the rest of the day when she flew off, squawking that she needed to get ready for their fight the next day.

“You should get patched up as well – and get a bath, then prepare yourself for tomorrow” Sullen hoof adviced, disappearing into the crowd like a king striding unseen.

Taking a quick look at himself, Speaker realized that his injures from the fight were still… there – he had simply used his anesthetic charm on himself during the fight and forgotten everything about them. Quickly heading over to the medic tent to clean and fix himself, Speaker listened as the next contest began. It sounded like the semi-finals for the light siege weapon contest.

The next morning Shimmer woke up to an even greater feeling of unease.
> Chapter 95: Struck by Wisdom
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Walking through the upper port district in the early morning was always fairly uneventful: The rampage of the giant flesh-monster was so long ago that most of the construction work on the new apartment buildings were long done, so beyond seeing the odd wood-worker or team of painters finishing up detail-work it was difficult to tell that a grand battle had even taken place. Well, there was a noticeable difference between the new and old buildings – but there wasn’t any battle damage of note.

Quickly crossing through the southern edges of the residential district, Speaker passed into the district of barracks. There were noticeably more ponies milling about, maintaining gear, stomping around on the various parade grounds or stumbling home from a long night of partying really hard – it was obvious that there were a lot of troops home on the roost. This probably also explained the large attendance at the games, since normal ponies would still have to go to work – such ponies usually only turned up for the events in the afternoon or evening.
Tagging along the groups of legionaries going to the arena, Speaker quickly found himself chatted up by several such young off-duty soldiers. They thought him a veteran going to the games, and so asked him when and where he served.

Now, among those serving in the seventh legion it is well understood that the first field force was all special forces – the very best – so even having served in that as a medic earned Speaker some instant respect, that he had served as combat-medic to the magically-armored gunzosha got him even more looks of admiration – though grunts being grunts, they also asked if he had any good stories from his time in the legion... mainly so they had something to listen to while getting to the arena: The main roads leading down to the gates out of the city were all clogged with thousands of ponies who were also heading to the arena, most as audience, some as vendors, others as competitors, some probably to do security, or be officials… basically a very large number of ponies were going the same way and thus one had a traffic jam.

Speaker knew that he wasn’t scheduled to fight until around noon, so he wasn’t in a hurry: “Alright… there was this one time I was stationed south of south-west of Nadir. We were there to stomp out some mutant raiders that had crept out of the everfree – but the mutants weren’t showing, and we spent five weeks waiting for recon to tell us where to go. Personally I didn’t mind – but the hardhats had to be on constant readiness to ship out… and the brass managing the garrison was so green you’d think they picked her off a tree”

“Hardhats?” one of the grunts wondered. Speaker recognized the confusion… good grief, these grunts were straight out of hoof-camp!

Taking a deep breath and giving the grunt the steely look of an officer, Speaker replied mockingly: “You dragon-damned hoof – Gunzosha! The gem-marked, the bright ones! Don’t they teach you anything in Hoof-camp?”

“Sir, sorry – we just got back from there… haven’t even been on our first deployment, but we’ve heard that the second field force is massing for something big that we’re sure to come along for”

Twenty years ago Speaker would have taken such a reply as a good thing, and encouraged the young legionaires to continue on with steely nerves, fire in their belly and a prayer on their lips, but now… now he knew what they were massing for – and green recruits fresh from hoof-camp was not what he had hoped for. This would need to be discussed with Maheka Feldspar.

Speaker’s lack of words of encouragement struck the young legionaries as discouraging. As oblivious as they were, one asked if something was wrong. Another quickly chided the first, guessing that Speaker was recalling some nasty battle where he had lost friends or something…

“Something like that – but trust me, with a little luck we’ll ensure that that won’t happen” Speaker said, forcing himself to sport a smile.
This calmed the grunts down, though now they began to ask into the story Speaker had been telling…

Looking at a mare clad in southern silks, selling spices he had never heard of, as they very slowly moved along the main road down the market district, Speaker nodded: “Ok, so with brass so green that they were budding the hardhats were having a run of the place. In less than two weeks they had three stills, a brothel, a casino blessed by Plentimon and two acres of prime hashish going. The only catch was weekly dawn muster which was handled by one of our own, a unicorn so hard-flanked you’d think he ate spears and shat barding – so every evening before muster every idiot who had gotten drunk despite knowing that they had to get up at dawn came in to me for a hangover cure…”

The grunts laughed – though it was that insecure ‘ya, we will likely end up doing the same’ type of laugh.

“I can’t begin to say how tired I got of doing that – plus it strained by medical supplies, so I put up a sign that anyone coming in after sundown on those days would have to pay with sexual favors in order to be treated” Speaker continued, looking stern but with a mischievous grin dangerously close to revealing itself.

The grunts listened closely – curious and amused.

“Now hardhats, they’re all alpha – so submitting to something like that… well… the mares didn’t mind, but after I bummed one of the stallions and then sent him off to the barracks still dripping from both ends at least half the morons stopped getting drunk the night before muster. I don’t even have numbers for how much I laid through that…” Speaker mused, reminiscing of his more lurid exploits during his time in the legion. The grunts were very much amused.

“Sweet gig – how do we get something like that?” one asked, sounding giddy.

Speaker shrugged: “You’re fresh out of hoof-camp. Show your best, learn what the test requirements are to qualify for specialist training and make sure to get into that – then walk the career path, gain rank… I had what… four tours over twenty years?”

Seeing the nods from the grunts around him, Speaker added: “Even if you don’t plan on making a career in the legion, do your mandatory tour with pride – serve with honor”

Speaker got a rowdy response of “Hoo-rah!” from every grunt in earshot, to which he could only smile.

As they approached the grand arena, Speaker had to split off from the grunts to enter the competitor waiting area. Upon realizing that Speaker was a competitor in the games the grunts became confused, at a loss of how to express their admiration and awe – even more so when Speaker revealed to them what he would be competing in by flashing his caste mark: “The big noon semi-final for the Locked Horns… you can’t miss it”

Leaving the grunts to the sound of their cheers and shouts of encouragement, Speaker felt invigorated. He had to fight and win for Lookshy, for the grunts, for the seventh legion.

Elsewhere, atop a flagpole, Shimmer sat in seagull form, opening her eyes. Bemused, she noted to herself: “Cute… but chatting with grunts won’t win you this…”

The first events of the day were mortal athletic competitions, mortal weightlifting… but it was clear that everyone was there to see the semi-final of the locked horns. To Speaker’s surprise, as he stepped out of the waiting area in the arena, he saw many ponies waving yellow or gilded flags, a few even waving flags with sunburst symbols. He couldn’t help himself but feel dutybound to fight for fans as well…

There weren’t any silver flags. Shimmer had taken note of this, keenly – and in turn she was plenty ready to express her displeasure…

As Speaker entered the fighting ring he found it empty… but the officials around the ring seemed calm and merely urged him on. It was then that maggots began to crawl up from cracks in the ring, clumping together… and slowly forming a writhing form resembling Shimmer.

With Shimmer somewhat ‘present’ the fight was declared started – but the maggot-Shimmer only bowed and gestured for Speaker to begin.

Taking a deep breath and recalling the wisdom that Speaker’s martial arts trainer in hoof-camp had expressed to him, the wisdom of the elemental dragon of water, Speaker weighed his options: Water can be calm, or it can crash – water conforms around the obstacles put in its path, never stopping… one should be water. This was a basic but profound lesson in martial arts and philosophy – but closer to Speaker’s heart was the wisdom that he himself had devised in honor of the Great Maker: A faster piston strikes sooner and harder, an object can be put into any motion through application of essence, a machine cares not for its user… and most profound: A machine can repeat its task ad infinitum.

With this realization Speaker found himself aware of a riddle he had known that he had been repeated countless times since his exaltation: What is the key to the thousand wounds gear? The gear that inflicts injury a thousand times, never stopping. The key was repetition.

To the audience it appeared that neither Speaker nor Shimmer was moving – which wasn’t entirely wrong either, though in Speaker’s case it was an acute onset of martial zen that had taken him over.

Then the fighting ring erupted into a gaping maw that reached up and tried to swallow Speaker whole. Shimmer had somehow shapeshifted in such a way that she had become the ring itself…

Leaping high into the air, Speaker called gift to himself and flared his anima fully – with its bright light and his essence sight he saw Shimmer’s essence clearly within the stone maw, revealing to him structural weakspots and cracks in the stone from previous fights: Gift roared, its blades a foot long with golden razor essence extensions. 

Like a comet Gift flew, raining sparks down a trail of bright sparks as if it was lit fireworks.

The sound that the stone maw made as Gift struck around it, the whole thing crumbling and exploding at the same time as Shimmer erupted from the thing in her warform as she took to the sky, was a weird inorganic groan mixed with the furious grinding of metal on stone.

Landing in the ruble perfectly, despite the decidedly uneven surface thanks to his balancing charm, Speaker hurled Gift with deceptively gentle force, it flying past Shimmer – above her – only to bank and come down upon her, striking her at second shoulders, slamming into where her right wing connected to her body.

Just as she was about to be struck Shimmer’s bone-armor linked up tight around where she was about to be hit, meaning that Shimmer suffered no real injury from the blow aside from her bone-armor getting scratched up pretty badly – but as with Morning Dew, Speaker had Gift slam Shimmer head-first down into the ringat great speed, making for a grand explosion of dust, rock and specks of silver light.

Knowing full well that he wouldn’t be able to pierce her armor, nor tire her, Speaker briefly considered his options. Leaping at Shimmer, attempting to get her in a clinch before she could get up properly to orient herself, Speaker just barely saw her feathers ripple before a silver-talon’d claw came up to catch his hoof, swinging him aside without her head even having been pulled from the ground.

Coming around for another go as quickly as he could, Speaker saw he feathers flutter once more – and again his attack was parried without her even looking.

…how?

Shimmer extracted herself from the ground, shaking her three-eyed bird-head off. Her third eye was in a bad shape, caked with dust and a bit of blood – of course! It’s essence-sensitive nature prevented her from blinking with it. Oh well, none of Speaker’s plans had involved preventing Shimmer from using essence sight anyway, the rest of her senses were probably…. For more sensitive, right! That would include her sense of touch, like feeling motion in the air telegraphing his attacks!

Making another attack, this time  knowing full well that it would be parried again, Speaker simply smiled up at Shimmer as she gave him a rather disappointed look upon her predictable parry: “Really? Trying for a third time?”

Nodding, Speaker used his anesthetic charm on Shimmer – wondering if there even was a way to counter it. Either way, he leapt back and was about to await Shimmer’s next move, but she made that before he had even landed: From essence nodes around her body, Shimmer fired streams of sticky essence-webbing at Speaker, trying to catch him. Gift zipped back and forth, severing the strands, but it turned that the webbing had simply been a distraction!

The fighting ring being in the shape of a stone cylinder with a flat surface on top for the actual fighting, Shimmer had extended one of her taloned hind-limbs down over the edge, then all the way around the edge the of the ring… and then she grabbed Speaker from behind, only to undo the shapeshifting that extended her limb, yanking Speaker along for the quite uncomfortable ride.

Holding back his stomach, Speaker fought to recover quickly from the disorienting experience, only to find himself being cocooned by Shimmer and her essence webbing.  Gift cut at the webbing, but it simply couldn’t cut it fast enough… and thus Shimmer flung Speaker over the ring, holding back a single thread connected to the cocoon.

Pulling the lone thread, the cocoon unraveled just as Speaker was about to hit the ground, allowing him to use his Graceful Crane Stance to land safely – but also defeated.

Bowing to Shimmer, who bowed respectfully in return, the fanfare for the victor sounded.

Well that hadn’t gone exactly as he had expected.

Trotting back to the ring, Speaker looked up to Shimmer who shifted back to her normal pony form: “Well fought”

“Darling, I’ve been fighting a lot more than you have the last century – you really shouldn’t be that surprised” Shimmer mused, not really able to hold back her urge to gloat a bit.

Taking his defeat in stride, Speaker consoled himself with the knowledge that now he would at least come in third in the tournament – that was a good compromise all things considered: “Now you just have to contend with Master Six Winds for the final bought tomorrow”
“Six Winds? He retired half a decade ago…” one of the officials commented, catching Speaker by surprise.

Quickly turning to the blue-uniformed official who was otherwise busy checking the damages to the ring, Speaker quickly inquired: “Wait, retired? Then who is the champion? Who’ll Shimmer be fighting tomorrow?”

The official gave Speaker an apologetic look that also tried to communicate his annoyance that he was being disrupted from doing his duties: “I’m sorry – but you’ll have to talk to someone else about that”

Shimmer and Speaker left the ring with the official muttering something about stupid old coots who couldn’t remember anything…

Later that day Speaker and Shimmer consulted the rest of the circle. Cash knew nothing of value, while Sully noted that all he knew on the topic were of the annoyed whispers usually spoken in privacy about this new champion: “It’s some metic unicorn mare from the south-east. She was raised in a temple of some kind, and spends a lot of time there. Gens Yushoto tried to adopt her, but she rejected every offer – apparently she’s a pacifist to boot”

“Wait… so the current champion of the Locked Horns, a martial arts fighting tournament, is a pacifist? That’s ridiculous” Shimmer blurted out incredulously.

Asking around at the Yushoto compound, much was revealed: The unicorn mare Treehugger was indeed a pacifist, though she had mastered a strange mix of martial arts, one that she refused to disclose after winning the tournament – she had evidently also turned down offers to work for legion, disappearing to where she had come from.

“She returned three weeks ago to defend her title – before that we didn’t even know if she was going to return” Yushoto Boribap noted, the mix of frustration and curiosity in his voice undeniable.

This presented Speaker and Shimmer with a great quandary: For the last couple of months, outside of tending to their own personal projects, they had also spared a little in preparation for the tournament – and during that time they had both trained themselves to ultimately face the many-style master Six Winds… not some unknown mare from the south-east.

“No wonder everyone else were so miffed about us showing everyone else up – their champion is already a foreigner, so they don’t want more contenders for that position” Shimmer said as she realized just how much such a turn of events must have impacted the martial honor and morale of Lookshy – that they themselves were not the best martial artists in the east?

“It is an embarrassing fact that we try not to speak too much about – that’s why so many of us had hoped that she wouldn’t return, though that would mean that you Lady Shimmer would have won the title already… not sure how well that would have gone over” Boribap sighed, sipping from his beautifully decorated tea-cup.

As servants brought in more tea and cakes, Cash noted that at least Shimmer was fighting with and for Lookshy to a certain extent – at least in the coming campaign. Boribap agreed that this would likely improve the reputation of Lunars in general to the general population.

Thus the circle spent the evening before the final bought of the Locked Horns tournament at the Yushoto compound, attending what turned into a spontaneous social event as other game finalists and semi-finalists showed up to chat and mingle. With only a few days left in the games many seized the opportunity to exchange contact information – including with that of the circle.

Speaker in particular was ask for, as word of his healing powers – and his ‘victory by ocular regeneration’ – had spread far and wide among the game contestants. With a bit of cajoling by Cash, Speaker ended up making a bit of a show out of it – there wasn’t any shortage of ponies present who didn’t have some kind of ache – and the spectacle of Speaker treating toothaches by making all the patient’s teeth fall out, only to grow in entire new sets of chompers, how he similarly could amputate entire limbs who’s owners had aches in them, fixing them up with new ones spun from pure essence. That the drink going around was strong enough to work as a disinfectant didn’t hurt either – and his anesthetic charm even made sure that it wouldn’t sting.

The next day Shimmer woke up next to Speaker back in the townhouse. She couldn’t quite remember how they got there – but that was ok. Unlike yesterday she didn’t feel any real kind of unease – but she did feel… hesitant, weary.

Back west, if she absolutely had to fight some unicorn upstart or monk who was screwing up her work she would usually stalk her target for weeks – she would learn everything about them, what they ate, who and what they liked to fuck, their favorite immaculate verses – and she would then use it all against them: Come to them as argumentative immaculate scholars and ruin their love of immaculate lore, turn into a rat and infect their food so they would become sickly – and finally, if she was being really mean, she would shapeshift into the guise of their lovers to kill them in their sickbed. Ok, she had only done all that once or twice to someone – but her general tactic to fighting anyone when the fight was planned was to scout things out and employ whatever intelligence she could gather to her advantage.

Even the preliminary tournament battles hadn’t been that big surprises to her – for she had snuck into the office that kept the books on who was in what initial elimination group and fixed things so she could be sure to be grouped with that realm unicorn – and with all those names known to her, she had also asked around extensively to learn who and what they were… and then she had fought to ensure that the realm unicorn, despite being an inexperienced and exceedingly hotheaded ponce, would at least make it past the elimination round.

To this end it irked her that it hadn’t been possible to do any kind of research on this mystery Tree Hugger unicorn. Was she even a unicorn? Maybe it was a sidereal in disguise… no, using essence while fighting would reveal that.

Poking Speaker, Shimmer shot him a coy and seductive smile: “Darling… are you awake?”

After he didn’t respond, Shimmer employed some slightly more direct and stimulating means of waking up her Solar mate.

Feeling something tugging on his nads, Speaker cracked open an eye: “Shimmer… I told you stop doing that a long time ago”

“You didn’t wake up when I poked you – now, would you be ok with me using all the teeth and legs you removed yesterday for today’s fight?” Shimmer said, smiling like a foal innocently asking if she could open all her birthday gifts a week before her birthday, merely because she wanted to. 
Taking a deep breath, yawning and stretching, Speaker gave Shimmer a look of dreadful anticipation: “Do I even want to know?”

Smiling, Shimmer gave Speaker a friendly pat on the head: “I’m thinking a macabre display to unnerve the pacifist. If I do a bit of quick scouting and get a tasty of her blood, then mould the limbs and stuff together to look like her parents… then rip those apart in front of her”

On one hand Speaker wanted to commend Shimmer for coming up with such a devious strategy – but on the other hand it also made Speaker feel nauseous. Nodding, if for nothing else than to make Shimmer go away, Speaker rolled out of bed and staggered to the bathroom.
Quickly shapeshifting into a seagull and flying out of an open window, Shimmer rushed to find her soon to be opponent.

Asking around among the local birds and what little other wildlife that lived inside Lookshy – mainly cats – Shimmer learned that there was indeed a foreign wood aspected unicorn living in the tent city around the games arena. Well, more than one – but it was a good lead none the less.

Circling over the tent city, Shimmer found a couple of good and high banner poles. Landing on each of them and turning into her Western Prism Newt form, in order to observe the tent city with essence sight in a discreet manner, Shimmer quickly got a sense of where all the enlightened contestants were staying.

Sniffing out which of the tents reeked of wood aspected essence wasn’t difficult, a simply tracking charm let her to do that in her regular pony form, and simply asking around at each of the half dozen locations ultimately narrowed where this mysterious Tree Hugger had hidden herself.

To  Shimmer’s minor annoyance it turned out that Tree Hugger hadn’t as much hidden herself, as she had simply never bothered to get her own tent – which was why she didn’t have a registered tent in her name: She had been sleeping in the tent of a group of young mortals who were supposed to compete in some of the long-jumping contests. Her payment for staying there? Shagging them all rotten from the smell of the tent… lovely.

Finding a few strands of hair that smelled like unicorn wasn’t hard – but damn, hadn’t Lookshy diverted an aqueduct for the tent city? Didn’t these ponies bathe every now and then? The rank smell in the tent was so thick one could cut it with a blade.

Stepping outside, Tree Hugger hair floating next to her, Shimmer took a deep breath – which she quickly regretted, as a cruel breeze had thrown the smell of a nearby dead and decaying rat right into her nose… oh the horror.

Very quickly stuffing the bit of mane into elsewhere and turning into a seagull, Shimmer took to the sky for cleaner air – also her seagull form didn’t come with a gag-reflex, which stopped her feelings of retching.

Finding a secluded rooftop with a row of chimneys to hide behind, Shimmer examined the hair she had recovered: It had a definite taste of unicorn and wood essence. Using a charm she had learned back west by her elders, Shimmer applied her own protean essence to the hair to reduce it into the blood of the being that had grown it.

To most ponies, even to Solars, a drop of blood from someone wasn’t really that useful – but to a Lunar… to a Lunar blood spoke volumes.

Consuming the drop of blood, Shimmer’s eyes flashed bright white-blue light as the lineage of Tree Hugger was laid bare before her. Visions of the unicorn mare’s parents, their parents and so on for several generations became known to her – not their names or personalities, but appearance and physical appearances became keenly known to her.

With this wisdom gained from blood, Shimmer recalled the limbs and teeth she had saved from Speaker’s medical show. Using the same shapeshifting charms that had originally let her grow out Speaker’s beard, Shimmer altered the limbs so their coat color, hoof shape, length of fetlocks and whatnot, all matched Tree Hugger’s ancestors.

With a bemused chuckle Shimmer recalled the last time she had done something similar, which had been right after learning that blood-ancestry keening trick: She had turned the body of a tribal pony that an immaculate monk had beaten up so badly that the poor soul had died from the injuries, into the shape of the monk’s father… and then she had presented that corpse to the monk – and informed her that if she didn’t return to the Blessed Isle, never to return, then her mother would be ‘presented’ next. Oh Shimmer had never seen a realm ship sail that fast…

With the legs done, Shimmer beheld the teeth: They were… less useful – who could recognize teeth? Still, having a bunch of teeth chucked at you would probably do for a great distraction. Or maybe string them into a macabre necklace? It would be a shame to let them go to waste.

In the distance the fanfare that signaled the Locked Horns finale sounded. Shimmer took a deep breath and took hearth, knowing that against a mere unicorn there was little which could be done against her…

Flying in over the arena complex, Shimmer landed in her seagull form and turned back into her pony form, looking around for her opponent.
A moment later a unicorn mare with a ruddy-brown mane done up in dreadlocks, dreads shorter than Shimmers’, staggered out from the staging area. Her coat was muted green, eyes bloodshot and her face contorted in what was probably an attempt at veiling her discomfort.

She looked like hell: Swerving, stopping repeatedly to prevent herself from vomiting. It was pitiful to see the mare crawl up the wooden stairs to the fighting ring, how she dragged her hooves, how she barely seemed able to hold her head up. She also reeked of every kind of booze and smokable drug that Shimmer knew – and she knew of quite a few.

Shimmer had to wonder if Tree Hugger had been roughed up by someone in order to make her lose the fight.

“You ok?” a nearby official who had been nervously watching the mare approach asked. Tree Hugger nodded ever so slightly, her nod quickly stifled as she chocked back another spasm from her body as it tried to vomit.

The official looked to Shimmer, to see if she was ok with going ahead with the fight.

“If I find out that someone did this to her so I could win easier I will be so pissed” Shimmer noted back to the official, keeping her eyes on the unicorn mare.

Nodding, the official signaled for the fight to begin. The fanfare sounded, and Tree Hugger reared into a swervy and unstable stance, half-stumbling from side to side as she tried to steady herself.

That Tree Hugger hadn’t simply asked for the game to be called out was… suspicious – no, it was beyond suspicious. Was it an illusion? A ploy to lower her guard? Shapeshifting into her warform, Shimmer beheld the mare in essence sight: Her essence was a mess, muddled, especially around the belly, the lungs, the head and… the blood? Damn, this mare was messed up.

Approaching cautiously, Shimmer sighted up her target and took careful aim, tensing up to pounce.

“You don’t have to fight me – wise ponies do not raise hoof against one another” Tree Hugger barely managed to force out, her breath ragged and strained.

As Shimmer leapt, Tree Hugger suddenly shivered and belched – loudly and at great length – and Shimmer hit the ground, out cold, with a blue cloud and a sweet smell being the last thing she sensed.
> Chapter 96: Light At The End Of the Tunnel
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Shimmer awoke, finding herself in hers and Speaker’s bedroom back in the townhouse. Wait, why was she there? There was a distinctly uncomfortable glimmer of light shining in her eyes, good grief.

Trying to get up, Shimmer found her body rebelling against her completely – Fuck, rolling around in poisonous anemones off the coast of Wavecrest didn’t leave you feeling this bad, and there was no high along with this either.

“Oh you’re awake already – great, your regen charms should handle the rest” Speaker’s voice sounded.

Looking around – and failing utterly to turn her head – Shimmer tried to speak, but her lungs barely even wanted to breathe, and it felt like the entire pirate fleet from Coral had come by and everyone had taken a most heinous rancid seaweed biscuit shit inside her mouth.

Shaking off a sudden chill, Shimmer forced her essence to regenerate her body – which helped alleviate her pain greatly it turned out. Breathing freely once more, Shimmer sat up. It was then that she noticed that the air was… different – there wasn’t the same feint smell of budding flowers in the air, it was stronger… like full bloom.

“How long was I out?” Shimmer asked, looking at Speaker. He looked happy… and weird – his uniform wasn’t that old faded red uniform that he had patched up a thousand times. He was in a fresh and bright red uniform.

Speaker gave Shimmer a quick look-over with his medical diagnostic charm, nodded to himself, then noted: “You have been out for a little over a month – Tree Hugger did a real number on you”

“What the… the fight – how in the greasy turd did she floor me without raising a hoof against me?” Shimmer snapped, her desire for words outstripping her breath.

As far as Speaker could explain then Tree Hugger practiced a martial art rarely seen outside of certain parts of the realm – and it was rarely used for fighting purposes either. Tree Hugger had mastered the weapon-form version of the style.

“I recall Cash learning it in the first age: Orgiastic Fugitive Style. Also called Drunken Bucking, because… well… it lets not only teaches you fight as a drunk, but to fight better when intoxicated” Speaker explained, adding that to master the style one had to learn to master the essence flows of intoxicants within one self, to the point that one could expel them all as an airborne attack.

“So that’s what she did… she must have loaded herself up on everything you can eat, huff, snort and drink under the sun before the fight, no wonder she looked like shit” Shimmer mused.

Speaker and Shimmer agreed that combining the style with what was no doubt rare eastern plant poisons and narcotics was quite brilliant. He also noted that he had informed the Seventh Legion of this stratagem, receiving much gratitude for finally revealing the secret of the champion of the locked horns.

“So is Lookshy going to start training their rangers in fuck-fighting and weaponized hookahs now?” Shimmer joked.

Shrugging Speaker could only note that it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing he had ever heard of the Legion experimenting in.

After a vast breakfast that saw Sullen Hoof swearing repeatedly, as Shimmer ate a month’s worth of food in the course of an hour – much faster than even he could cook, at least with the food being any good – Shimmer was brought up to date on the preperations to destroy Deep Rot:

The Seventh Legion was but a few weeks away from having everything ready, with the second, third and large parts of the first legion all assembled within Lookshy and gearing up. The skyship fleet had never been such good condition, and alchemically treated supplies had been made ready to survive a campaign into the underworld.

“…and yet you’re looking like someone stole your thunder and peed on your breakfast?” Shimmer commented.

Closing his eyes for a moment and stroking his beard, Shimmer tossed a rattling assembly it bits and bobs in the rough shape of a chakram onto Shimmer’s bed. It wasn’t Gift, but looked a bit like it – only it had a hole in the middle, no sign of any folded in blades around the sides, was missing several parts and clearly wasn’t done. The parts of the casing put together were mostly white jade etched with sunbursts and gears, but bands of orichalcum were inlaid onto some of them, making it look a bit like an oversized golden-ring honey melon that had been sliced.

In a sudden revelation, Shimmer recognized the outline of the chakram: “Wait… is this what you’ve been working on? How could you finish it so quickly?”

“It’s not. I’ve just been tinkering with – there’s not enough time to actually make it now, and all the factory cathedrals are booked for a very long time here” Speaker noted. A sigh followed, upon which Speaker explained in a sorrowful voice that a few days after Shimmer had lost her fight the Bodhisattva arrived with dire news: “Remember how he’s told us that the Barbate Arbiter is the only Deathlord who can get the other Deathlords to cooperate? Well, he’s gotten them to commit about five dozen Deathknights to securing Deep Rot. Fifty darkened Solars… that’s the kind of force that takes down Primordial”

“So… we’re screwed?” Shimmer asked, not really sure if she honestly wanted an answer.

A chill breeze shot through the bedroom, giving Shimmer a sharp chill. Clad in thick grey burlab stained with iridescent fluids, the Deathknight known as the Recalcitrant Bodhisattva of Penance and Suffering Ended strode, on limbs of ectoplasmic ghost-flesh that smoldered in the few rays of sunshine that peeked in around the drawn curtain of the windows in the room: “We are not hopeless – but we must act quickly if we are to turn this to our advantage”

Around noon the circle and the Bodhisattva gathered in the Teocala of Tu Yu. The old god was less than enthusiastic of having a Deathknight in his temple – but a single look from Speaker saw the god shy away, even though Speaker had intended no intimidation.

The plan that the Bodhisattva had set up was bold – to put it mildly – mainly because it sounded rather impossible, though he insisted it was not: He wanted the circle’s help to cleanse his black exaltation and become a Solar.

“Well… if we prove that a Deathknight can become a Solar that would probably make a shitload of other Deathknights defect” Cash noted.

The Bodhisattva agreed: Apparently an aspect of the black exaltation was that if you died, your soul was sucked into the abyss, forced to circle oblivion forever – forever to be tortured by the Neverborn: “To my knowledge no Deathknight is ever told of this when offered the exaltation. As Deathknights we have no hope of reincarnation… well… almost”

It was difficult for the Deathknight to put it into words, but as he demonstrated by flaring his caste mark, then it now didn’t look like a bleeding open sore in the shape of a sunburst – it looked like a golden caste mark drenched in blood: “I spent a long time coming to terms with my situation and rekindling what little light there is within me – I have worked with other Deathknights and helped them do the same, but it is difficult”

Nodding, Shimmer was intrigued – mainly because she truly found the idea of persevering through such hardship and coming out on the other side as a better pony to be a very… Lunar thing, but also because it would likely result in a lot of Lunars getting their Solar mates back.

“So… how exactly do you plan on doing this?” Cash wondered, asking the thousand talent question.

The Bodhisattva drew forth a bucket and coughed up something murky, greasy and foul smelling into it: “Before I tell you, I must tell you where I got the information from, less you think I merely made this up”

Cash, Speaker, Shimmer and Sully Nodded – with Sully commenting: “That duel you mentioned?”

“Indeed – I journeyed south in the underworld, to a mountain chain called the thousand edges, where the Deathlord called the First and Forsaken Lion has his grand fortress Merciless. It was known to him that I no longer serve the Bodhisattva, so I asked to fight with him to prove my skills, that I might serve him” The Bodhisattva began.

His visit to what Sullen Hoof jokingly referred to as the southern fried bean-mash known as falafel had of course not been to get a new master: The Bodhisattva had learned that the soulsteel axe that the Deathlord wielded was forged from the soul of a Solar ghost – a ghost that had first been captured and alloyed with grim ore mined close to the tombs of the never about a century or so ago – so the plan had been to ‘converse’ with the tormented soul in the axe.

“…I thought ghosts stuffed into soulsteel sort of died, or were destroyed” Speaker noted, having examined some of the soulsteel they had come across in Stygia, or back when they had recovered those soulsteel pikes that the then mind-addled Bodhisattva had been filling with foal-souls.

“The soul of a first age Solar is too valuable to waste in the forge – this soul was bound to the axe in the same way one might bind a fire elemental to a red jade daiklaive. The soul is bound to the wielder. I simply had to disarm the Deathlord a few times and ‘converse’ with the soul for a few seconds at a time… no it wasn’t simple or easy to disarm a Deathlord” The Bodhisattva noted, seeing the looks he was getting upon having claimed to have disarmed the supposedly most martially inclined of all Deathlords. 

To keep things short, the Bodhisattva explained that he had presented his quest to the soul in the axe. The soul had in turn mulled over the quest over some time, ultimately telling the Bodhisattva of an ancient first age right of penance – the ritual of the first sin.

Speaker did not recall this rite, but as the Bodhisattva understood it, then the rite had been devised very shortly after the birth of the Solars – before they had all assembled and begun to work together. It had been a penance right for the first Solar who truly sinned against Celestia. The Bodhisattva’s plan was to use a variation of that rite to cleanse himself.

“Ok… so what’s the procedure – do we need to fetch Sunrise for this?” Shimmer asked, so far pleased with the diligence that the Bodhisattva had put into finding a proper rite.

As it turned out, then the Bodhisattva had already accomplished several of parts of the rite, albeit slightly out of order: First one was to discipline one’s mind to resist the sinful compulsion, which for the Bodhisattva had simply meant to train himself in meditative techniques so he could still his mind and resist any base urges from his black exaltation to just obey or kill. The culmination of this was to fully break with one’s sinful ways – this too had been done, in the form of the Bodhisattva having destroyed the device which the Barbarte Arbiter had used to control his exaltation through.

It was the third step that would require help: “I need to meet Celestia and get her blessing to seek redemption – The most high must approve of my quest to become a Solar, judge me worthy”

“Well… that might require contacting Sunshine” Shimmer noted.

The Budhisattva nodded, then added that he did not wish to tell the circle of what came after getting Celestia’s blessing. Excusing himself with the fact that there were already Abyssals hunting him for his very outright countering of Deathlord activities in Stygia – not that he considered them much of a threat – and that he feared that those who hunted him might attempt to sabotage his quest or prepare ambushes if they learned of his plans.

“Right, you don’t want them messing up your stuff in advance – got it – but I have to ask: If all the Deathlords know that you’re a traitor already, why would this falafel fellow even entertain a duel with you?” Speaker summarized, too curious to help it on the topic of Deathlords.
Craning his neck and letting out a snort of brimstone smoke, the Bodhisattva replied: “The First and Forsaken Lion has battled the other Deathlords in the past – he’s tried more than once to conquer and hold all of Stygia for himself and his own plans. I simply had to present myself as seeking a strong master, having defied a weak master who had resort to subterfuge to control me”

“I take it he’s not much for subtlety?” Cash commented, not looking particularly impressed with the Bodhisattva’s crudely veiled deception.
Shaking his head, the Bodhisattva bellowed a cruel laugh: “Ha! I am by far not the first Deathknight to exploit him. He is a peerless warlord and warrior – but politics and the arts of conversation eludes him completely”

With their meeting all but concluded, Shimmer had but one question left: “Why didn’t you three contact Sunrise while I was still out? Why wait for me to wake up to start this?”

“You’re still the only one among us who knows the messenger spell… and apparently Yu-Shan is warded against unicorn-conjured messenger spells. Tien Yu is busy in Yu-Shan preparing for the push into the underworld, as is the Raven King, and Tu Yu doesn’t have the clout to get us into Yu-Shan from here” Cash quickly noted, not even bothering to veil his annoyance – though it was clear that he also understood why they were all busy.

Looking at the rest of the gang, Shimmer took a deep breath and used a charm that momentarily grew her brain a few sizes. It looked rather grotesque for everyone else – though the Bodhisattva didn’t seem to mind it – but it gave her a brief moment of greater intellect and a spark of inspiration drawn from the infinite dreams of the moon: “Can we say that we captured him and that we’re delivering him to Lytek?”

“Sadly no. I already used that trick with a helpful Sidereal to gain an audience with Lytek. Getting out of there required burning a lot of bridges, but I needed confirmation that my exaltation could be cleansed” The Deathknight noted.

Pondering for a few more seconds, Shimmer nodded: “Ok – well, from what I remember the Jade Pleasure Dome is right next to the calibration gate. Get someone to use the gate spell to summon the gate here… Heath Rose can do that”

“And force our way into the dome to speak to Celestia? Every Sidereal we’ve talked to has said that Celestia, Luna and the mares of the destiny of addicted to the games of divinity they play in there – and even in the first they never let any Exalts into the pleasure dome. That place was fortified to repel exalts back then, probably still is – the bronze faction will stop us before we could make it through the defences” Speaker pointed out, recalling that quite a few exalts tried to put an end to the pleasure dome’s influence on the incarnae – and that none ever succeeded, not even at the peak of the first age in the last few centuries before the usurpation.

Trusting Speaker’s memories on the defences of the Jade Pleasure Dome, Shimmer concluded that aside from getting to Yu-Shan then they would also need a way to get Celestia out to meet them. If only there was a way to get around both these issues at once…

“We would need a scandal – a panic. Something to rouse Celestia enough to draw her out, but ideally nothing that would actually get us in trouble… and from what we’ve so far seen of celestial law, then such a thing simply does not exist” Cash stated in a frustrated tone.
In a flash of inspiration that Immaculates would likely have attributed to the madness of the mare in the moon, Shimmer poked Speaker: “That chakram you were working on… you said there wasn’t enough time to finish it, right?”

Nodding, Speaker presented the tangle of mystic components in the rough shape of a flat disc with a hoof-sized hole in the middle. Bits of blue jade could be seen on the inside, with white jade, orichalcum inlays and filigree of impossibly cut gems spelling out ancients runes: “Calibration is too close – not even a factory cathedral would let me wrap this up in time for the invasion. But it’s ok: It gives me something to look forward to playing around with once we’re done there”

“Speaker – why not make a scene up in Yu-Shan by finishing it there?” Shimmer suggested, the silvery gleam in hers hinting of greater schemes brewing in her head that were so far unsaid.

Looking at his little hobby project, which barely had more than a few weeks of charm-fueld work put into and figuring that there was a good year or so left on it, Speaker gave Shimmer a tentative look: “Ok – but how does finishing this get us to talk with Celestia”

“Because only Celestia can close the doors to the Primal Forge, but I know a god who can let you in…” Shimmer beamed, looking more like a predator who spotted a weak pray than a pony who had a great idea.

Speaker pondered this factoid for a moment. As far as he could recall, then the primal forge’s Gates of Splendor Eternal were open most of time in the first age, with an endless stream of raw materials, essence and other strange things entering the place, and a similarly endless stream of the Great Maker’s creations. The gates were only opened and closed, ah right: “Yes, there was a contest once a decade of the strongest among the Exalted to see who could make the gates budge. Celestia would always win…”

Confirming this – mainly by ‘innocently asking’ Heath Rose via magical messenger about this contest, the circle got a reply surprisingly quickly, in form of a messenger spirit from Heath Rose who shouted in Heath Rose’s voice that the circle should stay the hell away of the primal forge: “That place hasn’t been safe for millennia – they disassemble you and build chairs or dancing crockpots out of you!”

With the whole circle and the Bodhisattva looking at Speaker, the Twilight caste Solar could but shrug: “Well it didn’t do that back in the first age... though I do recall that if the correct protocol wasn’t observed you might be mistaken for crafting materials – maybe they forgot the right rites? I was the official lorekeepers for that stuff after all. I know I remember them just fine”

Satisfied that Speaker could make entry to the place safe, Shimmer revealed how they were all going to get in there: “Back when I traveled east to here, I made a stop in the south briefly – too hot for my taste, and not enough water, but made contact with a Lunar elder working on trying to entice a celestial god who was living in exile near his territory to help him. It didn’t click for me until now, but that god was Jakatam Shining-Hammer”

Nodding, Speaker confirmed that Jakatam, originally a lowly god of the concept of hammers, rose to become the supreme god of artifice in the first age: “He was favored by Autochton… ya he should be able to open the primal forge. Good call there”

“Alright, so the plan is that we get this god to come along and open the gate for us, Speaker gets to have fun making his thingy, and the rest of us wait for Celestia to show up and close the gate?” Sullen Hoof summarized, just to be clear.

Finding the summary apt, Shimmer concurred – more or less: “Basically. I think Speaker has to be done first – I don’t remember the gate ever being closed while there was stuff being done inside. You can’t open it from the inside unless you have permission either, like if you’re that god and stuff”

The meeting over, Cash and Sully quickly left to go shopping for provisions. The Bodhisattva returned to what he had been doing – which turned out to be talking with the intelligence and operations directorates. Speaker was tempted to tag along to listen in on that, but Shimmer noted that Speaker should be gathering up all the things he would need to construct his new magic chakram.

That Speaker only had a day to gather up all the first age components and reagents for a full on high first age magical weapon made things… difficult – but by absolutely no means impossible: Pulling some strings at Valkhawsen, Speaker was given access to the sorcery academy’s stores, plus Shimmer still had a lot of jade from Denansdor. The only thing that was missing was a whole talent of orichalcum, and an all-night visit to the soulforge for that resulted in a tired Speaker returning on the back of a flying Shimmer in warform arriving by dawn to the landing pad where the rest of the gang was ready to fly off on Nah.

Zooming south-west at great speed – evidently Cash had somehow learned to make Nah go even faster than last – it took but a few minutes before the circle had passed the mourning fields, which seemed a lot more fortified than usual.

Sullen Hoof noted that he had helped the stores directorate conduct experiments in how to create and preserve rations in such a way that food can be made to last in the underworld.

“Really? I was under the impression that most fresh food spoiled fairly quickly down there” Shimmer shouted as she enjoyed the brutal onrush of air as she had most of her head out of the protective field of the crystal windshield Cash had gotten installed at the helm of Nah’s howdah at some point recently.

Explaining that it seemed to be mostly an issue of the transfer between Creation and the underworld, Sullen Hoof noted that he had helped test means to carry supplies over via means of the limited elsewhere storage means that the Seventh Legion had access to. Once there food and water would last as if in Creation, depending on temperature and humidity.

“So the installations at the perimeter of the mourning fields, they’re for storage?” Speaker asked. This turned out to be the case.

Passing by Thorns, the circle couldn’t help but notice that the shadowland around the city state had grown visibly larger. The Bodhisattva noted that the Mask of Winters seemed to be ‘fertilizing’ the ground around the shadowland with ritual blood sacrifices.

“A shame… I’ve been told that Thorns used to have a thriving artist community, patroned by the autocrat and his family – and some of the best vinyards outside of the blessed isle, along their territory down the summer mountains” Cash remarked, having heard many a tale of the goods exported from Thorns.

The seemingly endless dry savannahs of Harborhead stretched out for quite a while after the circle passed the summer mountains, but even those sparse grasslands eventually yielded to the aptly named glitter-flame desert, the endless expanse of dry sand that stretched all the way to the eternal fire of the elemental pole of flame.

At Shimmer’s suggestion Cash navigated along the edge of the summer mountains, or at least keeping them in sight. Apparently the place they were looking for was a volcano several thousand miles south along the massive range.

Flying for days, and camping at night within the mountains, Cash ultimately complained that they could probably shave three or four days off this trip if they could just go in a straight line and camp in the desert: “Shimmer, you have enough water stashed elsewhere – we can make the trip just fine”

As far south as they had gotten even the evenings were sweltering, but everyone knew that Speaker could easily build them all a shelter if need be with his singing staff, and yet Shimmer had remained insistant that they stay away from the open sands: “Look, there are things out there we don’t need to rouse – albino pony cannibals, the Jacharenai, maybe even the Lapiz or Ruby court of changelings depending on who’s in control of this stretch of Creation. Up here in the mountains the iron ores in the ground keep the changelings away, and the cannibals can’t hide in the rocks here to ambush us”

“We could take ‘em – we’ve dealth with changelings before” Sullen Hoof casually remarked as he served dinner.

