Bound by Scales

by FrostTheWolf

30- The Dwarven Dilemma

Shortly after going through the doors that lead into the mines, we found torches along the wall that were able to light the path forward. Leading us to a small ledge that served as a clearing to where we could see some of the orcs that we once saw in the immortal woods. There were a few different flaming stones, which we were told that by offering up some currency as tribute, we could be able to apply enhancements to ourselves that would last for a short while. Yet, things really got interesting once we heard Tina narrate the next scene. “You enter the dwarven mines… you also hear the anguished wails of the Sorcerer’s political prisoners and enslaved dwarves.”

Not long after hearing that, we then heard that same anguished wail from nearby as it echoed off of the walls and around the cavern we were in. “Agh! I’m a dwarf and I am enslaved!” For some odd reason, I had a pretty strange feeling that Tina may cross some boundaries with this next one.

“These mines house Ragnar, King of the dwarves and leader of the Anti-Sorcerer resistance. Mayhaps, if you talk to the dwarves, you may be able to join forces and perhaps become unstoppable, mayhaps.” That… sounded simple enough. Which was weird because up to this point, everything so far has been anything but simple.

“Don’t worry guys, I believe I can convince them to lend us some help with our quest-.” Garbuckle began to speak, shortly before being interjected when we all heard Shayne soon speak up with a question on her mind.

“So how exactly are we suppose to determine who actually talks to them? There are three of us, including Aurox and four of them.” She said, which lead to Tina actually figuring out how to see who does the actual talking.

“Well girl, we roll the dice. You will represent Ken and that wizard… whatever his name is… Shiv-Spike or something? Aurox will roll for Sir McBiggun and Aaron will roll for Wuzz-” Before I could even question the premise and say how exactly that was suppose to be fair, I heard dice roll in the background… and Aaron sounding really excited.

“Twenty! Hahaha!!”

“Oooh… Sorry about that, Shayney. It seems like we’re having Wuzz talk to the Dwarf King thanks to my homeboy Aaron over here!” She said, followed by what sounded like a high five. Ultimately, the thought that was in my mind was actually the same exact thing that both Shayne and I said a few moments later.

“I have a really bad feeling about this.” It didn’t help any that Wuzz right now was curling his fingers and cracking his knuckles like he was a James Bond Villain planning a sinister plot as we proceeded further. There was what looked like a minecart track leading up to where we needed to be next as we followed it up the wooden path on the side of a rocky ledge. Fighting off a few spiders and some stray orcs on the way over to what sounded like the most obvious name for a location in these mines… probably because it was set up by Orcs.

Camp Dwarf Torture. “Okay… I’m not seeing any dwarves… or torture here.” Wuzz replied as he looked around and shot a orc in the head with one of his arrows. “Such a letdown.”

“Well, whatever the case, we need to fight through these guys and push forward,” Garbuckle said as he pointed out something in the distance… from on top of Wuzz’s head. “I think I see some dwarves on the other side of this camp.” Well, onward I guess. It took several minutes for all of us, including Leona, to push through to the other side. Including having to slay an Orc Warlord and several different orcs that would want to blow themselves up with explosive barrels to try and kill us instead of actually fight. When some of them chased us through the next hallway to where the Dwarves were, the dwarves that were originally mining in place fought against the stray orcs and worked with us.

That was indeed a sign that things could work out… but we still needed to find the king for these guys. “Over here, laddie!” Wait, could that be-? Turning around in the direction of the voice, we now saw some of the other dwarves down by what looked like a pretty big gate and one of them had a crown on his head as he waved to us. “My boys are itching to fight by your side!” I was wanting to say yes, but it wasn’t our call to make on this-.

“I punch him!” Oh no… No no no no no no no! Oh god, please no!

“Wuzz, don’t! If we can just talk to them like… normal folks, we could-.”

“I PUNCH HIM!!” He declared. Only just flicking the king with a talon… and causing him to explode. “Uh… he was looking at me funny-.”

“WUZZ!!!” All of us collaboratively shouted in unison, which soon lead to one of the other dwarves in the area shouting out all over the mines.

