This is a side storyline of the Balance Books. Not part of the main trilogy.
Sol died, got a few new names to hide behind, and became a Shadow, a pony that held the powers of word and hoof magic of death. His mentor, Bluemane, died a few years after he defeated the rouge Shadow that made him. Needless to say, he has been wandering, catching and trapping various demons he comes across that threaten the peace and tranquility of Equestria. But when his mindless wandering takes him through the halls of Canterlot and a certain mirror portal, he decides to find out if magic is still a possibility, while trying to get home. Instead, he winds up helping the most untrusted trio in all of Canterlot High. The Dazzlings.
As our antihero Roseshield was wandering through the beautiful halls of Canterlot Castle with his head down in deep thought, he noticed that he didn't recognize some of the tiling arrangements that he had been seeing for the past few hours.
"Now where am I...?" he asked nopony in particular while looking around for something familiar to try and use as a marker for getting back to the main part of the castle. He started walking around hoping to come to a spot that looked familiar, but only finding that the more he wandered, the more lost he became. Eventually he gave up and decided to just start using hoof magic to help mark his path.
Little did he- "HEY! JUST GET ON WITH THE STORY ALREADY!" Ok, ok! Fine! Great gods, you just broke the fourth wall Rose. "So what! You need to get a move on! Just skip to the part where I stumble through the stupid mirror because of a thing chasing me that scared me or something stupid." FINE!
As Roseshield stumbled up the stairs and into the mirror, he expected to hit it and break it. Instead, he went flying THROUGH the mirror from the magical land of Equestria and into the equine free world of Equestria Girls. "End this story now." Oh come on! Quit breaking the damn wall! *sigh* Moving on!
Instead of his hooves and fur, he had cloth things covering his body. His fore legs were shorter than his hind legs. His front hooves had ten weird digits on them. Five on each.
"Where'd I end up now...?" Roseshield asked nopony in particular. As he looked around, he noticed that the other creatures of the land were trotting around on their hind legs only. So he decided to try it.
And fell back down immediately. He tried using the statue that was next to him as a kind of bar the help him stay upright. And it helped. But he knew that he couldn't bring it with him wherever he went. So he decided to try and take a few steps along the base of the statue, slowly getting used to his new form. That's when he heard a scream. And despite being so new to his form, he knew it was a scream of fear and pain and instinctively started running as he later found out, towards the sound.
It lead him to an alley with a couple of scruffy males with knives of their front hooves and walking threateningly towards three females, one with curly orange hair with yellow streaks held back by a spiked tiara, another with purple hair with blue streaks tied up and off to the sides with two sets of star baubles, and the third had light blue hair with dark blue streaks tied back and held with a simple scrunchy. The one with orange hair was unconscious with the other two staring at her limp body.
She's not dead. She's still breathing. Kill the males first. Wake up the female after. Was what went through Roseshield's mind as he barreled into one of the males, taking them both to the ground.
"Dafuq does this runt think he can do to us?!" shouted the other male as he tried to slash at where Roseshield was.
But he sensed this and rolled back instinctively, then brought one leg out and into the males gut, making him drop his knife and sending him flying into the brick wall from the force of the blow. Blood started to dribble out of that ones mouth as most of the bones in his back were broken or dust. The first male had gotten up in time to see his partner go flying. And decided to try and cut Roseshield while his leg was still extended. Bad move. Roseshield used the extended leg to swing himself around and grab the falling knife.
"You two were foolish to try and attack me..." Roseshield said in a cold and heartless voice that he mastered in his years of demon hunting back in Equestria. "Let alone those three females while I was near..."
"Dafuq are you man! Ain't nobody able to move that fucking fast!" The male yelled at him.
"Is that so...?" Roseshield said, before charging at the male, staying low to the ground and moving sporadically. When he was close he jumped up and over him, using the momentum of falling in combination to his own strength to slice straight down his spine. After his fist hit the ground, the force created a small crater, which would cause the male to fall back onto the hand that Roseshield had readied to tear out his spine.
Instead, he split the male in two, and had the bodies entrails spill all over him in a messy bloody baptism.