Nodding, Speaker noted and gestured to the Deathknight amidst them: “Perhaps, but if any of those things kill Nah during the fighting we’re stuck here – our friend here weighs too much for Shimmer to carry him” 

Indeed, with the Bodhisattva’s few remaining organic parts, mainly his shriveled up heart and a few shreds of other organs, encased in thick soulsteel plating, the Deathknight was not what one might call light freight – and he for one did not fancy the prospect of having to walk all the way back to civilization.

This Cash could not deny – especially since it was the Bodhisattva who now was the lynchpin in the plan to split the Deathlord-loyal Deathknights. As he didn’t need sleep, the Bodhisattva took watch once more for the night.

In the morning the rest of the circle awoke to a gruesome sight: Obsidian lions turn to shreds spread around the camp – none of their lava-blood seemed to have spattered anywhere near the circle, and the Bodhisattva… he seemed… chipper… if it even was possible for him to express happiness in his current form.

“I got us a guide” he stated, presenting the circle with a miserable looking creature he had tied up with sinew torn from the dead lions around them.

It took a few moments to compare notes and figure out what had happened, but apparently some Jacharenai, the lion-formed changelings that prowled the south-eastern deserts, had tried to attack the camp at night – and the Bodhisattva had captured their leader.

Elegance, the quite unfitting name of the decidedly ugly changeling pack leader, was not particularly cooperative – but between the choice of ‘being destroyed’ and ‘allowed to exist as their prisoner’ Elegance chose the sensible option, though she was quite upset that the circle wouldn’t let her cannibalize the remains of her kin for the gossamer that their lion-forms had been woven out of.

With a guide on board Cash was able to fly Nah through the glitter-flame desert further away from the mountains. The seemingly featureless sand dunes soon gave way to dunes of glass and crystal, as the head of the elemental pole had melted it all at some point. It also meant that travel could only be done at night, for the heat in the day was so much that flesh fried after more than just a few seconds of direct exposure to noon-day sunlight.

“I remember talking to a merchant who said that most of the caravans going down to Gem are all outfitted with these fancy talismans they make in the Varangian city states. They make the heat of day bearable… we should totally have swung by there and bought some” Cash lamented.

A few more days of travel by night and the circle arrived at a particularly active volcano. Speaker’s essence sight saw many dragon lines of local fire essence flowing into the place, and Shimmer said that it matched the description she had gotten of Jakatam Shining-Hammer’s humble abode.

Circling the volcano, a ruined manse revealed itself on the south-face of the lone mountain. Landing on a vast balcony overlooking an endless sea of smoldering and ashen dust to the south, the circle entered and found the place… well… ruined. Whoever had built the manse were long gone, though a few broken stained glass windows revealed dragon motifs. This had been the palace of the dragonblooded, though Speaker wasn’t sure if the stained glass motifs were original: “This place might be older… but that doesn’t matter right now”

With a charm or two Shimmer was able to hear through the ever-present rumbling of the volcano to where a chorus of tiny hammers plinked away at… something… somewhere… it was deeper into the volcano, that much was for sure.

Further inside, past fountains of lava and many places where molten rock and liquid fire essence ran like streams through holes in the manse walls, the circle struggled to navigate the hazards of the place.

Shimmer found that the ambient heat singed her feathers if in form with wings, , which made flying over the lava flows quite impossible.  She had to shift into a more heat-resistant southern sand-spider form, riding along on Speaker’s head.

Cash and Sullen Hoof, neither of which had Speaker’s elementals immunity charm or Shimmer’s option to turn into something for which high heat mattered not, suffered greatly for they had little to shield themselves with – at least at first…

In a stroke of genius, Sullen Hoof took inspiration from a cooking trick he had learned back in Nexus at a master of open-flame roasts, to use his essence to create a bubble of still air around them, thus insulating them – though periodically he had to cycle in new air that they might still breathe.

Speaker just walked through the lava, or swam where need. The Bodhisattva did so similarly, though without any elemental immunity charms – his ghost flesh was simply so tough that the molten rock could not hurt him in any meaningful way, for it was already dead.

Deep under the manse, at the heart of the powerful demesne that had fueled the manse up above, the circle found the ash-covered Jakatam and his swarm of not so shiny soot-covered hammers, as they flew around a hundred fire-essence fueled forges creating beautiful artisanal blades, more show-pieces than anything actually useful in a fight – but they were each and all elegant, ornate and worthy of many days of sincere poetry and admiration.

Jakatam himself… was not particularly pleased to see that he had visitors – but as Speaker leapt forward and presented Gift, then the god shivered and shook off several thousand years of soot and ash from his forges. 

Underneath was had to be tons of ash, the form of a pony was revealed – but with a body of pock-marked copper and steel, with limbs of sturdy and thick wooden shafts. This was a being wrought of the same materials that tools were made of it, and it showed – also his head was that of a hammer, with a mouth, nostrils and eyes at the front striking surface, which made him rather comical.

“It is time” Speaker said in old realm, with Gift held before him.

The god snorted, blowing out a cloud of ash from his nostrils: “For what? You want me to tune the thing up for you? I seem to recall you preferring to do that yourself…”

The voice of the hammer-god was like a chorus of tiny dainty hammers on silver bells, ringing out his words like beautiful and haunting music. It was entrancing for ponies to hear him talk, but not to Speaker, for he had become used to the voice back in the first age: “I need you to open the gates of splendor”

Jakatam’s expression hardened, sizing up Speaker and his other visitors. Speaking coldly he bluntly asked: “Will you leave if I give you my blessing to open them?”

Speaker wanted to argue against the proposition – for he remembered his friendship with Jakatam from the first age, but clearly this god had changed in the interim, for this was not the old friend he once knew – but he chose not to, for this was not the time: “If that’s all we need to open the gates… then yes”

Giving Gift a poke, making it light up and glow from within – white and coppery light pouring out through each tiny riveted seam and crevice in the magical device – Jakatam nodded: “Then leave. You never met me here, and I did not give this blessing”

Before anyone could get a word in edgewise Jakatam turned and began banging his head-hammer against a massive basalt anvil, working on some tiny bit of steel on it. This produced a heavenly degree of noise, making any further conversation impossible.

With what they had come for in hoof, the circle began to make their way out of the volcano. While passing through the ruined manse they suddenly came across Heath Rose who seemed to be waiting for them.

“Hey, fancy meeting you here” Cash quipped, happy to be out of the face-melting heat of the volcano – where they were right now it was only hot enough to crisp skin.

Heath Rose shot the circle a disheartened look, like that of a mother who knew that her foal was about to do something stupid and that she couldn’t really prevent it from happening: “You’re all about to do something really stupid… I’m just here to make sure you all get out of it alive so you’ll be there for the invasion”

It turned out that Heath Rose had arrived via a Yu-Shan gate that had the manse had been built around. This made getting to Yu-Shan exceedingly easy – though it did mean that Nah had to be left behind… but Heath Rose assured the circle that it would be brought back to Sunhill, unharmed, by some elementals who owed her a favor.

Thus the circle and the Bodhisattva stepped through the pearl-studded Yu-Shan gate carved into the wall of what had once been a ballroom, and exited into Yu-Shan, not very far from the Baths of Venus.

> Chapter 97: Lost Connection
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Standing on a gold-brick paved plaza among pagodas of jade and diamond, the sun high above shining brightly – marking that Celestia was ahead in the games of divinity – the circle found itself waiting, as Heath Rose hailed a cloud for them to fly around on.

Clad in thick dark robes, the Bodhisattva did his very best to mask his presence: He already seemed to know quite well that the blessed of the neverborn were feared and reviled in Yu-Shan – so there was no need to call undue attention to him.

Flying somewhat north-east, Heath Rose inquired into the circle’s plan and purpose. At first she seemed incredulously, but after a moment of thought she shot the Deathknight a mistrusting glare: “Turn him in a Solar? Are you serious? Is that even possible?”

“We won’t know if we don’t try – and if it works then the Deathlords will probably find it a lot more difficult to keep their abyssals in control” Speaker noted.

As far as the plan went, then the initial phase was simple enough… sort of: Speaker would approach the gates of splendor, use Gift, open the gates, enter and then do his thing inside. Shimmer would come along, since she was the one who had all the stuff for the project stored elsewhere. The rest of the gang and the Bodhisattva would remain outside, in hiding, waiting for Celestia to show up and close the gate.

Nodding, Heath Rose looked… distressed. Apprehensive would also describe her well: “You are trying to pull the most high away from the games… this hasn’t been done in millennia. She didn’t even come out for the Great Contagion. Do you honestly think that she will even care to respond to this?”

This was not something that anyone in the circle had an answer to  - but what they did have was hope.

A few hours later of impossibly fast heavenly transit the circle approached the Primal Forge from above: An impossibly vast walled off compound large enough to fit most of the scavenger lands and the hundred kingdoms into, the birthplace of exaltations, and the former celestial home of Autochton.

A few minutes later Speaker stood before the vaunted gates of splendor… he wasn’t really sure if should weep or cry, as centuries of memories of artifice and adventures flooded his mind.

Across the half-mile wide gold-brick cobbled street, on the seventh floor of a rather modest heavenly tea-house, had Heath Rose bought out the entire floor and cleared it out – leaving only Cash, Sully and the Bodhisattva… and Heath Rose lounging on an absolutely divinely luxurious futon.

“How’s he doing?” Cash asked, sipping on the heavenly tea they served at the place.

Sullen Hoof shrugged: “Nothing noteworthy yet…”

“I’ll be impressed if they don’t just eat him alive and make drumsets out of his skin. We always lose contact with those who go in there – hell, our freshest intel on the forge was from a sidereal who snuck in, was killed, and then we interrogated her next incarnation” Heath Rose noted.
Holding Gift out at the gates it quickly struck Speaker how the tiny primordial-made chakram paled in comparison to the impossible gates before him. The walls and gate around the primal forge were several miles high, and covered in burnished copper and brass tubes and mechanisms. Between riveted plates of exotic metals were endless churnings of gears and pistons, each dripping or oozing with strange and colorful fluids. It was like beholding the deranged masterwork of a clockmaker turned abstract artist and mad genius, with some gears turning back on themselves and yet somehow still working in all defiance of special continuity, while pistons and crystal tubes with liquid drew fluid from nowhere and sent its pressurized content elsewhere in huffs of lightning and smoke. This was alien in every sense of the word – wrought of a mind not bound by mortal logic and reason, a mind much more vast and ancient.

In a brief moment, Speaker recalled once seeing the hundred-yard wide gates defy space and sanity to somehow gape open enough to fit through a mountain. He had never really learned what that mountain was used for…

Approaching, Gift lit up once more. The few spirits, messenger gods and elementals moving about in the area paid little attention to the pony with the shiny thingy at the gate: The piles of sacrifices and ancient scrolls with what was likely reports or requisition orders were several yards high around the base of the gates – with the gates closed none of it could be delivered, and right now it looked like Speaker was just another servant about to add to the piles.

Essence sight revealed a second layer of defenses, beyond the ‘mere’ impenetrable layer of steel and magical materials that the walls and gates were wrought of: Wards and protective spells of the highest order, including the very seal of Celestia herself…  would the blessing of the shining hammer be enough? Oh well, only one way to find out:

As Gift came within a few feet of where the two gates met, nearby gears in the gates sprang to life as if touched by divinity: After a second there was a loud clicking, and some of the plating around the base of the gates where they met started to shift and move about, quickly swinging aside to reveal a circular indentation outlined by a thousand tiny gears, sprockets and other components wrought of a myriad of strange materials.

Lost in the sight along, Speaker barely even noticed that Gift was drawn to the indentation and socketed itself perfectly into the indentation for a lengthy moment, releasing a pulse of light and essence that flowed into the gate. At this point a chorus of steam whistles sounded, ringing out a loud and strangely melodic tune – simple and rhythmic, like a work shanty. It was then that the light spread to the entire gate, lighting up several square miles of gears and interlocking pistons, metal rods, chimes, whistles, and things for which not even Speaker had words.

This caught the attention of the spirits and gods in earshot… and they all ran, flew or otherwise spirited themselves away. The only things that didn’t run away were a trio of celestial lions that had been passing by a block down the road, though upon approaching Speaker they didn’t really seem sure of what to do.

“State your business! How did you open the gate!” One of the towering celestial lions bellowed, standing ten yards tall out of pure orichalcum – like a majestic statue that any king or warlord in Creation would give anything to own.

Speaker barely even acknowledged the presence of the lions, for the primordial miracle of mechanisms before him was bringing him to tears: “I don’t have to tell you that – and I used the key”

The gates groaned and the ground shook, as the twin gates began to inch open. From within spilled smoke of many colors, including colors that weren’t really there – colors that likely hadn’t made the cut when Creation was birthed, yet preserved in the impossible island of primordial potential that was the Primal Forge.

From the smoke spilled a tide of mechanical insects that crept around the gate and began to pick up and drag the sacrifices, scrolls and documents piled up at the gate inside. They were little messenger things, mechanical spirits – ex machine native to Autochtons own personal machine reality.

The celestial lions back away, fearing what would come next, as the gap between the gates grew. A clamor of noise was beginning to rise from beyond the gates, and the lions began to argue if they call in backup…

“Sir, with all due respect… there aren’t enough lions or war-gods in Yu-Shan to hold back what’s coming” one of them noted.

A beam of light and essence shot out of the barely opened gate, scanning Speaker. Quickly flaring his caste mark and presenting his very roughly pieced together work in progress, Speaker declared his intensions: “I am Bright Machine Speaker – I am here to create. You will assist me, for such is the will of the Great Maker!”

About three dozen metal limbs and tentacles with a mix of clamps or other grappling devices at the end shot out of the smoke, pulling Speaker inside. Shimmer barely managed to shoot past the lions and grab on to Speaker, turning into a snake and slithering into Speaker’s uniform.

To use mortal words to describe the sights Speaker beheld inside the Primal Forge would make Eloge weep. Then again, the sensory projectors and magical protocols by which the machine spirits of the forge communicated meant that eyes weren’t strictly necessary to perceive the communication they thrust upon Speaker. The thousands upon thousands of choirs of metal and crystal limbed spirits, who all wanted to know why the gates had been opened, why Speaker was there, who he was, what he was, what the status of the Great Maker was, and a thousand other questions mainly pertaining to things like “where are the raw materials I requisitioned three thousand years ago?” or “I finished this spoon six hundred years ago, please tell me where who ordered it so it can be delivered”

Speaker regretted not having learned a charm or two to defend against such an onslaught upon his mind, as he dropped to his knees with his ears bleeding… but then all of a sudden the noise went away, leaving only a tiny twin stinging sensation in his ears. Also he was now deaf.

A brief silvery flurry flittered across his vision, as suddenly Speaker found himself seeing the inside of his inner ear. In very thin and fine lettering, written upon his skin upon which he could see the smallest of veins just barely pulse, it read: “I’ll fix your hearing once you make them calm down. Hurry – they’re spilling into the streets outside – let’s not get trapped in here”

Nodding, and then feeling a bit stupid as that had probably just shaken Shimmer around, Speaker ‘saw’ his vision blur into silver and then face into his own.

Recalling a first age gesture for silence and decorum – a gesture that among contemporary ponies was considered exceedingly rude – Speaker bid the tidal wave of ex machina looming around him to shut up and get in order.

Now, among the three concepts that Autochon contributed to Creation, besides the notion of tools and faith, was dogma. As the legend went, then dogma was deviced as a means to codify and record instructions in tool use and means of essence transmittal, namely ritualized displays of faith. For the spawn of the Great Maker this meant that they were usually rigid adherents of any kind of dogma that they were made or instructed to adhere to: Among these were the old articles of order, as codified by the primordials She Who Lives In Her Name and…

“I get it – they obey you if you do the proper ritualized gestures – get on with it!” Shimmer admonished.

How Shimmer had read his mind was beyond him – but then again she was nestled in his ear as a tiny bug… who knows?

Doing the right gesture, everything fell silent.

“I demand efficient organization. Present your queries in an orderly fashion” Speaker stated in a stern tone. He might not have the organizational skills that Cash had, but he knew how to run a tight ship in any workshop.

A stately machine spirit in the rough form of a metallic pony stepped forth, its elegant limbs of partially gilded – but also obviously worn and scuffed – jadesteel, with a marvelous orichalcum nodule affixed in its otherwise featureless faceplate where one might expect to see a third eye. With a voice that seemed to made by simply making its face plate vibrate at various tones, combined with various clicking noises from within its form, it spoke in a strange and ancient dialect of Old Realm: “Introductions. This unit is archivist-herald First Flute of Last Filing. This unit has [error, number does not match any known scale or quanta, too large] requisitions indexed and ready to file within Outer Forge, and roughly seventeen times as many deliveries ready to be made”

No wonder Heath Rose didn’t want the gates opened… the things inside the forge would flood Yu-Shan – either trying to deliver things to gods or offices that likely don’t exist anymore, thanks to the Great Contagion wiping out most of Creation, or pillaging much of Yu-Shan in an attempt to scrounge materials for their woefully delayed projects. It would be chaos… and not the good kind.

“Didn’t the deliberative put in an override after Autochton left?” Shimmer reminded Speaker from inside his ear.

Nodding again – and once more instantly regretting doing so – Speaker spoke the command phrase. It was an ugly little bit of words that might once have qualified as some sort of poetry, but the meter and style was lost to history, so what Speaker said mainly sounded like garbled nonsense… but it worked none the less.

“Ok, I want all deliveries to be made, but in case that the intended recipient can’t be reached or found, return here and put the delivery into long-term storage. Accept no new requisitions, no matter what” Speaker commanded.

The Herald-Archivist didn’t even need to relay the orders before a third of the machine spirits hovering above them rocketed out into Yu-Shan. It like a metal storm, ripping at every part of his body, as the delivery spirits cared little for ‘mere’ ponies standing in their way. Judging from the roars outside, then they didn’t care much for celestial lions either – they had a purpose to fulfill.

“Now, with that out of the way, all requisitions go into long-term storage – make a new memory-cathedral to house them all. They can go out at a later date to be determined…” Speaker continued. Pretty much the rest of the swarm of strange spirits, some wrought of amber fluid with gems floating inside them for eyes, others more akin to living crystals or sentient clouds of sparkling vapor, dispersed.

With everything gone Speaker was able to look properly into the seemingly eternal vista that was the Primal Forge. The usual spatial reality of Creation went out the window instantly, as seemingly level roads would twist around to form ceilings, and yet there was a steady traffic of strange quasi-metalic spirits of lightning, steam and crystal wandering these roads turned halls, here, at the outskirts of the Great Maker’s primordial forge-palace. A mortal mind would likely have broken – and even Speaker felt the strain as his mind attempted to reconcile the mishmash of incoherent causal logic.

When the swarm of delivery spirits had been hovering around them he had at least not been in doubt about what he had been looking at, even if the things were strange and otherworldly, for such was primordial aesthetics.

Taking a deep a deep breath and centering himself, taking hearth in the fact that this glorious miracle, wrought at the very dawn of Creation, still stood tall, Speaker turned to herald-spirit: “Ok, that was old business – time for new business”

The spirit bowed, and from its chest burst  a thousand microscopic spiders of silver that spun air and essence into a scroll – the spirit in turn gazed with great focus onto the scroll, the fury of his vision burning stylized old realm symbols onto the essence and air paper: “Input command”

Retrieving his work in progress from elsewhere, Speaker presented the hoof-full of junk to the archivist-herald: “I need this built as quickly as possible. I have brought complete schematics, specs and materials to finish the job. I would also like to help in the process if possible”
Jumping out of Speaker’s ear and shifting back into her pony form, Shimmer also offered her help. Speaker thanked her, then gave First Flute a pensive look… how would this spirit react to such a request?

Clicks and whirring noises from the head of the archivist-herald sounded as the spirit contemplated the request and offers of assistance. The orichalcum nodule on the spirit’s forehead began to glow, with hot sparks bursting from it as messages of essence were transmitted far and wide across the expanse of the Primal Forge.

After a few minutes of this the spirit sprung to life once more: “Command accepted. Materials and instructions are to be given to the delivery spirits. For your evaluation, please stand still for the Skillsayer”

Before either Speaker nor Shimmer could really ask a giant floating eye of jade, starmental and strange ‘dripping’ crystals zipped in, gazes harshly at the two of them, then flew off again.

“Your skills have been judged adequate for certain parts of the fabrication. Estimated time to completion: Six years” First Flute bluntly stated in a uniquely courteous but direct manner.

Looking at Shimmer for a brief moment, Speaker sighed: “That’s not really an option…”

“Elaborate” the spirit requested.

Shimmer explained that they needed the thing finished as quickly as possible. That was Speaker ‘s exact wording, in old realm: “As quickly as possible”

The automaton spirit fell silent for a moment, then sprang to life once more: “Mortal ponies do not have authorization to request that level of resource commitment”

Flaring his anima fully, enveloping himself in a golden triangular sigil and three pairs of iridescent white wings that wrapped around him, Speaker stomped his hoof into the hard-pressed metallic dust that was the ground where they stood: “Mortal ponnies? What exactly are you taking us for? You scanned us to see if we could help in my own project! I am Bright Machine Speaker, friend of the Great Maker and The Maker’s Voice in the Solar Deliberative! You will not treat me like a common mortal pony!”

Like so many times already, the automaton spirit that was First Flute of Last Filing fell silent, with only the faint sound of gears churning and things clicking inside its head giving off any signs of ‘life from the thing. After a few seconds the thing one more began to transmit, with faint beams of essence arching far and wide from the spirit’s orichalcum forehead gizmo. Upon completion, the spirit dropped to the ground in a rather unnatural but obviously submissive posture: “Honored Speaker of His Word, forgive this unit. The spirits and ex machina that would usually detect the nature of the visitors to the forge and relay that information were long ago assigned to posts elsewhere in Yu-Shan and have not been seen or heard from ever since. For you and friend…”

“Lunar mate” Shimmer interjected coldly.

“…Lunar mate, we shall spool up all of our tools for you” First Flute stated.

Nodding in acceptance, Speaker smiled: “By our deeds and creations we shall honor him”

“By our deeds and creations we shall honor him” The archivist-spirit replied in kind, bowing its head.

With Speaker and Shimmer’s credential established things quickly picked up speed: A cargo-lifting spirit was summoned to bring the two exalts to the outer sanctum, to the outer wards of the impossibly huge forge-palace at the heart of the primal forge.

Atop a luxurious suite in a mile-high tower of immaculately polished brass and brushed silver the two were ritually cleansed, fed and anointed, that they bring nothing but their essence with them into the inner forge. Here they were also informed that with the number of ancients tool-spirits being roused, and legions of choirs readying themselves to sing, then the expected time until completion – once the creation process begun – was twenty seven seconds.

“Ok, see now that – that sounds faster than even what you can do” Shimmer said, not in any way trying hide the fact that she was impressed.
Finding it difficult not to smile to point of straining his face, Speaker agreed.

After all this, on their way into the inner forge, the two were separated: Shimmer had to go to a choir of spirits to learn a special dance of air and lightning, for such was her appointed position in helping in the project, while Speaker had to go elsewhere for what they were informed was a ‘treatment to bring him closer to the Great Maker’. Since none of this sounded objectionable, the two parted on good terms, curious to see what was ahead.

Using the form of a western thunderbird, the spirits of lightning in western ocean storms, Shimmer mastered the ancient primordial dance of air and lightning very quickly – it simply felt natural with her choice of form, though she did have to fend off a few touchy-feely analyst-spirits who kept wanting to ‘take samples’ from her to fully understand the scope of her powers’ utility.

“Don’t you have records of Lunars at all? Stop trying to pluck me damnit” Shimmer screeched, discharges of air essence lightning arching down the tips of her massive wings.

The spirits just gave the same lame excuse: “All types of tools must be retested once every five years, or more frequently if needed, to monitor deterioration and document any deviations” with its weird and unnatural high pitched voice, speaking with cut-off vowels and very clipped consonants, as if trying to make each word in old realm as brief and concise as possible, even if that meant sacrificing the beauty of the language.

It was then that Shimmer suddenly felt very… empty… for a moment, and she didn’t quite understand why. Was the spirit trying to use some kind of emotion-inducing charm on her? How rude!

Dismissing the spirit, Shimmer was led to the inner forge where she found Speaker dangling from a strange helmet gizmo that was connected to a lot of strange tubes, coils and magical material wires, all which in turn connected to the greater forger superstructure… and by Luna, this place was like in a dream, outside of time and space. Tools, spirits of making and machines of crystal and living oil swam in the air, all of like a strange cosmos of creation, orbiting a grand central workbench of all five magical materials, as well as a pale transparent blue crystal that was unlike any other material she had ever seen.

Shimmer was placed at the forefront of an impossible vast choir of spirits that looked like living sparks.

Now, it wasn’t that Speaker smelled weird – that was the anointment with the sacred oils and salves. It wasn’t the strange metal and crystal headgear that seemed more to be holding on to Speaker’s head than him wearing it. It wasn’t that he was hanging limp like a wet noodle from that headgear… it was something else… something that felt hollow, conflicting, yet not wrong at the same time.

Three sudden pulses of light and sound signaled the beginning of the act of artifice. Floating crystal platforms with the schematics set into them lit up, projecting the designs into the air above the everyone in writhing sigils that seemed to want to speak to you – to explain their purpose, their part in the design.

It was then the song and dance began, feverish and hectic – yet Shimmer never lost sight of Speaker as he yawned open to the point that she could hear the sickening sound of his jaw dislocate… and then from that grotesquely distended maw spilled forth a torrent of essence that was not of wood, nor fire or earth, nor air or water.

It was not essence that had the warm glow of the sun, or the enigmatic shine of the moon. It didn’t have the colors of the mares of destiny, nor even the darkness of the underworld – this was not essence of Creation.

“What is happening to him!?” Shimmer cried out, hoping that anything would respond as she manically tried to keep pace with the ecstatic dancing of the spark-spirits around her as they channeled wave upon wave of spiritually refined lightning and essence into the workbench before Speaker.

A small being, a tine spirit the size of an apple – looked a bit like a metallic orange, floated up to Shimmer and admonished her: “Focus on the dance: The demiurge is working”

At that moment Shimmer realized that her feeling of emptiness was: Her solar bond… it had been broken – or at least, it become unbound for there was no Solar before her. The pony hanging was from the strange metal and crystal helmet might have the body of Speaker, but not his exaltation.

Had Speaker given his soul to expedite this mad venture faster?

> Chapter 98: Letting What Was Severed Become Whole
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

From their sinfully opulent tea lounge and vantage point, Cash, Sullen Hoof, the Bodhisattva and Heath Rose beheld as the Primal Forge across the street sprung to life.

With its gates open, it was easy to see how the vast expance inside was coming to life. Spirits were going less in and out of the gates, than were simply going to and fro inside the gate and beyond.

“Looks like Speaker got them to make his thing” Cash noted, seeing the organized chaos beyond the gate for what it was: A ludicrously well-organized and infinitely large workshop where all the clockwork spirits, servants and assistants had just sprung to life.

Heath Rose concurred, sounding duly impressed: “The whole forge is coming to life… I don’t think that’s happened since before the usurpation” 

And just as abruptly as it had begun, the whole forge seemed to power down and go back to sleep. Cash found this amusing. He speculated: “Maybe they just decided to test to see if things are working – to show off for Speaker?”

“We’re coming out right now – we’re done, Speaker is… he’s messed up… we need to get to Lytek right now!” sounded the very sudden and exceedingly urgent magical message from the silvery messenger sprite Shimmer had sent before it repeated itself once more, then fizzled out into silvery motes of essence.

Heath Rose quickly sprang to action, dispatching unseen messenger gods to notify Lytek, the god Exaltations.

The rest of them barely got any time to speculate on why Shimmer wanted to get Speaker to the Right Hoof of Power, but it became painfully obvious once Shimmer came flying out of the primal forge, with a limp Speaker held tight in her arms.

Landing on the tea lounge balcony, Speaker’s outwards symptoms revealed themselves: Apart from being seemingly unconscious, then he was vomiting up slimy chunks of golden essence and blood. He looked like someone had grabbed him by the head and flung him around until he had become so rattled inside that his inside and exaltation.

Calling a heavenly rickshaw, Heath Rose put Shimmer and Speaker on, and then got in herself: “Ok you lot – you know what you’re supposed to do here. Once you’ve had your chat book it for the nearest gate out of here – it’ll be to your east. And if you get into trouble, don’t – if you can’t avoid trouble, outrun it”

Thus She, Shimmer and Speaker disappeared into the heavenly  sunny sky which moments later changed into that of a starlit nightscape with angry red tones throughout it, like the most delicate silk scarves strewn across the firmament.

The Bodhisattva, not used to Yu-Shan’s changing weather and lightning conditions found this very strange: “It is night…. But I feel as if it is still day”

“That’s heaven for you – and this means that the mare of battles is ahead in the games.  I’m not sure if that’s a good thing right now” Cash noted, fearing that the leader-position in the games might directly influence the outcome of their little trip to Yu-Shan.

Such fears seemed quickly confirmed, for moments later Sullen Hoof reported sensing a vast tide of light and and sound coming from the west: “I think Celestia is coming”

The Bodhisattva stood up, girding him and looking… frightened, timid, fearful even.

“Come on, chin up – you’re not asking for something unreasonable here. If what I remember of Celestia, then she’s quite reasonable” Cash reassured the Deathknight.

Scraping a worried hoof against the impossible geometry of the floor tiles and their dancing dragon motifs, Sullen Hoof worried: “That was three thousand years ago. I’ve seen addictions destroy a pony’s very soul in just three months on guild heroin. What has three thousand years on the games of divinity done to Celestia? What if she just smites us for daring to wrest her from the games to close these damned games?”

“If you worry, then hide. I am the only one who needs to face her” The Bodhisattva stated, flexing in his armor one last time before leaping from the balcony down into the street, scaring the golden shit out of the celestial lions standing watch at the gates of splendor.

Sullen Hoof nodded and slinked off into the shadows. Cash merely shook his head and smiled: “I want to say hi to her as well – might as well show her that we’re worth paying attention to”

Jumping down, one story at a time, Cash caught up to the Bodhisattva who was getting some very mistrusting looks from the celestial lions in their midst: “Please, gentlelions – he’s with me – and we have official solar business with Celestia once she shows up here” Cash said, flaring his caste mark.

Unable to disregard the ancient clauses that granted the Eclipse Caste diplomatic immunity on official solar business (whatever they might define as such), the lions had to abide – and thus the two waited the few anxious minutes as the grand celestial parade that was the entourage of Celestia approached, with the Most High at the forefront.

Celestia. The goddess of limitless perfection, heroic virtue,  the chief war-god of heaven, divine ruler of the celestial court, patron incarna of the Solar Exalted. Celestia had many titles. Of the most well known was that of the Unconquered Sun, for upon her creation was tested by the primordials – put through countless grueling adventures and trials – all of which she passed gloriously, so truly: She was unconqurerable, a shining beacon of virtue for all to aspire to and worship.

…well, that was many thousand years ago, long before the inception of the Exalted.

What landed before the Bodhisattva and Cash Charm was a goddess who indeed stood glorious, but she had a look in her eyes that Cash knew well, a covetous look – one of deprivation. Even her rainbow mane seemed to have faded a bit…

Seemingly ignoring the Bodhisattva and Cash, Celestia – a head taller than the Deathknight and twice the height of Cash, stomped over to the gates of splendor and with a single hoof slammed one half of the gate into place.

Cries of mercy and pleas to let the gates remain open sounded from within, but were quickly silenced as the second closed the gate shut.
“I don’t think you return to the Jade Pleasure Dome” the Bodhisattva posited sternly towards the Most High.

Celestia turned, slowly, her orichalcum shoes making ‘plinking’ noises as she stepped. Her gaze was terrible and one of utmost fury: “You dare”

To Cash, Celestia’s voice revealed many a thing. He had no doubt that Sully was in earshot as well, trying to gleam as much information as possible from the exchange. For one thing Cash could hear that Celestia was actually a bit frightened by the being before her…

“I will dare many a thing, for I have already defied those infinitely more powerful than you. I am the The Recalcitrant Bodhisattva of Penance and Suffering Ended, Exalted by the Dusk Caste Abyssal… and with your permission, I would quest to redeem this black exaltation return it to its original Solar state of being” the Bodhisattva stated quickly, clearly and concisely in his raspy nightmarish voice.

Craning her neck and giving the Deathknight before her an appraising look-over, her lips screwed into a tight expression of concentration for a few moments before she finally spoke: “You would ask my permission for this… why?”

“Depending on how I succeed I might well become a Solar, yet I am not chosen by heaven to become one of such an Exalted host. Thus I ask your permission to do so, should I succeed in my endeavor” The Bodhisattva explained in a grim but undeniably honest tone.

Taking a deep breath, Celestia took a bold step forward towards the Deathknight and waved her grand horn above him. The Bodhisattva whinced as the pure sunlight hurt against his ghostflesh – but it was a pain he gladly accepted.

“I sense great courage in you, and the conviction needed to carry through with the venture you propose. I also sense temperance to not haphazardly misuse your powers, and most impressively… you managed to hold on your heart, when so many others would have seen it forever taken from you and replaced with darkness. With this, I am impressed. Go forth, with my blessing, and become the lightbringer you know you can be” Celestia declared, her rainbow mane taking on a slightly more colorful appearance at the end of her words for some strange reason.

The Bodhisattva dropped to his knees and thanked Celestia – and while his eyes could not weep, nor his voice express happiness, then Celestia seemed to get the message.

Turning to her entourage, Celestia signaled for everyone to return to the jade pleasure dome…

“Wait – I would like to say something too” Cash stated with great panache, using a whole host of charms to not only get the Most High’s attention but to make his request impossible to deny… well, for lesser beings.

While she no doubt sensed the charms calling for her to respond to Cash’s request, Celestia certainly didn’t look like she had any inclination to actually do so. This disappointed Cash, who in turn applied a tad less subtlety in trying to get the Most High’s attention.

With a mighty and yet graceful leap followed by a perfect landing, Cash put himself next to Celestia: “So… not feeling chatty?”

There was no response.

“Your silence saddens me. I guess in my grief I might start telling everyone about the oaths I bound you to during my last incarnation… would be terribly embarrassing of course” Cash snarked, his eyes fixed on the Most High to gauge her response to his statement… his threat…

With a motion that was as swift as it was elegant to the point of bringing all martial hearts in sight to tears, Celestia spun around and held one of her four forelimbs at Cash in such a way that her mighty godspear came to be – its tip but a fraction of an inch from Cash’s nose.

Displaying balls of a scale that would likely have made the yozi known as The Black Boar That Cracks the Sky blush, Cash simply smiled: “And here I thought you would simply ward off such attacks on your character with your Aegis of the sun – but I guess you haven’t picked that up in quite a while…”

Neither god nor Exalt had spoken so harshly to the Most High in millennia. It showed.

The Most High, Lord of Heaven, looked at Cash with disbelief in her eyes. Such spiteful words, such hard truths – they had evidently not been spoken in quite a while, for Celestia looked torn. As the goddess of virtue, including the virtue of temperance, then it was not possible for her to ignore the sad truth of addiction… but as Cash had pointed out, then she had indeed thrown down her shield long ago and not picked it up since – leaving her defenses down, both physically, mentally and spiritually…

The tense silence ultimately amounted to nothing – at least not anything said. In the end Celestia gave Cash a disgusted look, though to the Eclipse Caste Solar it was instantly known that the disgust was less aimed at him, and more at Celestia’s own reluctance to act against her covetous love of the Games of Divinity.

To see the Most High turn away from someone who just called her out – called her out loudly, in public – oh this would be whispered about for decades, centuries even, in the hushed corners of social events across Yu-Shan.

Cash looked on as Celestia moved away,  a facade of smug self-satisfaction perfectly veiling his disappointment and the lingering feeling of sadness… for he just say the one being who was meant to be incorruptible creep back to her opium-den without even trying to resist.

“We got what we came for – we should leave before your actions cost us our lives” the Bodhisattva urged, tugging as gently as his clammy ghost-flesh allowed on Cash’s heavenly silks.

Sighing deeply, Cash nodded and turned to leave.

From somewhere unseen, Sullen Hoof had secured passage for the three via the magical food gates – and while Robed In Splendor was unsure if the Deathknight’s presence would cause his food-stores to spoil, then the three were quickly off – through another food gates – to Lytek’s office.

Cash Charmer, Sullen Hoof and a Bodhisattva who was but a head and a soulsteel-encased ribcage with a shriveled up heart all tumbled out of the food gate into Lytek’s office, surprising everyone – but just as quickly as they had arrived did Shimmer recognize them, allowing Lytek to continue his work.

While the Bodhisattva  formed new ghost-flesh limbs out of necrotic essence, allowing him to stand up, Cash and Sully inquired into Speaker’s condition.

Splayed out on Lytek’s grand dask, the god of solid light tinkered with Speaker’s soul and its connection to the Solar before him.

When the machine spirits of the Primal Forge had used the very tools that the Great Maker had used to create the Exaltations to remove Speaker’s Solar Exaltations, they had… stored it – somehow. What they had done to Speaker, what they worked upon him to make him spew essence not of Creation, this was not known – and yet the strange metallic traces of it were rife upon him: Stains of essence aspected towards lightning, metal and crystal had stained his flesh, his clothes and his beard – only if he ever regained consciousness would he possibly be able to explain what had happened to him.

That much was known.

What Lytek had also revealed, much to Shimmer’s horror upon their arrival, was that whatever crude means the machine spirits of the Primal Forge had used to reattach the Exaltation had not been… optimal. Thus Lytek now labored to fix this mess.

“…I haven’t seen damage like this since the primordial war. You kids really need to stop getting yourselves into trouble like this” Lytek groaned, working tools for which only Lytek and the Great Maker knew their names, tools that worked the stuff of souls and the stuff of Exaltations.

Putting his helmet down, Sullen Hoof gazed at Speaker with great worry in his eyes: “Can you help him? Can you fix him?”

“Of course I can – I am the god of this stuff. Don’t doubt my craft – just give me time” Lytek stated with not as much certainty in his voice as he had confidence.

Still, Shimmer could sense her love for Speaker return to her – or the love she had for his Exaltation. It was strange to think about, but she questioned it not: It was fate, it was destiny, it was the will of Luna.

As his soul healed Speaker regained consciousness – though the pain he still felt from the damage to his being, not his physical body, was great – and his anesthetic charm did nothing to quell the hurt.

“Speaker – what did they do to you? What happened back there?” Sullen Hoof was quickest to ask.

Finding his body easy to move, yet hurting deep within, Speaker struggled to Speak. Cash translated his groans: “They had to make room. Room in my soul. The connection could not be made while I was Exalted. They called it the demi-urge. I felt his touch”

“Who’s touch?” Sullen Hoof asked.

Shimmer felt stupid in even having to say it: “The Great Maker, Autochton, who else?”

As Cash continued to read the subtle twitches and spasms that Speaker gave off, while Lytek worked his soul, the circle learned that Speaker was – despite all the pain – feeling exceedingly happy with himself: His plea had somehow reached the apparently sleeping mind of Autochton… and the Great Maker had found his designs worthy.

“I must admit I do not find sense in this. You were gifted by this primordial, and yet you mock his work by trying to out-do him with a better weapon than what he gave you? Any god in Creation would strike down its champion for such blasphemy… how can this primordial be pleased with seeing you out-doing him?” the Bodhisattva wondered.

“The Great Maker is the lord of tools – he respects those who can iterate on his creations. If you ponies hadn’t done so to begin with, you’d all still be picking up sharp rocks in your mouths to cut reeds to make beds or thatch your huts – though I am curious, what did you make while at the forge?” Lytek explained, appearing close enough to finishing his work that he could comfortably make small-talk.

The Deathknight found his weird, but he couldn’t deny his curiosity either.

As Speaker sat up he displayed his new toy – touched by the very mind of the Great Maker – a new chakram, this time with a big hole in the middle, unlike the orichalcum disc that was Gift.

With a flick of the wrist and a trick of essence Speaker brought the device to life. From a seemingly empty crevice along the rim of the device, where there were no blades, erupted light and essence into a golden edge of pure force and heat – though it seemed not to touch Speaker as he handled the weapon.

“With his blessing I call it Homage – it will serve us well” Speaker said, his voice strained but exceedingly satisfied as he beheld his work before him.

Shimmer shook her head and hugged her love greatly: “You’re a fool you know that – an obessed fool, you and your toys”

Leaving heaven was very quickly accomplished – though not without drama. Cash’s ‘insults’ to Celestia had made him a prime target for any god and heavenly agency that wishes to enamor themselves to Celestia or the Bronze faction. Of course, at the same time then a lot of gods and agencies – mainly all the ones who honestly wouldn’t mind seeing Celestia brought out of her stupor and bring an end to the corruption of heaven – had similarly acted to help the circle or otherwise show them support.

To the circle this meant that for each corner they turned on their way to the dragon boats, they were met with celestian enforcers who would alternately try to capture them, or help them along to their destination. This mainly lead to highly spirited discussions between groups of godlings and enforcers that wished to arrest the circle, and those who wished to see the circle safely leave Yu-Shan. 

Sullen Hoof found it curious that there were no celestial lions among the squads sent after the circle, to which end Cash noted that the vibe he kept getting from the celestial lions was they cared more about the overall health and safety of Yu-Shan, as opposed to the hurt feelings of some god who had taken offense to something.

Of course, this was less reassuring than it could be, as at that moment the circle was galloping as quickly as possible from a throng of dog-sized scarabs with gem-encrusted shells that seemed quite invulnerable.

Reaching the quicksilver rivers that ran through Yu-Shan, the circle boarded a boat and Cash was somehow able to pay for passage to the sixteenth Yu-Shan.

Three days later the circle arrived in Creation, at the foot of the cliff on which the temple of Anisatsis was, at the shores of the Meander river.

“Oh hey, I remember this place” Shimmer noted, recalling that it was at this temple that the Gold Faction of the sidereals had their terrestrial headquarters.

With everyone back in Creation the question was what was next on the Bodhisattva’s quest.

“With Celestia’s blessing, my next step is a personal one – your participation is not needed, indeed it would likely only hinder me. However, for the step after that I will require your help to quickly travel across all of Creation… and at that point we will be hunted by all of the Deathlords” the Bodhisattva noted.

Thus the Deathknight left the circle, using the same kind of void-vortex necromantic spell that had once sucked Shimmer deep into the underground labyrinth of the underworld.

This left the circle looking around to see how they could quickly get around – but as it turned out, then Heath Rose’s predictions had seen the circle return to Creation at this point, so Nah had been delivered to the temple of Anisatsis… and the priests there were quite happy to be rid of the colossal beast.

Returning to Sunhill, the circle recovered for a few days, mended singed clothes and took some nice and recuperating baths.

On the fourth day upon their return, Speaker found himself busy tending to a number of Lookshyan amputees that had arrived that morning on a medical transport from a Lookshyan operation in the far east, where they had been trying to stop a series of mutant raiders – mutant raiders with very nasty necrotizing poison that required expedient field amputations to prevent an even nastier death.