“Those adventurers killed Ragnar the Emancipator! He was going to lead us all to freedom! KILL THEM!!!” Well, not only did we happen to kill off their king, but now also pissed off the entire dwarven race… and made them angry enough to want to murder all of us. Not to mention that the only way out of here was through these guys. Just freaking brilliant.

“Wait wait wait wait… You’re… fighting the Dwarves?” We soon heard the Handsome Sorcerer say in disbelief before sounding like he was laughing his ass off. “O-oh god, that’s just… that’s just hilarious… I was going to kill them myself but… thanks though!”

All while we were still struggling to make sure we don’t either get blown up by dynamite, crippled by pickaxes or worse, getting shot at; Leona soon groaned deeply on my shoulder as she narrowed her eyes at Discord. “You’re killing me here, Wuzzy… First, we’re having to fight our way out of a group of pissed off, cider guzzling shortstacks and now we’re getting taunted by a little girl impersonating the voice of a grown man… Seriously?!”

“Uhh… I’m sorry?” The Draconequus then said, which of course lead to both Leona and I groaning simultaneously as we kept on moving forward. By this point, we were out of the hall of emancipation where we first originally met Ragnar and now found ourselves a long bridge leading across to a massive door on the other side.

“Hey guys, ah don’t know about you, but that looks like our way out of here.” McBiggun’s words definitely helped with encouraging us in that moment… yet, something told me that there’s more than meets the eye when having to try and find our way out of this place. Especially when were now beginning to see something on the other side of the bridge.

“In the distance, you see a lonely wizard blocking your path.” We heard Tina say… turns out though, it was more than just a wizard. It was… wait, is that who I think it is?

“Perhaps they knows the way out of here,” Garbuckle said, before narrowing his eyes at Discord. “I say we talk to him.”

“With words…” Leona added on, only leading to Discord looking rather puzzled as he looked back at us.

“I don’t know why you guys are looking at me.” I just rolled my eyes as I looked back at the… wizard. If you consider a Wizard being Twilight Sparkle wearing a navy outfit and a hat that resembled the same one as Gandalf the Grey. She didn’t have the beard, but oddly enough, some of the features of her appearance matched that of the same outfit that Garbuckle was wearing. It was also around then that I noticed the current… objective to what we need to do.

Talk to the Wizard (with words).

That seemed… simple. Matter of fact, too simple. So, I decided to help move things along and approach the wizard in question, clearing my throat as I spoke up. “Excuse me, miss. My friends and I need some help-.”

Not even a few seconds after I spoke up, we all heard Twilight speak up… yet she didn’t seem too pleased to be seeing us right now. “Oh NO! Another band of adventurers that are wanting to defeat the Handsome Sorcerer!! Look, let me be honest with you…” She said, before saying something that… definitely seemed like her at the time. “You’re not going to make it. There's a high possibility that you’ll either die or be enslaved… or even end up dying while being enslaved!! And I in good conscience can’t let you go forward on your quest.”

Shortly after saying that, she took the staff she had with her in levitation spell and rose it above her head. Magic flowing behind her as she shouted out what she said next. “YOU SHALL NOT PASS!!!” Yet, once she brought the staff down, all it did was throw her backwards into the self made sign she was using in order to block the way out. Not to mention the objective changed once again.

Pass.

“Well, at least we don't need to worry about anymore unnecessary fighting right now,” McBiggun pointed out as we all passed her. Only to hear her shouting in response.

“Goddess dammit!!!” She roared, before sighing in defeat. “Alright… if you really want to find the way out, I’ll mark the exit on your map. But if you die, then I won’t be able to say I didn’t warn you… because you’ll be dead!” With that, she disappeared with a teleportation spell as we proceeded toward where the door was. Only to have it slam in our face… and for Wuzz, that happened literally.

“The exit is locked… by dwarven door locking magic!” We then heard Tina speak up as Wuzz used an air pump to reinflate his previously squished head.

“Well dang it!” Wuzz then grumbled once he had his head back in the game. “Now how else are we suppose to get out of here?!” We looked at one another for a moment, shortly before we heard someone else speak. It wasn’t Tina though this time, but actually Shayne as she cleared her throat.