"Damn..." he said, getting up and brushing off some of the guts from his shoulders as he moved towards the two conscious girls who were now slowly trying to get away from him. "Please. If I had wanted to hurt any of you, I could have your heads in a second. No, what I plan on doing is swearing myself over to you," he said, pointing with the knife at the one with light blue hair.
"Wh... Why me...?" the female asked, scared for her life.
"Because that's what the auth-" SMACK! Don't break the damn wall anymore!
"Because you're the most caring. I'm bound to the blades that I use to kill. Which is why I haven't killed before. All you need to do to send me back to this monster, is give the knife back to me," he said, lightly tossing the knife to her.
Luckily he took her flinching into account and it landed nicely in her lap without cutting her or leaving a stain on her skirt.
As the girl stared at the knife laying neatly in her lap, her mind couldn't stand the stress and shock and she fainted. Upon seeing her eyes roll up in her head, he dashed forward to keep her from hitting the hard cement. But in doing so he scared the other girl into grabbing the knife and pointing it at him, which forced him to pause in his advance long enough for the blue haired girl to hit the ground with an audible thump.
"Damn..." Roseshield said under his breath, "I'm sorry for scaring you, but I was only trying to keep her from hitting the ground. I really am bound to that blade in your hand. If somepony were to give a command while holding it, I would have to obey it. Please, put it down so we can get the three of you back home. OK?"
The girl simple stared at him, fear and adrenaline making her eyes wide and her hands shaky. But she was not scared enough to be useless. Instead of putting the knife down, she put it in her pocket, careful to keep it from stabbing her. Then she slowly got up and moved to the orange haired girl and picked her up, holding her with one arm over her shoulder. Roseshield picked up the other girl and carried her bridal style.
"So, where too?" Roseshield asked, turning towards the purple haired girl.
"H-Home," was her unsteady response.
As it turned out, 'home' was a run down, back street, abandoned warehouse. Upon seeing it, Roseshield almost dropped the blue haired girl. The girls had all recovered from their respective states, but the blue haired one liked that he was carrying her, rather than dragging her like the purple haired girl was. After giving a bit of each others history, minus names as an act of mistrust on both sides that Roseshield wanted to end as quick as possible, he figured out that they were banished here after a fight with the Princesses Celestia and Luna.
"So. Your names are...?" Roseshield prompted, after they had all gotten inside the warehouse. Which was actually more inviting once inside the doors than it looked.
"I'm Sonata Dusk," the blue one said, pointing to herself, "That's Aria Blaze, and Adagio Dazzle!" She said, pointing to each of the girls in turn.
"I am Roseshield. Demon hunter and trapper, and Shadow of Death. I have been in Equestria for about about half a century before being chased here," Roseshield said, looking around the room as he realized that his heart was beating frantically. He placed a hand over it quizzically and tried to focus on what was making it flutter so.
Upon seeing this, Sonata took his hand. "Magic here is weird. So you being an undead immortal back in Equestria doen't mean anything here. Your heart is beating for the first time in about a half century, right?"
Roseshield looked up at her, not just from the contact but by the uncharacteristic words of wisdom coming from the most playful of the sirens. "It's only ever beat when I was near a threat or demon... So yes. For the first time in a half century, my heart beats its own song... But how do you-"
"She does that. She'll sometimes have more wisdom than even old Sunbutt could in all her and her sisters years put together," said Adagio, staring Roseshield down, hoping to make him uncomfortable. But he shot back a glare cold enough to put ice cubes in someones drink.
"If it's a stare off you want, Adagio, then I can assure you that I will win. Got it?" Roseshield said in a voice so cold that the Arctic would seem warm in comparison. Adagio simply nodded to this, cowed by the pure killing intent under the coldness that only she could sense pouring from him in waves. "Now then. Author-" *SMACK* I BLEEDING TOLD YOU STOP BREAKING THE WALL! Gods! Do you know how much it costs to repair the wall you idiot!?
Aria saw this and moved an inch farther from him. Sonata being the oblivious fun lover that she usually was again, missed it entirely. "So. Demon hunter, huh?" Aria said, hoping to divert the sudden awkward silence.
Roseshield noticed her effort and went with it saying, "Yes. I hunt down the various demons and spiritual threats toward Equestria. Then, once I manage to weaken them enough, I would seal them away in my soulless body."
"Because you were a walking corpse, right?" Sonata said in her usual carefree voice.