The legionnaires were awed and amazed, and to Speaker it was quite refreshing to engage in some barracks-banter afterwards with Lookshyans who hadn’t really heard of him before – everyone in Lookshy had heard of Speaker one way or the other, plus it let Speaker tell of his adventures more freely without them judging him or calling him anathema. Indeed, at the end of the day as the Daystar sailed into the western wyld the lot of them were quite fond of Speaker, who in return had demonstrated the use of Homage – and there were few things that soldiers enjoyed more than a live demonstration of magical weapons.

As the pulsing trail of light from Homage faded and the rod of iron collapsed into two, with the cut ends glowing bright red from the incredible heat that, a filly who looked young enough to have just gotten her cutie-mark just a few days ago, came galloping into the recovery room with ragged breath past the bright noon-day sunlight shining in through the broad windows of the recovery room.

With a smidge of soothing essence, Speaker calmed the filly and helped her regain her constitution. The message she had was dire: “Raiders – massing to the south. They’ve blocked the canals down to the yellow river!”

Speaker didn’t even have to say goodbye or wish the legionaries around him good recovery – they knew well enough how an officer had to act when news of an attack was coming. What they didn’t expect was Speaker basically dumping enough essence into them to instantly boost them back to good health: “It won’t last – you’ll collapse by the end of the night and have to recover normally again, but for now innocent ponies need protection. Will you fight by my side?”

Every Lookshyan legionnaire knew well enough that it was good to fight from the high ground – but every pony-at-arms in Creation also knew that having the moral high ground was even better, and defending what amounted to a community of healers and scholars against some random band of raiders… now that was about as good as it got.

As they rushed towards the front, Speaker and the legionaries were diverted to the Sunhill armory. 

To Speaker’s surprise then the ponies of Sunhill Defence Force had, in months since Speaker had been to Sunhill, worked together with the foundry and forges that Cash had set up to support the shipwrights he had planned, to produce surprisingly high quality weapons and armor.
While equipping the legionaires and sheating himself in a glowing shell of essence, another messenger came in: The raiders had sent a list of demands.

“Where is Shimmer and Cash? They should be here!?” Speaker inquired, frustrated that he hadn’t heard from his friends.

The messenger, an old stallion, tried to give Speaker that old ‘grandfather trying to conceal an unfortunate truth to a grandson’ look – but Speaker was at least as long as him, so it didn’t really take: “Sorry my lord, but Mistress Shimmer and Master Cash left us last night for business in the north. Though I do know that Cash’s trio of secretaries is coordinating getting everyone who isn’t set to fight into the manse”

“What about Sullen Hoof?” Speaker asked, while trying to make sure that the lamellar armor one of the legionnaires were putting on wasn’t putting pressure on the pony’s bandaged wounds.

The messenger noted that Sully was out scouting – he had been the one who had discovered the raider’s camps.

“Wait, camps? Are they even attacking yet?” Speaker simply had to ask – he had thought that the raiders had been spotted on the approach. This turned out not to be the case.

“Chuzei, should we go back to recovery?” one of the legionaries asked tentatively, his head into the suit of lamellar armor he was trying to put on.

Thinking for a moment, Speaker nodded to the legionnaire: “Yes – return to your recovery rooms before my charm fizzles out”

The legionaries left, as did the messenger. Sitting down on the cold floorboards of the armory, Speaker focused on the hearthstone of the sunhill manse, briefly fiddling with it from its setting in the hearthstone amulet hung around his neck.

Through his connection to the hearthstone and the manse, Speaker used the hearthstone’s powers to scry across Sunhill. Following the flow of ponies, it was easy to find one of the three secretaries of Cash directing the citizens of Sunhill into the safety of the manse. Willing an illusion of letters to appear before Sunrise, Speaker communicated to her:

“What’s the evacuation status?”

The surly looking stallion barely paid attention to the text, shouting commands to and fro, ensuring that ponies were directed into halls and rooms that weren’t full yet: “Everyone should be accounted for in twenty minutes Lord Speaker – DO you know if Sully has reported back again yet?”

Speaker could only spell out “No – do you know when Shimmer and Cash will be back?”

The clerk threw a brief but intensely worried glance at the floating black text before him: “I only know that the boss and Lady Shimmer left to gather more allies for the battles ahead – but they packed for a weeklong trip, so I don’t expect them back anytime soon”

Terminating the connection, Speaker held back a sigh. This was not the time to worry or wish that your friends were there to bail you out: This was the time for an officer to take charge.

Lookshyan battle manual would have one hunker down in a defensive situation, but Speaker knew well enough that there wasn’t much of a city wall to do that with. No, this situation called for more… primitive… strategy.

In the hundred kingdoms, where a thousand warlords roam and pillage countrysides so fertile that some farmers harvest even in winter, the thing that such warlords find that they run out of most easily is not supplies – but troops. Over seven centuries since the fall of the shogunate, this had led to the evolution of a champion-based form of warfare commonly practiced in the hundred kingdoms.

Sure, a siege requires enough troops to cut off whatever your laying siege to, even then it was common to send forth a champion from each side if neither side would simply yield and surrender – no sane warlord would ever commit troops to a battle they didn’t think they were sure to win, while champions… well… if win they’re amazing, and if they’re dead you don’t have to pay them anymore.

Thus Speaker commanded the Sunhill defence force to take up a defensive position – as much as was possible – as he strode past them on the docks, as he leapt into the trees along the twin channel’s western bank.

Leaping from canopy to canopy, Speaker attempted to approach the raiders unseen – and who would ever be looking out for ponies approaching from the tree-tops?

Nearing the raiders, Speaker saw the two junks that had been turned to block the channels. It looked like river pirates, and they flew no banner – a common feature of pirates who wanted to be able to ply their grim trade one place and then sell their loot somewhere else without being recognized. Then the wind changed direction and Speaker was struck with a thick wall of the most putrid stench, indeed the smell was as foul as back in the… oh dear… underworld.

Ceasing with his leaping around, and instead just using his perfect balancing charm to gracefully stride over the canopy leaves all quiet-like, Speaker got close enough to recognize the shambling gait of the perimeter patrols at the blockade: Zombies.

Was this a pre-emptive strike from the deathlords? It was difficult to tell, and where was Sully?

“I’m beside you” Sullen Hoof quietly noted, spooking Speaker quite thoroughly.

It turned out that the night caste Solar didn’t have much to report beyond what he had initially relayed back to Sunhill: “I think whoever is in charge of this is staying below deck, either that or they have ghost messengers that I can’t see – what are you picking up with essence sight?”

Looking around in essence sight didn’t reveal much that Sullen Hoof hadn’t already observed, though Speaker did spot a few ghost sentries up in the rigging of the two junks – they appeared chained to the rigging with ghostly chains.

It was then one of the two junks exploded, and zombies spilled out of the broken hull like a ripe tomato filled with writing maggots breaking open – but on top of that growing and flailing pile of zombies stood a familiar form: The Bodhisattva!

Wielding a dread blade of soulsteel that howled with mad glee as it was swung, the Bodhisattva dispatched zombies by the hundreds – it seemed roughly as challenging as stomping ants. 

Moments later, from the remaining junk, emerged what Sullen Hoof was certain was a deathknight he had fought with back in Stygia: “That’s the Scarlet Puppeteer, she’s a master of necromancy – that explains all the zombies… look, they’re still spilling out of the other junk. Just how many were in there?”

The fight between the Bodhisattva and the Scarlet Puppeteer was brief – without being able to really use her zombie minions to her advantage the Bodhisattva was quickly able to reduce his foe into a bleeding heap screamineg for mercy…

“Hold it! Don’t kill her just yet!” Sullen Hoof shouted, leaping from his and Speaker’s hiding spot in the chanel-side tree canopy down onto the deck of the blood-smeared junk.

Amidst zombies that simply stood mindlessly and tended what basic duties they had been instructed to do in advance, with Speaker in close pursuit, Sullen Hoof welcomed the Bodhisattva and politely requested that the Scarlet Puppeteer be spared… for now…

“I would like some information from her before you kill – perhaps in exchange for a merciful death?” Sullen Hoof quickly but eloquently requested.

The Scarlet Puppeteer, her pasty white coat and skin spattered in her own blood, was held tightly in the Bodhisattva’s writhing tentacle-like ghost-flesh limbs – but at the sight of Solars approaching she howled and screetched: “It’s true! You’ve been consorting with Solars! Just wait until I tell the others!”

With a quite grotesque snakelike ghost-limb wiggling into her mouth to silence the Scarlet Puppeteer, the Bodhisattva gave Sullen Hoof a somewhat aggravated look: “Well met – but do you honestly think she will tell you anything?”

“We just want to know exactly why she was sent after us. The amount of zombies here, this isn’t a raiding force – this is an invasion force. What Deathlord put her up to this?” Sullen Hoof explained, Speaker nodding as he too would like to know if more threats would rise against Sunhill within the foreseeable future.

Between Speaker’s lie detection charm, the Bodhisattva’s tight grip and Sullen Hoof’s powers of investigative clarity, the three quickly learned from the Scarlet Puppeteer that she had been sent by the Deathlord known as the Black Psychopomp. Sully recognized this title as belonging to the Deathlord he knew as the Walker in Darkness.

“If the Walker is coordinating attacks with the Barbate Arbiter, then that puts at least three Deathlords against us for Deep Rot” Speaker noted, wishing that he knew more about the exact number and types of troops available to each of the three dread ghosts.

The Bodhisattva bid Speaker take hearth: “Fear not. I came here because I finished my business in Stygia. We need to move quickly and seek Cash, for I need help to travel swiftly all over Creation. I need to restore my severed link to the essence flows of Creation”
> Chapter 99: Around Creation In much less than 80 days
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Returning to Sunhill after setting the two junks and all the junks on board on fire – something that required an inordinate amount of oil, tar and the help of a surprisingly helpful fire elemental – Speaker, Sullen Hoof and the Bodhisattva discussed what to do with their prisoner.

They knew well enough that if they simply killed the Scarlet Puppeteer, the deathknight sent by the Walker in Darkness to attack and destroy Sunhill, then the Deathlords would know what had happened upon the interrogation of the Scarlet Puppeteer’s ghost.

There was also the issue of how to keep a deathknight captive – since Sunhill barely even had facilities keep mortal ponies captive: The judiciary system that Cash had set up relied less on prisons and more on talking things out, finding the root cause of a dispute or crime and then using potent social charms and magical oaths to ensure that one wouldn’t commit such a crime again.

Sullen Hoof had a partial solution, though afterwards Speaker wasn’t entirely sure if he liked it: Using his orichalcum helmet on the Scarlet Puppeteer, Sullen Hoof was somehow able to ‘remove’ the deathknight’s identity of self… indeed, upon taking the helmet off her, after she stopped flailing about and screaming, having simply gone limp, the abyssal’s head simply had no face…. Just a sheer flat surface.
“How will she eat?” Speaker felt it necessary to ask.

Shrugging, Sullen Hoof noted that how he had gotten it explained then one who’s face had been taken didn’t need to eat… on the plus side it allowed the magic mask to disguise Sully very thoroughly as the one who’s face had been taken.

“Disguising yourself as a Deathknight – yes, that will be useful” the Bodhisattva noted.

Without her face, the Scarlet Puppeteer had become quite docile. Speaker theorized that it was the sensory deprivation – or perhaps the mask took more than just the face, perhaps it was part of her will and personality as well? As much as he wouldn’t mind investigating this curious phenomena, or how he didn’t like mistreating prisoners, then… well… it’s a deathknight – he could live with that.

At this point it became a question of waiting for Cash and Shimmer to return. Speaker found it annoying that he hadn’t quite learned the messenger spell from Shimmer yet – learning sorcery was just so much more difficult than puzzling out charms.

During dinner, the three talked about what the Bodhisattva needed help with now:

“So, you said you needed Cash’s help – I take it for traveling purposes?” Speaker inquired, while relishing in the lush odors wafting up from the nut-flour bread stuffed with forest herbs and some kind of ludicruisly succulent fowl.

The Bodhisattva, not really eating anything – for his stomach and intestines had been removed along with the rest of his insides when he had been under the influence of the cursed daiklaive, so now the entropy of creation somehow fueled him – nodded: “That and from now I need to stay on the move. I renounced my fealty to the neverborn and the Deathlords quite publicly at the mouth of oblivion – up until that point I had never publicly moved against the Deathlords or the neverborn. I had always been able to infer that I was working to aid the neverborn outside of Deathlord control, but this… this was too much”

“But you are still working to end the suffering of the neverborn?” Speaker wondered.

Nodding, the Bodhisattva sighed heavily: “Oh that is still part of the plan. I have search the deep wyld extensively, parlayed and fought with countless changelings. Through this I found war manses with various primordial-killing weapons – but most of these require solar essence and deliberative activation codes”

“You do know that we probably wouldn’t mind helping with that” Sullen Hoof noted, relishing in his culinary creation from within his mask.
Shaking his head, The Bodhisattva straigned to force a look that didn’t seem to quite cooperate with his ghost-flesh body: “You have work here, with Sunhill, with Creation – what I work towards relates to the underworld, towards ending it… you can’t afford to leave Creation for the time it would take me to wrest control of the changeling occupied war manses I’ve discovered”

“Fair enough… but remember: You have friends and allies here” Speaker reminded the Bodhisattva with a kind smile.

Gazing at one of his fore-hooves, spectral maggots diving in and out of his ghost-flesh, the Bodhisattva remained pensive for a moment: “Thank you – but know that our time of peace is short here. The Scarlet Puppetter was no doubt sent because my enemies knew that I would be coming for your help. I am now officially hunted by all of the Deathlords – and once they realize that the Puppeteer isn’t sending in status reports, then more will come”

“So that’s why you want Cash’s help? To get around to wherever you need to go next as part of your quest?” Sullen Hoof reiterated. The Bodhisattva nodded, adding that he would tell them were he wished to be taken once Cash returned.

It took two days before Cash and Shimmer returned, flying in on Shimmer’s warform. In that time Speaker inspected the brand new paper mill that a group of entrepreneurial citizens had set up, using water wheels set in the canals to slowly operate large hammers that pounded wood chips into fine wooden pulp. That they had made such a fine production facility all on their own, without Speaker or Cash’s input at all, made Speaker quite proud.

The paper-makers in turn took great pride in their commendation, but Cash and Shimmer returned to Sunhill before Speaker had time to look into what other nifty things the ponies of Sunhill had set up.

While Nah was loaded with food and supplies the Bodhisattva explained the next two steps were – logistically – closely linked: “To transgress against Creation, against its lords in Yu-Shan, is to bring yourself out of balance. To be in tune with Creation was to be in tune with its elements. Thus, to redeem myself, after gaining permission to do from Celestia herself, and officially denouncing that which corrupted me, I must journey to all five elemental poles and realign my essence with that of Creation” 

“Well that sounds like fun – I’m sure the realm will just let us zip up to Meru…” Cash noted glumly.

The Bodhisattva gestured for Cash and the others to withhold their commentary – for he was not done yet: “After that I will to mend my body. I was tricked into giving most of it up to the Neverborn, and from my research there is only one power left that can be said to be greater than them – I need to find Gaia and get her to restore my body – this must be done immediately after I realign my essence with Creation, for I will be weakened greatly by it”

Shimmer perked up at this, while the rest of the circle looked rather perplexed as to how one might get an audience with a primordial…

“So you want to go to the moon?” Shimmer inquired, looking very much as if she knew exactly what the Bodhisattva was talking about.

The rest of the circle looked even more confused at this point.

Shimmer explained: “It’s well known among Lunars that Gaia and Luna were lovers. Some even speculate that it was Luna who seduced Gaia into fighting on our side during the primordial war. Now, the thing is that Gaia left Creation a while ago… poking around the wyld”

Learning that Gaia had straight up left creation caused the Bodhisattva to visibly wilt, his ghost-flesh briefly getting crusty and stiff, flaking off...

“…now hold on – Gaia isn’t all gone, and she returns to Creation every now and then. Her jouten lives on the moon. We can go talk to her” Shimmer hastily added,  the Bodhisattva breathing a raspy sigh of relief.

“Thank you – I have come too far to just run into a dead-end… my life and soul would be forfeit in so many different ways” The deathknight lamented.

Taking off with great haste, Cash charted a course that would take the circle all the way around Creation with great haste, for they knew well that if they remained away for too long then Sunhill would no doubt suffer. 

First stop would be the easy one: The elemental pole of wood, and thus Nah was pointed due east and made to fly at great haste.

Taking council, the circle agreed that a route that would take them clock-wise around creation, going from the wooden pole to the pole of fire, then water, then air before finally heading to mount Meru for the pole of earth.

“I figure if we pick up pursuers on the Blessed Isle we can flee away from there towards Lookshy” Cash argued.

Shimmer frowned, pointing towards the west on the map Cash had nailed down to the floor of the howdah: “No, we should head west after that – getting to the moon is always easiest when you’re near where the moon sets. If you sail into the reflection of the full moon at midnight then… somehow… you’re supposed to end up on the moon, or so I’ve heard. That’s our best bet – otherwise I guess we could ask Heath Rose”

The circle found this agreeable.

The course that Cash had plotted would take them around most realm holds, ensuring that there would be a minimum of pursuers that might put Nah at risk. In the east this meant nothing, for the realm had little to no power there, and thus two days later the circle was close to the elemental pole of wood, with the trees reaching to the sky so high that it was impossible to tell where their tops were.

For the Bodhisattva a day’s meditation on the nature of wood at the base of one such gargantuan tree was enough, while the rest of the circle struggled to keep the three local tribes of wyld mutant ponies, a few large and frighteningly intelligent predators and a pack of cruel wood elementals at bay.

For Shimmer this resulted in a nice new ebony-tiger form, while Cash ‘bartered’ – or scammed, by Speaker’s definition – two of the three tribes for of a large amount of green jade, the tusks of many a local beast, and exotic hides. Speaker helped by keeping Shimmer patched up, while Sullen Hoof foraged for strange fruits, nuts, beans and vegetables.  The intense levels of wood essence in the air was so much that even the seeds and nuts that Sully gathered kept growing on their own, without water or dirt – and to Shimmer… well… the predators she kept at bay and occasionally slew would often regenerate quite swiftly, making killing them a bit more of a challenge than at first expected.

Moving on, Cash flesh the circle west-south-west. Flying south of Great Forks and crossing just north of Denansdor, as long as Cash could get Nah to pass it, ultimately crossing the summer mountains and entering the dune sea, the endless desert.

Like their journey to Jakatam, the weather grew hot and dry as the days went on. This time however, Shimmer had prepared a few tricks to combat the heat: Using timbers she had stored in her elsewhere-den, Speaker added a nice roof to the howdah, while opening up parts of the crystal windshield to allow for a constant cooling breeze to be circulating around the circle.

When they reached a point where desert sand gave way to rolling hills of glass that would melt during the day and harden during the night, the Bodhisattva declared that they were close enough – indeed, at this point they had gone two days without landing Nah, for the ground was too hot for the beast to touch down, even at night.

Hovering about twenty yards above the surface, the Bodhisattva leapt down.

As he sat down to meditate, the hot glass around him rippled like red-hot soup, his ghost-flesh hissing as it cooked… but it was too numb, too tough, for him to even notice. At least his necrotic essence seemed to ‘deaden’ the molten glass so he didn’t sink in it…

This presented the circle with a problem: Nah clearly needed rest – but there was no place safe to land.

Despairing that anything he could build would no doubt just melt away, Speaker couldn’t see any kind of solution. It was then that Sullen Hoof simply suggested that he keep building: “Just raise a platform on some pillars that you keep ‘growing’ to counter them melting away”

“You know, sometimes focusing on the problem too much means you can’t see the solution… thanks Sully” Speaker said, as he reached out and took his singing staff from elsewhere.

At the end of the day, when the only slightly cooler nightfall came and the Bodhisattva was done, the circle left for the endless oceans of the west.

Crossing the firepeak mountains several days later, the air began to cool and the terrain turned into endless jungle, though that quickly gave way to thousands of miles of plantations and rice paddies fed by a tight network of rivers. From his maps Cash recognized the rivers, revealing that they were flying over the realm satrapi An-Teng.

“Hold on – got to do a little course correction or we might attract trouble” Cash quickly noted, pulling on Nah’s reigns.

Flying south around An-Teng, skirting what Cash said was called the Banyan jungle, the circle reached the great western ocean before nightfall. The endless waters underneath them was a blur of speed as Cash raced Nah much faster than a flying yeddim had any  business going, however without landmarks then navigation would have become an issue, if not for Shimmer’s familiarity with these her native waters.

Guiding the circle directly north-west, Shimmer led the circle towards Wavecrest, though they ultimately only skirted the southern beaches of the large island. The fisherponies down on land, tugging at their nets and working on their boats, barely had time to notice the brown streak of fur and golden essence zip across the sky high above.

Feeling no small amount of unease at coming so close to her old master’s stronghold of sunken Luthe, Shimmer steeled herself and led the circle a few hours further north-west until the Bodhisattva said that they were close enough…

“Uhm, won’t you sink if you jump into the water here?” Shimmer wondered, looking at the soulsteel-armored Deathknight.

The Bodhisattva shrugged: “I do not need to breathe – I can meditate on the bottom”

“We’re close enough to the pole of water for there to be no bottom…. You would sink forever” Shimmer pointed out. Speaker nodded, recalling a few ill-fated attempts to find the bottom of the elemental pole of water in the first age.

The Deathknight glared down at the water with a truly vicious scowl: “If I could be made to float… or be boyant, underwater…”

Speaker pursed his lips as he looked at the Bodhisattva, then at Shimmer, then at the Bodhisattva again… and finally at Shimmer once more – and Shimmer did not like how he was looking, but how could she deny her Solar mate?!

A shapeshifting and surgical removal of a float-bladder from the giant fish-form Shimmer had been in, followed by some quick regenerative healing, with the combination of some string that Sullen Hoof had, resulted in an inflated balloon made of out an air-bladder that was normal in most western fish to help remain boyant, tied to the Bodhisattva. In turn, the Deathknight removed what armor he could, to lighten himself. 

With Shimmer providing backup, the Bodhisattva and his bladder-balloon was lowered down into the water where he sank… but only enough that the large bladder remained on the surface, keeping him from sinking any further.

Nah was landed in the water as well, the large fuzy yeddim remaining boyant quite well on its own – though it did seem to prefer to tip over to everyone’s surprise…

Spending the afternoon on the side of Nah, Cash had a sudden realization: “Hey, Speaker – that float city made of barges that we found you on, the Denzik? Where is that this time of year?”

“That was not something I paid that much attention to… but I think they said they always make sure to be anchored outside the same place come calibration. I think they do that at Wavecrest” Speaker noted.

Cash pulled his big ol’ map from elsewhere. It was a detailed map, and apparently made of some kind of water-resistant paper treated alchemically to stay dry and clean: “Ok, it’s too early for that – but… we found them going south-east. Of course! They spend the winter down south, makes perfect sense. That would mean they’re further north. Perfect! If we can spot them when heading to the pole of air we could do a little business with them – and you could say hi to your friends”

“Might be nice – if the delay is ok with the Bodhisattva” Speaker said.

Flying off that evening, the Bodhisattva found no issue with visiting the circle’s friends on the Denzik, but sadly the circle’s flight path and that of the grand city-ship did not cross as they flew north-east.

Disapointed, Cash made a note to fly by the Denzik next time it crossed the inland sea come descending earth or whenever exactly they head north. 

Several days flight over open waters, dodging storms and any ships that Sullen Hoof spotted flying with realm flags, the circle came to the south-western shores of the north. It was cold, rocky and nothing but wilderness for as far as the eyes could see.

Heading further north-east the circle started to see signs of civilization, though mostly just small encampments and what was probably small tribal villages. Half a day’s flight got them to a point where Cash pointed out: “I don’t need to use my flight charm on Nah anymore… there’s nothing pull us down to the ground”

Speaker concurred, noting that he had activated his chaos-repeling pattern to stabilize reality on the howdah – ensuring that nobody started to float off…

“Very well – the air essence here is strong. I will meditate here – pull be back down by sunset” the Bodhisattva noted, leaping high into the air… and staying there.

Looking around, Sullen Hoof spotted some scattered structures on the ground. They looked broken, but he could make out some old realm sigils on a large sign. Speaker translated them and was able to make out that it was a ‘flight school’ – which made sense to have this close to the pole of air, seeing how easily damn near floated around here.

“Makes falling impossible, right?” Sullen Hoof half-wondered, half-joked. Speaker nodded, noting that the biggest issue was usually getting ponies down again.

“That would explain the frozen unicorn corpse I can see floating around up above us” Sullen Hoof said in a somewhat more grim tone.

The discovery of the frozen unicorn prompted the circle to try to get the poor thing down while the Bodhisattva floated about, meditating on the deeper nature of air and its significance as an elemental aspect of Creation.

Getting the frozen body down was… difficult – Shimmer found that while it was very easy to ascend in her winged beastpony form, then flying downwards proved a struggle. Ultimately she was able to throw one of her essence strings down to Cash, who tied it to Nah and then 
dropped his ‘whatever beast I’m riding can now fly’ charm, causing Nah to very slowly drift down and thus pull Shimmer down as well… but that also turned out to be a really bad idea: “Cash, we need to fly up! Changelings on the ground!” Sullen Hoof cried out, having spotted the creatures peeking out of the ruins on the ground.

A hail of razor ice from the ground followed, prompting Cash to make Nah fly upwards. Once out of range they closed with Shimmer.

The frozen body of the unicorn was positively ancient: It was equally mummified and frozen, for the winds around it had drawn every drop of moisture out of the corpse over the century – it also bore the marks of the shogunate fifth legion, meaning that it had been floating around up there for more than seven hundred years.

Aside from the frost-worn uniform and a few personal items that Shimmer tucked aside for when they were to bury the poor thing, then the real attention-grabber was the device which Speaker insisted was how the unicorn had gotten itself stuck up in the sky to begin with.

“Alright, up where frosty was floating you simply do not fall down – at our current altitude we do, albeit slowly… and these…” Speaker presented the ornate gilded shoulder-harness thingy he had removed from the ponycicle.

The harness fit snuggle over Speaker’s head and onto his shoulders, and allowed him to atune to them remarkably quickly, which in turn made magical straps connect themselves around his forelegs. Shimmer found the hoof-sized rubies set under golden pinions on either side of the thing, just behind Speaker’s shoulders, might more interesting, though as Speaker committed essence to the them they lit up:

“Watch this” Speaker said, as the rubies began to blaze and emit a golden spray of essence that coalesced into wings: “You can fly with these things!”

Flapping his wings a few times, Speaker ascended upwards – though he was careful to avoid getting too high up, as he did plan on going down again. It was during this that he saw the giant serrated ice spike fly by Nah – apparently they weren’t entirely out of range!

Diving down to aid his friends, Speaker found himself joined by Shimmer as they together dove towards the ground – weapons and claws ready to strike.

The changelings appeared wrought of clear ice crystals that orbited each other like sentient clouds of ice and snow.  Shimmer just plowed into them, clawing, slashing and throwing them about with a hate-fueled wild abandon, while Speaker remained aloft, tossing Gift down at carefully aimed at targets to reasonably great effect.

It didn’t take long to scatter the icy changelings – but as Shimmer quickly pointed out, then these things had merely been the figments of some other greater changeling’s imagination, for they had been pathetically weak: “Scouts, outriders – these things were eyes and ears, not teeth or fangs”

Finding Shimmer’s analysis agreeable, Speaker suggested that they get back up to the others before the real changeling lord of the region arrived.

Up at Cash the two were informed that the Bodhisattva was signaling that he would like to be picked up. A bit of Shimmer’s essence string and Nah flying south where reality let things fall from the sky later and the deathknight was back on the howdah.

“Ok, when we enter realm airspace we should expect to be detected almost immideatly. Our only hope is that they won’t have any skyships around to give chase” Cash said as he briefed the circle, having traced the route he was planning on his map with a glowing line of essence.

Sullen Hoof scoffed: “Bah – as if they have anything that could catch up to us. I’ve seen how fast those sky-ships can go – and Lookshy has more of them than the realm”

“You’re missing a rather crucial element. The realm doesn’t need to catch us – it needs to intercept us. If its spies or lookouts spot us and managed to send a message in ahead of us we could meet a wall of essence artillery… “ Shimmer noted.

“We don’t want either of those things to happen, I get that – which is we’ll be passing over the blessed isle under the cover of darkness” Cash noted, sounding confident in his plan to avoid the realm’s lookouts via cover of night.

With this plan in mind the circle made camp on the shores of the inner sea, at the southern base of the Dehennan mountains. There was little in the form of civilization in the area, making for another night of camping under the open sky with Speaker tinkering with their newfound shoulder-mounted wing-projectors.

According to Cash’s maps, which he revealed had come in part from a few gods of cartography in Great Forks – meaning that they were accurate far beyond what was necessary – then the distance from where they were to the shores of the blessed isle was somewhere around six or seven hundred miles: “We’ll reach the isle near Chanos, then it should be another three hundred to reach Meru, and gods knows how long to fly up along it before the Bodhisattva feels out a spot suitable for his meditation”

“…and what if we’re pursued? The realm’s sky-ship fleet is stationed at Chanous! They could catch up to us during our wait” Speaker worried.
Cash once more dismissed Speaker’s worries: “Again, we’ll be leaving soon so it’ll be nightfall when we reach the isle – they won’t spot us”
“They won’t spot a giant yeddim glowing with golden essence, which leaves a trail over a mile long, at the dead of night?” Speaker pointed out.

Nodding to signal that he acknowledged Speaker’s worry as legit, Cash smiled: “That’s just for show… Nah doesn’t normally do that when I use my charms – though I do plan on doing that when we leave for the west”

It was with no small sense of trepidation that the circle packed up camp and left for the blessed isle.

Approaching it the weather became noticeably milder. The feeling of earth essence was strong, and its stabilizing influence was undeniable. Even the waves on the inner sea closer to the isle were milder than the breeze above them would normally have.

It was about a few hours before midnight when Nah sped across the northern shoreline of the blessed isle, not terribly far from the Chanos Prefecture.

Not wanting to give the legion stationed at Chanos any excuse to spot them too easily, Cash guided Nah in low over the shoreline and quickly found this to be a terrible idea: The Chanos prefecture was a hilly and mountainous prefecture, and so was the lands bordering it. On the plus side, then flying low through the valleys that these terrain features produced gave the circle good cover against anyone watching the skies at night. This didn’t help much when a realm sky-ship, a small light skyreme, roared overhead… they clearly hadn’t seen the circle, but they had flown so close by Nah that the yeddim got frightened… and it’s deep rumbling groan of fear was very easy to hear.

It took the skyreme, with its blue-jade keep glowing brightly, about a minute or so to turn about and come around to try to spot the source of the noise.  The circle didn’t wait around, but Sullen Hoof – with his sensory enhancement charms – could tell, even as the circle flew away from the location, that the unicorns on the skyreme were looking around the sky with devices similar to the essence lenses he had seen in Lookshy.

There was a tense silence as the circle continued south for the rest of the night. By dawn they reached the northern slopes of Meru, to which Speaker wept: Where once sacred Meru, the resplendent city of gold and ivory that had housed the gods before the primordial wars, then later the Solars during the first age, which had wrapped all the way round the peak of the enormous mountain, there was nothing – at least from the north face.

It was plainly evident from the overgrown debris that stuck out of the ground along the many rivers that sprung from the mountain, that the entire north face of the mountain and its portion of the ancient city had simply collapse and fallen down the mountainside. Such artifice wasted so cruelly was more than Speaker could bear.

Since their exit-plan involved heading west out of the blessed isle Cash turned Nah right, so they would scale the western slopes of the mountain. This made all the more sense since the eastern slopes were, according to Cash’s magical map, dotted with pilgrimage trails and temples for immaculate faithful, making staying out of sight impossible.

The base of the imperial mountain was replete in dense forests only parted when a river that ran from the mountain carved a wiggly line through it. This gave good cover for Nah and even allowed the circle to land in a small clearing for breakfast and to wash up: One had to look just a tad presentable when nearing the heart of the first age.

Taking flight up the western slopes, Cash noted that it would take most of the day to reach the summit as the Bodhisattva had requested. Apparently, according to the deathknight, there was a powerful demense at the very peak known as a sublime site for meditation: “The seat of Passiap – though it is also guarded by unicorns and earth elementals… but that shouldn’t be an issue we can’t handle”

> Chapter 100: To The Heavy-side Lair
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ascending up the slopes of the imperial mountain, of what in the first age had been known simply as the omphalos of Creation, sacred Meru, was not a quick process.

Dodging mountain-side earth aspected demesnes of immense crushing power, so mighty that not even the brightest minds of the first age had found means to cap them and tap their near infinite powers, was not easy: Speaker and Shimmer tried to spot them, but being so close to the elemental pole of earth made it very difficult. More than once Cash struggled to pull Nah out of a gravity vortex created by such a demesne – anything not tied down was sucked into these vortexes.

Still, the trip up the mountainside was a lot calmer than had been expected: At first, crossing a large water aspected demesne from which a large waterfall poured, the circle was accosted by a group of water elementals.

Luckily, before any alarms were raised, Sullen Hoof leapt into the midst of the water elementals and stood among them on the face of the waters just before they poured down the side of the mountain: “How dare you interrupt us – I will have you all reassigned to the pole of fire!”

The elementals recoiled, for they sensed neither Solar nor pony in the being before them: With his charms of disguise Sullen Hoof had veiled his essence to appear as that of a Sidereal and made his mask take on the rainbow hues of starmetal.

Jumping back onto Nah without saying a word, merely gesturing for Cash to continue the ascent, the circle found that no other elemental force on the mountain tried to interrupt them for the rest of the trip.

“Nice one – but don’t you think the sidereals will be pissed if they catch impersonating an agent of heaven?” Shimmer wondered, not wanting to call down any more wrath on the circle than was necessary.

Sullen Hoof shrugged as he terminated the veils put on his mask and essence, now that they were out of sight of the elementals: “Mandate of heaven – we can have our essence appear as anything we want here. Now, posing as a sidereal up in Yu-Shan… that would be trouble”

Spending the rest of the day moving up and acclimating to the increasingly thinner air, the circle suddenly found itself choking on poisoned essence as it had passed into a layer of clouds… and the source of the poison was all too clear as they quickly flew out of the cloud: They had entered into the western ruins of the ancient city of Meru, although this time Speaker didn’t weep… but Shimmer did sense that everyone around her grew quietly more enraged every second they beheld the ruins of the once glorious Solar capital of Creation.

Sniffing out a safe route of the ruins that wasn’t filled with an invisible miasma of poisonous essence wasn’t easy, for it stung and burned in Shimmer’s nose – and even Speaker with his medical charm found it difficult to counter the damage it was doing to her sense of smell on the fly. Even more worrying was the health of Nah, which only through Speaker’s constant infusions of clean essence and use medical charms was able to remain conscious – Cash’s flying mount charms didn’t work on unconscious or dead mounts… that was for Abyssal riding charms, and the Bodhisattva did not know of such. 

Leaving the tarnished ruins, their once gleaming towers of glass, adamant, alabaster and orichalcum lost to millennia of dirt, essence decay and whatever other foul sorcery the sidereals had used to kill the Solars…

“Wait, you mean all the destruction back there is linked to the Usurpation? I just thought the destruction was from unicorns and sidereals trying to destroy the place afterwards… how do you know they’re linked?” Sullen Hoof wondered.

Speaker shrugged and turned his gaze to the dull floorboards of the howdah: “We passed by a crater where a bunch of broken columns stood, right? That was where the great banquet hall of heaven and earth used to be… that’s where we were all invited, where the usurpation itself was kicked off”

“That would explain all the snarled essence and fate strings I saw… I mean, they were so taught and frayed that I could spot them just with essence sight – reality is just broken there” Shimmer chimed in.

Ascending further up the mountainside from the ruins of Meru turned out to be very quick: Despite the altitude the air was as if they were at the surface. Cash recalled the ancient oaths that air elementals in the area had been put under, ensuring that from Meru and to the peak the air was nice and breathable.

This made the last leg of the journey a very short one, to which end the Bodhisattva roused himself and warned the circle: “Up on the peak, at the seat of Pasiap only unicorns are allowed – and from what I have been told then it is guarded well”
“But not by anyone connected to the wyld hunt, right? Just ordinary unicorn monks and whatnot - not anyone trained for fighting Solars and Lunars?” Speaker inquired, hoping that they wouldn’t have to be there too long.

The Bodhisattva rocked his head back and forth, looking somewhat uncertain: “Yes and no – I was told that its helmed by the kind of unicorns who would master their respective elemental dragon style purely for the meditative insights they give – but I have a plan to avoid too much fighting”

The daethknight’s plan was surprisingly simple: The circle was to drop the Bodhisattva off out of sight and let him approach the demesne on his own. By using an aspect of ghostflesh form he rarely bothered to employ, the Bodhisattva would manifest a horn and try to pass for some kind of unicorn who had been caught in the underworld and subsequently corrupted by it… and that he was seeking to reconnect to the elements to cleanse himself.

“So… basically tell them the truth, only you’re not really a unicorn?” Cash noted, finding the simple plan quite elegant.
Extruding a ‘horn’ of sorts from his ghostflesh head, it having the same semi-transparent properties as the rest of him, the Bodhisattva disagreed: “No, for now I am a unicorn”

Cloaking the Bodhisattva in hardy sail-cloth from Shimmer’s elsewhere den, the circle set the deathknight down out of sight from the demense. It was only a short walk there – there were no patrols or anything around the place… it didn’t appear as if it was made with flying intruders in mind.

Between Shimmer and Sully’s sensory enhancement charms allowing them to relay what was happening up at the peak, Cash and Speaker found that they were able to also witness the exchange – even if by proxy:

Approaching the shrine built next to the demesne, the Bodhisattva was stopped by unicorn monks outside who at first simply seemed surprised to see a pony approaching from somewhere other than the proper trail leading up the eastern side of the mountain. It was when the Bodhisattva came closer and his ghostflesh nature became impossible to hide that things got heated – but even then the deathknight was allowed to plead his case to the abbot in charge of the shrine: 

“Gracious Abbott Weathered Granite, I have come to humble ask you for permission to meditate on the seat of Passiap”
Apparently the abbot wasn’t much for formalities, though Sullen Hoof noted that the unicorn had a very mumbly and gravely voice – either way the abbott demanded that the Bodhisattva be honest.

While the deathknight explained his plight, spinning a deceptively honest yarn about having been misled into darkness, corrupted, his mind addled and his body mutilated beyond all recognition – and him now seeking to reconnect to Creation and redeem his soul, the circle got a visit… of a sort.

Listening intently, or waiting with rapt attention for Sully or Shimmer to relay the conversation they were listening in on, none of the heavenly exalts noticed the stranger in their midst.

“Ahem” the pony said, clearing his throat in an unmistakably haughty tone.

Everyone spun around on the howdah to see who or what it was – that it was a pony stallion in monk garbs really didn’t surprise them, though Shimmer needed but one sniff in the pony’s direction to note: “Sidereal”

“And you’re a Lunar” the stallion replied, nodding to Shimmer – looking none too impressed.

Sullen Hoof remained either oblivious, or at least remained focused on listening in on the abbot and his mystery supplicant, while Cash moved to assume a martial stance – but Shimmer put a hoof up in front of him: “No, he knows well enough not to fight us – it would blow his cover, not just ours”

The Sidereal looked less than pleased but nodded: “True. Now please tell me why I just got a report of another sidereal coming up the 
mountain…”

“How about we don’t – and in return we won’t tell anyone that you let a bunch of Solars sneak around here under your watch?” Cash retorted.
The Sidereal’s face flashed through a quick series of expressions, going from annoyance, to bemusement, to shock, before settling on abject horror: “Solars… plural?”

“Caste marks” Cash quipped. Everyone else – sans Sully – flashed their caste marks. The poor Sidereal looked like he was ready to wet himself.
Strutting forward and gently caressing the quivering stallion, Cash briefly nuzzled the monk-lookalike: “So… what’s it gonna be? A firesite chat, a little cuddle under the stars?”

Speaker threw a quick glance over at Shimmer who looked to be holding back a great deal of laughter.

Seventeen seconds later Cash and the Sidereal were down behind Nah doing all kinds of surprisingly not noisy things – and about fifteen minutes later again the Bodhisattva returned, draped in a monk’s garb. An immediately obvious change about him was that his ghost-flesh had become noticeably more opaque… but his gait had also become heavier, slower, appearing tired

“You ok? You look… different” Speaker asked, helping the deathknight up on Nah.

The Bodhisattva’s breath was labored, but he explained that his condition was on account of the revelation he had experienced at the climax of his meditation: “I saw two possible outcomes of my quest: Die a hero now and reincarnate a Solar, or seek a third breath using a golden lure”

“A golden lure… how fitting – alright, Cash, you ready back there?” Speaker called.

Cash, looking splendid and divinely fashionable as always in his heavenly silks – indeed Speaker suspected Cash of having struck a deal with the god of haut couture at some point, perhaps in a past life, to always look good – quickly bounded up to the howdah.

As Nah began to ‘walk’ up into the air, it left behind in its shadows a thoroughly messy pony on the ground… his monk’s robes bunched up to his shoulders, his hind quarters caked in dust and bodily fluids, his face smeared even more so, though the most noticeable thing about the poor soul was that he was splayed out unconsciously on the ground in a puddle of what was likely his own and Cash’s emissions – and he had the biggest smile ever on his face.

“Had fun?” Shimmer asked, chuckling ever so slightly.

Smiling, Cash shook his head in a pleased fashion: “The poor thing had been living in celibacy here for months… so pent up – he’ll have fun explaining that to the bronze faction”

“What about you Bhody?” Cash quickly asked, accompanied by a respectful nod. 

While the Bodhisattva filled the circle in on how his story had moved the abbot to tears – a feat he had accomplished mainly due to the good intelligence he had received regarding the seat of Passiap and its administration. Evidently the Bodhisattva had been informed by the ghost of a unicorn that had served as monk there, along with a number of other denizens of Stygia which had described to the deathknight the sensation of being near the various elemental poles. It had been this wisdom which had allowed the Bodhisattva to judge if he was close enough to a pole for proper meditation.

“Neat, so now you’ve covered all five and we’re heading west for… what was it, the reflection of the moon on the sea? Is that the last part of your quest?” Cash wondered, as he flew Nah very quickly down the enormous mountain.

Passing through the poisonous ruins of old Meru in less than a second, the Bodhisattva acknowledged Cash’s statement: “Indeed, the ghost of a Lunar hinted that a path to the moon could be found in the west… the alternative is much worse”

Nobody dared ask what this worse alternative was, but Cash and Shimmer kept the Bodhisattva in polite conversation for a good while, all the 
while Sullen Hoof scouted the evening horizon for any sign of skyships or other forms of airborne pursuit.

“Exactly how many ghosts did you talk about this in Stygia? Your quest here can’t exactly be that secret if you quizzed everyone down there about where you’ve been by now” Shimmer wondered, putting forth a quizzical hoof.

With a tired smirk, like a grandfather being asked the same question for the third time by a pertinent but lovable granddaughter, the deathknight looked to the heavens and pretended to breathe deeply: “Those I asked were not left with the memory of my inquiry… or I destroyed them – either way I ensured that my trail was clean. A lot of deathlord spies and informants already tracked me before I started this, so I made sure I was not tracked successfully”

“You weren’t” Speaker interrupted, his eyes closed and a firm hoof clenched around the bright glowing red and golden gemstone that was the sunhill hearthstone, its sharp facets and its warm light signaling resolve and dedication.

Shimmer instantly picked up the unease and dread in Speaker’s voice. Cash did as well, but he was busy controlling Nah as the flying yeddim roared down the mountainside at speeds that would make air elementals billow with envy.

Before Shimmer could ask, Speaker simply said: “There are deathknights at Sunhilll – they’re demanding we give them the Bodhisattva or they start killing ponies” as he sensed what was happening in and around the Sunhill manse, thanks to the powers of the Sunhill heartstone.

“I’m here… not there, and I don’t intend to be given to anyone – hostages or not” the Bodhisattva groaned, his ghost-flesh rippling aggressively.

The predicament was the simple but profound fact that upon completion of his meditation at Passiap’s seat the deathknight’s essence had been severed from the underworld – he no longer respired its dark essence, but he did not yet respire the essence of the living either… and his ghostflesh limbs still required a constant feed of essence to remain corporeal: Basically he would be running out of essence over the next few weeks, and without that to keep his head in existence he would die.

“I know – but they’re threatening to butcher all of Sunhill, to paint it in blood and entrails just to spite us… if we don’t cooperate” Speaker relayed, looking none too keen on observing such vile acts through the remote sight that the sunhill hearthstone gave him.
Grabbing Speaker by the shoulders and looking him straight in the eyes, Shimmer commanded: “Tell them to meet us on the moon!”

Shimmer’s logic was that if the deathknights wanted a shot at the bodhisattva, then they would have to work for it a bit themselves… also, there might just be a few things on the moon ideally suited to kicking the ever-loving shit out of unwanted guests.

“And we’re not unwanted, right?” Cash quipped jokingly.

Racing west at great speed, even if it meant zooming over the western half of the Blessed Isle like a golden comet blazing across the sky, shining so brightly that one might momentarily think there were two suns out.

To the circle’s surprise, then there were wasn’t much in military presence on the western end of the Blessed Isle – even the farming communities seemed more spread out. Sure, the land was still very pretty and far more fertile than the rest of Creation, but beyond that it was remarkably dull and uneventful territory to fly over.

Things got a bit more dicey when the circle crossed into the western ocean: The realm might not have had any skyships in the circle’s flight path that could intercept, but they did have plenty of naval facilities… and thus Cash quickly found that he had to soar high into the sky to avoid archers, horn-flung bolts of elemental essence and the odd ballista firing at them.

At greater heights it was only a few kinds of essence artillery that could reach them – though that didn’t really make things any safer, as implosion bow shots detonated in the air around them, sucking in air and everything else not nailed down into crushing vortexes of doom, or lighting ballista charges going off like burning cracks in reality, colored by whatever flavor of elemental essence was fueling each lightning ballista.

Still, the ships couldn’t in any way keep up with Nah – not even the few first age gunships they had could match their pace, though Nah got singed more than once.

By night-time everyone kept their eyes peeled: It was cloudy, annoyingly enough – but Shimmer managed to sniff out a few air elementals, and Cash ‘convinced’ them to clearing the sky around them for the rest of the night… they were looking for the reflection of the full moon – only problem was that it wouldn’t be full moon for a couple of days, and the Bodhisattva’s dwindling essence reserves wouldn’t last that long.

Speaker was able to help by lending his own essence to the deathknight, but this had the side effect of burning the Bodhisattva quite severely, as the essence of sunlight seared the ghostflesh until it was dimmed and turned into the deathknight’s own necrotic essence – thus this proved to be a viable but exceedingly uncomfortable way of keep the Bodhisattva alive.

At sundown on their second day of waiting the circle once more sprang into action, and the moment the full moon had risen Shimmer shivered, howled in joy and sprouted a head full of feathers… and directed Cash to fly Nah into the reflection on the moon in the water– not land on the reflection, but fly head-on into it.

Now, as Shimmer had explained things then this was all based on an old story she had been told at a western Lunar moot that her elders had taken her to. Indeed, this legend was why supposedly why every ship in the west, when out on the open sea, took great measures to avoid sailing into the reflection on the moon.

Speaker had his doubts – but they left him just as quickly as the water they splashed into did, as dry and breathable air replaced wetness. Even the sound of ocean waves roiling had faded into deafening silence in an instant.

Opening his eyes was a strange experience. Speaker could not recall having ever been on the moon, even in the first age. High up in the cloudless lunar ‘sky’ there were but grey ashen dust all around, pockmarked through and through by craters of various sizes.

“Hey Shimmer, I think that thing with ships staying away from the reflection… I think you were right on that” Sullen Hoof said, his voice betraying his surprise as he gestured down towards the ground.

Under the circle, down on the surface of the moon, was a small mountain of wrecked ships. The broken hulks looked smashed and twisted, though Shimmer quickly noticed a pattern in how the debris was scattered: “They all look like they fell from… up here”
“What did you expect? We appeared about a mile up in the… moon-sky” Cash noted, looking mostly as if he was pondering whether there was anything worth salvaging down on the surface.

Shimmer mostly looked horrified at the implications: “So many sailors falling to their deaths… if that was in creation it would be a shadowland by now”

The mention of creation reminded Shimmer of something, to which end she quickly noted: “That reminds me – while we’re here, I want all of you to limit your charm use… strictly speaking we’re not in Creation anymore, so the Solar mandate of heaven doesn’t apply here. This is Luna’s territory… and we are but guests”

Getting one’s bearings on the moon was difficult. Aside from the mountain of shipwrecks, then noteworthy landmarks were few and far between. The average surface landscape was one of plateaus of grey dust, flattened by myriads of half-faded craters.
“What caused all the craters? Can’t imagine it being old damage from the primordial war” Speaker wondered, while Shimmer scouted the horizon for… something.

Shaking her head while keeping her eyes peeled, Shimmer replied: “Nah, the moon passes through the wyld during the day remember? There are a lot of things to bump into… and crap, Cash – bank left!” Shimmer blurted out. Cash tugged Nah’s reigns mightily, causing the great beast to groan so that all of the beast rumbled. The yeddim peeled left, just as the ground before them erupted with writhing tentacles wrapped in shifting shadows and rapidly changing rainbow colors. The ground itself also changed, beginning to writhe and heave, as if breathing or chewing. All around them similar madness erupted, forcing Cash to take them high into the air.

Up in the air they saw how huge swaths of the moon’s surface was… well… being smeared in wyld energies and reacting accordingly. This was the function of the moon, so it really shouldn’t have surprised anyone – but that requires that one is a savant steeped in the mystical origins and functions of the moon. Changelings swarmed the place, with forms unlike anything that made any sense at all in Creation, undulating, writhing and looking a tad confused about what was going on.

To the circle it was quite terrifying seeing such a terrying host of changelings appear, though some relief did come as the lunar surface seemed to periodically turn itself inside out, swallowing up wyld zones and the changelings spawning in them, dragging the lot into the lunar underground screaming.

Whatever straggler changelings that didn’t fall into the chasms that had opened beneath them also soon seemed to be huddling together. It didn’t take a military strategist to recognize that they were taking up defensive positions… but against what?

“Ok, guys – whatever it is those changelings are trying to defend against, we want to talk to them – they can guide us to the silver chair” Shimmer exclaimed, sounding eerily enthusiastic about whatever beings she was referring.

Carefully going closer to the surface, the circle suddenly found that there were but dead changelings to be found. Whatever things had been killing the things was quick and had not left behind any trace of their passage – even examining the wounds via a changeling autopsy (something Speaker hadn’t exactly imagined that he would be doing on the trip) only revealed that they been slain with arrows, arrows that had been removed from the scene.

“Well isn’t that cute – Biddy and his buddies going sight-seeing” a haughty voice declared.

From the shadows of a pile of dead changelings stepped, followed by what looked like a good deal over three thousand ‘freshly’ animated mangled corpses that appeared plucked from the mountain of ruined ships. Sailor pony zombies, on the moon. Lovely.

“Just hoof over the traitor and we won’t do anything more than kill you” the same voice declared, this time coming from a mare clad in thick soulsteel armor. Each of the jagged plates writhed with tormented faces pressing themselves out against the surface of the material, and the deathknight wearing the plate appeared just as foreboding: Beautiful and pale, like a corpse painstakingly prepared for burial, with eyes so cold one’s soul might freeze and a long black mane tied up in a yard long braid.

Next to the armored deathknight two other abyssal exalted stepped forth, one covered in wrappings of stitched together hide that was etched in glowing runes to the point that only two sunken eyes were really visible, the other being similar to the Bodhisattva: All ghostflesh limbs and head, with a chest heavenly encased in thick soulsteel plate with a fancy amulet hanging around his neck.

“Anyone you know?” Shimmer calmly asked the Bodhisattva, never taking her eyes off the three deathknights.

The Bodhisattva nodded, gesturing towards the one who had spoken: “The Mare of the Mirthless Smile, one of the Mask of Winter’s more martially inclined. Not familiar with the other two”

“I know them” Sullen Hoof whispered, having already faded from view: “The wrapped one is the Harbinger of Dread Wisdom, necromancer. 
The zombies are his doing. The Bodhisattva-knockoff’s name is Rice Blossom”

The ghost-fleshed Rice Blossom instantly flinched, as if some pain had been inflicted on him. He then angrily roared: “I renounced that old name! I am He who slays All Things Living and Holds No Fear!”

Speaker, Shimmer and Cash all smirked at the mentioned of the deathknight’s full title.

“Ya I figured you would love this” Sully whispered.

Rice Blossom didn’t get the joke – which only infuriated him even more so, though from his restraint it was clear that he was waiting for orders to attack.

Capitalizing on this lull in the moment, Cash stepped forth: “Well then Rice Blossom, you do realize that we were the ones who slew the last bearer of your exaltation?”

The ghost-fleshed deathknight remained outwardly calm at this revelation, but Cash’s charms of detecting subtle social signaling told him otherwise: “Oh, and we weren’t particularly impressed back then either… your masters really need to make a concerted effort if they want to make anything worthy out of you”

The indignant look in the blood-sphere eyes of the ghost-flesh deathknight was priceless, and both Shimmer and Speaker had to put some effort into not laughing. The Mare with the Mirthless Smile… well… she smiled, but it was an eerie and psychotic one, revealing teeth that looked just a little too uniform and pretty to be perfectly natural. The abyssal wrapped in hides groaned: “Just kill them – take the traiter alive”

The zombies lurched forward, breaking into a charge. On their limbs various crude weapons had been strapped, but Shimmer deftly caught the entire first wave in her magical web, swinging them around like a big smelly sack of groaning meat, then using that sack to whack the next two waves of zombies, before swinging the trapped zombies about herself and off into the distance. Three thousand zombies were now a bit under two thousand.

Rice Blossom did something to his hooves, making them project large bone spikes and claws. Crude, ugly, but clearly sharp and deadly, they made for excellent supplements to his punches and bucks… well, if he could land any of them, as Cash’s invincible ego shield made him a most elusive target.

The Mare with the Mirthless Smile approached the Bodhisattva more calmly, retrieving a grand soulsteel daiklaive from elsewhere. The massive six-feet long blade was oddly plain looking, appearing almost like a normal two-hoofed blade, only oversized as only the exalted could wield. Upon swinging it about her, its true nature was revealed: Flailing ghosts trailed after it, reaching, grabbing, faintly shrieking as they were drawn forth from the blade that had cleaved their souls from their mortal coils.

“Careful – she was always a better warrior than I was, loves to see her foes in pain” the Bodhisattva warned, stepping back to keep himself well out of reach – he knew that he didn’t have the essence to fight.

Shimmer quickly shifted into her warform, while Speaker prepared Gift and began to think of how to disarm his foe.

A sudden shriek saw the hide-wrapped abyssal drop, all the remaining zombies dropping to the ground as well. Sullen Hoof stood behind him, with a long green jade kitchen knife dripping with blood floating behind him.

“Wiser warriors would recognize unfavorable odd” Shimmer noted, as she stepped in between the Mare and the Bodhisattva.

The Mare with the Mirthless Smile didn’t answer, merely smiling unnervingly once more, then leaping high above Shimmer – still towards the Bodhisattva – while her floating blade swung for Shimmer, forcing Shimmer to parry the attacks.

It was then, as the Mare reached the peak of her leap, that Gift swung around and struck her from bellow. It harmlessly dinged into her armor – but the force conferred launched the Mare high into air.

Shimmer, wrestling with the blade in her attempt to hold on to it with her massive silvery claws, felt the pull on the blade as the Mare was struck, but managed to keep a tight grib – even if it meant letting the blade draw blood on her end – and to add insult to injury, she could feel the blade leeching her essence away from her.

At first the Mare didn’t seem terribly impressed by this attempt to disarm her. Reaching out with a hoof to the blade, she attempted to call it to her – but Shimmer managed to hold on tight, even as the blade nearly dragged Shimmer up into the air, but with large talons digging into the ground she went nowhere. Then the Mare noticed that she wasn’t really falling down… that was when she stopped smiling and called out: “Slayer! A little help!?” with a strangely plain and ordinary voice. No wonder she liked to stay silent.

Rice Blossom was furious. He was enraged. He was livid. Frothing a bloody foam around his ghost-flesh mouth, his ivory-while fangs gleaming whenever he threw his weight around and the foam was tossed aside to reveal them, as he kept up his futile attempts to strike Cash.

Cash Charmer, having long since recognized the tactical value of tying this one dangerous foe down so the rest of the circle could deal with their foes in peace, had merrily been insulting and taunting his foe using social charms to detect and then rib on everything that Rice Blossom held dear or disliked. There wasn’t the button he hadn’t pushed, to the point that Cash was quite certain that whoever got Rice Blossom’s exaltation next time around would likely exalt with an instant albeit explainable hatred of Cash just the same. Oh sure, his magical shoe-claws couldn’t do much of anything against the abyssal, but that… that didn’t seem to be needed, as Sully, Shimmer and Cash appeared to have things wrapped up on their ends. It was then that the Mare called out.

Looking up to see the Mare floating somewhat helplessly in the air, Rice Blossom shot Cash a quick look that was very much meant to kill – for dark fire blasted out of his eyes but, like everything else, simply missed – before he turned to Shimmer and Speaker.

“We can’t disarm that – and we know how tough the ghost-flesh is. Any ideas?” Speaker said to Shimmer.

Still struggling a bit to keep the Mare’s grand daiklaive in her grasp, Shimmer hastily answered: “No clue, but I’m busy keeping this thing down – you and Sully figure something out”

“Hey Rice Blossom – don’t you think going up against three Solars is a bad idea? How about you just surrender and we help you become a Solar as well?” Sullen Hoof inquired, drawing out a large cast iron pot from elsewhere to throw.
The deathknight sneered at Sullen Hoof, grabbing an amulet of smoky quartz and rusty iron around his neck: “Say my name one more time you sneaky little bitch”

“What? Not afraid that it might break another of your toys back in your fortress?” Sullen Hoof retorted haughtily.
Speaker recalled that the Bodhisattva had mentioned something about deathknights being punished, somehow, if their old mortal name was used when speaking to them – something about the Neverborn punishing them for maintaining that ‘link’ to the world of the living, one of the reasons they all used titles in lieu of names.

“Don’t – he wants you to say it, something about the amulet and reinforcements” Cash quickly pointed out, having sensed the motive behind the deathknight’s statement.

Sullen Hoof nodded, but the deathknight didn’t seem particularly deterred: “Well if you won’t – then I will. Rice Blossom!”
Chains of old iron shot out from the ground, covering the deathknight in almost an instant, followed by lightning coursing through the lot and the abyssal roaring in pain... but the amulet he wore around his neck – the lighting fed into it, and before anyone could do much, the amulet shot a beam of necrotic essence forth, blasting a massive hole in reality right before Rice Blossom. The portal was about big enough to fit forty ponies side by side, and seemed to eat light around it. Even looking at it hurt one’s eyes, for this was not something that should exist.

A rusty trumpet sounded from beyond the portal, followed by the rhythmic sound of marching hooves which only grew louder…

Rice Blossom laughed as the lightning abated, his ghost-flesh seared and burned with marks of white-hot chain links all over him: “How about three Solars against an endless tide of death?”

> Chapter 101: Beseeching the Seeker of the Golden Question
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

“I would very much prefer if you kept that away from the moon” a regal voice stated in a decidedly ancient dialect of old-realm.

The being that had spoken was strange, to say the least: Its head was that of a bird of prey but with large feathered ears, its main body was that of a scorpion thrice the size of a pony with six legs, and its forelimbs were that of a scaly reptile. It wielded a bow of strange bone and polished ivory, all of it covered in runes that gave the illusion of the bow being wrapped in bands of hide and silk... 

Throwing Gift to snag the amulet away from Rice Blossom, Speaker hurled his chakram hard – but to no avail: The deathknight guarded the amulet fiercely and was about to swallow it, when the strange creature shot an arrow into the heavens with such force that the vibrations from its bow  shook everyone.

“You two” the being said, gesturing towards Rice Blossom and the mare: “…are trespassing – and bringing an invasion force here. Close the portal and I can see you on your way back to creation peacefully, or I will dispose of you – your choice”

Rice Blossom snarled at the being, then charged at Shimmer. It was obvious that he was going for the Mare’s grand daiklaive. It was then that the arrow that the being had fired fell down and struck the ground right in front of Rice Blossom.

“You do not want me to dispose of you – it is not a kind fate” the thing stated calmly, albeit with a notably stern tone.

Looking at Shimmer, Speaker gave his Lunar mate a curious look. She shrugged, and once more held on tight to the grand daiklaive – her claws and her hands a bloody mess at this point, though her regeneration charms made sure that her wounds didn’t get any worse than necesary.

Before Rice Blossom could do much else, the strange being had put an arrow through each of Rice Blossom’s ghostflesh hooves, anchoring him quite firmly to the ground with arrows that might as well have been rods of steel. Walking up to Rice Blossom, its six scorpion legs barely even leaving pin-pricks in the fine dust on the lunar surface, the thing snatched the amulet and crushed it with its claws, just as the legion of undead on the other side of the portal was about to cross through. The portal collapsed like a bubble of dark smoke bursting, leaving but a few bits of bone that had managed to reach across to fall to the ground.

Roaring in impotent fury, Rice Blossom strained mightily against the strange arrows that had pierced his flesh and anchored him to the ground – the beast did not care, and with a dismissive gesture from it the ground opened up under the deathknight, the abyssal falling screaming into the black chasm until his voice faded.

“You may put the other one down there too – they will be dealt with down there in a timely manner” the beast bid.

Nodding, then throwing Gift, Speaker had his magical chakram strike the Mare so that she coursed into the chasm… she smiled – but this was a decidedly sad smile, as if she wanted to frown but her face was unable to do anything but smile. It was a rather pitiful sight – and begged the question of whether the Mare with the Mirthless Smile had gained that appearance voluntarily or if had been forced and locked upon her.
Turning to the circle, the beast nodded to Shimmer: “So, what brings a Lunar to the moon? …or Solars and… one of those things… for that matter?”

“Hold on – who and what are you? You seem familiar somehow?” Speaker asked. He had wracked his mind, but he just couldn’t place the thing anywhere.

“I am Granalkin, the archer of the silver pass, former third soul of Mardukt” Granalkin introduced itself, bowing its head gracefully.

Cash and Sullen Hoof both seemed rather confused on how a ‘former’ sub-soul of a primordial could simply have left such a position, but Granalkin didn’t seem in the mood to explain this in detail. Shimmer followed up by noting that Granalkin was in charge of security on the moon: “I had sort of hoped that you’d come sooner, but hey”

“Indeed – now, please state your purpose here”

Explaining that they were on the moon seeking Gaia, or some part of Gaia – to help the Bodhisattva get a new body, Granalkin seemed sympathetic: “Very well – but be warned: If Luna should come while you’re in her palace, then you’re on your own, for she tends to get upset if you get her hopes up and then disappoint her”

Shooting an arrow into the sky and bouncing it off a star, Granalkin somehow made the arrow come down to the moon like a shooting star, trailing blue light across the sky in the direction the circle was to trave: “Follow the light and you will find what you seek”

Thanking Granalkin, the circle mounted up on Nah once more and flew off.

“THERE!” Shimmer burst out excitedly after a while.

Everyone turned to look in the direction Shimmer was pointing. On the horizon was a… pale blue light.

Flying closer revealed it to be a truly magnificent palace of midnight blue ice, polished silver and luminescent crystals. It was beautiful, like a dream – indeed it was very much like the kind of palace that architects across creation might well dream of.

“This is the Silver Chair of Night… oh wow, I’ve always wanted to visit this place” Shimmer said.

Sullen Hoof was less impressed, having seen plenty of the impossible magnificence of Yu-Shan. He was still more curious about this Granalkin thing: “So what exactly does he do around here? Security? What’s to guard against here?”

“Nightmares. The moon draws in wyld energy and turns it into moonlight. Ponies get dreams from that, but also nightmares – Granalkin stalks the caverns down underground, killing the worst nightmares before they leave for creation” Shimmer noted. Speaker nodded, his recollections of the diplomatic effort involved in getting Granalkin to defect from his primordial a vague memory – but it sounded about right: Granalkin had always been about the hunt, having always admired how Luna had brought the night with her for him to stalk in, which was the angle that the Solar and Lunar diplomancers which convinced him to defect and remain neutral in the primordial war had used.

Approaching the palace, Cash suddenly stopped. There were things approaching them, coming from the palace – many things.

As the strange flying creatures neared, Speaker thought for a brief moment that it might be pegasus ponies, for at a distance they seemed to fit the description – but as they got near enough to come into the light that the moon was reflecting off Nah, it became clear that they were something else: Bat-ponies.

Clad in dark purple and blue armor, and displaying features not entirely pony-like, these beings were… well, not really ponies at all. They were too large, their limbs a bit too long, their ears too pointy and what have you. As if made out of dreams of ponies, as dreamt by someone who had only been given a rough description of what a pony was, the bat-ponies spoke in a strange dialect of old-realm, but not the same as Granalkin – no… this was akin to how some changelings spoke.

“Identify yourselves and state your business” the lead bat-pony barked. 

Cash flared his caste-mark and replied: “The purification of a tained solar exaltation. We seek the Creation-mother Gaia. This is official Solar business”

The bat-ponies withdrew momentarily and seemed to argue amongst themselves on what to do. Sullen Hoof noted that he could hear through his hearing-augment charms that they seemed unsure of what protocol was for official Solar business: “…they just can’t remember – it’s been so long since any Solars have come here”

Shimmer sighed, stepping forth and calling for the attention of the bat-ponies: “Hey – just treat them as if they’re visiting Lunars, at least for now”

The bat-ponies appeared to accept this and guided the circle down to the beautiful palace. Landing in a large circular courtyard lined with towering obelisks of mirror-polished obsidian, the circle and the Bodhisatva was led into a large hall decked out of the murals of all twenty-five constellations, as well as murals depicting… other things places – there was a mural that showed the twisted visage of the demon realm Malfeas, another that somehow showed the constantly twisting madness of the wyld complete with constantly changing figures and shapes. A dark one showed a red moon over the underworld, and then there were some displaying places which none in the circle could recognize and much less describe with mortal words.

At the end of the room was a grand throne of silver, blue jade, black jade, and strange materials that had likely been plucked straight from the dreams of ponies and beasts alike. Next to it stood a particularly grand bat-pony, its gaze cold and its grimace stern. It stood a good head higher than the other bat ponies, towering above the circle – even the Bodhisattva.

“Master of ceremonies, they seek Gaia” the circle’s escort’s declared.

The master of ceremonies exhaled slowly through its nose, though even for Cash it was difficult to tell if it was meant as a sigh or some kind of expression of annoyance: “The earth mother is not present. It is six hundred and seventy two years since her grace deigned to visit these halls”

“When was the last time before that?” The Bodhisattva inquired.

The master of ceremonies briefly flashed a look of disgust that the ‘thing’ that was the Bodhisattva could even speak, let alone that it just spoke directly to it: “That would be a bit under two thousand years ago”

Tiny ripples in the Bodhisattva’s ghostflesh signaled his dismay, for his eyes could not weep and his face only inspire dread. Shimmer put a hoof on his shoulder to comfort him.

“Is there a way to summon Gaia?” Cash inquired, expertly veiling his fears that this trip was for naught.

The master of ceremonies calmly explained that if such existed, then the great mistress Luna would be using it every time she came by.
“She’s looking for the golden answer, right? Can’t we just shine some golden light into the wyld from here to lure her in?” Cash suggested, recalling some of what Speaker had said of Gaia at some earlier point, not that he ever really understood what this question was about… though Speaker had seemed unsure of that as well at the time.

The master noted that such séances had been held many times, to no success, in the first age following Gaia’s original departure from Creation.

“Well of course that didn’t work… you can’t just shine a light randomly into the wyld, that’ll go nowhere” the Bodhisattva noted, explaining that he had spoken at length to souls that had died in the wyld, only for their souls to flee to the underworld in an attempt to escape the changelings that didn’t care if their quarry were living or dead.

This seemed to pique the interest of the master of ceremonies, as the Bodhisatva regaled of the time he  had spent exploring the wyld. To find his way back to Creation he had used a trail of necrotic essence motes puddled around glowing wads of gossamer: “All light is brighter when cloaked in darkness – a light out in the open in the wyld just bleeds into the surroundings…”

Even Shimmer found this revelation interesting: “Wouldn’t the changelings object to you leaving behind unchanging things?”
“They did – that’s how I got the gossamer to mark my trail, by taking it from their remains” the Bodhisattva noted.

The master of ceremonies, satisfied with the Bodhisattva’s explanation, seemed to have gotten the idea: “Can this feat be applied at the grand lunarian lighthouse?”

The Bodhisattva remained silent, thinking for a moment: “Is that what makes the moon glow?”

“After a fashion: It is the apparatus that all absorbed wyld energy is channeled through and shined down on Creation as moonlight via – it can be configured to shine its light into the wyld as well, as was done during the previous gold-light séances” the master of ceremonies noted.
Reaching forward and recalling a mighty staff from elsewhere, the master  of ceremonies struck the ground with his moonsilver staff. The ground shook, and the crystal lights that hung throughout the hall, giving it a muted but pleasant ambient light, all rattled: “We go to the lighthouse”

Instantly things began to blur for the circle. Apparently the master of ceremony’s statement was less a declaration of intent, and more a command for some unseen force to move them all.

As things came into focus the circle found itself atop an impossibly high tower that somehow looked over all of the moon, at once, in defiance of all common sense regarding line of sight and spatial geometry.

The grey moonstone structure had a flat top, above which an enormous crystal of adamant, moonsilver, flecks of lapis lazuli and other strange things didn’t just glow… it gave off moonlight so intense that one could feel it physically like a cold wind.

Once more the master of ceremonies struck the ground with his staff, causing the crystal to wobble and flow apart into an apparatus wrought of many lenses and platforms. In the middle was a platform obviously meant for a source of light, big enough for five or so ponies to stand on.
“This is the configuration used for the original séance. How would it need to be changed?” the batpony inquired.

Looking intently at the array of crystals and lenses, the Bodhisattva ho’d and humm’d for a good while, looking at the setup as both a mortal and with essence sight. He then began to give the batpony further instructions on how to realign some of the smaller lenses, where to position mirrors for it all. The alterations weren’t grand, but Speaker could barely keep up with how the essence flows of the array changed with every minute alteration the master of ceremonies effected – this was a device meant to send out dreams, to project hope… fitting that it should be used to send a message of gold and mystery into the wyld.

Suddenly leaping up onto a new platform behind the central platform, the Bodhisattva sat down and bid Cash, Sullen Hoof and Speaker to ascend as well.

Once everyone were in position the master of ceremonies struck his staff once more, causing the entire array to rise high up. The strange geomancy of the moon meant that from their vantage point Speaker and the others could see all across Creation, though from their point of view it looked upside down… and the peak of Mount Meru looked tantalizingly close, almost close enough that one might shout and be heard there.

It was then that the master of ceremonies did something else, which caused the array to aim elsewhere, to point away from Creation, pointing to the wyld.

“Now, flare your animas – in the sequence I instructed!” The Bodhisattva called out, as he flared his own grim anima, staining his platform with bloodspatter and tiny chunks of quickly evaporating gore.

As darkness crept up behind him from the Bodhisattva’s soul made bare, Cash first ignited his anima – its golden fire condensing into a gushing fountain of golden coins, his diplomatic nature giving off a kind and welcome glow. Sullen Hoof followed suit, adding a veritable light of mystery to the mix. Finally Speaker lent his anima like a searchlight, unifying the polite but mysterious light – communicating a riddle of light simply by its glow, a glow made all the brighter by the dark sheath that both followed and surrounded it, keeping the light focused and impossible to miss as it seemed etched in front of a perfectly dark background no matter what angle you looked at it from.

After a moment the lens array had absorbed enough of it all to begin emitting, but just as it was about to begin a terrible shout shot through everyone’s mind: “Who dares interfere with my moon?”

The voice, regal and fierce, was that of none other than Luna herself… and she didn’t look happy.

The master of ceremonies was about to try to explain himself, but Luna ignored him, raising a hoof to strike down this paltry minion who had disappointed her so.

“Hold it – he was acting on your orders” Cash shouted from up in the lens array.

Luna, in all her shades of blue, indigo, purple and starlight, shot Cash a look that would likely have stripped the soul of a mortal bare – yet she did not speak, and stayed her mighty hoof.

“Your MC told us that you’ve instructed your staff to be open to any attempt to call Gaia to creation - that’s exactly what we’re doing” Cash explained.

With the smallest of gesture from Luna, Cash found himself flung through the air and thrown on the ground before the goddess by an unseen force.

Up on the platform, Speaker and Sully could do little but watch as Luna in all her resplendent glory, with her moonsilver regalia and her mane of night sky and starlight, stood ready to smite the uppity pony who had dared to interrupt her.

Floating Cash up with the glow her horn, Luna beheld Speaker intently: “You are the one who spoke to my sister outside the Primal Forge, are you not?”

Cash nodded, struggling to maintain his composure – then Luna suddenly released him: “Good, that will be why I won’t kill you just now for interrupting me. Now explain yourselves”

One brief explanation later, Luna expressed that she found the cause of the circle and the Bodhisattva just – though having the moon suddenly wink out, from the perspective of Creation, had apparently caused a torrent of desperate prayers to be thrown at Luna – which is why she was now at the lighthouse.

“Thank you – but we still need the aid of Gaia. If I complete my quest to purify my essence before I have a body that can live on its own, then I will die as I am cleansed” The Bodhisattva noted.

Nodding, Luna gazed towards the ‘sky’ that was the wyld: “And I hope you succeed – I love little else than to be with Gaia once more, but I fear that this is futile. A call with solar light has been tried before”

Shimmer, having remained silent until now – mainly out of awe of finally meeting the incarnae of her exaltation, cleared her throat and attempted to answer: “Oh Argent Madonna, we know that a golden call has been made before… but this is different”

Luna turned to give Shimmer a predatory smile – like a cat trying to decide whether to play with a wounded mouse some more, or just eat it. 

Gesturing for Shimmer to approach and continue, Luna’s appearance subtly shifted into her full moon aspect – that of the bloody huntress, the goddess of the hunt, though many in Creation knew this form mainly as Nightmare Moon – for it was in this form that she Luna would occasionally be sighted shepherding or hunting (depending who you asked) nightmares around in the sky at night, always during full moons.

Shimmer found this terrifying yet effortless display of power surprisingly… terrifying – yet for those she working to protect; for them she mustered up the courage to speak on: “The Bodhisattva, he has traveled the wyld in ways none of us can – using beacons of light insulated by necrotic essence to mark a path. We’re trying to mimic that here, for he found that a light is all the brighter when it shines in darkness”

As her gaze quickly shifting from that of a bemused predator to one of genuine curiosity, Luna stood upright and respectfully nodded, suddenly wearing a captain’s hat: “A light framed by darkness is indeed all the brighter – my silver chariot uses this very same principle to light up the night and guide ships across Creation. Do continue”

At that moment the lighthouse tower trembled, shaking the lens array apart. Moonsilver lenses of all shapes and sizes came crashing down, shattering on impact or splattering into great piles of liquid moonsilver. A split second later, just as everyone was about to react to the shattering of the lenses, something miraculous happened – something that had not happened since about six hundred years ago: The moon bloomed.

All around them the grey ash-like terrain of the moon, so torn and degenerate from having been exposed to wyld energies over and over until it had lost all form but the simplest of dust, erupted in violent geysers of water and fire. Plants that had not graced Creations since before the primordial war blossomed in colors for which mortal words did not exist. Mountains rose and chasms yawned open, revealing the labyrinth of tunnels in the lunar underground. Life had come to the silver chariot as the herald of something far greater.

“I can’t believe this… is it truly that simple to call her?” Luna idly mused as she gazed longingly at the tidal-wave of elemental fury and majesty before her.

Cash couldn’t stop smiling – he could barely count the number of things he see the circle blessed with as thanks for delivering Luna’s long lost lover to her… hell, being part of the circle that found a ritual that could successfully summon Gaia back to Creation? Now that was a feat that would be remembered.

“We will receive her in the gardens!” Luna commanded, the master of ceremonies quickly banging his staff against the stone floor. Things once more shifted, the circle reappearing in a vast garden complex that reached from horizon to horizon.

A flurry of batponies rushed around the circle, brushing off dust, quickly brushing everyone’s hair – looking at each other confused when it came to preparing the Bodhisattva – all in preparation for the mother of life’s arrival.

The gardens were more like an impossibly vast nature preserve, populated with strange not-quite-ghosts of animals that didn’t exist anymore in Creation, as if they had been remade out of the longing and dreams of hunters, riders, breeders and ranchers that had missed them so. If not for the oncoming presence of a Primordial, then Shimmer would likely have relished in the chance to perform a sacred hunt on some of these.

“Uhm… Cash, do you remember any protocol for how you’re supposed to behave when a primordial is around?” Speaker hesitantly asked Cash, feeling decidedly unsure of the situation.

Cash frowned with furious thought as five ear-splitting dragon-roars sounded, as five truly gigantic elemental dragons flew in from beyond the horizon. Each was the size of a mountain, and together they blocked out the sky completely. One had bright red jade scales, with a maw of obsidian fangs each likely the size of a great north-eastern redwood, with a mane of fire and eyes that glowed like the sun. Another had elegantly etched blue scales like enormous feathers and a white beak, and horns unlike anything anyone had ever seen. Another was black, another white and the fifth green – all imposing as only the greatest of elemental dragons could be, and then some… for these were not mere greater elementals: They were the five prime devas of Gaia, the original and very first elemental dragons, worshiped by the unicorns as the immaculate dragons.

Just as quickly as they had appeared they each faded into brightly colored dust, flittering down to the garden and reappearing as half-draconic pony-form beings. There was no doubt about their supernatural and primordial nature, for like the bat-ponies then their features were just a little too perfect… and each radiated an effortless primal intensity with their mere presence of the sort that ten thousands warrior poets would gladly drain their inkwells dry to describe, only to weep them full them again with their tears that they might write of it once more.

It occurred to Speaker that if but the mere component souls of Gaia continually exuded such a presence, a presence of such grandeur that his only recent experience to match was the glorious swansong and death of his former circle-mate Red through the re-shaping of an entire pocket-reality into the grandest and most epic battle that a young and hopeful Dawn Caste Solar could imagine for but a single moment… then meeting Gaia might well be far more intimidating than he had hoped. What in Creation had he gotten himself into?

Luna nodded respectfully to the five devas, who returned the gesture as if it was the meeting of old friends.

As for the circle, then only the Bodhisattva did not tremble, and Cash benefited greatly from his collar of dawn’s cleansing as it instantly undid the ‘damage’ of him having pissed himself.

Amid the five devas strode a sixth. A mare, beautiful and terrible at once, causing the grass her hooves touched to twist and turn into strands of emerald that then somehow bloomed into beautiful gemstone orchids. Her mane was ginger and glowed like a late setting sun, her coat a shade of cream. Across her form she was draped in a dress that appeared woven on long strands of grass or some other form of coarsely spun plant, but it looked quite alive for it continually blossomed with multicolored petals, only for the blossoms to burst into small colorful puffs of elemental essence.

“Is that… Gaia?” Shimmer poked Speaker and asked.

Shaking his head ever so slightly, unable to take his eyes off the strange mare before them: “No, that’s Gaia’s jouten… her avatar. The five dragons and the rest of her subsouls are as much Gaia as the avatar, multiple souls remember?”

To behold a whole primordial – not one half-destroyed, mangled and imprisoned one, or one dead yet undying – it had an air of sadness to it. To witness something so pure in its primordial expression of the concepts it revolved around. A mortal pony would need words, deeds and attire to display who she was – but a primordial simply… was. This was not a being akin to a force of nature. This was a conglomerate of beings working as one, which had invented the concept of a force of nature. Speaker felt tears in his eyes, yet could not move himself to wipe them away.

“Gaia!” Luna shouted gleefully, leaping forth to embrace the mare.

Even in the first age many exalted scholars debated and pondered the exact nature of the love affair between the primordial who contributed the concepts of the five terrestrial elements and, arguably, the concept of mortal life, to Creation. How it had started was unknown, and how the two truly saw each other… this was not entirely understood either, at least not in any specific form. Still, as Luna embraced Gaia’s jouten it was clear that the two cared for each other.

After a polite if somewhat awkward round of introductions, Gaia contemplated the Bodhisattva’s request: “You would have me make you a new pony form to live in… are you certain that this is what you want?”

“My body was stolen from me, through lies and deceit, as a way to control me and force me to give up my dream of ending the misery of the neverborn. In my current form I cannot harm the neverborn, for a body made by them cannot harm them” The Bodhisattva explained.
The emerald mother nodded: “I can make you a body… but to transfer your soul and black exaltation to it… I don’t think that’s been done before, at least not with an exaltation such as yours”

This didn’t phase the deathknight – and so Gaia asked for flesh, blood and bone be brought before her. How or why Luna had such things stocked was not inquired into, and so each of the five elemental dragons breathed their fire into the rough pile of viscera and blood that Gaia had assembled.

Pasiap breathed his fire first, the essence of earth giving the pile a more solid form. The flesh and blood began to rearrange itself into a more pony-like form. Next Daana’d breathed water essence onto the form, making the blood and other fluids within the form flow into place. Next up Heshies inhaled sharply and bathed the form in elemental fire, lighting up the eyes of the pony and giving its organs and muscles energy to function and heat from within.

Witnessing this incredible act of creation – truly, life being made before their very eyes… it was fascinating to watch. The new pony had a nice normal brown coat, even if it was a tad shaggy, with slightly darker brown mane that looked very unkempt, just like the very long unshorn fetlocks. A generic pony one could well be tempted to describe it as.

Finally Sextes Jylis did a little dance around the now seemingly whole pony. Sure it looked a tad pale and was just slumped on the ground like a sack of rice, but beyond that it seemed to be breathing on its own already – but then Sextes Jylis motioned for the Bodhisattva to approach – and then the elemental dragon in pony form breathed green fire into the Bodhisattva’s mouth. This did not look pleasant. 

The deathknight looked dazed, for the lack of any better word. The pony before him blinked and looked up – and the two locked eyes, both raising their right forehoof and touching each other… themselves… himself…  then suddenly from between two armor plates on the Bodhisattva a rusty chain with a spiked hook shot out and slammed into the new pony’s chest, plunging in deep. Obscene amounts of blood gushed from the wound, but then stopped as the brown pony’s pale features took on a slightly darker grey shade. The transfer was now complete.

“Oh right, you have to be on the verge of death when you get the black exaltation…” Speaker noted, feeling decidedly uncomfortable with what he had just seen.

The Bodhisattva would much later go on to pen many interesting works and theses on the topic of ‘live exalted soul transfer’, a feat that not even the Solars of the high first age were able to accomplish – but for now the new newly created pony form merely rose and drew breath calmy… then began to hack and cough quickly violently, liquid water essence pouring out of his mouth and nose.

Speaker was about to rush to the Bodhisattva’s  aid, but the Bodhisattva raised a hoof to hold Speaker off as he finished cough: “No please, I am fine… haven’t felt this alive in ages”

The Bodhisattva’s old form quickly began to fade, leaving only its armor and a withered heart behind. The Bodhisattva stashed the armor elsewhere for later use, but the heart? He wasn’t quite sure of what to do with it.

Much celebration ensued. The Bodhisattva celebrated that he was now on his final leg of atonement and spiritual purification. The circle celebrated that with this no abyssal exalt was beyond salvation. Luna and Gaia ‘celebrated’ in their private chambers – and if judging by how continually flustered the elemental dragons were, then Luna was doing that thing with her tongue again.

The next day, as the moon traveled through the wyld beyond Creation, attracting the madness of the total chaos so that it might become dreams and nightmares, Luna finally got around to congratulating the Bodhisattva: “Your accomplishment will be remembered here… and I thank you for letting us keep your old husk here. It now wanders the gardens as the unique creature that it is”

The ‘husk’ of the Bodhisattva’s old form looked like most of the other creatures in the gardens – formed of a dream, or a recently awoken-from nightmare. Its ghost-flesh limbs were a tad more transclucent, now wrought of starlight and the hazy fog that clouds and obscures dreams long forgotten, and its armor was but a replicate of etched dark wood and leather painted over to look like soulsteel.

“I could not have done it without your gracious permission. I… last night I slept so… I think I had forgotten how to truly sleep” The Bodhisattva noted, tears swelling in his strangely multicolored eyes: His irises were like five rings of jade, starting with green, then red, then black, then blue and finally white. The mark of Gaia perhaps?

Luna frowned a bit at the Bodhisattva’s humility: “You should stand tall at your achievement. Your hunt is nearly at an end – but you know… you really should have left your black exaltation behind, and reincarnated as a true mortal”

“I… why?” the deathknight asked, the faint wound on his chest barely even there anymore after Speaker and Shimmer had had their way with the Bodhisattva before the celebrations had begun.

Luna snaked around the Bodhisattva, her body flowing like dark mercury: “Survival, perseverance, a complete dedication to your hunt. These are admirable traits for a Lunar – were you not already chosen, then I would likely have offered you exaltation myself”

The Bodhisattva didn’t really seem to know what to say that, standing somewhat stupefied and very surprised as Luna left to do whatever – probably return to Yu-Shan and rejoin the games of divinity. Gaia had already left, indeed Luna hadn’t come out of her chambers until Gaia departed Creation once, seeking her illusive golden answer, the answer which could not be denied.