Roseshield blinked at her, slightly amazed she remembered that small detail. "Yeah. Exactly. But the last time I went down to the Underworld to visit Death, it seemed to have some more flesh and a lot less creepiness."
"So maybe you sealed something that was sealing Death?" Adagio asked, still wary of their savior.
"Perhaps. But I wouldn't know unless I went down there and released and resealed each of them individually," Roseshield said.
"You thought about doing that once, didn't you?" Aria asked, seeing Roseshield's downcast eyes.
"Hmm? Oh. Yes. Sorry, I was miles down memory lane. But I have thought about doing it, but then realized how hard some of them are to fight, let alone seal the individual demons. It would take me longer to figure out which ones sealed Death away," Roseshield said, looking at each of the girls in turn. And then he felt something foreign in his chest. A kind of swelling that he hadn't felt in years. But as he tried to pin it down for identification, it grew. And he knew without needing to pin it down what it was. Not love, but pride. Pride that he had saved creatures of darkness without needing to seal them away. Or use his magic. He was proud of being able to do that, as it was one of the last things Bluemane taught him before he died at the hands of that one demon...
As Roseshield helped Sonata put the decorations around the circle of circles, he began to wonder what it was she was writing in the circles so he looked over.
What in the nine pits? Crescendo of the Undead? Magic is a Friend? Dark Azure Nights? Human Magic? Equestrian War? Why would Equestria have a war? He was so busy looking at the various things that when he looked back to Sonata, he almost jumped out of his skin. She was staring at him mere inches from his face. "GAH! Sonata! When did you get so close to me?"
She simply smiled and pointed at the center of the circles. In the center was written two words.
THE END.
Roseshield looked at the sky for a quick second. Wait... Dude, in specialty chapters, I don't care if the wall gets broken. "Really? Then what the hell's with your choice of humor?" Eh. I wanted to mess with the readers. "You're twisted." And Sonata thinks you're crazier than her now. As Roseshield looked back at Sonata, she was looking at him like he had just condemned everyone that liked tacos. "Damn you Author..." Right back at ya Sol.
"So... Who or what were you talking to?" Sonata asked warily.
"Um..." Roseshield looked around just as warily. Can I tell her? Dude. Specialty chapter. Wallbreaks galore. You really wanna pass this chance up? Will she remember any of this when you go back to the arcs? Nope. Good. "I was having a small argument with the author of all the stories that you wrote the titles of in those circles and are probably going to summon in one massive crossover fight," Roseshield said hoping that Sonata wouldn't get lost after he said more than four words that didn't include 'taco', 'fun', or 'party'.
"Oh. Ok!" Sonata said, going back to setting up the summoning circles.
Wow. You really pulled that out of you ass, didn't you Author? Yep. Don't do it again. You got it. Now then. If you readers want to continue reading the specialty crossover galore, go to each of the stories in the order listed. Damn-
It had been a few years since the first incident that brought Roseshield to the EQG dimension. He reverted back to his old name, Sol, while around the girls, but otherwise went by Roseshield. The three got him enrolled at the same school as them very easily, claiming him to be a new neighbor. The principals merely nodded and waved him through the doors. He had in his bag the knife, seeing as how it would be too dangerous to leave the object in one place that was as open as the warehouse.
The idea that he put sand in a bag with it so as to get it by the metal detectors was Sonata's idea. And as dumb of an idea as that was at the time, going through the metal archway and hearing it not go off shocked him mentally. But he showed no emotion outwards to betray his surprise. He did jump, however, when Sonata came up from behind him and wrapped herself around one of his arms and start pulling him off to one side.
"Don't let the others get to you, I'm a lot smarter than I look and act so that I can do stuff like this and not raise questions. So ifrst things first, is little miss Sparkle butt really an alicorn? Because when we left it was just Sunbutt and Moonbutt," Sonata said, barraging him with questions and things that changed as he answered one question after another. Eventually the bell rang signaling the start of their first class... that was right behind where the two were talking...
Damn she's good... And kinda cute... Roseshield couldn't help but stop and evaluate himself as that thought crossed his mind. There's no way I'm in love with her... Right?
The class was over before he even ad a chance to realize what it was over, but pulling out his schedule he saw that it was supposed to be improvised theater.