In the meantime, the circle had prepared for their return to Creation. Not satisfied with waiting until nightfall when the moon would pop out of the eastern wyld, Shimmer was certain that she would be able to get them out through a wyld zone not that far from Lookshy.

As the Bodhisattva joined them, looking extraordinarily happy, he requested that he be dropped off before they reach Lookshy.

“We’ll try – we have to get to Creation first” Cash noted, launching Nah into the… moon sky? Heaven? Someone really needed to come up with some proper names for these things.

Flying away from the moon sideways – that is, at a right angle to the moons trajectory, Cash aimed to avoid the wake of wyld chaos trailing the moon, as well as the compressed chaos in front of the moon. It looked really weird to see from a distance: Multiple wyld pocket realities mushed together before the moon, and thousands more trailing behind the moon like cats running down a wounded capybara. As their distance to the moon increased the wyld distorted the scene, until nothing logical could be seen at all – only Speaker’s mechanical hoof artifact and his chaos repelling pattern maintained a bubble of normalcy around Nah that left them unmolested by the insanity around them.

Using unseen trails of scattered moonlight and other ‘marks’ supposedly left by other Lunars, Shimmer helped Cash navigate through wet deserts, dry oceans and sweltering beehives made of boiling lard. Their speed was little use against the changelings as they simply had to alter their nature ‘to be faster than our prey’ – though such narrative oneiromancy would fail spectacularly the moment the changelings passed through the normalcy bubble made by Speaker’s charm, where their bodies of strange things and impossible ideas was forced to function purely as their mundane Creation-wrought counterparts… and thus a gleaming warrior made of spinning gems would simply become a pile of gems falling by the wayside, or a cruel minstrel playing a gossamer instrument strung with stolen strands of fate would find her strings intangible yet destined to return once out, while inside the bubble.

“That looks like a tree! Finally, something that just looks normal!” Sullen Hoof shouted.

The tree was made of weeping kittens. Still, it was the closest semblance to anything that actually even faintly appeared as if from Creation. A short while later the trees thickened and became much more regular – even though many of them still had leaves of cloth, or strange green metals, or solid liquids.

Once they were a bit closer to Creation, Shimmer began to guide the circle through a special path through the madness: At the end of the trail they exited into Creation through what turned out to be a wyld pocket in the western end of the hundred kingdoms, not that far from where Speaker had once lived prior to exalting.

Arriving at Lookshy, the circle found that the Seventh Legion was ready to head out: Now was the time to bring the war-machines of the living to the underworld. Well, it might be… for Heath Rose was waiting for the circle at their town house in the upper harbor district – and she didn’t look happy.

> Chapter 102: Into Darkness
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Having just returned from a couple of weeks worth of frantic travels, with Calibration barely a week and half away, the circle had been looking forward to at least a day or so of rest and relaxation before the Seventh Legion sallied forth into the underworld.

Upon their return, however, they were met by Heath Rose – their Sidereal acquaintance – and she looked… miffed. She also looked remarkably bald, and dressed like an immaculate monk.

“What are you looking so saddle-sore about? Someone nick your mane?” Cash casually quipped, his jovial tone betraying how mentally exhausted he was after maintaining advanced riding charms on Nah for a couple of weeks.

Gesturing angrily towards the sky, Heath Rose glared furiously at the whole circle: “The moon, three days ago… it turned green! – and Luna missed a turn in the games of divinity! Now she’s back and all bubbly and bouncing off the walls! Explain!?”

“Hey now – the moon turned back to normal once Gaia left” Shimmer protested.

The circle settled into the tea-lounge and Sullen Hoof whipped up some soothing tea – and a few hours of debriefing later, with Cash showing footage from his recorder of everlasting glories, resulted in Heath Rose sitting very still, either because she was at a loss for words or due to momentary catatonic terror.

“Come on – just because we found a way to summon Gaia back to Creation doesn’t mean that we did something bad!? She made the Bodhisattva a new body!”

“Yes… a body from outside fate. Anything he does now to alter Creation and causality will be as destructive as if a changeling was running around eating the souls of random mortal ponies” Heath Rose groaned, nursing her tea-cup. The look on her face spoke of the maddening paperwork that no doubt awaited her back in Yu-Shan to document and explain what the circle had done.

On the plus side Heath Rose readily agreed that if the Bodhisattva could wrap up his redemption quest, then it would no doubt be a great boon to fixing things in general – but Gaia’s presence and the fact that she might be called again, well maybe – the issue there was apparently rather complicated: “A lot of gods still have built-in allegiance to the primordials. If wanted to, she could roll in and basically take over much of the heavenly bureaucracy.,. no I don’t expect that she wants to, but considering how things have gotten since last she was in Yu-Shan she might well just do it anyway – and we’re in no condition to pull another primordial war to win back Creation and Yu-Shan right now”

Worries of well-intended primordial take-overs of heaven aside, then Heath Rose was in Lookshy to coordinate the immaculate contingent that had arrived a few days ago. Apparently the immaculate leadership back on the Blessed Isle had opted to save face by swapping out most realm-born immaculate in Lookshy due to the whole coup thing. Heath Rose had been made part of the Immaculate Convention, giving her power and influence over the immaculate order – officially she was posing as the secretary of the new immaculate abbot of Lookshy, unofficially she was making the final ‘tweaks’ to the new immaculate monks and priests, optimizing them for the campaign into the underworld and for social interaction with the locals.

“Speaking of which, the legion has made a few scouting sorties into the underworld while you were gone. They’ve confirmed that a large array of some sort has been built over the center of the pit of that manse you found. The legion is ready to set out in three days – that’ll give us four days until the start of calibration” Heath Rose noted, retrieving a few scrolls from a pocket inside her monks robes – even though the scrolls were far too big to have possibly fit into such pockets.

The scrolls contained sketches and drawings of Deep Rot, evidently made by observers and scouts from the scouting missions. Speaker recognized much of it – but the array… that was new, though how it looked was eerily familiar: “That’s an End Time Relay alright... Any idea how close it is to completion?”

“Not very much anymore – there have been Sidereal sorties to the manse as well, probing their defenses. We damaged the array quite a lot, but they have a legion of zombies restoring it. It will likely be operational in time to let Tien Yu’s prophecy come true – so the legion is heading out in three days.  Incidentally: I need to whip all of you into shape for that” Heath Rose explained, giving each of the circle an appraising look.
Accepting Heath Rose’s tutelage, a swift lesson plan was very quickly laid out – though not everyone needed much if anything: Shimmer was let off immediately, as was Sullen Hoof, both on grounds of being more than capable of handling themselves in fights against other exalted. Cash had to demonstrate the potency of his defensive charms before Heath Rose, which ultimately satisfied her, though she was not particularly impressed with his combat proves against an exalted opponent – but as he himself noted: “I’m a lover not a fighter, but I’ll bend the ear and mind of any abyssal who comes near me”.

For Speaker Heath Rose expressed tentative curiosity at Homage – mainly because of the unholy chaos that opening the Primal Forge had caused, but also in how Shimmer told of Speaker’s exaltation having been somehow temporarily ‘disconnected’ in order to somehow let Speaker make the device impossibly quickly. For combat proves, Heath Rose found Speaker’s skills just barely adequate, though she found his defensive charms just plain insufficient: “You will be going up against foes with soulsteel daiklaives and powers akin to dawn caste Solars – your shield charms might work well against elementals and mortals, but against an exalt those shields will be cut like thin skin”

“Any suggestions on how I can improve myself in three days?”

Heath Rose nodded and led Speaker out into the garden behind the town house.

In the morning a messenger arrived with an update from the martial staff: The Seventh Legion was ready to set out in two days, and Sullen Hoof was requested by the Stores Directorate to advice on perishable supplies for the campaign.

Sending the messenger away along with Sully, Shimmer sauntered through the house to the garden out back, the messenger’s scroll floating beside her in a bluish silvery glow: “Hey you two, the legion says they’re sailing out in two days”

“Great… two more days of torment” Speaker groaned, forcing himself up on his hooves.

His old uniform in tatters, with Heath Rose standing beside him wielding a beautiful staff wrought of black wood, yet it glimmered like stars in the morning sunlight as if set with a thousand tiny gems, Speaker was covered in welts and bruises to an extent that not even his anesthetic charm could mask all of the pain.

“It doesn’t have to last that long – if only you learn your lesson” Heath Rose admonished, whacking Speaker hard over his forelegs.

Too tired and too bruised already to respond to the hit, Speaker simply exhaled deeply in resigned frustration. Shimmer found the display a bit unnerving, but Heath Rose had explained the process to her in private while still ‘teaching’ Speaker – having appeared in two places at once somehow – and it was supposed to have worked already.

“I never pegged you as being this stubborn. I have struck you in every chakra, every primary and secondary acupuncture nerve point – this is a lesson in getting hurt and defending against it, not a lesson in learned helplessness!” Heath Rose reprimanded, striking the ground hard to vent her own frustration. The stone cobble cracked.

Oh how Speaker had learned about getting hurt alright. Indeed there was not a part of him that had not been struck – not even the parts one usually ensured never got struck – but that staff… it was made with starmetal somehow, he was sure of it: It would strike him as if guided by fate to never miss. What kind of lesson could possibly be learned from such senseless yet methodical torment? Using even his most advanced shield charms were apparently useless – for Heath Rose were able to strike so hard that they were useless…

“…and that’s the lesson dumbass! Don’t sheathe yourself in shielding essence; become one with that protective essence – even if just for a moment! You’re supposed to keep trying, not give up” the Sidereal scolded, twirling the staff in a distinctly frustrated manner that clearly signaled a desire to hit Speaker some more, but at the same time she showed enough restraint to not do so, as it would clearly be useless.

Stepping up behind Speaker, Shimmer spoke plainly: “…then let me suffer the consequences of his failure – if he won’t learn, let me be struck instead. As his Lunar mate, I’m supposed to help ease his burdens”

Feeling very much so that this was incredibly much not the time for Shimmer to pull some stupid Lunar stunt and disrupt his ‘training’, Speaker raised a shaky hoof to object, but Shimmer was already in position behind him.

“You do realize that with a new punching bag I won’t hold back anymore, right?” Heath Rose said with a cruel smile to the Lunar before her, speaking like the cruel and calculating teacher that she was.

Shimmer laughed and sat down with her back turned to Speaker, facing Heath Rose: “I have survived ten thousands changelings ripping at my seams, a thousand unicorns turning the elements against me, and at least half a dozen angry gods smiting me when I liberated their slaves and captives – you want to hit me with a stick? Give me your best shot”

“It’s made with starmetal – hits quite hard” the monk-dressed Sidereal warned, twirling the staff into a striking position.

Hearing that Heath Rose had held back made Speaker feel even more miserable – but not Shimmer was playing this madness? She was simply laughing off Heath Rose’s warnings.

“Suit yourself – this one’s going to hit you so hard it’ll make your next seven incarnations feel the pain” Heath Rose calmly stated, the staff erupting in a bright green prismatic light as was swung.

In the first age this would have been so easy to defend against. He remembered the charm just fine – and he had done the right essence sigils and weaves all night, but it just hadn’t stuck! …and now Speaker could clearly see the staff trailing the strands of fate leading straight to Shimmer’s head and future beyond that – this really was a blow that would strike more than once!

The next thing Speaker knew Shimmer was congratulating him, and Heath Rose was looking quite pleased just the same. Taking stock of the situation, Speaker found himself standing up, his right forehoof raised and having caught the staff – not in any way that would have parried and pushed the blow aside, but having simply let it impact him straight on… and yet he was not any more worse for wear.

“Told you the direct method wouldn’t work – he’s not like Sully or Cash. Speaker always works best when he’s trying to protect or help someone else. I win the bet” Shimmer beamed, looking exceedingly pleased with herself.

Looking at his hoof, Speaker could clearly see the fading essence trails of the charm he had clearly just used – had that truly been all it took to activate it properly? Protecting someone else? Looking at Shimmer quizzically, then at Heath Rose, Speaker  found himself yawning.

“Get him something to eat, then some rest, then fill smartypants here in on exactly what he did – I have things to do. See you in the underworld” Heath Rose quickly stated, bowing as she backed into the house and disappeared.

Speaker found the idea of food and sleep exceedingly appealing, so before he knew it the sun was low on the horizon and it seemed to be afternoon – but he felt delightfully well rested and pain-free.

“Alright – talk to me, what the hell was that stunt you pulled this morning, and why didn’t you do it earlier?” Speaker quizzed Shimmer. The Lunar looked pleased as punch that Speaker hadn’t been able to figure this out on his own.

Holding out Speaker’s right forehoof, Shimmer stroked it gently as she told of great Lunar warriors with hearts of gold who’s greatest defensive charms only really worked when they fought to defend others: “Sure, many others find different means to trigger their most potent defenses – a cause, a calling, honor – For you, they need heart”

Nodding, Speaker nodded slowly: “Ok… but what if I’m fighting on my own?”

“Do you need to be right next to someone to defend it? You love life, you want to save and protect Creation – maybe we could get Cash to work you over?” Shimmer mused, holding Speaker’s hoof and looking particularly… scheming.

Speaker wasn’t sure if liked the idea of having Cash mess with his head – but as Shimmer explained, then Cash would simply use his charms to very quickly talk Speaker into caring for a few more things, so he could use his new charm more readily.

To Shimmer’s surprise Speaker found this rather amusing. 

As they headed out to find Cash, Shimmer inquired into this.

Speaker explained as they passed by random ponies on the street: “I recall a set of Solar meditative charms that let you dedicate yourself quite fanatically to a cause… they were popular in parts of the primordial war, for they made it impossible to trick a Solar warlord into betraying or abandoning that cause – and many primordials were apt at warping the minds of their foes”

“Neat – I know there are Lunar charms like that, but my elders warned me against dabbling in them – makes you too predictable for wyld hunts” Shimmer noted, sniffing in the direction of a flower vendor.

Taking a deep breath and shaking head ever so slightly, as he enjoyed the calm walk: “Makes sense. I recall a number of Solars who used those charms too much, turning them into zealous champions for almost anything at the drop of a hat – it made a lot things needlessly complicated and far more bloody than was really necessary”

Finding Cash in his business office in the Market District, Speaker found what Shimmer had planned for him to be far less intrusive than he had feared: All Cash really did was ask him a few questions, like: “So… you want to end the suffering and imprisonment of the captive souls in Deep Rot?” Who could say no to that?

“And you want to protect Creation from the End Time Relay?” was another no-brainer. There were a few others, but it was mostly just chit-chat and having a laugh about Speaker’s last day of merciless ‘training’.

Leaving a few minutes later, Speaker didn’t feel any different – but noted that now more than ever did he want to put an end to the Bodhisattva’s schemes: “I won’t leave the underworld until I’ve utterly destroyed the Barbate Arbiter – he’s a ghost, and I’ve got just the spirit-killing charm for that”

Shimmer expressed that she found this quite agreeable…. And secretly hoped that Cash would be able to de-program Speaker once this was all done, because right now Speaker looked like a possessed mad-pony with murder in his eyes.

Packing up medical supplies, food and bottling water in the black and blue-jade treated bamboo water-bottles that the Seventh Legion used, the circle prepared for battle and stuffed Shimmer’s elsewhere-den full of useful things and whatnot. When the time came, they mustered at the aviary in the old city.

Arriving there, they were met by hundreds of pony legionnaires marching into the aviary to be sent up and loaded into their skyship transports. This was one of the key strategems of Lookshy which had allowed it to be the dominant power of the east for almost a thousand years: Its ability to fly troops around quickly and utterly out-maneuver their foes – or just rain down arrows and other things on ponies they didn’t like. 

Getting closer, it sounded as if a unicorn officer was briefing a batch of legionnaires on some of their supplies – mainly due to the essence-enhanced reverb in the charm being used to boost her voice: “…so keep your equipment under guard and remember to resupply your salt constantly. There will be stores of salt issued to every wing for distribution”

Speaker and Shimmer walked up to the briefing, figuring that once the briefing was over they could ask for directions on where they were supposed to go. Speaker looked quite gung-ho, nodding along to the unicorn officer’s briefing:

“In addition to your usual equipment and the salt, you have all been issued five alchemically infused nuts. They are color coded for easy use” the unicorn mare barked, reciting what was clearly a well-rehearsed well-repeated briefing for the umpteenth time that day while floating out three small colored nuts: “The green ones, of which you should all have received three, are to be bitten down on, at which point they will foam up in your mouth. It will taste bad. Spit the foam on open wounds to clean those wounds instantly – remember: Assume that every blade you face in the underworld has been rubbed on a rotting zombie. You do not want that wound to fester!”

Shimmer wondered if this was Sullen Hoof’s doing, all the while the officer mare continued: “Next up you have all been issued a single yellow nut: Eating it will make your temporarily fearless – this is to be used when ordered to only, NOT if you happen to get scared! Do I make myself clear?”

One of the legionaires, a rugged looking mare in armor identical to what everyone else was wearing, had raised a hoof to ask a question: “Will these nuts become part of our regular kit? They sound real handy”

“That’s the plan soldier – they have been field tested already, but this is the first time they’re used on a large scale. Now, lastly there is the last nut – the red nut. This nut is poisonous and will kill you” the officer stated, finishing her sentence with a furious glare.

Another legionnaire gestured to ask. The officer nodded, prompting the young stallion to speak: “Maam, I thought suicide pills was against legion regulations?”

“They are – but this is a special exception: The poison is slow and will take a couple of weeks to kill you – and we have a cure waiting for you here. However, the nut has a side-effect: If you die from the poison, or before getting the anti-dote, then you are guaranteed to not rise as a ghost. Remember your earlier briefing on how the underworld works: If you die there, you will become a ghost no matter what. This is to prevent that. So consider yourselves under orders to eat your red nut the moment you cross over into the underworld!” the mare barked, looking over the troops before her for any sign of reluctance or doubt. She found none, smiled and nodded in respect.

At this point Speaker was quite convinced that this was something that Sully had cooked up.

“Dismissed – get to your skyreme!” the unicorn mare commanded.

Stepping up to the unicorn mare, Speaker saluted the mare.

“This area is off limits to civilians for the time being – please leave” the mare barked, giving Shimmer and Speaker a stern look.

Two caste-mark briefly flared later, and the unicorn looked positively terrified: “I… I’m sorry your lordships – I didn’t mean to offend”

“That’s ok – you didn’t know. Now, where should we report?” Speaker said in an ever-so-slightly bemused tone.

The mare took a deep breath and steeled herself, then directed Speaker and Shimmer to the skyreme ‘The Soaring Leaf’. This skyreme turned out to be a spectacular relic of the first age, a skyship with a large keel of blue jadesteel, and unmistakable leaf-motifs on its sails.

On board Speaker and Shimmer was greeted by the very Taimyo Karal Linseed: “Ah, there you are. Cash and Sully has been waiting for you – we’re taking off within the hour”

To Speaker’s surprise then the Taimyo wasn’t flying in the skyfleet’s flagship, the Skywolf – it apparently had priority as troop transport at the moment.

Joining up with the rest of the circle below deck, Speaker and Shimmer greeted Cash and Sully: “Alright guys – everyone clear on the battle plan?”

“Indeed, and I have a larder filled with honey of distilled sorrows ready to wish any ghost we find on their way to sweet oblivion” Sullen Hoof noted with supreme confidence. Where he had gotten honey made of sadness, nobody dared to ask.

Joining the circle, or rather joining Speaker, was the team of special ops rangers which would be accompanying the Solar on his underground infiltration into the manse. Indeed, Speaker’s task in the coming battle was quite simple but also fraught with danger: Using his singing staff and the powers of the earth aspected unicorns in his team he would tunnel into the manse, disable any shields and anti-air defences and then destroy the whole place. The rangers were bringing all kinds of essence-disrupting weapons, each clad in the same kind of armor worn by the rangers that had tried to kidnap and kill Speaker previously…

For Shimmer, Sully and Cash their roles were more straight-forward – but none the less dangerous as well: They were to fight on the frontline, defending the artillery positions that the first field force would deploy on the ground to pummel the manse from the outside – ideally to damage it at range if possible, or just to draw the forces garrisoned there out to let Speaker and his team do their work. 

As they had heard no word from Sunrise, they had to assume that she would be too late to the party to participate.

“Hey, at least she’ll be here to give a nice eulogy if we don’t make it back” Cash joked half-heartedly.

Speaker was more sad that the Bodhisattva hadn’t shown up as the Soaring Leaf energized its blue jade flight core and led the way for the rest of the skyfleet south by south-west to the shadowland known as the Mourning Fields.

How the Seventh Legion had figured out how to cross into the underworld during the day was a mystery to Speaker, but it wasn’t anything he bothered asking into – as the sight of the underworld from up high was quite breathtaking, especially to the north, where the ghostly visage of old Deheleshen still stood like a city-tomb for an old memory.

As almost two hundred skyships, only a third of which were combat vessels, the rest just lightly armed troop transports, soared east towards Deep Rot, Speaker found the Taimyo up on deck scouting for something. Apparently she was looking for sign from a team of rangers already on the ground, sent weeks in advance to scout out the manse for a good spot to land essence artillery.

Calling on Sullen Hoof to join with his charms to see further and clearer, the team was quickly spotted a few miles from the manse – they were surrounded by a legion of ghosts. Lovely. Wait… the ghosts were set up in a defensive formation around the rangers – and the rangers weren’t in chains or anything.

Shimmer suggested that she, Cash and Speaker go down and have a look real quick, while the fleet held back.

Cash, riding on Shimmer in her warform, and Speaker using his essence-spun wings emitted from his golden pinions, flew down to assess the situation.

Outside the dug-in fortification, the trio was held up at spear-point by a patrol of ghostly ponies at arm. Cash spoke softly and carried big charms, getting the three taken to the ghost legion’s commander.

In a large tent made from the worn hides of flayed underworld monsters, the three exalts were greeted by the commander of the Lookshyan rangers sent to scout the area, as well as a ghost clad in ancient armor who looked even older, and a much younger ghost, that of a unicorn, which surprised Speaker greatly.

“Ruby?”

> Chapter 103: Breaching on Black Shoals
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Cash Charmer, Chosen of the Solar Eclipse caste, Bright Machine Speaker, Chosen of the Solar Twilight Caste, and Last Shimmer, Chosen of the Lunar No Moon caste, stood before the ghost of the unicorn they had all known as Ruby, in the command tent of the ghostly legion which was evidently protecting and working together with the ranger scouts that the Seventh Legion had sent ahead to scout out the territory around Deep Rot for suitable locations to set up a fortified artillery position.

“Uhm… hi, didn’t expect you here” Ruby meekly said, but she was quickly pushed aside by the older ghost next to her – the commander of the ghost legion from the looks of his many spectral medals and other bits of faded decorations on his exorbitantly battle-worn armor: “What is this? Do you know who they are?”

Ruby nodded: “Yes sir, that’s Cash Charmer, Last Shimmer and Bright Machine Speaker – my former charge when I was alive”

Upon hearing Speaker’s name the old ghostly commander flickered for a moment, then howled a joyous howl that somehow blew the tent around them away. Around them ghostly legionnaires gathered, many of them looking as if they had hacked to pieces and then glued back together again multiple times.

“Could it really be… is it you milord?” the old ghost inquired, stepping forth.

As the old ghost moved, new parts of the ghost’s form became obvious – namely that it was the ghost of a unicorn, as the silhouette of a horn became apparent as the ghost moved his head about, it trailing ethereal vapors. Another similar vapor-trailing object was that of a sizable blade lodged in the back of the ghost’s head – but that didn’t really seem to bother him… it was probably what had killed him originally.
Speaker looked at the old ghost, but couldn’t really tell what all the hubbub was about.

“I am Taimyo Sunscale, lord of the Lost Legion of Deheleshen , reporting for duty your imminence” the old ghost said in a rusty voice, saluting Speaker imperiously. Around them almost four thousand ghosts saluted Speaker as well.

Cash shot a brief look at Speaker: “So… reinforcements?”

It turned out that ever since the usurpation there had appeared a large number of ghosts from dead soldiers and officers loyal to Speaker in the underworld: Those who had been killed as they had refused to cooperate in the grand coup or the purges that followed the usurpation. 

Taimyo Sunscale had been one of the commanders of Deheleshen’s home legion, the force dedicated to defending the city – and even in death he had continued this task, zealously keeping out looters and agents of the Deathlords from his sacred home. Of course, during that time not that much of Deheleshen had appeared in the underworld, as the city itself still stood – but quite a few temples to Celestia had appeared, as they had been demolished. This of course changed with the Great Contagion, as nearly all but the old city fell to disease and the Baloran crusade: Now nearly all of old Deheleshen was to be found in the underworld, except a large barren patch where the old city stood untouched in Creation.

The Lost Legion’s numbers had also swelled with the fall of the city, and while the newer unicorn-loyal troops might have been surprised to know that the city they had defended had been founded and ruled by a Solar, then most of them readily accepted Sunscale’s command – 
having little else to do in the underworld aside from getting enslaved by the Deathlords.

Speaker was moved to tears many times by this display of loyalty, as Sunscale and other legion ghosts from the first age told of how they had defended the city.

After a while another patrol came in with more ‘intruders’ – Taimyo Karal Linseed and a small guard of unicorn legionaries. After brief introductions and Linseed utterly losing her shit at the realization that nearly one in ten dead Lookshyan legionnaire over the last three thousand years was present around her, the battle plan was revised – though it didn’t change much: The Lost Legion would help fortify the artillery positions, then move back and assist the second field force to keep clear the ground around the flight route back to the mourning fields, to ensure a clean exit once operations were done.

That the Lost Legion wouldn’t help with the assault on Deep Rot was mainly due to security issues: They all knew that the abyssal nearly all practiced some level of necromancy – and as ghosts the Lost Legion could have parts of it subverted that way. That they hadn’t already, something Cash claimed to be sure of after using a few charms on Sunscale to verify it, had mainly been because old Deheleshen simply had never been a target for the Deathlords – all the magical weaponry and whatnot was still on the Creation-side in the city – plus Taimyo Sunscale clearly was a seasoned user of first age battle tactics, putting him mostly on par with the Deathlords when it came to battlefield maneuvers and use of all kinds of creative strategems. The Lost Legion had also never strayed far from the territory it held, unlike the roving bands of ghostly warlords and raiders that dotted the rest of the underworld.

This was still quite a lot to take in for Taimyo Linseed – though she clearly dreaded having to pass this information on to the rest of the general staff – some of the staff had ‘family’ in the Lost legion! Oh the chaos this would cause, the scandals!. Still, she signaled for the skyfleet to begin deploying – Operation: Pit Fill had begun.

Essence artillery by the dozen were unloaded: Lightning ballistas, implosion bows, concussive essence canon with barrels so big a pony could jump around inside them and not hit their heads – this and much more was unloaded from their skyship transports and dug in, a thousand ghosts digging trenches and chopping down local pale-wood trees to fashion into stakes that were put into the ground around the fortifications: Against mindless zombies, simply putting pointy things out in front was one of the best defenses you could mount – at least until enough zombies had impaled themselves that they rest could just climb over them.

Once the fortifications were done, which happened in no time at all thanks to the extra labor and Speaker using his singing staff – much to the joy of the first age ghosts in the Lost Legion, who had all longed to Speaker’s staff sing once more – the Lost Legion withdrew to unite with the units from the second field force that were covering the exit route, with Speaker promising to meet with them once everything was over. 
Once the ghosts were gone salt was distributed around the fortifications to keep ghosts out - not even friendly ghosts could cross these lines, though zombies and skeletons – both basically animated flesh or bone automatons, could be made to scatter the salt lines. Thus defences against both ghosts, skeletons and zombies had to be layered and made to overlap.

The bombardment began before the last of the artillery pieces were in places – and oh how they thundered: Fueled by hearthstones originating from the many manses under Lookshy’s control, the lightning-throwers and essence-chuckers drew near-limitless amounts of energy from Creation, raining it down over Deep Rot.

This revealed its outer defenses very quickly: A black fog rose as a dome around the manse, upon which all the lightning and other projectiles exploded harmlessly in puffs of smoke. The whole place looked quite daunting: The large thirty foot wall that ringed the two mile across manse looked very much designed to be as uninviting as possible – and its seemingly invulnerable shield just sealed the deal.
This shield had already been reported by the scouts earlier, but this made for a delightfully colorful and exceedingly noisy distraction as Speaker and his team delved underground.

“Ok you lot – form up, and remember that the deeper we go the more we’re likely to run into… things… down here – and do say if the walls start bleeding, we don’t want to drown while down here” Speaker called out.

The unicorn rangers, clad in their magical armor, completely covered from hoof to tail, with only their crystal visors to look out from – but their senses none the less enhanced from the magic and many enchantments that made up their armor – did not openly express worry upon hearing this warning. Indeed, they had all been briefed back in Creation weeks ago when the final plans had been made. This still didn’t mean that any of them had ever partaken in operations in the underworld – indeed, until recently no Lookshyan field force had deployed active units in the underworld.

Closing up the tunnel behind them, the air aspected unicorn in the team lit up her horn to prove air and light for the squad while underground. The two earth aspected unicorns in the team joined up with Speaker up in front, using their powers to shift the bone-strewn ashen dirt around them, allowing them to move forward.

The singing staff soon proved useless – the ground was too much ash caked in dry blood and bone chips, hardly any actual dirt for the staff to affect. Still, Speaker’s crafting charms did wonders in shifting dirt ever without a shovel or other tools – and thus team Jade Mole progressed as planned, going up and down as the walls bleed with blood or the floor began to have faces push themselves out of the ground, the madness of the outer labyrinth nipping at their heels.

Up on the surface the response from Deep Rot had manifested: A ghostly emissary with an honor guard of heavily armored zombies had galloped forth from the manse, the emissary being the gaunt ghost of a pony stallion with sharp features and a jet black mane that looked like a big wad of carefully sculpted tar that had been stuck to the top of the ghost’s head. Cash turned the poor fool’s mind inside out in just under seven words – this was not an operation that involved diplomacy what so ever, for any attempt to stall or halt the attack on Deep Rot would clearly be a ploy to buy the Barbate Arbiter time to destroy Creation, but the ghost apparently knew nothing to the point that it was obvious that its mind had been wiped prior to having been sent out. This had been a test, not a serious attempt at parlay.

Shortly thereafter several steel gates in the great wall surrounding Deep Rot swung open, and dragon after dragon of shambling zombies clad in crude armor and vicious war-ghost with a faintly red iridescent glow about their semi-transparent forms spilled out. The counter-attack would soon begin.

Catapults with special salt-delivery canisters were loaded and made ready to be drawn taught – and archers had extra arrows distributed among them. Among the officers special prayer-strips blessed by the Raven King were handed out, each with a powerful invocation to mulch all dead things around whoever read the prayer out loud – they should do wonders against massed zombies once they started clogging the spikes on the defenses.

Underground, team Jade Mole made swift progress through the ‘dirt’ of the underworld. Digging under Deep Rot’s wall turned out to be easy enough: The earth aspected unicorns in the team were specialists in subterranean operations, and knew charms that let them ‘see’ through the underground, letting them guide Speaker in what direction to lead the tunnel. What they hadn’t quite expected was the ghost of Rose appearing among them, acting as if everything was normal.

“What?”

“You heard Taimyo Linseed’s orders – any ghost inside the battlezone is to be considered under enemy control” one of the unicorn rangers noted, the voice-talisman in the unicorn mare’s armor making her voice sound metallic and artificial, as her horn flared red with fire essence building up…

Rose didn’t take the implied threat as much, instead swiftly walking up to the unicorn ranger who had spoken up and fiddling with the voice talisman.

“Hey – what are you, restrain her!” the unicorn ranger shouted  as she tried to fend off Ruby to no avail.

…restraining a ghost is not an easy feat, even in the underworld – unless you know special spirit-wrangling charms, like the one Speaker knew.
“Ruby – what are you doing?” Speaker asked, tapping Ruby on the shoulder. Her spectral armor rattled in a strange way that gave off a fading echo.

Giving the speech-talisman one final jiggle, Ruby slapped it in place and stepped back: “I’m fixing it – trained as an artificer before switching to sorcery, remember?”

“Damnit, what th- my voice? Hey I didn’t even know this was broken – I thought I sounded cool” the ranger mare noted, sounding more surprised than angry.

The lone wood aspected unicorn in the team groaned and blasted Ruby with a charm, causing vines to sprout up around the ghost, immobilize her: “We have our orders” – he aimed his horn at Ruby to deliver a final blow.

“Hold up” Speaker said, jumping in front of Ruby: “We have salt – we can just leave her here and block her from following us.
Ruby began to tear up: “But… then I’ll be trapped down here?”

Speaker took a firm hold on the ghostly mare’s shoulder pauldrons and looked Ruby straight in the eyes: “Your service to Lookshy ended the moment you died. Morning Dew has been dealt with and is gone – you have nothing to prove here and only endanger us by following alone. If you’re doing this out of some sense of loyalty or duty to Lookshy, or me, or the Lost Legion… don’t”

“But… you… I was just trying to protect you, to help you, to finish my work” Ruby said, her voice breaking into a full on bawl.

Sullen Hoof had warned that ghosts tended to be extremely emotional, one way or the other – it was in their nature since all that kept them alive was their memories and desire to live, having no mortal urges or drives to guide them anymore.

A swift smack over the nose snapped Ruby back into reality, as much as one could call the underworld reality: “If you care for me – then pass on. Trust me, reincarnating isn’t that bad. I’ve tried it myself – and I promise: I will smack around every god in heaven if that’s what it takes to find out where and who you’ve reincarnated as, and bring you back to Lookshy, ok?”

Ruby wiped the tears from her eyes and looked around at the rangers and Speaker: “You’d really do that for me?”
Speaker flared his caste mark and smirked: “By Celestia’s hairy third testicle” 
Laughing, Ruby faded from reality… her soul passing onto Lethe.

The rangers were all silent, until the mare with the newly fixed voice-talisman spoke up – her real voice, a firm but smooth voice, coming through clearly: “Wow… are you really going to do all that for her?”

Speaker turned around and began to dig once more, his charms and essence scooping away twelve times as much dirt as a normal mortal would be able to shift using even the best of digging tools: “Of course not – but a good doctor should do anything to comfort a dying patient – I figure the same applies to patients who are dead and need to convinced to become even deader”

The rangers nodded – and it wasn’t really possible to see if their expressions were worried or of respect for Speaker’s ability to remain focused on the mission despite the obvious personal connection. In truth Speaker was simply happy to see Ruby passing on, having absolutely dreaded having to deal with her after Deep Rot had been dealt with. It was with a sigh of relief that he focused on moving blood-caked ash aside, thankful that of himself and Ruby, at least Ruby knew peace.

Back on the surface the counter-attack from Deep Rot had begun as expected: Waves upon waves of zombies had skewered themselves on the stakes around the battlements – but other necromantic creations had also been used: Creepy centipede-like creations of hundreds of pony skeletons with the hips and hindlegs removed, where head of the one was stuffed into the ribcage of the next one in front. They scuttled over the battlefield mindlessly, getting blown apart quite readily – but then there would just be two shorter skelepedes – and once they reached the battlements they would crawl up and function like ladders and bridges for the zombies to rush over.

Shimmer flew around above, spreading her silvery essence webbing across the battlefield to stick entire talons of zombies together into big wiggling piles of undead – the things were simply too stupid to free themselves or move as one. Similarly she spread salt around liberally from big sacks hung over her back, hindering the slower but far more menacing war ghosts that were slowly approaching under command of heavily armored martial abyssals who were expertly swatting anything thrown at them aside, or kicking holes in the salt lines impeding their troops – though salt dropped in the middle of formations made for wondrous disruptions.

It was shortly thereafter that team Jade Mole broke through on the inside of Deep Rot’s walls. Their priorities were simple and straightforward: Get the shield down, neutralize or disrupt any local anti-air weapons, sabotage the manse – in that order.

Of course, such a simple list of priorities didn’t matter much when they could see bonestriders stomping out through the gates not far from them. The one ranger in the team who was designated as the communications specialist quickly crept back into the tunnel and discreetly cast a spell to massage high command at the fortification of incoming warstriders. Hopefully they would be able to blast them before they reached the fortifications.

Getting a read on the surface layout of the manse was breathtaking and nauseating at the same time: Beyond the massive pit in the middle of the place then there were dozens upon dozens of smaller structures around the rim of the pit, some channeling dark lightning, some routing crystal-pipelines with blood – and then there were legions of undead just standing around, waiting for orders, just fields of ghosts and zombies, intermittently displaced by some large cobbled-together monstrosity. Of particular note were four large obelisks that drew darkness from the dome into them – this made the obelisks a priority target.

Sneaking around was difficult due to the massive garrison force, but the sentries spread around Deep Rot seemed a lot more focused on just swarming and attacking the intruders as opposed to sounding any kind of alarm. With all the noise that stomping bonestriders, the manse itself and other undead monstrocities made nobody seemed to pay much attention to the sound Gift made as it destroyed ghost after ghost, clearing the way to a small obelisk shrouded in black smoke.

From what Speaker could tell via essence sight, the obelisk was one of many, channeling necrotic essence down from the dome of dark mist that was somehow making both lightning and implosion rounds go off on its surface harmlessly. It wasn’t powering the mist, but it was drawing from it? Strange…

“Hmm, this obelisk – the stone is strained and far too hot for just standing here. Maybe it’s somehow absorbing the impacts on the dome?” Speaker theorized. One of the earth aspected unicorns on the team, a specialist on sorcerous artifice and demolition, agreed, but noted that it should be pockmarked from the impacts if that was the case.

Looking around at the surface of the obelisk, while the rest of the rangers stood careful watch, Speaker suggested that if the impacts were being spread perfectly evenly across the whole thing, both inside and outside -  even the mightiest blow would be like a mild breeze on the seemingly ceramic material: “It looks like there are flecks of soulsteel in the mix as well – hell, it’s a wonder that this whole place isn’t built of the stuff”

“Can you take it down? The firedust charges we’ve brought work best against non-magical materials” the demolition pony noted, standard Lookshyan manse-demolition protocol being to go for the frailer elements of a manse to quickly destabilize its essence flows.

Speaker nodded and applied his deconstruction charm: Holding his hooves up hard against the base of the obelisk, golden essence seeped into microfractures within the material and disrupting the essence flows within – suddenly great geysers of blood erupted from the opposite side of the tall construction, Speaker pulling away quickly: “Move! This thing was a lot frailer than I thought!”

The demolitions expert and Speaker got some good distance from the obelisk as more ruptures, crushed organs and gore spilling from them – it was as if the obelisk had housed a highly pressurized undead monster, now flopping out on the ground, flailing about and gurgling grotesquely as the expanding organs and tissue burst and exploded with loud pops and sprays of blood. As its bits flailed about it suddenly caught one of the rangers, who despite blasting the bloody tentacle with both fire and ice was crushed as the tentacle coiled around the poor mare. When Gift managed to chew through the tentacle and release the body there was nothing left to save, except the magical armor with its newly repaired voice talisman which the rangers quickly and expertly disassembled and was about to distributed amongst their saddlebags when Speaker suggested he just stash it all elsewhere – that way it wouldn’t bog the rest of them down.

On the plus side the miasma dome was… crystallizing? The black mist was turning into solid flakes on the side of the dome facing the artillery barrage, like dark obsidian snow, which was quickly being blasted into powder by the artillery.

With the dome opened up Speaker knew that it wouldn’t be long for the skyships to come in and begin their bombardment. Ok, next up was check for anti-air weapons and take those out:

Looking around the walls Speaker only saw weapon emplacements aiming outward, not upwards – but then it didn’t have to ballistas and obviously conventional weapons: “Look for large crystals or other possible emitters that can project beams or bolts of essence”

“We should seek higher ground, get a better view o-” the wood aspected ranger began to suggest, but was permanently interrupted when a long sleek javelin of ivory with bands of soulsteel shot through his helmet, killing him instantly.

From the shadows stepped three abyssal, their caste marks bleeding down on their foreheads like open wounds into their souls – the one front did a flick of the hoof, making the javelin reappear in her grasp. The two others had soulsteel daiklaives at the ready, them glistening just like their soulsteel armor.

No words were exchanged at this point– the fighting commenced immediately, both inside Deep Rot and outside as the Bone Walkers made it up to the outer fortifications of the artillery fire base, only to be met by Lookshy’s own jade warstriders and Shimmer in a warform beefed up to warstrider-size.

> Chapter 104: Having the Darkest Parts Be In The Past
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Speaker came to, feeling himself being dragged across somewhat smooth stone. His uniform was in taters, and his head hurt. Looking around in the darkness, Speaker couldn’t see much at all – and his ears were still ringing from… right, he had gotten knocked out – and his forehooves were in chains, so he was also captured. Fun.

While not able to see, then once his ears stopped ringing Speaker was able to make out that someone were dragging him along the ground, pulling in the chain in his forehooves were bound up in. His captors weren’t responding to him trying to talk either – and worst of all, then something magical about his chains prevented him from using any kind of charms what so ever. He couldn’t even light up his caste mark to illuminate his surroundings!

Trying to recall the fight, Speaker noted that it had been far too brief: At first there had only been three abyssal, but those three were not as stupid as the ghosts that team Jade Mole had encountered previously. One of the abyssal had lit off a signal flare, and moments later about two dozen other abyssal showed up in full battle regalia – Speaker had no clue if the rest of his team were alive or not.

Getting up on his hindlegs so he wasn’t dragged along the ground made things a little easier – and the higher vantage point revealed a pale green light at the end of whatever tunnel they were moving through. Closer to the light it became obvious that the beings pulling his chains along were zombies – and not the usual scraggly rotting ones: These things were glistened in the light with embalming fluid, and looked as if the muscles of three ponies had been grafted onto a fourth – no wonder that he couldn’t pull back against the two.

As the three came out of the tunnel, into the light, Speaker found himself in the grand throne room of a Deathlord. Well, he couldn’t be quite sure that it was a Deathlord, but so far Speaker had yet to meet an Abyssal who styled him or herself as a king. Oh and the chains around his forehooves – they looked like a nasty mix of orichalcum and soulsteel – no wonder they were able to prevent him from using charms.

Grand tapestries on rawhide, covered in images of maps and schematics,  wrought through artistic branding that looked to have been made while the beasts that the leather was  from were still alive, covered the walls – and rows upon rows of ghosts in chains beat drums with their spectral hooves along the walls, making for a rhythmic beat that mixed eerily well with the jingling of their chains. Down the middle was a large table of thick burgundy wood, upon which was a large map was spread out and small ghostly ‘things’ tumbled about, evidently ghosts that had been forcibly reshaped and disfigured into sentient markers representing various military forces and assets – this was here they were coordinating and planning the defense of the whole place!

At the end of the table, which was lined with abyssals and ghostly advicors – all of which looked ready to go in battle – was the throne. Oh what a throne it was: Simple yet elegant, it seemed to be made of a single large bone, somehow sculpted like clay, to seat the grotesque creature that sat upon it.

The creature, evidently half-way through eating some hapless ghost slave – holding the back half of the ectoplasm-oozing remains in a giant cracked hoof, bellowed a maniacal but brief laugh as Speaker came into view: “Finally – the architect brought before us! Bring him here”
The voice the thing was guttural, deep, as if constantly half-choking – and Speaker’s near-supernatural medical knowledge also picked out what sounded like partially lacerated vocal cords. In short this being just sounded wrong.

The two muscle-zombies, their hooves looking tiny compared to their grotesquely oversized limbs – completely covered in muscle grafts, began to pull once more and brought Speaker past the long war-map and the abyssal generals, ghostly advisors and ghost slave servants lining it. They all remained silent, but threw poisonous glares at Speaker the whole time.

At the throne, Speaker shot the Deathlord a nasty glare: “The Barbate Arbiter, I take it”

The ghost, swollen like a over-ripe moldy grey-green tomato – yet with multiple lacerations, through which gore, pus and bits of atrophied organs hung and oozed – gave Speaker a nauseating grin: The front of the Barbate Arbiter’s face was devoid of flesh, and his teeth were short irregular spikes or nails of black iron pounded into where normal teeth might once have been. Where the pale green moldy flesh, devoid of any remnant of a coat, began again around his face were random clumps of unkempt and tattered white hair, both as beard and as mane, though the bloated mass of the rest of his body nearly seemed to swallow his whole head – to the point that there were flabs of torn flesh hanging over empty dark eye-sockets that just seemed to eat light.

Taking this as a confirmation of the Deathlord’s identity, Speaker pondered what in Creation he could do. No charms, including the charms that would call Gift or Homage from elsewhere, and without knowing exactly where this throne room was within the manse… what to do?
The Arbiter leaned down towards Speaker, revealing strange and just wrong rounded nodules of bone sticking out from his spine through his back, reaching out with a forelimb that just… oh gods what was that thing? Through the Arbiter’s right shoulder was a massive black iron spike, and where there should be limb going down on one’s elbow there were just steel bands around a jagged bone-stump, holding the remaining skin tight in place. For an ‘elbow’ there was a floating purple crystal shrouded in necrotic essence, linking to a floating severed hoof which was also just connected to a bit of shattered bone, with bands of steel holding withered flesh tight: “I have such delights planned for…”

A violent tremor shook the entire throne room. Several followed in rapid succession, shaking everything vigorously. The chandeliers with candles that burned with a clear and surprisingly bright green flame shook to the point that wax dripped down on the war map and the tiny shrunken ghost figures down on the map, which had to dodge and roll to avoid the hot wax. The few struck shrieked with tiny shrill voices and rolled around in agony while the generals and ghost advisors laughed, yet shared many a nervous glare – but none dared to flee for cover while in the presence of a Deathlord.

It occurred to Speaker that the tremors were from the bombardment – this meant that the miasma shield was still down. It also meant that he was still in the manse somewhere.

Suddenly two of the mini-ghosts on the map screamed and then popped into black puffs of smoke. The Barbate Arbiter quickly moved his gaze up to the map, floating past Speaker in such a way that it became disgustingly obvious that there was no bottom half of the Deathlord: He was a bloated chest, shoulders, a pair of hooves and a head – nothing else.

“That was the bonestriders at the gate – give me a direct feed!” The Arbiter Bellowed.

With an evidently well-drilled series of moves, one of the ghostly advisors seized a ghost slave who cried out pitifully. One of the abyssals, using a thin and quite deadly looking soulsteel daiklaive, severed the ghost’s head – which was then stuffed into a small lift, which instantly began to move up, the slot in the wall where the lift was closing up as it moved up.

The rest of the ghost was then flayed, and its semi-transparent hide was floated up into the air above the war map:  A necromantic spell cast on it displayed what the head saw and vibrated to give off the sound that the head heard.

The ghost-head managed to transmit for roughly one second, its final image being that of a warstrider-sized Shimmer in her beastpony form clawing at the head with moonsilver-scythe-like talons. The building shook once more right after that.

This made Speaker wonder exactly where this throne room was. Underground seemed like an obvious choice – but Sullen Hoof had said that none of the Deathlords build their lairs underground in the underworld, to avoid the effects of being within the labyrinth. But… Deep Rot was built like a giant hole in the ground going all the way down to the deepest points of the labyrinth. Was this throne room insulated somehow?
But that would mean that Shimmer was on the ground in the manse – and that wasn’t part of the battle-plan – she was supposed to screen the skyships that were to go through the hole in the shield and bombard Deep Rot directly. So why was she on the ground?

The generals and the Arbiter spoke in a strange tongue, it sounding like orders were being given. A third of the abyssals  picked up their weapons and left through various doors to the side – a few even left via a big hatch in the floor.

“Now that we have dealt with that… I have a whole funhouse of horrors lined up for you – such delights to show you – and you won’t even need eyes to see them” the Barbate Arbiter declared with just barely suppressed jittery sadistic glee, swiveling around to face Speaker.

Taking a step back away from the Deathlord, Speaker looked around desperately. The Deathlord dragged his giant head-sized hooves along the floor, the cracked hooves rasping along the ever so slightly rough stone floor while the Arbiter giggled to himself: “I have waited for so long for this… and now a the hour of my triumph you deliver yourself to me”

“What are you talking about?” Speaker shot back – trying to bide his time, looking for something to help him, though with the magical shackles his options were quite limited.

Scooping Speaker up in one of his cracked hooves, the Arbiter brought the Solar pony up before him. Stroking his beard with his other hoof he went: “Yes… you even got the beard – Your Lunar mate’s work, right?” 

To Speaker it was as if the Arbiter was trying to seduce him… or sweet talk him… or perhaps it was to analyze his response to these creepy statements? Either way Speaker could feel the Deathlord’s mental tendrils boring into his mind – it was not a pleasant feeling. The wet feeling by his nose signaled the start of a nosebleed.

The dark pits of the Barbate Arbiter’s empty eye sockets were haunting – like gazing into oblivion. It was difficult to resist – the urge to obey, to concede to… Speaker didn’t even really know what the Deathlord wanted of him, yet he felt the seductive pull to simply acquiesce!

Suddenly a series of violent tremors shook the throne room again – the ghostly servants huddled in the corners and under the grand table, while the ghostly advisors stood almost mindlessly still, stoic to a fault – or perhaps they were under a spell? Either way the walls began to crack, and Speaker felt the the Deathlord’s pull lessen on him.

Slamming a giant hoof the table, the Deathlord brought up another necromantic spell that showed a different view of outside. Speaker smiled as he saw the Skywolf, the giant blue jade-steel skyship in the shape of an enormous orca arc about the place, inside the shattered remains of the miasma dome. About it flittered flying ghosts and other airbone creations lashed together of bone and thin fleshy membranes, but they were being shot out of the sky at a prodigious rate. Other skyships could also be seen, trading shots with bonestriders on the ground firing great sharpened poles tipped with soulsteel like arrows from warstrider-sized bows.

It struck Speaker that the viewpoint that this ghostly vision was coming from was very high up in the air – around the same height as the Skywolf, its thick jade armor plating easily repelling all but the most well-aimed artillery fire from the ground.

Hold on – Heath Rose had said that Deep Rot had a large array built above the central pit. When they had all arrived via skyship there had been nothing above the central pit of Deep Rot… or was there?

While still held tight in a hoof the size of a small pony, Speaker squirmed to look around and observe the great hall he was in via essence sight. Oh yes… the place was part of the manse alright, and all the essence flows passing through conduits in the walls were going up to the ceiling, concentrating above the largest chandelier in the room… a chandelier with a large yellow glowstone that almost looked like a small sun. What delightfully not subtle symbolism.

The Barbate Arbiter was at this point fully engaged in directing the battle, speaking in that dark tongue to the vision projected before him – the flying ghosts and necromantic constructs seemed to obey his commands just by him talking to them in the vision.

With this improvement in defense coordination, Speaker saw how the ghosts and flying construct clustered around the Skywolf’s ‘flippers’ and other joints, hindering its ability to move and dodge artillery fire – that was bad, really bad, and so speaker struggled mightily once more, managing to wiggle a hoof free!

Reaching for Gift, the weapon appeared by his hoof from elsewhere, and with a series of rapid and forceful blows just as the weapon’s blades spun up, did Speaker manage to free himself by cutting at the hoof that held him.

Snarling in pain, the Arbiter threw a furious glare at Speaker – who had already dropped into the martial stance of his Thousand Wounds Gear style, Gift ready to strike.

The Deathlord’s dark gaze hardened, the fetid folds of flesh around his face piling into furious wrinkles – like a pug who’s face had been ripped off: “That weapon – that is mine! Seize it!”

From the shadows a deathknight cloaked in green leapt, the white mask that covered its face somehow staying in place without any visible straps - and the hollow eye holes of the mask betraying the morbid fact that the abyssal’s skull had been cut almost in half, leaving it with grey matter exposed and no lower jaw at all. This was a deathknight in the service the Arbiter, not a loaner from one of the other Deathlords like all the ones at the table.

With a large soulsteel guan dao, the abyssal struck hard at Speaker – who despite parrying the blow with Gift found himself forced to the ground simply by the might of the blow.

“Get me that weapon! It is mine!” the Deathlord howled once more, completely ignoring the battle on display above the table, the ghosts and constructs losing tactical coordination almost instantly as they just hovered in the air, awaiting orders – the Lookshyan gunners on the Skywolf and the other skyships shooting many of them out of the sky effortlessly.

Throwing Gift at his foe, the abyssal twirled its polearm and tangled Gift expertly in the rings on the backside of the guan dao before flinging Gift over to the Deathlord – but Speaker reached out with his essence and recalled Gift before the Barbate Arbiter could grab it. With a frustrated scowl the Arbiter cried out: “Kill him! I’ll have a monstrance ready for his body”

While he didn’t know what a monstrance was – then Speaker had no plans on letting the Arbiter do anything to his body. Being able to move fully, Speaker opted not to stay and fight, but to try to get away: Using his jumping charm to gain some distance, and Gift to harry the abyssal in a way that prevent giving immediate chase without opening one-self up to attack, Speaker leapt high over the Abyssal and the Arbiter, towards the only open door leading out of the war room – the same door he had come in via.

As he arched over the Arbiter, he saw that the Deathlord had begun casting some kind of necromantic spell – probably not a good thing to be around for when it was done – but that was when Gift came zipping back to him, its high-pitched internal essence engine puffing out a faint trail of steam and golden sparkles… which meant that Gift wasn’t messing with the Abyssal.

Looking down at where he was looking to land – the far end of the large table – Speaker saw, much to his own chagrin, that the Abyssal was simply standing there, guan dao simply pointed at him, waiting for Speaker to fall down and skewer himself on the large soulsteel polearm.

The sound was horrible. Having used his balancing charm to making himself spin on his way down, the guan dao cut at Speaker’s shield charm with an absolutely horrible screeching sound – like a thousand iron nails on just as many chalk boards. It was as if the edge of the guan dao was ripping at the very essence of the shield around Speaker with tiny claws and hooks.

The wet feeling in Speaker’s ears and the slight dulling of the noise hinted of bleeding, as he twisted aside from the polearm and stuck the landing thanks again to his balancing charm.

Trying to run past  the cloaked deathknight, Speaker quickly found himself tangled in rusty hooked chains that had shot out from the cloak… indeed, the cloak had been ripped away from the chain-shots, exposing the abyssal’s dark scalemail and thick green plate armor underneath, and a green hood, for of course the hood hadn’t been part of the cloak.

…well, with a head so disfigured and hideous, who would want to show that anyway?

Trapped by the chains, Speaker felt the abyssal beginning to ‘reel him in’ – not that it stopped him from using Gift, but that soulsteel scale-mail was more than what Gift could punch through any time soon, and Speaker didn’t have a steady enough footing to throw Gift any better right now.
It was then that – once more – the whole room shook. This time it shook very briefly, for then one of the walls exploded inwards, a thoroughly wrecked bone-strider coming through and falling over on its side amidst the rubble. A stream of noise and sound from the outside coursed in – the sound of battle, of essence canons blasting left and right, and of ghosts and undead things moaning and shrieking.

…and then Shimmer flew in, her warstrider-sized warform effortlessly pushing aside boulders and broken timber-bones. Her three eyes were ablaze with silvery light, and her bone-armor was scorched and cracked in many places, though she didn’t seem to be bleeding at the moment.

“Shimmer!” Speaker cried out – but just as Shimmer turned and was about to launch herself at Speaker and his foe did the Arbiter release his spell at Shimmer… or not – Speaker didn’t recall much about sorcery, but he could recognize a broken and miscast spell well enough to recognize one when he saw one, but then again miscast sorcery was often incredibly dangerous, and the torrent of necrotic essence struck Shimmer like obsidian lightning, dropping the massive Lunar instantly.

Seeing the smoldering Lunar tumble and fall right before him, her bone armor shattered where she had been struck – leaving a massive gaping wound – Speaker found himself at a loss for words… for he knew quite well how tough and powerful Shimmer was when in that form, and to drop her like that…

“You never could protect the mares you use to fight your battles” the abyssal chided Speaker, its voice distinctly male, and unmistakably similar to the Bodhisatva’s old voice: It sounded very much as if it spoke from beyond the grave.

Wait – insult or not, what in heaven’s name was this Abyssal even talking about? Was this some weird attempt at mind-games?

Reeling Speaker in and pressing the Solar up against Shimmer’s body – rubbing him into her bloody wounds – the Abyssal continued: “You always send them to fight your battles for you- This shouldn’t surprise you. First Ruby, now this one – for a healer, you are quite adept at making others die for you”

Ok now that… that, the comment about Ruby… how could this Abyssal have known this? Had Ruby’s ghost been under some kind of surveillance? Was that how team Jade Mole had been found? Still, if this Abyssal wanted to play the insult game…

“Oh sure – how about you throw shade at the realm or the Mouth of peace?  They’re the true experts when it comes to getting innocent ponies to march to their death” Speaker replied, taking some measure of solace in the expectation that Shimmer had hopefully pulled the same stunt as when she had been bisected by the Bodhisattva, which would explain why she looked dead but… hopefully… wasn’t.

In retrospect Speaker figured that he should probably have insulted the deathlords instead – with their use of ghost slaves and whatnot – but luckily the Abyssal really seemed to get pissed at the mention of the Mouth of peace, grabbing Speaker hard and throwing him to the floor with an angry roar.

The Barbate Arbiter laughed: “Oh he got you there… haha”

It was a malignant laugh – a cruel laugh, obviously hinting to Speaker that he had struck a nerve with the Abyssal. In that moment, as the Abyssal turned to give his master a… masked look? Speaker managed to twist himself around enough to get a good look of the chains holding him, which allowed him to use his disassembly charm to dissolve them into rusty vapors.

Free once more, Speaker leapt towards the giant hole in the wall. It pained him somewhat to leave Shimmer behind, but for the moment he had way more important things to do – he knew that this is what she would have wanted; Creation needed to be saved first, so no sense in getting captured again!

The Abyssal gave chase, shouting: “You’re not getting away this time! I almost had you before, you’re not getting out of this alive!”

The ‘outside’ of the war room was…. Well it wasn’t. Looking into the hole showed the war room and the coming Abyssal, but everything around that… wasn’t? And yet Speaker stood on that nothing, and it was as firm as the rock that made up the floor in the war room. Oh yes, the war room had been part of a veiled structure floating above – which of course also meant that Speaker couldn’t see the edge of the structure, and this didn’t look like a place that did much in railings.

A skyship zipped by, the marines on it looking rather perplexed the hole in nothing and Speaker standing at its edge – but none of that really had time to matter, as the Abyssal tackled Speaker and they both fell off the structure…

Falling, Speaker pushed the Abyssal away from himself, righting himself via his balance charm.

The Abyssal didn’t take kindly to this, flinging more rusty spine-chains at Speaker in attempts to catch him – but Speaker used Gift to deftly parry the incoming hooks. This only further angered the Abyssal: “You’re not getting away this time! I will be the one who kills you now!”

This struck Speaker as really odd – not just the ravings of a lunatic Abyssal – but… this pony clearly had some of… wait… he had mentioned Ruby as well? Could it be?

“Morning Dew?” Speaker shouted, the sounds coming from nearby Skyships battling flying ghosts and firing at the ground making for a lot of background noise.

For a brief moment the Abyssal seemed to hesitate – and in that moment of opportunity Speaker flung Gift at the Abyssal, striking and shattering the ivory mask that covered the Deathknight’s face. As the mask shards fell away from the onrushing air, the deaknight’s mutilated face, or what was left of it, was revealed.

Truly, it was as if a pony’s head had been placed on a chopping block and only the front third had been chopped off – it was disgusting in so many ways, and wrong in even more ways.

“Seriously, is that you Morning Dew?” Speaker asked again – both out of curiosity, but also… morbid curiosity? How could a unicorn become an Abyssal? Was that even possible?

These thoughts on Morning Dew – it made the changes, disfigurations and amputations done on the Abyssal all the more obvious: His tail, it had been removed… it was a strange pulsing plume of blood spilling from his rear, in a macabre display that now flailed in the wind and rained blood everywhere.

How on earth could a priest agree to be desecrated in such a way?

Distracted and perplexed by these thoughts, Speaker found himself on the defensive. The Abyssal was fighting a lot better than he had any right to, considering that they were both falling at terminal velocity.

Now, one of the problems with falling is that you tend to fall in a single straight line – and unless you can fly, then maneuvering once falling is not very easy. This makes you a very easy target, especially if being attacked by someone with a massive guan dao which has a really long reach – and while Speaker’s shield charms were able to shrug off some of the blows, then the abyssal was merciless, and managed to cut through the essence shield despite that with multiple blows, cutting Speaker over the chest and sides.

With his anesthetic charm then anything short of a fatal would didn’t really phase Speaker – and his bravery charm ensured that he didn’t fear death, or the fact that he was falling, or his foe who was trying to kill him – but still, the Solar was more than cognizant that if he didn’t come up with some kind of solution then he would likely go splat. To make it even worse, then Speaker could also feel that with every forceful caress of the razor edge of the goan do he was drained ever so slightly of his essence…

Throwing Gift, not to hit the abyssal, but to strike himself – to propel him away from his assailant – Speaker looked down at the ground. Soulsteel spires, dark stone obelisks and minor structures of pale wood – nothing that looked very nice to land on.

“Don’t you dare try to run away! It is my turn to gut you like a fish!” the deathknight howled.

Recalling the exact death of Morning Dew, that he was impaled on a stone spike, Speaker frowned: “Dew, you got impaled – not gutted – get your story straight”

“My name is not… that! Not anymore! I am The Certainty of Death and Endless Toil – and I will kill you!” the pony that was not Morning Dew anymore retorted, very angrily.

It occurred to Speaker that Certainty’s short fuse was an odd change from how Morning Dew had acted. This was not the calm, smug and calculating mastermind of a monk who had spent almost a century engineered a coup against the General Staff – a coup that would have worked if not for Speaker and the circle. Had death, or whatever other dark process by which a pony becomes a deathknight, taken his patience away?

Certainty didn’t seem to be in the mood to give Speaker time to ponder this – but as they were both plummeting to their death (or second death?) Speaker increasingly found it prudent to stop doing so, as the ground as getting closer and closer.

“Tell you what – seek me out in your next incarnation, and pray that the next bearer of your dark exaltation is a little less hotheaded. I have other things to do” Speaker noted with no small sense of self-satisfaction, igniting his ruby pinions.

As a large pair of wings of golden fire erupted from Speaker’s the pinions on his shoulders, the Solar’s falls very quickly began to halt. The Deathknight’s fall, not so much.

The things that Certainty shouted at Speaker as he fell out of earshot were not kind, nor were they terribly imaginative – something that for some reason bothered Speaker on some level: He had expected Morning Dew, even in this new degenerate state, to still be as intelligent and well-read as he had been while alive.

What Speaker hadn’t counted on was that the Barbate Arbiter had apparently gotten back in control of the flying necro-drones in the airspace above Deep Rot – and so moments later he was swarmed by disgusting things of brass, bone and sinew that simply latched on to him and weighed him down, piling on to him faster than Gift could cut them to pieces.

Still, even if he couldn’t move that much then his wings also burned the things, keeping them free to flap furiously – this slowed his descent, and between the ablative layer of flesh that were the limpet necro-drones and his own shield charms, then he landed relatively unscathed, suffering only minor cuts and bruises.

Of course, being on the ground inside Deep Rot meant that the legions of undead waiting to be sent out to fight against the Lookshyans were now coming at him… and the limpet drones were still preventing him from flying off, one of them had even barfed on his right-side pinion, fouling up the wing-emitter somehow.

This had of course been expected – with Speaker’s plan at the moment was simply to surrender again to buy himself more time – but what he hadn’t expected was that the ghosts and zombies attacking him were seemingly too dumb to understand a surrender, or maybe it was the noisy they were making?

“No, I said I surrender! The Barbate Arbiter will want me handed over to him” Speaker cried out once more as his undead captors clawed at him and his essence shield.

Mentioning the Deathlord seemed to have a strange effect – the gaggle of pony ghosts trying to rip him to shreds looked terrified, while the zombies that were surrounding everyone suddenly expressed a more sinister glare – they also pointed their spears at Speaker. Lovely.
A split second later, to the right of Speaker, the sound of bones snapping and zombies groaning as they tumbled into each other came out of nowhere – something was ripping through the zombies, and getting closer.

Still pinned, even though the ghosts had halted their attacks, Speaker found it impossible to free himself – but his attempts of twisting out of the grasp of the half-dozen ghosts holding on to him quickly stopped as the ghosts all suddenly… melted? They didn’t melt away from him, but melted around him, turning into shackles around him that groaned and sulked.

Revealed from behind the now chain-transformed ghosts stood the Certainty, though his suit of scale-mail armor was caked in blood and bone-splinters – whatever charms that had prevented his second death when the deathknight had impacted the ground, had clearly not protected the Certainty from actual physical harm, though he didn’t seem to be hindered by half of him having impacted the ground.

With a notably wobbly gait, not that it seemed to hinder him, the Certainty trotted up to Speaker. His ivory mask looked hastily reassembled and stuck together with slime, but that only made him look all the more menacing: “I told you… I will be the one to kill you”

Raising his guan dao to deal a killing blow, Speaker looked around franticly for a way out. Gift was… stuck… in a zombie, great – and Homage? Maybe? But would he even be able to parry such a decisive blow?

It turned out to be a moot point – as suddenly the Barbate Arbiter’s voice boomed out: “Stay your blade! I want his spirit broken before you break his body”

The ghosts and zombies parted as if by magic, abiding by the Deathlord’s unspoken commands. How the Deathlord had come down from his invisible perch so quickly was not something Speaker could tell.

Pulling him up with the blood-chains from his back, the Certainty nodded and brought Speaker with him as they followed the Deathlord’s floating corpus towards the outer wall of Deep Rot.

> Chapter 105: Reborn
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Getting to the outer walls of Deep Rot was not as easy as one might think, especially when hauling around a captive by blood-chains that sprung from your back. The bombardment from the skyships was still ongoing, but from what Speaker could tell then Deep Rot had been stocked with generous amounts of materials for repairs – and tireless undead work crews were throwing themselves fanatically into any breach opened up by the bombardment. The speed at which these repairs were happening was actually quite impressive – were the ghosts and zombies doing the work being controlled remotely, or were they simply trained that well?

This didn’t mean that moving from cover to cover while being bombarded by essence artillery was any less perilous. The Deathlord known as the Barbate Arbiter seemed to feel this as well, to which end he at one point signaled for his Deathknight The Certainty of Death and Endless Toil to halt.

Speaker, hanging upside down, bound by ghost-chains, looked around. There wasn’t much to see: A nearby stockpile of large slabs of mummified flesh and rope-like conduits made of woven sinew, was being distributed to zombie work crews and their ghostly foremen by hideous necromantic constructs with strange limbs that seemed custom made for slab-lifting.

The sudden dimming of the ambient light, as the Barbate Arbiter’s necromancy drew in light and twisted it into something… else… was an unsettling experience, but that paled in comparison to when the Deathlord unleashed the spell, blasting one the skyremes out of existence, and damaging another.

Billowing smoke and raining down debris, the damaged skyreme made a hard turn to avoid crashing inside Deep Rot’s walls, including 
launching signal flares to call for assistance. Seeing the green and purple flares explode into colored smoke-clouds raised Speaker’s spirit: It meant that not everyone on the ship was dead from the dark sorcery that had struck it.

As the Barbate Arbiter prepared for a second volley, shaping huge amounts of necrotic essence into something far worse, the Certainty suggested: “Aim for the skywolf – if you destroy their flagship their morale will falter”

The haughty tone, the spite – Speaker was sure that the Certainty only suggested that in order to fuck with Speaker. Would the Deathlord’s attack be enough to penetrate the jadesteel armor of the giant orca-shaped skyreme battleship? What the Certainty had said wasn’t exactly wrong: Much of Lookshy’s morale and sense of superiority rested on them having the demonstratively best weapons, gear, armor and magical devices to use in battle – to be outclassed in terms of sorcery liked that would indeed strike a great blow against Lookshyan morale.

As Speaker watched the Barbate Arbiter shape another bolt of void-fueled death in un-existence he saw the Skywolf come about and make a beeline towards the artillery position, in roughly the same direction as the damaged skyreme – it was clearly trying to get away from whatever was shooting down skyships.

The Certainty stood by quietly and observed his master – well, as quietly as was possible: The damage from his fall was painfully obvious, for his mask had been destroyed in the fall and stuck back together crudely, plus the fact that most of the Certainty’s left side had been completely crushed from impacting the ground was quite easy to spot – and yet… by some dark magic or necromantic charms then such grievous wounds didn’t do to anything  – the damaged parts of the Deathknight being held together with a jagged web of purple and dark essence. Hmmm, if that essence could be disrupted…

The Deathlord unleashed his magic, which was difficult to describe for it was like a crack in reality filled with oblivion that spread – speeding up to the enormous blue jadesteel orca that was the Skywolf. To even try to process such a sight of should-not-be was distressingly enervating.

As the void-crack shot towards the Skywolf like lightning a multicolored haze burst from several ports in the skyship. The mist quickly coalesced into a brightly shimmering cloud of blue, white, red, green and black colors all vying to be the color most obvious… Speaker had no clue was this was – for he had never seen Lookshyan spell defenses geared towards shielding against anathema sorcery.

As the un-lightning struck the cloud its function instantly became obvious, for the cloud swallowed the spell and began to darken, followed by heavy rain and thunder… and then the Skywolf shot out of the cloud, leaving the hostile spell behind to run its course as the elemental thundercloud bled the power in the spell off into thunder and rain, though drinking that rain should probably not be attempted.

Speaker cheered, to which the Certainty gave him a powerful and painful shake – the Arbiter also turned to shoot Speaker a furious glare: “What was that?”

“Beats me, but I think it worked” Speaker said, smiling with defiant glee.

His dark eye-pits seemed to… spread? It was if the darkness within them was spilling out like tiny clawed insect legs of darkness trying to grab prey. Whatever the Bodhisattva wanted to do say or do to follow up his question was quickly cut short: The Skywolf’s artillery crews had zero’d in on the trio down on the ground – as evident by things starting to blow up around them via lances of elemental essence.

Using swift but arcane gestures the Deathlord had the slabs of mummified flesh fly up and over the three – each several yards across, which made Speaker both question and despair at whatever source such huge wads of muscle had been drawn from – and under that cover they made it to one of the blockhouses along the wall around Deep Rot, as the Skywolf executed its fighting retreat along with the rest of the skyship fleet.

With the skyreme bombardment over, the Barbate Arbiter and the Certainty took a moment to compose themselves – in the case of the Certainty very literally, as the Barbate Arbiter stripped half a dozen zombies from the blockhouse garrison and used the parts to fix the Certainty. This process took quite a while, though sensing time in the underworld was difficult.

“Did you hope that Skywolf’s fire would consume us all? Foolish – Deep Rot protects me. I cannot be destroyed as long as this manse stands” The Arbiter gloated, his mouth dripping with ectoplasmic slime. In fact, all of the open sores and wounds on the Arbiter’s bloated form had started to leak, as the Deathlord floated further up into the air, revealing the truly grotesque hole underneath him: His bloated corpus was after all in the image of only the front half of pony. So many dangly bits. Ewww.

Suddenly the Deathlord’s form caved in – as if it deflated in an instant – and from the hole underneath shot out a blood-soaked pony, who landed right next to Speaker.

Looking up, the Arbiter in his new pony-sized form, stretched a bit – twisting his head and limbs around just a little too much… it was obvious that this was a dead body, a corpse possessed by a ghost… and yet it looked frightfully familiar: “There we go – fitting through the doors here is much easier this way”

With but a gesture, the Arbiter had clothes form around him. Necrotic essence twisted and broke into cloth spun of gold and alabaster, impossibly beautiful. Speaker recognized it as first age fashion.

“Are you a ghost from the first age? From the primordial war? Or later on?” Speaker wondered. His fearlessness charm made it impossible to panic – and considering how otherwise hopeless his situation looked, then he figured he might as well try to learn something before he was killed.

The Barbate Arbiter looked briefly at the Certainty, then he laughed: “You haven’t figured it out yet? You poor fool….”

“I’ve had my suspicions, but getting reliable information on the origins of the Deathlords is a little tricky. Not even Sully could dig anything up while down here” Speaker mused, not even noticing that he was being flipped right side up or put down on the ground.

New chains of soulsteel wrapped themselves around Speaker – and the Arbiter led the Solar and the Deathknight out to a balcony looking out over the battlefield wasteland beyond the walls. Ok, it wasn’t really a balcony… it was a mishmash of zombies that had tangled themselves together, like army ants forming a bridge, only here they were forming a balcony, complete with nice stone tiles for the floor and neat railings made of legs. As the Barbate Arbiter began casting another spell, the Certainty yanked on Speaker, forcing him to look towards the artillery position:

“Behold as your allies falter – you may have brought down the void-shield, but the walls were never breached, and the End Time Relay will engage as planned” The Certainty gloated, his voice just as ghostly and beyond-the-grave as the Bodhisattva’s had once been.

Looking at the battlefield in the dimming light of the underworld evening, seeing four giant magi-mechanical jadesteel ponies thundering through the sea of zombies to catch the falling skyreme, with the Skywolf zipping past overheard , Speaker shrugged: “To be frank, then I don’t see this as that much of a loss. Most of the plan has worked perfectly so far – artillery position is still there, shield is down, and the ships can do another run”

The Certainty looked… confused and frustrated... as much as a pony with no face or front part of his skull could look surprised – maybe he was just annoyed that Speaker wasn’t wilting from despair: “They have achieved nothing but leaving their dead to join our ranks – the unicorns you arrived here with have already joined our ranks in undeath. We didn’t even have to remove them from their armor”

Having helped suit up the rangers of team Jade Mole Speaker found that line very dubious: “You mean you couldn’t get the armor seals up and just reanimated their corpses, instead of using them to suit up some deathknights? I’ll also go ahead and assume that the wards that they had inside worked in preventing nephracks from possessing their bodies”

The Certainty paused for a moment, which was all Speaker needed to know for him to deduce that he had struck a nerve – but before he could continue taunting the Abyssal he was interrupted by the Arbiter:

“Be quiet – the Solar is baiting you, fool. Now bring him here: I will have my prize” the Arbiter stated with a manner-of-factual schadenfreude in his tone that genuinely disturbed Speaker.

With Gift still stuck in a zombie gods-know-where, Speaker had very few options left. He remained silent as the Arbiter released the spell he had been building: A vortex formed before him, in which zombies threw chunks of soulsteel and a little bit of orichalcum… and then several dozen skeletons marched mindlessly into it.

As the swirl coalesced into a single form, a sarcophagus revealed itself: Etched in spider-like runes and radiating a general feeling of “This should not be”, it made Speaker feel exceedingly happy about his charm which rendered him fearless. A more interesting detail that Speaker noted was that the Arbiter actually looked exhausted, tired even, after having cast this spell – was this sarcophagus that powerful? A single magical torture device or holding cell requiring that much essence? That didn’t bode well.

Without words, ceremony or boasting the Arbiter made a swift gesture: the chains that held Speaker quickly gravitated towards the hideous sarcophagus which opened its dark maw – but Speaker simply spread out his legs, so he couldn’t fit… because that black void from within that thing, it didn’t scare him, but sure as hell didn’t make him want to go in there either. There were things moving about in within the dark, glinting ever so slightly in the waning light.

Dropping Speaker down before the sarcophagus, the Arbiter let out an annoyed grunt: “Certainty, get him in there”

The charm-blocking chains around Speaker’s legs faded away in an instant, and Certainty quickly began to close his distance to Speaker, but the Solar chose not to focus on the Abyssal. Dropping into a martial stance, but facing the sarcophagus, Speaker called from elsewhere his other gyroscopic chakram: Homage.

The burnished gold of the orichalcum shell, etched with infinitely regressing runic patterns, made the chakram gleam from the light of Speaker’s caste mark. Activating the weapon, making the essence beam edge manifest, Speaker smirked briefly as he threw it with all his might into the sarcophagus.

The Barbate Arbiter barely had time to register this sudden development – at first thinking nothing of the disc, but as the beam edge activate the Deathlord recoiled in horror, and barely managed to cry out for Certainty to get the weapon – but it was too late: The chakram activated the sarcophagus. It slammed shut with great force, but not for long.

The Certainty tackled Speaker, pummeling him with furious blows – leaving Speaker a bloody mess as his shield charms were not up – but the damage was done, or being done… inside the sarcophagus.

“No, the monstrance – damn this thing! Open up!” The Arbiter groaned furiously through clenched teeth, pounding fruitlessly on the soulsteel sarcophagus.

It was then that the Sarcophagus began to rumble, parts of it beginning to glow from heat exposure. The Arbiter barely had time to get into cover behind the Certainty before the monstrance’s top half snapped off, Homage having melted the thing in half from within thanks to its beam-edge. As the seals of the sarcophagus broke, a mighty gust of wind rushed towards it, the oblivion inside absorbing everything around it.

Homage instantly zipped over to Speaker, who wasn’t slow to use the weapon to make a few choice swipes at the Certainty to fend him off.
Staggering up on his hooves, Speaker looked out over the wall. There was a very long way down, and he wasn’t in good shape by any stretch of the imagination – so just jumping off wasn’t an option, and time was running out just the same.

The Certainty and the Arbiter weren’t looking pleased – and began to advance on Speaker…

“Ok, I’ve changed my mind… you can kill him now – but at least make it messy” The arbiter commanded bitterly, stepping away while the Certainty advanced to engage Speaker.

Steeling himself, which wasn’t easy when you’re so beat up, Speaker readied Homage and stood ready to take whatever the Certainty was going to do.

The attack didn’t come… instead the image of the Certainty faded in misty shadows and crimson dust, and the next thing Speaker knew the Certainty was biting shadowfangs into his neck, draining him of essence at a prodigious rate.

A few seconds later Speaker was released – and he dropped to the ground with a feeling of spiritual emptiness inside him… completely drained of essence. The clattering sound of metal on stone as Homage hit the ground was what terrified Speaker the most: The Chakram had deactivated.

Drained of spiritual strength, Speaker found himself unable to get up. Maybe the Certainty had drained him of more than just essence? He didn’t feel dissy… but he was hurting… oh bother, had he been drained so much that his anesthetic charm had stopped working? …oww, yes that seemed the case. Even his ears hurt, dulling his hearing.

Hooves gathered around him, some skeletal, some wreathed in tightly wound embalmed flesh, some in soulsteel armor – one pair left bloody prints where it walked, the Barbate Arbiter.

T’was difficult to stay awake. Speaker felt cold for the first time in the underworld, his elemental immunity charm having ceased to work alone with the rest of his charms. He still felt Homage, so the attunement there was still good – that meant that the hearthstone socketed into it should be feeding him new essence from Creation… but he wasn’t feeling it. Was it some fluke of the underworld? The proximity to Deep Rot?
Something was picking him up… that couldn’t be good… then he was dropped again, very abruptly – what the hay? There was a dull sound of many hooves scrambling around him.

It was then, at that dim moment as the cold and alluring grasp of sleep clawed at Speaker’s mind, that he heard it. Oh such heavenly joy… and blinding fucking light good fucking grief that shit stings!

The dark evening sky above Deep Rot, illuminated dimly by the night-time ‘star light’ of the Calendar of Setesh, and the blood-red image of the moon in the underwold, was suddenly split. A searing burst of light had pierced the veil between Creation and the Underworld, opening up a rift through which heavenly music poured, like sweet milk and honey to the ears.

Momentarily invigorated by this sonic bliss, Speaker staggered up,  struggling to get a proper footing… oh, he was bleeding… no wonder the stone tiles were slick.

Looking around, Speaker found himself strangely alone on the balcony, though he was closer to the door than he remembered from before the Certainty had drained him. A quick few glances around him revealed that Homage was gone – but again, so was everyone else – and the door leading from the balcony to inside the wall was closed!?

Turning to the heavenly music, Speaker saw that it was coming from a big glowing cloud high above the Lookshyan artillery position. Could it be Sunrise? It seemed to be descending upon the artillery position.

As Speaker’s gaze fell from the heavens the ground, Speaker saw the strangest of things: The ocean of undead that were shying away the cloud… indeed, it seemed that legions of ghosts and zombies were running away… back towards Deep Rot… back towards him… oh bother.
The approaching tide of zombies and ghosts rose, pushed upwards by the many giant necromantic constructs thundering along the ground, pushing everything in front of them, grinding the things that did not move out of the way into paste. The tidal wave rose and seemed poised to crash into the wall of Deep rot…

Drawing what he feared to be his last breath, Speaker weakly steeled himself and prepared to meet his death once… it hadn’t been the first time he’d done it on this day – but there really didn’t seem to be an out this time. Then the tidal-wave of undeath before Speaker exploded into a shower of cold blood, hot shattered bits of armor and bone splinters: A barrage from the Lookshyans had hit its mark.

The wave, now broken, breached just below the balcony. It was a twisted mess of ghosts and zombies mushed together – none of them needed to breathe, so they weren’t suffocating, though the ones at the bottom were most likely getting crushed. On the plus side then the seemingly endless pile of animated corpses and semi-transparent ghosts was close enough to the balcony that Speaker could jump down on them…

With a quiet and quick Prayer to Celestia, Speaker galloped to the edge of the balcony and leap with all his might, aiming for a ‘patch’ of zombie that looked relatively flat and even…  a wayward flesh slab maybe? Who knew, who cared.

Maybe it was the hearthstone in Homage, maybe it was just dumb luck, but as he leapt Speaker felt just the tiniest of second wind within, granting him enough essence to push two charms: His balancing charm which made for a safe landing and his jumping charm, which allowed him to jump further on at the same instant.

Leaping from zombie head to zombie head, crushing some, denting some, annoying others, Speaker made good speed over the undead. 

Many a ghost shrieked at him, howling obscenities that hadn’t been heard in Creation since the first age, but only a small number had any way of stopping Speaker – and the few in any condition to fight couldn’t keep up, since Speaker wasn’t staying to trade blows.

The music became louder as Speaker got closer to the artillery position – oh such joy it was to listen. Every yard closer another instrument became audible, another celestial cymbal, a divine drum, another choir of angelic voices. Speaker wept as he approached.

Clearing the last of the undead, the rear-most still trying desperately to flee from the music… indeed those closest seemed to be burning with white fire that flickered to the tune of the music… oh yes, this was definitely Sunrise.

In the last half mile to the artillery position Speaker passed many an overrun defensive position. Charred stakes caked in the ashes  of what had been zombies, scattered remains of salt lines… and fallen ponies.

The sight of friendly fallen, brothers and sisters in arms, sons and daughters of Lookshy – it took from Speaker his second wind. Ceasing his bounding leaps, Speaker felt his body ache again. Slowly moving from dead to dead, Speaker collected ear-marks from each of them, the tiny metal plate stamped with each soldier’s number, hidden well away under their helmets. The chances that there would be time to collect their bodies was minimal… at least they had all hopefully eaten the thingy from Sully that prevented them from rising as ghosts.

Moving closer to the artillery position he heard a noise – a groan. Quickly homing in on the sound, Speaker found an old legionnaire just barely clinging on to life. Thanks to the wondrous sanitary conditions of the underworld most of the zombie bites on the poor soul had already festered and gone partially necrotic – Speaker could fix him, he knew that, but he needed essence!

“You look like shit sir” the old stallion groaned, as Speaker dragged himself along with the wounded soldier on his back.

“…and you smell like shit” Speaker retorted, having noted the exceedingly pungent stench of the stallion.

Apparently the undead had bombarded the legionary’s position with literal shit bombs, scattering the salt lines and opening up for a war-ghost charge. Made perfect sense really – oh well, Lookshy’s strategoi would have to figure out a defense against that on their own.

At the outermost fortification Speaker dropped off his patient, who was carried off to an infirmary, and then he too dropped to the ground, exhausted in both a physical and spiritual sense.

The hard but familiar feeling of the tough and unforgiving fabric of a Lookshyan stretcher greeted Speaker as he woke up. Oh how many naps and he had taken on stretchers like this back in the days… and while he ached, then it didn’t really hurt that much – it seemed as if most of his wounds had been tended to and were healing… hmm, that would have meant at least an hour of surgery and then a full night’s sleep. The amount of light shining in from outside the tent confirmed this - it looked to be morning.

As he stirred several voices quickly rang out, alerting others that Speaker had woken up. Within moments Speaker found himself surrounded: The Battleaxe, Taimyo Karal Linseed, a couple other officers and… Sunrise!

“Hey Sunrise – good to see you” Speaker said tentatively, not wanting to overexert himself just yet until he knew exactly how much he had recovered.

As it turned out, then Speaker needn’t worry – though he didn’t get any time to figure that out on his own, for an orderly flipped the stretcher and left Speaker in a heap on the ground.

Getting up, Speaker looked around while everyone else tried not to laugh. Spotting the Doctor in charge, Speaker shouted “Hey what’s the big idea?”

“You told me yourself that recovered patients shouldn’t be allowed to take up space” the doctor, an old mare who ‘only’ looked twenty or so years younger than Speaker, said as she turned to face her accuser.

Recognizing the mare as one of the many medical students who had worked and studied under him back when he had served the legion, Speaker smirked: “True, I did teach you everything I knew”

“Not true – if what I’m hearing out you doing is true, then you’ve been holding out on me” the doctor barked, sounding rather displeased – but her smile showed her statement to be friendly banter.

“Enough – Speaker, we need to know what you saw in there” Taimyo Linseed commanded.

In another tent, Speaker, Sunrise, some officers, the Battleaxe and Taimyo Linseed conferred. Speaker detailed that he had confirmed that the veiled structure at least three hundred yards above the central pit of Deep Rot housed the controls of the place, and that it also likely housed the End Time Relay. He also confirmed the presence of the Barbate Arbiter: “…last I saw him he had shapeshifted to look like me, only without the uniform and perpetually drenched in blood, wearing white and golden robes”

With great sorrow Speaker also reported that Shimmer was either dead or captured – and as was the rest of Team Jade Mole, plus he had lost Gift and Homage.

“Can’t you recall them through elsewhere?” Sunrise asked.

Reaching out with his mind, Speaker felt that Gift was being held back. With Homage it actually worked, but that still meant that Autochton’s Gift was in the hooves of the undead. Shaking his head, he noted: “No dice on Gift – but I can still sense it – so I can find my way to it” 

“It will likely be used to lure you into a trap – and what was that sarcophagus they tried to get you into? A torture device?” The Battleaxe noted grimly.

A rather unassuming stallion with a brown piped up: “Sounds like they had a monstrance of celestial portion ready for you – that’s for tormenting and converting Solars into Abyssals”

The stallion, with eyes of the five colors of jade, introduced himself as ‘Lee, Bodhisattva of the Third Breath’.

Speaker and Sunrise greeted their old friend kindly, congratulating him on the completion of his quest. Heath Rose, having apparently hidden herself in the shadows, also stepped forth and expressed her appreciation: “Impressive – your solar exaltation tied you back into the loop of fate… very interesting”

The unicorns present found the sudden appearance of two uninvited ponies into the officer tent a little more annoying – but two caste mark flashes later and they were a bit more cooperative, especially once Speaker explained that Lee was the very same Bodhisatva that some of them had met back in Lookshy, only now alive and a Solar.

“Incredible – so your quest to come back to life paid off” The Battleaxe noted, having met the Bodhisattva previous during the planning phase of the campaign into the underworld.

Nodding, Lee stepped up to the planning table: “After a fashion – I was never dead to begin with, just really close it. The real trick was not dying the moment I took my third breath. Any-who, I just got here – what’s Deep Rot’s status?”

Between Speaker’s report on what he had seen of the dread manse’s inner workings and what the various skyship crews had observed then it seemed that very little progress had been made – but at the same time then the miasma shield was still down, so the bombardment into the manse proper was still ongoing, even if it was largely ineffective.

“How long can you keep the bombardment up?” Sunrise asked, looking intently at the illusion Speaker had conjured of Deep Rot.

Taimyo Linseed reported that most of the essence artillery was fueled directly by hearthstones – so they could keep going as long as their lenses didn’t crack, and they plenty of spares of those thanks to Speaker: “The implosion bows and lighting ballistae have enough ammunition for two more days of sustained firing, if you factor in downtime for period repair and maintenance – the issue is more food and morale”

Indeed, a siege with no results was rarely a fun thing to be part of – even more so when in very hostile territory. It was also proving surprisingly difficult to secure the route back to the Mourning Field, as undead raiding parties were almost constantly harrying the fortifications set up along the route. The Battleaxe noted: “We can hold it just fine for the time being – but if the route collapses we likely won’t be informed about that until it’s too late to do anything about it”

The real problem about the exit route collapsing was if enemy forces moved into position to intercept – a couple of ballistae firing bolts fitted with chains tied to something heavy enough could easily root a skyship, plus the hulking necromantic creations that the Deathlords seemed to favor using would probably be able to take such chains and then pull skyships down to the ground…

“That’s not the real issue though – our biggest problem is the lack of the heroism-pills. Pretty much every unit used theirs during this first engagement. Supplies are coming in from Creation, but resupply is first scheduled to come in about four hours – if the undead sally out before that…” the quartermaster noted in a very worried tone.

Linseed nodded: “Ya, even I used mine – those Deathknights… when they reveal their anima… I’ve never seen anything so terrifying”

“Gasing into a soul touched by oblivion isn’t pretty – but I think I can help with that. I can lead your troops. I know a fearlessness charm similar to the one Speaker uses, plus I was originally trained to lead the Barbate Arbiter’s forces so I know how they fight” Lee offered, the unicorns looking just a tad apprehensive about handing over their defenses to a still relatively unknown party.

It took a bit of convincing, but ultimately Lee was given command of the biggest frontline unit in the central outer perimeter, the unit meant to take the biggest brunt of any direct undead counter attacks, to which Lee left to strategize with the officers now under his command.

Sunrise took her turn to explain her reappearance, explaining that thanks to Heath Rose she had assembled a celestial orchestra to amplify her undead-smiting singing, as well to ‘back her up’ as shw would perform the martial arts she had been taught while in Yu-Shan: Silver-tongued Nightengale Style.

Linseed had apparently heard of the style, but never seen it performed with spirits from heaven to provide the tunes for it…

Speaker also noted it would have been real nice if Linseed had brought that Soul-Breaker Orb along to just toss into the manse – it would end all the broken souls slaved to the place, which would probably break the manse quite spectacularly.

“We talked about that before we sallied out – doing so would make it impossible to recover the orb. It is too valuable when there are less costly ways to destroying the manse” The Battleaxe retorted, sounding confident in the ability of her troops.

The new strategy that Linseed and the Battleaxe were thinking up involved placing some skyships halfway between Deep Rot and the fortified position, to spot over the manse walls so they could guide the artillery fire more effectively. Under most circumstances this would work – but Speaker had seen how quickly things got repaired inside Deep Rot’s walls: “They’re probably reinforcing and resupplying the place via underground tunnels”

…but the two Taimyo had taken this into account: They were planning on trying to repeatedly fire on the same targets, to first damage a spot, then take out the repair crews that would swarm the place. They seemed to have accepted that the siege would last more than a few hours. To this end Speaker’s new role would be to sneak in and mark targets using his anima and do on-site sabotage, with the skyships then relaying that target information via messenger spells.

This sounded better, but Speaker still needed several hours to regain his strength and for his to fully respire a new pool of essence. The commanders understood: Most of the unicorns needed time to recharge as well before the next push as they were all depending purely on hearthstones for that, though most of the artillery was continuing the barrage without pause.

Leaving the officer’s tent with Sunrise, Speaker found Lee and Cash outside talking.

“Precious – did he complain when you tossed him out?” Cash asked, sounding quite bemused.

Lee, the Bodhisattva of the third breath, shrugged: “In very unkind terms – but when I showed the few ponies among the peasants who could read how the mayor had been cooking the books on tax collections they shut up him for good”

Seeing Speaker, and apparently also Heath Rose, emerge, Lee turned to properly greet his old friend: “Speaker, good to see you”

A bit of chit chat ensued – introducing Heath Rose to Lee, though with the usual warning that Lee would likely forget her once the Sidereal was out of sight. Sullen Hoof showed up shortly later, with Cash regaling about how Sully had taken down several large necromantic constructs in battle: “The way he struck at their flesh… it rippled – I’ve never seen anything like it”

“I just tenderized them enough for the ground troops to hack them apart” Sullen Hoof humbly noted.

Eyeing up newly ‘re-exalted’ Dawn-caste Solar, Cash put an almost brotherly hoof on Lee’s shoulder: “Say, how would you like to meet some of your old comrades?”

“My old what?” Lee say, brows furrowed with no small amount of worry and apprehension.

Cash smiled incredibly smugly and glanced at Sully: “We took prisoners…”

> Chapter 106: The Last Moments of Peace
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

As the circle and Lee trotted to the stockade where the prisoners were being held they discussed the strategies of the Deathlords:

“They sent out the zombies and skeletons in swarms – and individually they’re lousy fighters, but they’re amazing shock troops. They just throw themselves at you, try to pin you down in groups and then rip into you once you’re down” Cash noted, sounding oddly non-plus’d about such a strategy.

“Did they get to you?” Speaker wondered, looking at Cash to check for wounds – but there was nothing but minor cuts and scrapes to see.
Cash snorted: “No, it’s the waste. These things, the zombies, the skeletons… you’ve seen it yourself – you said that these things are really good laborers. They’ll lift anything that isn’t so heavy that it’ll break their limb and they’ll work until they rot or are ground to dust – using them as shock troops is a waste. We could rebuild Creation to its First Age glory with that kind of labor-force”

Lee found Cash’s indignation hilarious: “You should have a chat with the Silver Prince – he’d love a Solar with your attitude”
Being compared to a Deathlord wasn’t exactly flattering, but at this point they had arrived at the stockade…

“Do you really think that your redemption will convince any of them to betray their Deathlord masters?” Sunrise inquired with some apprehension .

Lee shrugged, peering into the stockade with its many pony-sized steel cages: The Deathknights captured were being held with those essence-binding shackles, but even then many of them were struggling and thrashing about: “Celestial exaltation is granted to those who show potential for greatness… and not even Celestia herself can forcibly exalt anyone – the black exaltation are given personally by the Deathlords to those they simply think will be useful… not all of them have the potential to be great, only to be killers, or tools”

“That didn’t answer the question” Sullen Hoof said, tapping the ground impatiently.

Lee turned from the stockade while Cash negotiated the circle’s entry: “Even if we talk them into redeeming themselves then very few of them will likely be able to keep that solar essence… they’ll simply die as mortals as the purified exaltation leaves them”

“What if that happened to you?” Speaker wondered.

Looking towards the blood-red moon of the underworld: “Then I would have died happily as a mortal, safe in the knowledge that my soul was not damned to eternal torment”

“If nothing else then that gives us a bargaining chip with them” Cash quickly stated, gesturing for the circle to enter – the guards having opened up for them.

From the battle the seventh legion had captured eight Deathknights with the help of Cash and Sully, at the cost dozens of unicorns and hundreds of mortals. The guards in the stockade did not look happy to be watching over creatures that had killed so many of their own…
“Chosen of the abyss – hear me!” Lee roared, as only a chosen of Dawn could.

Leaping up on a crate, Lee spun around to address all of the captive Deathknights: “You may think you do not know me – but trust me, you have all heard my title. I was once the Bodhisattva of Resurgent Misery and Lost Causes”

Hearing that title caused most of the Deathknights to at least perk up and turn an ear towards Lee – though Cash and Sully noted that the Deathknights who still ignored him were the ones with whole bodies, the ones that hadn’t undergone the face-removing ritual.

“I spoke with kind souls in Stygia, and consulted the very god of exaltation in Yu-Shan. I quested to each of the five elemental poles and I even summoned an untouched primordial and gained a new body… it was not easy, but if you dare to chose for yourselves, and reject the fear through which the Deathlords bind you, then you too can be free and have a shot at becoming a Solar” Lee orated, putting forward a bold case to his former comrades in arms.

The quiet that followed Lee’s speech hinted of much silent deliberation. Speaker recalled well how the then Bodhisattva had told of the eternal punishment that awaited dead Abyssals: Their tainted souls would circle oblivion, forever to be tormented by the Neverborn for having failed them. Such a dreadful punishment to keep the Deathknights in line… but at the same time then the then Bodhisattva had known that failing his quest before it ended would likely have resulted in just as bad a punishment.

Suddenly a dense fog arose around the steel cages. Quickly looking around to see where it came from, Speaker saw that it was a legion sorcerer casting it. The unicorn, a mare in red First field force robes, approached the circle: “The fog is sound-proof. We use this to let prisoners think in peace without influencing one another – I can still see and hear through it… we already have two calling out that they’re willing to talk”

Lee and the unicorn entered the fog, leaving the circle behind.

“Are you hungry? You haven’t had anything to eat since you woke up” Sullen Hoof asked Speaker casually, sounding a bit bored.
Speaker nodded and was about to say something to the effect of “Yes, I could use a bite” but a messenger came running from the officer tent calling for the circle. Sullen Hoof said he’d meet the circle there with something to eat.
Back at the officer tent it seemed that the Taimyo had cooked up a new strategy and needed to fill the circle in on their roles:

“Phase one will be the skyships approaching overhead, through the hole in the shield dome, and help the artillery target their volleys. Once the artillery has found something good to pummel, and done so enough to cause essence flow disruptions in the manse, we enter phase two” The battleaxe explained, gesturing forcefully over a newly made map of the battlefield. 

Listening intently, the circle awaited instructions on where and when they were to be deployed as Taimyo Linseed explained phase two: “Once the manse has been damaged the transport ships loaded with salt will dump their cargo over the manse, locking down the ghosts commanding the zombie and skeleton repair crews. This should disrupt the repairs and their internal communications, since they seem to be relying on ghost messengers, and allow for Team Jade Mole to deploy directly from Sunrise’s cloud down onto one of the damaged parts of the manse and do some proper irrevocable damage”

Speaker nodded, as Cash spoke up: “Sounds reasonable – but about me, Sully and Sunrise?”

Linseed threw Sully a quick glance, as the orichalcum-helmeted pony handed Speaker a sandwich: “Speaker, Sullen Hoof and Heath Rose is now on team Jade Mole, since the debriefings from the rest of the team indicates that the Barbate Arbiter’s forces have orders to capture 
Speaker – so he will need more backup.  Cash Charmer, you will join up with Lee and work your demoralizing charms on enemy officers like before to taunt them into duels and then capture”

Finally, Sunrise was instructed to move her cloud of music and undead-smiting along over team Jade Mole, to give them cover and space to move. Once team Jade Mole was inside the walls Sunrise was to move her cloud up to keep the skyships clear of ghostly fliers.

“Sounds good – what’s the plan when all this goes tits up?” Cash noted with veiled snark.
The two Taimyo and their half dozen advisors all shot Cash dirty looks, but Cash kept up his expectant gaze.

"We know that the enemy possesses sorcery that can shoot skyships – but now we know to look for it. That kind of sorcery would take time to shape out of essence, and build-ups like that can be detected and disrupted” the Battleaxe stated firmly, sounding confident and defiant in her faith in her troops.

Speaker gestured that he had something to say. Linseed nodded at him. “I can already tell you where to fire the artillery: The veiled central controls of the manse, hovering above the pit”

The two Taimyo quickly agreed that targeting such a location would be perfect. Speaker then added: “I also think it would be wise to add a layer of subterfuge here. If you can get me some gold, quartz, and dark iron I can make a mock Soul-breaker Orb – if we bring that into the manse it might trick some of the forces lent to the Barbate Arbiter to flee – I already hinted to the Deathlord that we had one brought here, so it shouldn’t be a difficult sell”

Everyone agreed that this was a great idea – but the quartermaster quickly pointed out that the only crystal anything they had spares of were crystal lenses for the essence cannon. Speaker figured he could tarnish a clear lens and mould it into shape – but the dark iron and gold… to mimick the soulsteel and orichalcum components, well… there was plenty of steel which could be tarnished and darkened, but gold?

“I believe I can get you some gold from my backup singers – though we’ll have to replace it once we’re done” Sunrise said calmly, her eyes distant as she thought of every spirit and godling in her ensemble.

With everyone satisfied Taimyo Linseed stated that operations were scheduled to begin once the skyship with supplies arrived from Creation in a few hours.

Speaker and the Quartermaster quickly galloped off to the makeshift smithies set up to maintain the weapons of the many legionaires. Sunrise arrived shortly thereafter with a  spirit that sported a lush golden mane… who didn’t look all too happy, though with a face like a bird carved in stone that wasn’t easy to tell.

With the dummy Soul-Breaker Orb ready and hidden elsewhere, and Sullen Hoof having ensured that everyone was well-fed, it became a waiting game for the supply skyship.

Quickly bored of waiting, Sullen Hoof scaled the tallest watch-tower, one wrought of locally sourced pale ghost-wood, to act as look-out, though the unicorns up in the tower weren’t all that keen on the company.

The shadows building over Deep Rot were quite worrying, and the circle worried about what was happening to Shimmer – for as Speaker reported, then she was likely playing dead and hibernating after having been grievously wounded… if wasn’t just dead.

That Speaker wasn’t any more worried for Shimmer was what Cash and Sunrise found more troubling though. Out of earshot of Speaker Cash explained that the heightened care and commitment for Creation’s survival that he had put into Speaker earlier might be overshadowing Speaker’s love for his Lunar mate.

“The way he’s talking to the troops over in the infirmary… he’s sounding very ‘greater good at the expense of the individual’ and I don’t think that’s very good” Sunrise noted, recalling quite clearly how her foalhood had been marred by selfish cult leaders who cared little for the wellbeing of their members and more for the prestige and image of their cults.

“I think I can reframe Shimmer’s relationship and use to him enough to make him care for the time being. Cash, can you undo what you did once this is over?” Sunrise noted, the frown on her brow clearly signaling her dismay.

Cash paused and contemplated the exact ideas he had put into Speaker, then he finally nodded: “If I can catch him when he’s tired – he’ll likely resist it if I approach him while well rested. Either way we can sort this out once the battle is over”

The circle split up and tended to their own business, awaiting the supply ship.

About an hour before the scheduled arrival of the supply ship Sullen Hoof cried out from the watch tower: “Incoming from the north-east, half a mile up but dropping. I see smoke!”

It took another minute or so for the skyship to get close enough for everyone else to see: The supply skyship was being harried by flying ghosts, and it was smoking… and losing altitude.

From the signal flags the ship was flying the unicorn lookouts were able to inform everyone else that the skyship had already used all three emergency wind-bottles – magical pots half the size of a grown pony, coated with blue jade paint on the inside and corked with a big chunk of white jade, they had contained strong winds to be used for emergency propulsion. Other signal flags told of wounded on board and damage to the ship’s controls, which explained why the thing was losing altitude.

Warstriders were scrambled to intercept and catch the ship – skyships weren’t structurally sound enough to survive impacting the ground – but as they thundered out to intercept the ground erupted before them: The undead had been digging tunnels under the north-eastern approach to the artillery position, and now they were collapsing the tunnels!

It didn’t take many moments for news of this to spread throughout the camp. Morale took a big hit – everyone knew what was on those ships…

Speaker and the circle quickly found themselves summoned to the officers tent. Sunrise was ordered to round up her orchestra and put on an impromptu morale-boosting show, while Sullen Hoof was ordered back on the watch tower to look for sallies and sneak attacks from Deep Rot or the exposed underground tunnels. Cash was ordered to the stockades to help Lee converting more prisoners and Speaker was told to report to the makeshift warstrider hangar.

At the warstrider hangar – or oversized tent really - Speaker could hear Sunrise’s music starting up: It was an inspiring military hymn, though it was a tad awkward due to the celestial instrumentation. Inside the hangar Speaker saw a rare sight: Two of the wondervolt warstriders were being readied.

“You, warstrider repair-pony, something came lose in the crystal essence relays during transport here – make it happen!” A very stressed-sounding and looking Karal Warm-Steel shouted, the head of the Wondervolts, as she poked her head out of the pilot-hole in the back of her warstrider .

Speaker nodded and  instantly leapt up to her, clearing the fifteen foot tall warstrider with each by means of his jumping charm: “Very well – and is the voice amplifier still working?”

Warm-Steel sighed, running greasy hooves through her already stained and matted fiery orange mane: “Yes, but the dust here in the underworld is really messing with our wing joints…”

Without a world Speaker wormed his way into the armored pilot-core of the warstrider. It was a beautiful kaleidoscope of spinning gems and pulsating mandalas of colored sand suspended in essence matrixes, each displaying some kind of information to the warstrider’s pilot about the thing’s state of being. It was clear that whoever had designed the thing had expressed a great love of jewelry.

Fixing the bits of scratched crystals that channeled essence from the pilot to the rest of the warstrider was easy enough – convincing Warm-Steel and the sorcerer-engineers normally maintaining the warstrider to pour a bucket of oil down to him was a little more difficult, but it did result in the wing joints of that particular warstrider not squeaking nearly as much anymore. It also resulted in Speaker’s uniform looking like a royal mess.

As the winged warstriders took off, their blue jade-stell armor and inner skeleton negating their otherwise massive weight, it occurred to Speaker that there simply wasn’t a word in riverspeak for pegasus pony – despite the wondervolt warstriders obviously having been built to look like pegasi. The only language he knew that had a word for that lost race of pony was old realm… so these unicorns didn’t even know what their flying warstriders were meant to look like.

The five wondervolts zipped up to the supply ship, firing their hoof-mounted lightning-ballistae at the ghosts swarming the place. Immaterial or not, the lightning tore through the ghosts and sent many of them falling to the ground like ashen rags that howled in pain and impotent fury. Once the ghosts were cleared up the flying warstriders helped keep the ‘sinking’ skyship afloat, guiding it towards the artillery position for a soft landing.

It was then that giant skeletal arms with long rusty iron claws shot up from the field of collapsed ground, swiping at the fliers – it didn’t take many moments for two of the warstriders to get grabbed.

“Cash! Someone get a messenger to Cash Charmer – tell him to get out there with me to bring these things down!” Speaker shouted, setting off in a gallop towards the broken field.

As he leapt from ashen dirt mound to ashen dirt mound, avoiding the pits and cracks in the ground that led into the darkness beneath, Speaker took stock at the battlefield before him. The damaged skyship, if the ghosts could damage it why not just bring it down? Was this meant as a trap to lure out the wondervolts and take them out? And now zombies and warghosts were spilling out of the broken tunnels to intercept him, wonderful.

Leaping around most of the enemy forces, and trying to dodge and parry most of their archers – an easy feat, considering how poorly a zombie aimed, and war ghost archers were too enraged and hotheaded to fire in anything resembling a formation… basically Speaker might as well be dodging the scattered arrows of a talon of drunk pony recruits. War ghosts and zombies worked a lot better in close combat.

At the root of one of the giant skeletal limbs that had sprouted from the ground, one holding and crushing a warstrider, Speaker took a deep breath and struck the giant bone once with a firm hoof. This was not a blow meant to destroy – but to explore, to diagnose, to examine: Between his crafting charms, his medical charms and his memories of grand first age sorcery the Solar quickly discerned the necromantic nature of the bones – they were conjured, not real, and pulsed from within with thick flows of essence to power the crushing might of the claws up above.

Bringing Homage to bear, Speaker powered up its singular blade of hot essence and thrust the disk at the bone. The impact was blunt and didn’t do anything to begin with, but after a few seconds the bone blackened and turned to ash around the energy blade – and so the disk slowly but surely made its way into the giant bone.

Once inside Speaker sealed the hole with his repair charm – five seconds later the wrist of the giant clawed hand holding a warstrider burst in a shower of bone splinters and dark fumes as Homage had cooked the essence inside, the wondervolt flying off with furious flaps of its blue jade wings.

Cash Charmer caught up with Speaker moments later, the two making short work of the remaining bone-tower-claws. Cash simply smashed the things at the base with his hoof of the day-star style, clearing the way for the wondervolts and the supply skyship, while Speaker did his thing with Homage.

As they returned to the camp they were met with cheers – but also concerned looks from Sully and Sunrise. The two quickly caught on the worries of their friends, to which Speaker put them at ease at least for himself: “I know we burnt through a lot of essence out there, but with my hearthstones I’ll be topped off before the courage-nuts are fully distributed”

Nodding, Sunrise gave Cash an inquisitive look: “What about you? Do you have a means to recover your essence before the next battle?”
“Oh come on – of course I’ve got something up my sleeve…” Cash said with a smarmy smile.

It turned out that before they had left Cash had used the thing he’s best at – money – to buy week’s worth of worship at a surprisingly large number of monasteries, villages and other places, paying ponies to not pray for him… but pray to him.

Heath Rose found it in very poor taste to simply pay ponies to pray to you, but she couldn’t deny that for what it was being used for then it served a very good purposes: “Still, this is going to ruffle all kinds of feathers back on the Blessed Isle – a Solar gaining mass worship is just the kind of thing that could light a fire under the Wyld Hunt again, even with what you lot did to Peleps Pureblood”

“Shouldn’t matter – when we’re done here Lookshy will consider us a vital asset. No Wyld Hunt will be able to approach Sunhill without getting turned away by the Seventh Legion” Speaker noted confidently.

Giving Speaker a judging look for a moment, Heath Rose ultimately nodded slowly: “Just don’t get upset when Lookshy starts demanding things of you – they won’t prioritize letting you perform medical miracles nearly as high as having you around to fix their broken toys.”
Turning to the rest of the circle, but also giving Speaker a glance, Heath Rose continued: “Now, speaking of priorities, what will yours be for the coming battle?”

While the orders from the Taimyos dictated the deployment of the circle, then Heath Rose was more curious about exactly what the individual members of the circle were going to do in practice.

Sullen Hoof and Cash Charmer explained their rather effective strategy on how to double-team large swaths of ghosts and zombies: Cash would use his charms to talk the ghost officers into ordering their zombies into a dormant state so they wouldn’t interfere while they were to duel – it was some kind of torpor meant to allow for necro-surgeons to perform maintenance – and after that Sullen Hoof would zip in and quickly kill the ghost as it and Cash was about to square off, leaving up to half a thousand zombies just standing idly by. For larger formations of ghosts Cash could only distract them - but that was all Sully needed to quickly leap around them and leave a thick line of salt in place, walling them in. 

“That explains a lot of the zombies and ghost that Sunrise managed to burn off when she first appeared… makes me wonder if they’ll even send any more of those out” Heath Rose noted.

Sunrise, as commanded by the Taimyo, had simply planned to use her heavenly back-up choir and orchestra to open up a path for Speaker and the other sappers that were going to move in and destroy the manse: “I’m sure they’ll try to attack the cloud, either during our approach or when we are in place to give our grand performance, so aside from singing I think my role will mainly be of a defensive nature”

Heath Rose added that for Sunrise’s grand performance then part of their preparations in Yu-Shan had involved getting Taru Han, the Lady of Souls, goddess of herding the souls of the deal into lethe for reincarnation, to write a song for Sunrise to sing: “Since Deep Rot works through enslaved ghosts linked in a hivemind, this song should free most of them and spirit them off to the next life – if it doesn’t break Deep Rot outright, then it should certainly make for a good distraction”

Lee nodded, but looked uncertain: “Distraction, yes – but I doubt it’ll destroy the place. The Barbate Arbiter is well known for building in failsafes and other backups into his designs – plus I don’t think those souls can leave even if they want to. The other Deathlords mock him for wasting resources on making sure that his creations don’t fall apart nearly as easily, but considering how well Deep Rot has been holding out against our attacks so far… this won’t be easy”

“What about you Heath Rose? Where can we find you when this gets underway?” Sullen Hoof wondered.

The Sidereal said that she’d tag along Speaker into the manse: “My heavenly martial arts have given me great insight into how essence works – I can help disrupt and destroy Deep Rot’s essence flows, plus I think I’m the only one here who can defend against necromancy”

“Oh that’ll be nice – I’ve been told that the greatest losses the Lookshyans took in the last battle was from abyssals who managed to cast spells at them. Unicorn sorcery can’t defend against necromancy at all, their essence is too weak” Lee said, having apparently been briefed on some of the after-action reports already, or just snuck a look at them.

Sullen Hoof agreed: “Yes – the worst was some kind of white sphere they would conjure up and throw at massed troops. Striped the flesh from their bones by its pale light, no matter what kind of armor they wore – only unicorns were able to resist, but then they would be outnumbered and swarmed by skeletons”

Speaker noted that he’d experienced that spell back when he and Shimmer had captured the dead leader of the ponatees. Heath Rose had also read reports of such a spell, noting that the best defense against sorcery like that was to distract them while they shape the spell and subdue them quickly.

The circle spoke a bit more on tactics and what worked best against what, with Cash sneaking more than one subtle charm-enhanced hint at Speaker that it might be a really good idea to also try to rescue Shimmer – she had cheated death once, so there was no reason why she hadn’t done so again and was simply await retrieval.

It was then that the horns sounded and troops everywhere scrambled to ready themselves, put their armor repair kits or whet stones away and helm the defenses.

Lee, Sully and Cash left to join up at the forward defenses. Sunrise called for her orchestra and backup singers to assemble. Speaker followed Heath Rose to the staging area for the new and improved Team Jade Mole.

The unicorn rangers of the team were at first surprised to see Speaker alive – they had apparently bugged out fast after Speaker had been caught, as their previous orders had been to disengage and get out if that happened. Speaker was just as surprise to see them alive – but such was the tricks that battle could play on you.

This time around the rangers’ orders were of a roughly similar nature to last time, but as the ranking ranger, a gruff looking water aspected unicorn mare with a perpetually wet mane who sounded like she washed down her breakfast with a good helping of gravel, noted: “We didn’t know that they would target you that intensely – now we do, and we’ve geared up accordingly for it”

By the same note, the team had scavenger up some very nice and not that blood-stained jade armor for Speaker to wear – its old owner having died in the previous battle – but Speaker declined: “My own shield charms are just as good, and they don’t work with armor”

The unicorn mare didn’t look entirely convinced, but as Speaker and Heath Rose very quickly demonstrated using one of the ranger’s spears then it took considerable might and effort to even scratch Speaker, let alone actually hurt him.

Equally, to Speaker’s surprise then the rangers all treated Heath Rose like an old friend and peer – probably some Sidereal charm at work – but it meant that Heath Rose was in turn offered the jade armor, she too turned down, noting that her martial arts didn’t mesh well with armor getting in the way.

“Does anyone want some bloody jade armor?” the mare exclaimed, annoyed that her otherwise well-planned and well intentioned generosity was going to waste.

There were no takers – the other rangers had far more advanced magical armor on already. Speaker suggested they offer it to Lee – he could probably use it. Thus, a pair of messengers hauled the armor off the front lines.

Moving into position under Sunrise’s cloud, the team discussed tactics and strategy: The rangers wanted to remain invisible and use that to pick off anything that got too close to Speaker. Speaker and his chakram would be ranged duty, picking off anything attacking them from afar, while Heath Rose would support where needed since the rangers didn’t really know what she could do – but she assured that she’d be helpful.

The final horn rang out, signaling the restart of the main bombardment. Runed crystals hummed to life as hearthstones set in them flooded the things with essence from Creation, essence that moments later was shunted through gemstone lenses and projected out towards Deep Rot at frightening speeds. The Jade rivets, bronze tubes and steel struts that held it all together groaned, as the mighty concussive forces pushed and pulled in the several dozen artillery pieces. This was more than enough firepower to reduce a city and its walls to dust – as was standard battle protocol for Lookshy: Always employ superior force.

> Chapter 107: Offense
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Under the cover of Sunrise’s cloud, Speaker saw the first volley of ball lightning and bolts of volatile essence sail through the air and in over Deep Rot’s walls. He knew that this was just the initial volleys, meant to soften up the defenders and disrupt them while the skyships moved into place.

The mighty Sky Wolf, the blue jade orca-shaped flagship of Lookshy’s sky-fleet, led the charge, its own essence cannons raining elemental destruction down on the structures insides of Deep Rot, followed by half a dozen more artillery skyremes, and a dozen smaller escort vessels likely geared to repel flying attackers and screen or scout for necromantic sorcery.

The counterattack quickly picked up, black lightning shooting up from the walls of Deep Rot. Most of the skyship hulls already had plenty of singed streaks from such hits, and half a dozen ships hadn’t been able to join the battle due to being too damaged from last round, with repair crews back at the artillery position working franticly to get the ships sky-worthy again.

Speaker couldn’t see it, but between the Sky Wolf and the other artillery ships then the skyships were mainly shooting at the enemy anti-air weapons: It was easy enough to spot where a lightning ballista was shooting from, a regular spear-chucking ballista less so, but Lookshy made good telescopes for spotting ground positions.

This time around the defenders of Deep Rot also seemed to have come up with a few new tricks: A thick black fog rose within Deep Rot, covering everything inside the walls in a midnight black haze. This undoubtedly complicated any attempts at spotting ground targets for the main artillery… but then, that wasn’t the plan, mainly because the weapons on the skyships simply weren’t powerful enough to do that much damage on a hardened target such a fortified manse, but there was another reason as well.

The Sky Wolf and the Artillery Ships were all a diversion: They quickly began to relay information back to the main artillery, guiding their volleys upwards… towards an unseen target some hundred yards up, based on Speaker’s information.

When the first volley landed a partial hit on the flying control center of Deep Rot the entire manse shook, as did the ground around it for miles. With a little adjustment to the targeting, the next couple of volleys hit a lot better… and moments later the veil that hid the command center from sight fell, revealing a grotesque structure with a really big antenna array of sorts on top of it.

Heath Rose quickly identified part of the array to be in the shape of the greater sign of Saturn, the Mare of Endings: “That… is probably not a good thing”

“That would be the End Time Relay” Speaker noted coldly, sounding ever so intent on seeing that array destroyed.

With the relay seat of control and the relay revealed, the defenders of Deep Rot seemed to switch strategy. From a distance, what looked like tiny ants began spilling out from the floating control center, zombies creating a husk of writhing, undulating, ablative flesh for the artillery to destroy, instead of damaging the manse itself. This just proved that the thing truly was a vulnerable target.

Several gates in Deep Rot’s walls also flung open, a massive counter-attack spilling out – it seemed that the defenders really didn’t want the bombardment to continue.

Four signal horns rang out, the sign that Sunrise was to move her cloud up and advance on Deep Rot’s walls. Team Jade Mole followed under the cover of the cloud.

The undead hordes spilling out of the manse seemed to take care to stay out of effective range of Sunrise’s singing, giving the cloud a half-mile wide berth at the very minimum, as they circled around to assault the artillery position. Speaker took a deep breath and hoped that Lee was ready for them.

The dim roar of battle rose behind Speaker as the fighting between Lee’s forces and the undead began – but at the same time a sizable detachment had moved into position before Sunrise’s cloud… and it wasn’t making any effort to get out of the way.

“Speaker, the troops in our way… they don’t sound undead” Heath Rose noted in a decidedly worried tone.

It took Speaker a moment to recall that the usual Sidereal essence-sight charm worked more like essence-hearing – but then Sullen Hoof appeared and reported: “They’re living ponies, well armed and armored – with red armbands…”

“Oh heavens – the Thornguard” Heath Rose blurted out. She quickly explained that these were elite of Thorn’s living army, trained by Abyssals... and were probably led by one too: “Those ponies… they’re volunteer mortals”.

Moments later Sullen Hoof confirmed that a pony clad in what looked like freshly flayed hides, who wielded a dirty great soulsteel axe, was leading the unit of Thornguard troops. 

The thought of living ponies voluntarily serving a Deathlord sickened and enraged Speaker: “How far are they?”

“A bit under one and a half mile – its open terrain, but they’re heavily armored, so they’re not going anywhere soon. They’re expecting us to come to them and their archers” Sullen Hoof said, giving Speaker curious looks…

Looking at Heath Rose and Sullen Hoof, then throwing a quick glance around to see if he could tell where the invisible rangers were hiding – which he couldn’t, Speaker’s look sharpened as settled his gaze in the direction of Deep Rot and the waiting Thornguard: “Sully and Rose, you’re on the Deathknight – there’s probably more than one, a whole circle if we’re unlucky. I’ll do a fly-over now and soften up the troops with Homage. Ideally it’ll reduce them to appoint where the Abyssals will be fighting alone”

Everyone nodded, and Speaker galloped out from under the cloud and willed his ruby pinions to ignite. With a roar of flame Speaker was skyward, wings of fire beating hard.

Giving Sunrise a quick wave before spinning around and facing Deep Rot, Speaker got a very nice view of the battle so far: Lee’s forces had engaged the undead – and judging from the blazing golden anima down in the midst of tiny moving things on the ground, then Lee was doing just fine. The Thornguard ahead was divided up into a main force with two small infantry blocks on either side – clearly ready to move up and encircle anyone approaching. Behind them were three sizable units of archers, though Speaker couldn’t see what quality bows they were using.

Thinking for a moment, Speaker recalled that back when Thorns had been a Realm tributary their archers had been generally rather poorly equipped – issued only basic wooden bows, not the superior composite bows that most of the Nexus mercenaries liked to use. Lookshy’s bows of course much better, based on… well… Speaker’s own first age designs come to think of it, the pulley and multi-drawstring design he had thought up so long ago, still being the absolute best kind of bow short of magical artifact powerbows.

Still, the enemy archers were by far the greatest threat – not to Speaker – but to Sunrise and her orchestra. Their cloud was too far from the ground for even spears to reach, at a height of roughly fifty or so yards, but volleys of arrows could still reach them – and those musical spirits and godlings didn’t look particularly well armored.

Bringing Homage to bear, Speaker dove towards the archers and threw Homage with a mighty charge of essence – commanding it to keep attacking the blocks of archers until they were no more. Homage zipped down silently, leaving behind a pulsing trail of light from its energy blade, a light that quickly subsided when it disappeared among the mortals down on the ground.

Moments later a return volley of arrows came up towards Speaker, whistling through the air. Being arrows fired by mere mortals they had no chance of hurting Speaker, such was the strength of his shield charm – and thus Speaker hovered above archers and simply waited for the carnage below to subside.

It didn’t take long for the thornguard infantry to start moving – clearly their commander realized that if they did nothing Speaker might start attacking them as well: They shuffled around, setting up a shield wall around the panicking archers. That their commander didn’t seem to do anything to even try to save the archers sickened Speaker.

After the first ten minutes of waiting, Speaker found it surprisingly disappointing that he wasn’t getting any return fire. The archery volleys had long stopped – and judging from how the archers down below were falling left and right, then Homage was doing its job just fine.

Suddenly a messenger spell appeared before Speaker in the form of a glowing scroll. As Speaker touched it to unfold the scroll the whole thing erupted into a puff of cloud – or rather, a hollow cloud, inside of which the scroll unfolded allowing Speaker to read it without any prying eyes down on the grounds being able to see it.

It was new orders: “Stay airborne – flare your anima twice in rapid succession if you see anything coming our way. We’ll be there in ten. Heath Rose”

Halfway through waiting for the cloud to reach his position the archers finally broke, scattering back towards the walls of Deep Rot. Looking towards the walls, Speaker had to wonder why the anti-air artillery there wasn’t shooting at him. Maybe he was too small a target for them to aim at?

With the archers gone the Thornguard infantry began moving towards the cloud at a clearly-essence fueled gallop – which made Speaker wonder what kind of strategy the commander for the troops had in mind to take on the cloud…

This question quickly had its answer revealed: As the two sides closed, the ground rose before the Thornguard! Great slabs of rocks and dried flesh came out of the ground, under the Thornguard, carried by giant clawed skeletal limbs just like the ones that had grabbed the Wondervolts earlier!

It was a bit chaotic, with dozens of Thornguard falling to their death as the slabs rose out of the ground underneath their hooves to carry them up – but in mere moments a thousand or so Thornguard were moving up to disembark on Sunrise’s cloud!

A single booming war-cry pierced the sky, exploding the first several ranks of Thornguard in showers of blood and links of chainmail, staining the front of the cloud red. Speaker quickly concluded that Sunrise really hadn’t been kidding about her song-based martial arts…

The rangers appeared down on the ground, dropping their magical veils as they began to demolish the giant bone limbs holding the enemy forces up. Hundreds of Thornguard fell to their death screaming as the bone limbs began to topple, but their screams were drowned out by the glorious battle music from atop the cloud.

The Deathknight leading the Thornguard quickly found herself tangled up by Sully in a web of sticky… warm and liquid but quickly cooling caramel? Heavy Soulsteel armor became a prison as armor-joints clogged and locked up. In anger  the Abyssal flared her anima, but the cloud around her melted away in seconds, leaving her to drop to the ground looking rather… not happy.

Sullen Hoof somehow caught up with the Deathknight on her way down, exploiting the still largely immobilized state of being of his foe to deliver a finishing blow.

Speaker joined the fight himself, flying under the slabs of stone or flesh and pushing… trying to tilt the slabs – no need to topple the bone limbs holding them up if the passangers had already fallen off. This worked well for the first three slabs, but then the limbs seemed to tighten their grips – but that just revealed cracks in the remaining stone slabs that Speaker was able to get Homage to widen, breaking the slabs and letting the troops on them fall to their death.

The whole battle was over in about thirty minutes, with minimal casualties among the orchestra – though many of them were quite visible shaken by the experience… not so much from seeing mortals fight and die, but more for seeing the fury and might of Solars unleashed around them – apparently that was a lot more scary to some of them.

Approaching the wall Speaker was called down by the rangers. They had received a message from Skywolf command that the battlements before them had been salt-bombed, though Speaker still needed to scout ahead for anti-air in range of the cloud. Once over the wall Speaker was to give the rangers ‘the package’ – though the rangers didn’t seem entirely sure what this package was… and then Speaker was to find something worthwhile to sabotage so the manse would blow up.

“Why weren’t we told about this package?” One of the rangers asked, the voice-talisman on the ranger’s magical armor making the ranger’s voice both clear as day to hear but oddly quiet – an odd magical feature, but it probably had its uses.

Speaker nodded, realizing that the Taimyos had kept the Soul-Breaker Orb decoy ploy a secret – made sense: the decoy would be worthless if the Deathlords somehow learned that it was fake, so the fewer who knew of it the better: “Need to know basis, you don’t need to know yet. It will become obvious when I give it to you – now get up on the cloud!”

The air elementals producing and controlling the cloud spirited the rangers up to the front of the cloud, though keeping them hidden within the swirling mass of cloud.

That there hadn’t been any proper counterattack or attempt to disrupt or destroy the cloud worried Speaker. Heath Rose and Sully agreed, plus only having sent a single Deathknight out to fight them? It didn’t make sense… the manse’s defenses had been far better coordinated and controlled in the previous battle.

It turned out that the counter-move to the cloud came just as the cloud had moved half-way over the battlements: Several lightning ballistae popped out of piles of broken zombie corpses, having been hidden there – and as they opened fire on the cloud four Deathknights leapt up into the cloud from a hiding place within the battlements, attacking and killing several air elementals before erupting onto the top of the cloud where everyone else was!

Sullen Hoof and Heath Rose quickly leapt into action, Sully engaging one while Heath Rose struck at the essence of another…  somehow jumping into that Deathknight, who looked rather confused at first, as did the other Deathknights, none of them really sure of what had just happened.

When the Deathknight with Heath Rose inside began to stab himself to death with his own bone-clawed hooves… well, Sully, Sunrise and Speaker all remembered Heath Rose’s essence-possession technique from the manse with the bonestriders back in Chung Do.

Speaker flew out to engage the lighting ballistae, throwing Homage to cut off the critical guidance spikes that allowed the ballista to target their magical lightning… without those the things couldn’t discharge, making them blow up rather spectacularly.

Now, flying around inside the several mile wide perimeter of Deep Rot was not without its dangers – there were a lot more ghosts flying about inside the manse, and while individually they weren’t much of a threat then Speaker still had to make sure that he wasn’t grabbed and dragged down to the ground by them. No need to repeat that adventure.

It didn’t help that much that the skyships were still bombarding the manse from up above – random explosions around you made it difficult to listen for incoming flying ghosts, not that they made that much noise to begin with – and some of those things had surprisingly sharp claws and teeth, enough to even given Speaker a few minor wounds through his essence shields.

Flying back to the cloud, Speaker contemplated whether he should waste essence on healing his injuries, or just hit himself with his anesthetic charm and keep going – healing would spend a lot more essence… but would also leave him in a less vulnerable state.

This train of thought was derailed as he got to the cloud – it had shrunk considerably, and Heath Rose, Sully and Sunrise were talking with the rangers and tending to their own wounds.

“One more hit like this and the cloud is out – the few air elementals left can only maintain this much” Sunrise lamented. The orchestra of spirits was huddled together quite tightly, few of them having enough room to play their instruments.

The rangers suggested that Sunrise and the cloud retreat out of Deep Rot, and wait outside the walls – to cover provide transport for their eventual retreat. Heath Rose liked this idea: “As nice as being kept clear of undead in here would be… it’s probably the best idea”
“Sully, go with Sunrise – keep her safe” Speaker ordered.

The Orichalcum chef looked as if about to object, but stayed his tongue and joined Sunrise on her cloud.

As the cloud floated away Speaker recalled the fake Soul-Breaker Orb from elsewhere, and gently floated it over to the rangers: “This is the package – find a good central spot to hide it, set the timer and then get the hell out”

“Wait, they brought two?” one of the rangers blurted out before getting punched, hard, by one of the other rangers.

It instantly dawned on Speaker what this meant… and how dangerous that really was – though he was also a bit curious as to how exactly the unicorns were hiding such a large device on them?

“Very well – I’ll take this to the central control station of this place. Go into the pit and set it somewhere there. Message us when with how much time we have to get out” Speaker half-ordered, half-suggested, unsure of exactly what kind of orders the rangers had gotten on how to use their Soul-Breaker Orb.

The rangers silently nodded and headed off – they all knew how dangerous their mission was. Speaker mainly hoped that when they deployed the orb that they wouldn’t just set it off instantly…

With the rangers gone – and very much out of sight, as their magical veils had been re-engaged – Speaker and Heath Rose looked upwards, towards the no longer veiled control station of the manse… it was covered in ashen scorch-marks from all the artillery hits, and the jiggling, writhing mass of zombies crawling on it to cover any breaches – and with every direct hit from the essence artillery a rail of tiny bits of zombie drizzled into the giant pit in the middle of the manse.

“Heath Rose – can you fly up there with me?” Speaker wondered, certain that the Sidereal had some means of flying ready – be it conjuring a flying cloud through sorcery or maybe pulling out an air elemental to ride on from her ear….

The green-eyed Sidereal with the dark-brown coat smiled and drew out a living butterfly from within her cloak. Putting it on the ground before her, the mare made a few strange gestures and then… well… she broke reality a bit.

Speaker looked on with no small amount of confusion as Heath Rose somehow ‘straddled’ the dainty little butterfly and began to ‘ride’ it up into the sky... It was first when she called out for him to keep up that Speaker ignited his ruby pinions with golden essence, letting him soar into the sky on wings of fire.

It took a bit of debating with himself on whether he should even ask how Heath Rose was doing that – ultimately he bothered not to: It was probably some kind of Sidereal reality twisting.

Approaching the command station from below turned out to be rather perilous: There were still parts of its underside where the veil worked – with invisible bladed soulsteel spikes everywhere, possibly antenna or something for sending signals back and forth between the control station and the ten thousand enslaved ghost-minds down in the manse.

With a few scratches and torn clothes the two found their way into the manse, and by the light of their animas the two exalts began raising hell: Floating his dummy Soul-Breaker Orb behind him, Speaker quickly managing to attract all kinds of fun attention inside the control station. Heath Rose fiddled around with fate so that the orb would read as truly being made of the magical materials, which ensured that the horde of ghosts and half a dozen Abyssals who looked very much caught off guard, all believed that the fake orb was very real and very dangerous.

Leading their pursuers on a merry chase through the manse, Heath Rose using some kind of Sidereal Secrets/Journeys-based charm to constantly find the right route out, even if it was through hidden doors or secret passages, the two worked diligently to pick off their pursuers one by one: Deathknights that tried to dodge or parry the incoming disk of hot death being thrown at them. Homage was thrown back at the ghosts and Abyssals repeatedly, cutting up ghosts left and right or stumbling anyone trying to dodge.

It also turned out that Heath Rose had no small amount of nasty things she could toss behind her while the two galloped around, leaving dozens of clouds of 8-Scream devil powder hanging in the air behind them, or hoof-fulls of one-inch adamant-encased blue jade icosahedrons… they turned to be quite aptly named lightning boxes, for when their pursuers stumbled into them they unleashed their lightning charges to a spectacularly lethal effect.

In between throwing Homeage backwards, so it would bounce off the walls to attack his pursuers from an odd angle, Speaker managed to ask: “Exactly how many things do you have in your pockets for this?”

While it was difficult to shrug when galloping, Heath Rose did manage a strained one: “To be honest I don’t know – my secretary packed this, I just told him I had prophesized that I would be chased at some point”

Speaker shook his head as they rounded a corner, Heath Rose quickly gesturing for the two to stop: “Hold up – I tossed a love bomb, I need to see this go off”

As they waited for a few tense seconds, Heath Rose peeking back around the corner, Speaker took a deep breath and took stop of the situation: Above him, glowing with golden light, hovered his fake Soul-Breaker Orb, it looking undamaged. The walls and ceiling were naked hewn rock, roughly polished to a dull and grey mat finish. The only difference for the floor was the multitude of stains on it, from the various drippings that zombies and other undead things had left behind in their passing.

Suddenly a bright pink light erupted from behind the corner, and Heath Rose looked… surprised, in a positive way, but not in a way she had expected: “Oh…”

“What is it?” Speaker said, curious to look around the corner.

With a friendly but firm hoof to his chest Heath Rose stopped Speaker: “You don’t want to look. That wasn’t the good kind of love bomb – I had hoped it was something that would overwhelm the ghosts with passionate love... it wasn’t”

Speaker furrowed his brows in a mix of incredulity and disbelief: “Exactly what are we talking about?”

“Love, the kind you clean up with a mob and bucket – suffice to say that the ghosts and Deathknights chasing us have all been prevented from giving pursuit” Heath Rose stated in a very manner-of-fact like tone, sounding quite uncomfortable with the topic.

Unable to withhold his laughter, Speaker shocked Heath Rose with his lack of disgust as he peeked around the corner: “Oh that’s nothing… let me tell you about this thing Sunrise once did back in Nexus – what was it they called it? A Harlotry Hot-Tub? Hose-down? Something like that…”

The two sauntered off, having eluded pursuit. Sure, there was the odd patrolling ghost that they had to put down, but between their magical martial arts and the magical weapons they wielded – Homage and Heath Rose being able to change the essence of her hooves into blades or claws or starmetal – then no ghost was able to stand before them.

Certain that word of them having a Soul-Breaker Orb had spread in the manse, based chiefly on the fact that most of the patrols they now ran into seemed to recognize them as the “Orb-bearers”, the two decided that the best thing to do would be to hide the orb somewhere to make it look like they had deployed it and set the timer: They both agreed that there are few things more convincing than seeing someone running away from having planting a soul-shredding bomb.

Having apparently stolen the fate of the real Soul-Breaker Orb and adding that to the dummy orb, Heath Rose made the thing produce a very unmistakable ticking noise – Even Speaker found it difficult to tell that the thing wasn’t real now that fate supported it being the real deal. Even the gimbaled rings within the device swung around just fine, making the illusion damn near perfect.

Using his deconstruction charm, Speaker hid the device inside the wall of a rather unassuming passage. Repairing the hole was an effortless exercise in repair-charm use, which led the two exalts to discuss what to do next…

“I say we find some strong essence relays and destroy them – the more we cripple the manse before the orb goes off, the better” Speaker suggested.

Heath Rose, more certain that the orb would be plenty to up-end the manse, suggested a different target: “Why not try to find Shimmer and see if she’s still alive? I would have gotten a message from Lytek if her exaltation had arrived at his office”

Without even a second thought Speaker dismissed the idea: “She knew what she was getting herself into – and while her loss is regrettable, then we need to focus on destroying this place”

The Sidereal took a pensive half-step back. This was the kind of cold and calculating, charm-spun singular focus that she had been told so many dreadful stories about – so many warnings about: Solars that had used charms on themselves to hone their minds into maniacal weapons, unable to give time or compassion to the fallen, lost or captured…

Of course, she had also been briefed by Cash on exactly what to say to convince Speaker otherwise, to which end Hearth Rose threw Speaker a dismissive frown: “You do realize that it would take almost a century to bring Shimmer up to her current level of skill? Think of how much more she can help Creation as she is now, compared to how much time you’ll have to waste training her, or having other Lunars train her, if you let her die?”

It honestly frightened Heath Rose that she had to present Last Shimmer in such a way – as an asset for Speaker, and not as a friend or lover – still, judging from how Speaker’s expression turned into a slow nod then it seemed to have worked.

“Can you track her?” Speaker asked in a cold tone that made Heath Rose pray that Cash Charmer could undo whatever exactly it was he had done to Speaker once this was all over.

Pulling out a bamboo scroll covered in glowing ink – an enchanted map that had apparently charted the route they had taken within the structure – Heath Rose pondered the hallways charted so far: “Well, we never went into any of them rooms we passed. Let me do a divination”
Finding a remote alcove, Speaker stood watch while Heath Rose attempted to chart the weave of fate, despite it being frail and faint in the underworld, seeking the silver strand that was Shimmer’s. She quickly gave up: “Too much essence is being thrown around here – there’s too much interference. Tracking things via fate works best when there’s no supernatural activity, plus the underworld is so far removed from the normal weave of fate…”

“Fair enough. Do you think this place would have its dungeon in the command structure, or down around the pit somewhere?” Speaker thought out loud.

Heath Rose pondered the question for a moment: “Well, we never got any kind of message that he was holding her hostage… but you said she had burst in through the wall in the throne room, right? Was she too big to move out of there last you saw her?”

The look of happy surprise on Speaker’s face said it all: “Oh she was in her warform alright, the big version of it. Unless they moved her out of the hole she had come in by… so we just have to track the essence flows here to find the throne room!”

Between essence sight and essence hearing, the two quickly began to track the various grim conduits of soulsteel and pulsating flesh, neatly stitched together.
> Chapter 108: Failure
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Approaching what they were certain was the throne room of the veiled command station of Deep Rot, Bright Machine Speaker and Heath Rose quietly discussed what and how they were going to do things if the Barbate Arbiter was there – which he quite likely would be.
Since their chief goal was rescuing Shimmer then they wouldn’t have to stay and fight the Deathlord – they both agreed that even with their power, then that wouldn’t be a fight they would likely win.

Heath Rose suggested that Speaker focus on freeing Shimmer and healing her – assuming that she was playing dead like what Speaker had told of her doing back when the circle had first met Lee. Once back amongst the living, if Shimmer could flee by her own devices she should just follow them out there. If she was in too poor a shape to run, a not entirely unlikely scenario, then she should shapeshift into a flea and just tag along on Speaker or Heath Rose.

“I’ll distract the Deathlord – I’m a much better liar than you are anyway, and we’ll be in trouble if they find out about the orb too quickly” Heath Rose added, referring to the fake Soul-Breaker Orb they had hidden in the manse, which was enchanted and fate-altered to very much look and sound like a real one, a real one that had been activated and was set to go off at some point in the near future no less.
The four super-zombie guards at a large steel-reinforced door of pale timber finally revealed one of the doors into the throne room. The four guards fell quickly and silently thanks to Heath Rose stealing the sound of their fighting back and storing it in a small glass bauble while Speaker had Homage cut them limb from limb, leaving them wiggling on the floor in many pieces.

Homage made short work of the doors hinges, making for a very loud entry as the two slammed the great steel-reinforced ghostwood door down so that it fell into the throne room – the two standing triumphantly atop the doors as the dust settled, animas ablaze in all their glory.
The throne room was in roughly the same state Speaker had left it – still a bit messy from the previous fight, though there were ghost slaves and zombies cleaning up and doing repairs to the hole in the wall, and a gaggle of ghostly Abyssal advisors and generals huddled around the long central table above which a magical image of the manse and its battlespace was projected. The Barbate Arbiter was at the far end of the table, resting on his throne, still in the form of a bloody version of Speaker in ever freshly-blood-drenched first age clothes. He didn’t look that happy to see the two: “You!”

Speaker dropped into a fighting stance, Homage ready to throw: “Me!”

Not partaking in these few seconds of banter, Heath Rose had instead scanned the room: “Speaker, to his right, go!”

Last Shimmer, wreathed in thick chains, her wings nailed to the floor and her beautiful talons torn from her body and hung above her like a grim but cluttered trophy, stirred – her hippo-sized warform looking battered and bruised to put it mildly: her bone-armorwas  cracked in many places, torn off in other spots. Why hadn’t she healed those injuries? Speaker knew well enough that she had more than enough regeneration charms.

Speaker darted to the left, using his balance and jumping charms to quickly close the gap between him and Shimmer.

To avoid Speaker grabbing anyone’s attention, Heath Rose quickly twisted the gem on a previously hidden bracelet: Her more utilitarian cloak and combat garb shimmered and became an elegant and officious dark green robe, befit of an official agent of heaven – and as if she had been standing by the great table all along, which even the loom of fate would tell you that she most certainly had been all along, she struck a hoof down upon the table with great force, calling for attention to herself: “I am Heath Rose, Chosen of Secret and Agent of Yu-Shan. I am here to negotiate for the release of the Lunar”

Through her charms Heath Rose made her demand all but irresistible, forcing the Barbate Arbiter to focus more on her than Speaker. He bellowed, with a voice that now very much did not fit the form he appeared in, as it was the same beyond-the-grave croaking he had spoken in his previous form: “Fool! You have nothing to negotiate with and-“

The entire room shook as another artillery volley hit the structure, dulled noises and an unmistakable, and rather sickening, squishing sound coming from the hole in the wall where Shimmer had originally entered – the zombies on the outside had been struck in such a way that the force of the blasts were squishing them into the hole, into the throne room, like a chunky meat paste through a tube. 

“I could order the bombardment to stop” Heath Rose haughtily noted, imperiously gesturing for ghostly servants to bring her something to sit on.

The offer rang hollow to the Deathlord, how snarled back at Heath Rose: “You think me a fool? The unicorns would simply begin again the moment you are gone”

“She also lies – she doesn’t have the authority to command the bombardment to stop “ a Deathknight called out from further down the table towards the Barbate Arbiter.

Having reached Shimmer, Speaker didn’t pay that much attention to what the others were shouting back and forth about. His diagnostic charm revealed a host of issues, mainly one linked to Shimmer’s essence being locked down: A collar not unlike the charm-blocking shackles he had been in had been placed around Shimmer’s neck – so that’s why she hadn’t been able to use her regeneration charms or shapeshift out of her chains: “It’s ok – I’m here now”

Shimmer strained to open her eyes and look at Speaker. Her face had multiple lacerations – it had been clawed at – maybe as part of some kind of torture? Either way the wound were easy to heal, letting her open up her third eye once again. With a weak voice she let out a thankful squawk: “…the collar”

“I know – I’m working on it”

Seeing that Speaker was likely about to use Homage, and recalling how Speaker had explained that the Barbate Arbiter had acted quite oddly around it, Heath Rose upped the ante to ensure that nobody was looking away from her: “Well if you don’t think I can do that, how about I offer you something else?”

“And what would that be?” The Barbate Arbiter spat, staining the table in his end as bile seemed to overflow the corners of his mouth – was he having trouble maintaining such a small form perhaps?

Heath Rose shot back with her most wicked grin: “Why, I could offer up the location of the Soul-Breaker Orb we snuck into this place earlier. It’s hidden in the walls here somewhere– you have no chance of finding it in time if we don’t tell you where to look”

The ghostly servants and advisors all shrieked and panicked at hearing that such a weapon of soul destruction had been planted on the premises. Even the Deathlord looked worried, albeit a tad incredulous: “You lie! You have spoken nothing but lies to us! Kill her!”

Even as nearest Abyssals began to draw their soulsteel blades, the same one who had detected Heath Rose’s lie called out once more: “No, she isn’t lying – they really did bring a Soul-Breaker here!”

And with that all of the present Abyssals who had not gotten their faces removed got up and left the room. Some quickly broke into a gallop, others dissolved into liquid shadow and flowed away into drains in the floor, a few began casting a teleportation spell.

The three remaining Abyssals, a conspicuously naked and beautiful mare with her tail tied up like a common harlot, a pony so heavily armored in spiky Soulsteel plate that it was impossible to tell if it was a mare or a stallion, and a familiar green-hooded one, all seemed unsure of how to respond to all the commotion.

The Barbate Arbiter reacted a bit quicker – flying into a rage at all the fleeing Deathknights, trying to reach out to grab and stop the teleporting ones… but in a flash of purple light they disappeared before he could get to them. The Deathlord’s furious roar as he turned to face Heath Rose was exceedingly intimidating: “How dare you?!”

“As an Agent of Yu-Shan it is well within my authority to foil plots aimed to destroy Creation. I need no other justification to act on my heavenly mandate” Heath Rose stated firmly, sipping on a cup of tea that she most certainly had not had a moment earlier.

Examining the collar around Shimmer’s neck carefully, Speaker quickly noted that the essence and charm-blocking collar wasn’t being powered as a normal attuned artifact… it was the very manse that was powering the device – which also explained why the only weakness he could find with the design was to cut its spiritual energy source… but waiting for the Soul-Breaker Orb to do that was a tad unhealthy.

“Hold on – I have an idea…” Speaker quietly said to Shimmer, recalling Homage from Elsewhere. Quite a few feathers got melted or at least singed from the heat of Homage’s energy edge, but the collar itself? Nothing.

Heath Rose quickly seemed to pick up on Speaker’s inability to free Shimmer: “Now, as I was saying earlier: Give us the Lunar, and I will tell you where to find such an orb here in your floating castle”

For once the Barbate Arbiter actually seemed to ponder the offer, but he was quickly interrupted by the Certainty: “Master, don’t be tempted by their lies – it’s just another trick to buy themselves time and confuse you!

The Deathlord was less impressed by his minion’s loyalty: “Shut up you fool – get the bloody chakram and let me think. Drips and Flails, kill the Sidereal”

The Unsullied Whore Observed By Many Who Drips Poison Into The Hearts Of Onlookers and The Stallion of Kaleidoscopic Chains turned to engage Rose, but the few precious seconds that it took them to draw their weapons from elsewhere and leap at the Sidereal was all the Chosen of Secrets needed to dissolve and refract infinitely into the ambient essence flows of the manse.

She reappeared a few seconds later behind the two, with but a gesture ripping the essence out of Flail’s Soulsteel plate armor, forcibly de-attuning it – making it impossibly heavy and cumbersome to wear, effectively trapping the Deathknight within his own armored shell. Drips, having already slit her wrists on Flails’ armor spikes, swung her blood whips at Rose, who wasn’t impressed: “Really, Laughing Wounds style? Honestly now…”

Catching the blood whips flowing from Drips’ wrists Rose heaved, pulled, twirled around and tossed Drips out of the hole in the wall through the tube of zombie-meat. Drips’ screams were quickly muffled as she disappeared into the meat-tube, though to Heath Rose’s dismay she had gotten blood spatters all over her fancy celestial robes: “Oh for… the dry-cleaning will ruin me”

While Rose’s fight was over as quickly as it had begun, then Speaker and Certainty’s struggle drew out a lot more – Speaker using his jumping and balancing charm to constantly keep on the move and try to stay out of range, while throwing Homage at Certainty with great force over and over.

Heath Rose took the opportunity to sit down at the table once more and sip her tea: “So, have you considered my proposal?”

Speaker’s strategy was at the very essence of his Thousand Wounds Disassembly style: Slow and methodical disassembly of his foe. Sure, the thick scale and plate Soulsteel armor that the Certainty wore made him pretty much impossible to harm directly, but like any good craftspony would know, then one does not simply strike a stone or a piece of timber and expect it to be cleft in twain: One had to chip away at what you were working on.

This wisdom, combined with the rather obscure and often overlooked detail about Thousand Wounds Disassembly style – that the force of its attacks, once performed correctly, were as inviolate as the laws of heaven and could thus bypass the usual magical protection afforded by armor made of the magical materials – which again was combined with the armor-melting features of Homage – meant that Speaker was able to slowly strip away the Certainty’s armor, or disarm him, provided that the Certainty kept trying to parry Homage with the long handle of his polearm which was getting awfully hot from repeat exposure to Homage’s energy blade.

All in all it was a seemingly perfect combination of martial arts and weapon to defeat a magically armored opponent. Too bad that the Certainty had orders to catch Homage – this made things a good deal more dicey.

Balancing his attacks while making sure that the Certainty wasn’t able to catch Homage by having the chakram come in from odd angles, Speaker slowly worked away much of the Certainty’s plate and scale – not that the Certainty didn’t get a few good blows in with that nasty Soulsteel Guan Do of his: Like before, whenever it would even scrape by Speaker’s essence shield Speaker would hear this most horrible screetching sound, as if all the souls forged into the Soulsteel screamed at him. It was quite distracting, and on more than one occasion did it manage to make him drop his guard – opening Speaker up to potentially fatal blows of such might that they even pierced his essence shield. Only by Speaker’s anesthetic charm was he able to ignore his injuries.

It was when Speaker managed to leap around the Certainty, then do a quick hop, skip and jump forward – pressing the Certainty back – that Shimmer was able to trip the Certainty by swiping his legs with her beak, that Speaker was finally able to properly and critically injure the Certainty: Throwing Homage with steely precision, while at the same time supercharging the essence blade and the guidance magic within the device, Speaker managed to hit the now largely unarmored Deathknight full on, by swerving under his attempt to parry the attack and hitting him under the chest:

In the split second that Homage made contact, Speaker’s anima erupted as two copies of the weapon shot out of it, following the golden vapor trail of the chakram to also strike the Certainty – machines working best with repetition after all.

The Deathknight’s unearthly scream wasn’t made any better by the fact that his voice was produced from behind the cracked mask covering his missing face, but the end result was undeniable: one front leg and two hind legs with neatly singed cuts falling to the wayside. 

“Master!” The Certainty feebly cried out as his voice somehow choked on blood, reaching for the Barbate Arbiter pitifully – but Hearth Rose had the Deathlord locked in deadly negotiations – and maybe a charm or spell or three – for he did not pay any attention to what was going on around him.

Disarming the Certainty at this point was easy – the grip of his essence was only as strong as that of his body, and with only one limb left that was nothing compared to Speaker. Flicking the Guan Do over to Shimmer, Speaker stepped over the Certainty and with a strong hoof held him down. A single swipe of Homage cut the mask in two: “Traitor…”

“Save your bile for someone who cares! I spent over a century trying to keep our neck of the woods in order – but the gods are too corrupt. The wisdom of the Neverborn is flawless: There is only tranquility in d-“ The Certainty said in spite, until Speaker ended his miserable existence.

Considering what Speaker knew of the fate of dead Abyssals, then the Certainty’s claims of tranquility in death seemed highly dubious… if nothing else, then he was misguided – or just simply lied to.

Quickly turning to Shimmer, Speaker found her hacking away at something under her wing – it turned out to be one of the dull steel hooks holding her chains. Homage made short work of it and the other hooks, freeing Shimmer up – except for her collar… which seemed to come with its own set of restraints:

“I can’t… damn thing seems locked in position over the floor here” Shimmer lamented as she furiously tried to push or pull her head away, but the collar was locked into position with a force greater than even what she could muster in her beast-pony form.
Looking at Heath Rose and the Barbate Arbiter – the two were clearly exchanging words at a frightful pace, but… he couldn’t hear anything?

“She put a spell up around them… it insulated them from us – that’s why the Arbiter couldn’t hear the Certainty’s pleading o r losing the fight” Shimmer pointed out.

Shrugging, Speaker once more had a go at Shimmer’s collar. Again, it became obvious that the only way to disable the collar was to disable the manse that was fueling the collar’s indestructibility…

Recalling his singing staff from elsewhere, Speaker tried to disrupt the nearby essence flows of the manse by messing with the floor – but the singing staff simply wasn’t powerful enough to disrupt the stone around them, for it was locked into form by the strong essence flows of the manse.

Frustrated, Speaker struck at the manse with Homage – but even that did nothing of any consequence. Sure he had healed her body, regenerated her talons, even mended the cracks in her bone-armor… but he could not do anything to that damn collar.

“Please – Speaker, you have to get out here. Your memories of the first age are the key to restoring so much of Creation” Shimmer pleaded, while Speaker furiously struck at the manse with his singing staff and Homage.

Giving Shimmer a harsh look, Speaker silenced her with but his glance: “No – you are an important of Sunhill and our greater plans. Abandoning you here just wouldn’t make sense”

Shimmer seemed to be both touched and slightly put off by Speaker’s words, but her gaze equally hardened: “I get that – but if what Rose said is true about there being a Soul-Breaker Orb here… You need to get out of here my love”

There suddenly was a… lightening – all the shards of broken or melted off scale and plate armor from the Certainty, even the Certainty’s corpse began to jiggle – then float slowly into the air. A split second later Speaker and Shimmer also felt the effect.

“The orb…” Speaker said in shock, recognizing the gravity-altering effect as the first part of a Soul-Breaker Orb’s detonation: All of the pattern spiders in charge of maintaining reality for the area had fled to other parts of the loom of fate, leaving gravity unenforced, though heavier things and sentient beings who knew that they had weight still had an effect of gravity upon them, since their mere acknowledgement of the phenomena was enough for the loom of fate.

“Take my heart, give it to my next incarnation – it will give her my memories and my love for you, if she doesn’t have it already” Shimmer said in a very hurried tone.

Speaker didn’t even have time to ask what she meant before Shimmer ripped part of her cracked bone-armor away with a rather unpleasant ‘sticky’ sound of connective tissue tearing, followed by her plunging a fist full of talons into her own chest and ripping out her own heart – presenting it to Speaker.

Speaker took the heart – it was the size of his head, and still pounding for a few precious seconds before it disappeared into elsewhere: “Shimmer…”

“Don’t go to Sunken Luthe when you come looking for my next incarnation… I love you…” were the last words of Last Shimmer, Chosen of Luna, No-Moon Caste.

A deafening silence fell upon Speaker as Shimmer’s body slumped onto the ground before him. Such a waste… no, such a loss… not just for Creation, but for him, for his love, for her love. A sea of tears welled up in his eyes as he just stood, hoofs drenched in Shimmer’s heart-blood, silently swearing that for his love to Shimmer he would survive this day and see her returned to his side.

Now, Heath Rose and the Barbate Arbiter had not failed to notice this sudden change in local reality. Indeed, Heath Rose had been about to give up anyway – even using her most potent negotiation charm to forcefully end the debate and compel the Deathlord to at least partially releasing Shimmer had failed, the smoldering remains of a prayer strip infused with the scripture of the maiden’s promise on the table a testament to that – but as the prophecy her friend May Blossom, a fellow Chosen of Secrets, had pronounced years ago suddenly became apparent in its meaning as it came true to her, Heath Rose used the vaunted Sidereal charm simply known as Avoidance Kata to jump five minutes back in time to buy her… hold on… she was not five minutes back in time.

Crap

The Barbate Arbiter had also caught on to what was happening: “What… no! Damn you all!”

Speaker turned to face the Deathlord with smoldering hate in his eyes. The feeling was quite clearly mutual.

As the Solar and the Deathlord leapt at each other, Speaker wielding Homage and The Barbate Arbiter wielding Gift – having somehow socketed it into one of the cracks of his oversized hooves, Heath Rose observed and realized that an old prophecy her friend and colleague May Blossom had made to her was coming true: “When a stolen present and an impossible honorific clash, I will see Venus in the light of underworld moon”

Through the hole in the wall, where Shimmer had originally crashed in, the underworld moon shined bright crimson. Heath Rose instantly drew an old sword from elsewhere that she had been given over eighty years ago, back when she had completed basic training as a Sidereal – it wasn’t even magical the sword, though the craftsmanship was absolutely divine…

…and not a moment too soon either, for the next instant did golden light and ghostly shadows seep up through the brickwork of the floor, and pour in through the hole in the wall.

Speaker, stuck under the bulk of a raging Deathlord who was beating the ever-loving crap out of him, barely even managed to notice the light and enact his final act of defiance – the defensive charm Heath Rose and Shimmer had taught him before they had all gone to the underworld.

The Deathlord, despite being empowered by the very Neverborn to carry out their hate and deathwish, was but a ghost – a soul made manifest – and a Soul-Breaker Orb was nothing if not aptly named. With an echoing shriek that faded far too slowly was the Barbate Arbiter torn asunder, dissolving into motes of putrid black essence which was sucked away into the soul-vortex formed by the orb. To Speaker he mainly felt as the Barbate Arbiter’s bulk lessened, ultimately fading into nothing – leaving only Gift somewhat painfully half-embedded in his left shoulder.

As the singing shadows subsided, mere moments later, Speaker got up, wincing at the pain. Extracting Gift was not pleasant, and while his anesthetic charm kept him from hurting too much then even that couldn’t cover the hurt felt from such a grievous wound. His right foreleg dangled with no sensation, only pain from the shoulder. He probably should be a lot more worried about that, but honestly… he just felt numb.

Looking over at Heath Rose, Speaker couldn’t help but feel empty inside. Not moments ago had Shimmer killed herself and given her heart to him. Her blood was still fresh on his hooves and sleeves.

Heath Rose looked ready to shit herself – or as if she just had, standing in an awkward pose with a sword that was crumbling in her hooves: It was simply too much for a mundane blade to be empowered to cut the strings of spacial fate that had ensured a minute pocket of safety from the Soul-Breaking. For Speaker his coat still glistened as if dusted with fine crystals from the use of his adamant skin technique. Shimmer was still dead, but he had committed himself to defending her memory and honoring her last request.

It was so impossibly quiet.

It took a grim minute or two, but the deep groans of the stone and brickwork around them signaled that it was time to go. A few seconds later things started to float up into the air again – but this time it was because the manse control station was beginning to fall out of the sky.

Summoning the last of his essence, Speaker ignited his ruby pinions and together with Heath Rose on her butterfly they flew out.

Outside the scene was one of… deadly silence. Down on the ground absolutely nothing moved, though many things were on fire from the bombardment. In the distance, in the sky, were skyships – at a safe distance. That was good to see.

It was then that Speaker had a grim epiphany and dove, racing with the falling manse control station – not that it was going that fast, but it was slowly accelerating downwards as the manse failed and its essence flows dried up.

The butterfly straining, Heath Rose felt the angry screams of the pattern spiders as she used charms to make the poor little creature fly a lot faster than a butterfly had any business doing, just to keep up: “What are you doing?”

Speaker, his face locked in grim determination, didn’t look back – his eyes glowing bright gold as he scanned the pit that was Deep Rot: “The Soulbreaker – we need to swoop in and fetch the remains of it before the control station crashes on it”

Heath Rose didn’t argue – she understood well how handy it would be to have that back, mainly so it wouldn’t fall into the hooves of whatever Deathlord dug it out of the ruins first.

It was then that she noticed that the giant ring that was the wall around Deep Rot had… shrunk? It certainly wasn’t two miles across anymore…. And it was cracked and broken in many places… oh no.

“The place is imploding!” Heath Rose shouted. Speaker did not reply, disappearing into the pit.

Flying down amidst the now empty holding pens and other torture-device looking things that had held the ten-thousand enslaved ghosts of scholars, poets and other innocent ponies captive – all of them now conspicuously empty – Speaker tracked the essence trails of shattered souls leading back to the remains of the real Soul-Breaker orb.

Deep down on the side of the pit,tt the bottom of a small crater on an outcropping, surrounded by the remains of five dead armored unicorns, Speaker found himself wanting to weep – but unable to. Around them were piles of rusty and ashen armor – the material remains of far too many war-ghosts to count. These unicorns had died as heroes, defending the very thing that ultimately killed them in order to save Creation. Speaker opted to honor the remains of Team Jade Mole, stuffing four of the dead bodies into elsewhere, packing the remains of the orb into a sack, then struggling mightily to carry both the last body and the sack out of the crater – to the point that he could not. It didn’t matter: The control station was coming in too fast, no time to get out.

Looking up at the mouth of the pit, as the control station overshadowed it and began to ‘plug’ the pit, Speaker dragged the body and the sack into an alcove. Retrieving his singing staff, he burrowed into the side of the pit.

The noise as everything came crashing down, the falling control station wrecking everything as it scoured the sides of the pit, was deafening – but it was quickly muffled into an omnipresent rubmle as he closed the tunnel behind him. Speaker cared nothing for the noise – for he felt dead inside.

It took a while for the rumbling and the dust to settle, far too long to be sitting in a hole in the ground with a dead unicorn and a sack full of broken bits of orichalcum, starmetal and soulsteel, but ultimately Speaker felt no more tremors – and thus brought about his singing staff once more to get him back to the surface.

To Heath Rose it had simply looked as Speaker had been crushed by the crumbling manse, as the control station fell into the pit.

After about fifteen minutes Heath Rose heard a soft tune creep through the debris, a sad little funeral dirge, and a bit after that Speaker popped out of the ground along with a dead unicorn in a fancy suit of armor and a dirty sack.

Heath Rose helped carry the load back to the artillery position, Deep Rot folding in on itself as they left it – the whole manse crumbling into its central pit, down into the hole at the bottom of the pit which linked straight to oblivion. As they touched down at the artillery position there was but a hole in the ground left where Deep Rot had been.

They found the encampment largely abandoned – though it didn’t take long for transport skyremes to arrive and spill out loads of ponies that began a frantic and hurried disassembly and loading up of the essence canons. It seemed as if every living soul had bugged out when they had gotten the message that the orb had been set and would go off shortly.

“I think the throne room was insulated from incoming spells… including messenger spells, we couldn’t have been warned even if they tried” Heath Rose commented, as hundreds of ponies rushed around her and Speaker, carrying boxes and hauling carts filled with strange looking things that had previously been part of magical weapons.

Speaker didn’t comment – though he suspected that it was right. It was a sensible thing to do; ward a war room against scrying and other external spells that might disrupt or harm those inside.

Seeing that Speaker didn’t appear that talkative – yet at the same time still quite shaken from having survived the Soulbreaking, from having heard that honeyed song of shadows calling on her souls – Heath Rose kept talking. It was the silence that bothered her: “So… The Barbate Arbiter, he fought with Gift? I didn’t see much of it, but it looked like he fought with your style”

Inhaling deeply and slowly, and exhaling likewise, Speaker replied: “I know – he was the ghost of my past incarnation”

The flight back to Creation was largely uneventful. The path was largely clear of obstacles, and the few posts along the way under siege were quickly rescued and their attackers bombarded to oblivion. Speaker didn’t even bother to listen in on the songs of victory that everyone else sang – he remained silent. Heath Rose didn’t say a word either, terrified beyond words that there now was both evidence and testimony supporting the bronze faction theory that the Deathlords were the mad ghost of First Age Solars. But how could Speaker be sane if his first age ghost had been this nuts?

Translating back into Creation, Speaker asked Sunrise to join him on a detour – promising to meet up with everyone else for the victory celebrations back in Lookshy.

Down from Sunrise’s cloud, at the shores of the inner sea, Speaker bid Sunrise pray for an audience with one of the water gods of the inner sea.

“No prayer needed – I have something better” Sunrise noted, retrieving a small rune-etched rock from her robes. Speaking into it, Sunrise somehow relayed the request magically to heaven, from where marching orders were quickly dispatched down to the nearest terrestrial god of the inner sea.

The godling was nothing special – a high-ranking water elemental really, appearing as a plume of foamy sentient water with sapphire eyes and big ol’ pointy aquamarine teeth. Speaker didn’t care: “I need you to take this blood from my hooves, keep it safe and undiluted, then bring it to the great western ocean and spread that blood there on the next sunset with no moon”

Sunrise instantly picked up on what Speaker was setting up. She found it to be a worthy gesture – Shimmer had always liked to swim.

The godling was at first about to protest – finding the task far too lowly for someone of his rank – but Speaker’s furious gaze and blazing caste mark dissuaded the elemental from saying anything, accepting the half dozen drops of blood and encasing them in magical amber with a touch.

“What will you do now?” Sunrise asked as the godling left, speeding westward with great haste and much splashing of water.

Speaker looked at his hooves. They were clean now – they also felt clean – and lighter. Stomping his hooves down onto the ground hard, he smiled for the first time since leaving Deep Rot: “I will honor her sacrifice. I will go home, clean up, heal the wounded…”

“And then what?” Sunrise quizzically asked – it was clear that she sensed that Speaker wanted more than just that.

“Then I will journey to bring Shimmer home again – once Lytek tells me where the exaltation went, no sense in searching blindy” Speaker said, looking purposefully towards the west and to the heavens.

> Chapter 109: Epiloque
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the aftermath of the Battle of Deep Rot, many things happened. Some of these things had been predicted, others had not – and not all of them were beneficial, though that was mainly a question of one’s point of view.

Sunhill grew – not due to any sudden influx of refugees or immigrants – but due to the sizable fortification that Lookshy set up five miles south of Sunhill along the Sunhill canal, to house and retrain the legionaries that the Seventh Legion sent to Sunhill for medical treatment. The redoubt became known as the Dragon’s Dawn redoubt, and sent a not so subtle message to nearby warlords and raiders that Sunhill wasn’t just considered an asset by Lookshy, it was also well guarded.

Further afield, Lookshy recovered well from the battle of Deep Rot. Its material losses during the siege had been minimal compared to what originally been planned, which was usually the greatest problem when fielding its First Age arsenal: A few skyremes had been lost, but such wonders could be built anew, more or less. When the final headcount was in the number of ponies lost in the underworld were just under seven hundred – far under the General Staffs initial projections. This feat was mainly attributed to the speedy resolution of the conflict and the Solar who went by the name Lee, Bodhisattva of the Third Breath, as his valor in leading the main defenses at the battle saw every bulrush and charge from the undead repelled with not a single legionnaire falling under his command. The scars those troops had born in that battle were shown with pride.

As Lookshy released information and magical recordings from the battle other fun things happened: Thorns, which had previously worked quite diligently under the Mask of Winters to come into good standing with the rest of the Scavenger Lands was utterly humiliated and scorned for having lent troops to Deep Rot’s defences. Images of Thornguard fighting spirits sent from heaven ensured that no pony or spirit in the east looked kindly on Thorns, and the Mask of Winters quickly found his diplomatic inroads drying up completely – not even the guild wanted to do business with him, at least officially.

Additionally, further afield, reactions from the Realm about the battle of Deep Rot were oddly mixed. Until the battle the exact nature of the Deathlords had still been largely unknown and unproven, but now there were legions worth of witnesses to wickedness and evil of these shadowy beings. Of course, news that Lookshy had openly cooperated and fought in battle along with Solar anathema didn’t exactly resonate well with the Immaculates, but Lookshy’s fairly indisputable proof that even Yu-Shan had lent its favor and aid to the Solars and to Lookshy in the battle muddled that message quite a lot. Sure, Immaculate doctrine would have it that the heavens and the immaculate dragons hated the anathema, but this could not be explained away so easily. It raised uncomfortable questions and started debates that many a faithful monk and abbot had best seen unspoken.

With the redoubt south of Sunhill the threat of river pirates evaporated completely, as did the need for Sunhill to set up its large scale armed forces for its own defences – though Speaker still trained up a surprisingly skilled peace-keeping force, marveling visiting Lookshyan officers with their discipline and the flawless executions of their drills, for such was the powers of Solar military training charms. This did lead to some minor contentions as Cash repeatedly had to ‘remind’ visiting Lookshyans that they were under Sunhill law, not Lookshy law.

There was barely half a day’s worth of patients left on his ‘to do’ list when Speaker finally got the message from Lytek: Shimmers exaltation had left his office for a new bearer – and while he could not track it himself, then he knew the exaltation well enough that he knew what kind of host it preferred: “You should seek a small island tribe beset by changelings or some other evil, and find a defiant lorekeeper there who refuses to let the memory or legacy of their people die”

Before leaving for the west the circle held council in Sunhill. Speaker reaffirmed that he would still supervise the hospital remotely, via the hearthstone of the Sunhill manse. He also gave the rest of the circle plans for a second manse, effectively a new city, designed to be built on an earth aspected demense about four miles north-west of Sunhill. Speaker figured that the circle could oversee the land claims and clearing while he was gone, provided that Sunhill grew enough to warrant such grand expansion.

Cash found the expansion plans sensible: A new initiative he had set up offered free healthcare to the crew of any merchant ship that docked at Sunhill, which was already attracting disproportionally large numbers of merchant shipping to Sunhill – even to the point that Great Forks was getting a tad upset over losing commerce. The Guild also didn’t like the situation, but found it difficult to enforce their trading embargo.

Indeed, Great Forks’s response to losing its top position as the east’s center of healing had caused no small amount of tension between Great Forks and Sunhill – but at the same time Great Forks’ divine leadership was exceedingly happy about Solar named Lee who had settled among them to restore and train their armed forces, him only requiring mandate to lead those forces in battle against the Deathlords when the time came, a mandate he was given without any debate or haggling, or that was at least the official story.

Back in Sunhill Sunrise’s orchestra held their last concert before Speaker’s planned departure, the orchestra returning to Yu-Shan just the same – but with the promise that if Sunrise called upon them, then most of them would most certainly return – and they would likely bring a friend. In Yu-Shan the spirits that had fought, sung and played with Sunrise at the battle of Deep Rot were lauded and commended, many finding new job offers coming their way as other gods desired such prestigious spirits be part of their entourage or courts.

In fact, all of Yu-Shan felt the after-shocks of Deep Rot. Heath Rose’s reports were spread far and wide, and the Sidereal rose to a level of prominence and power few others at her age had ever reached, even as her sub-convention on the Barbate Arbiter was officially closed down – but after that she could pretty much choose any position she wanted: There wasn’t the convention that didn’t want her on, and many generous offers and bribes were sent her way.

The politics of Yu-Shan also shifted ever so slightly as this new star of the Gold Faction rose. The Bronze Faction was caught between the very real politics of finally having agents and tools available who could strike against the Deathlords – but those agents and tools were Solars. Like in the realm, this raised questions and debates that many senior Sidereals in the Bronze Faction would have preferred left unsaid.

A new prophecy was pronounced: “A third age will dawn in Creation, birthed from green flame and clouded in brass smoke, guided by lights of many colors”

Everyone agreed that this didn’t sound good and should be avoided at all costs.

Beyond this foreboding prophecy, then the bronze faction did gain some ground: With deathlords now finally confirmed as a true threat and understood as the mad ghosts of ancient Solars, it became a lot easier for the bronze faction to sell the idea that new Solars had to be treated with caution – and not just blindly lauded as saviors. The gold faction may have proved that some of them were nice, but this was proof that they could go oh so very bad. 

Back in Sunhill Speaker woke up on the  morning of his departure, and as usual spent his few minutes via the Sunhill heartstone scrying all of Sunhill to see if everything was fine – which it wasn't, because being one of four kings of a city state meant that there was always something to do. His journey to seek out Last Shimmer's reincarnation had been postponed many times over on such accounts.

Oh how he wished that he would be able to leave for adventure again - but such were the burdens of governance.

Thus ends the scroll of the Exalted Ponies.

Thus begins the Tome of the Exalted Ponies.