“You know, that wizard that we just passed might know a thing or two about door locking magic… Just saying…” Though, it didn’t seem important at first, hearing that gave me an idea though as I looked back at everyone else and began to backtrack a bit. Following the path that our wizard friend was taking in order to catch up with her as she opened the gate that blocked our path.

“Excuse me, miss… but do you happen to know something about a kind of door locking magic?” Garbuckle then asked. Yet, the question soon had the robed alicorn wizard’s eyes widen in shock and amazement before she answered his question.

“No way… That’s like number three on my top five favorite types of magic in the world!” She replied gleefully, before shaking her head to refocus her attention back to us. “Look, you’re going to need the secret dwarven passphrase to open the door. Go find some weird runes scattered around the mines… I-i bet those are the letters making up the passphrase. If you find the letters, you can probably get out of here!” Wait, did she say probably? “In fact, I found one just the other day! But you can’t have it! Go ahead and find your own.” When she said that… and guided us to where the rune actually was, all it did was just tempt us in order to take it.

And what made things even weirder was when Wuzz decided to… exchange the rune for a random book while wearing an archeologist outfit, brown leather hat and had a whip at his waist. “Hey! Aww…”

Shortly after the ranger got the letter and tossed it over to me for safe keeping, we then heard Tina speak up as she gave us some… emphasis on what exactly we found. “Nice! That looks like the symbol for the letter T… One down, three to go.” Just as we were about to leave though, the wizard soon spoke up and then asked something for us to do on the side.

“Hey… If you’re not too busy, can you assist me with something?” She asked us. I nodded my head in response, seeing that she did help us understand how the passphrase worked, provided one of the runes for the same passphrase and also showed us the exit out of here. “FACT; all great known wizards have beards. FACT; Mares are incapable of growing beards. Turbo fact; if you get some dwarven beard hair, I would look swank as heck!”

I looked back at Leona and everyone else, raising an eyebrow as I noticed Leona preparing some fireballs in advance, thinking that burning them would be the solution. “Now, you can normally just shoot the dwarves, but that’ll just singe the hair! Instead, we need to trick them into killing themselves.” And how exactly are we supposed to do that? “Hit the dwarves with this enchanted cider gun to make them drunk, then lead them into some mining equipment! It’s gonna be morally ambigu-awesome!!”

As she handed the enchanted pistol to us, that was when we heard Shayne ask something. “Wait… Cider gun… so are you saying that if you shoot anyone with it, it makes the person that gets shot intoxicated?”

“That’s what it sounds like… they did happen to become public enemy number one in dwarven society, so maybe something like this can come in handy.” Aaron suggested. I’m not gonna lie… but he made a very valid point. Even if it was because him rolling the twenty on the die in the first place and allowing Wuzz to do the talking was what got us all into trouble in the first place.

And yet, before we could even go forward a few feet, I was hearing a new dwarf like voice on my ECHO device. “You!! The sorcerer told me about you! Said you’d come for his queen… well, tough titty! I’m in charge of these mines and you’re never going to get the other runes… NEVER!!”

Just as we heard that, I soon heard a comment from Wuzz as we looked at one another. “Can I shoot him with the cider gun when we fight him?”

All of us at the same time had the exact same answer for the draconquus ranger right now. “NO!” But before we could continued on with the game, we soon heard something ringing again, followed by Tina’s voice.

“Hunh… unidentified caller… Ehh, there’s no telemarketers out here, so give me a second…” We heard Tina say before answering. “What’s up, homie? Dis is Tiny Tina speakin’.” Wait… Did she just tried to talk like a gangster just now?

“Ummm, hello? I’ve been trying to get in contact with… Well anyone for the past hour. I don’t know where I am, or why I’m dressed like this… But it really creepy here and I don’t like it… SOME ONE HELP ME!!!” Wait, what the hell? Was that… Asphyxious? But before anyone could say anything, I heard Tina end the call immediately… followed by Shayne questioning her decision.

“Tina, whoever that guy was sounded like he needed some assistance. Why did you just hang up on them?” She asked, shortly before hearing another statement from Tina as we were fighting through the dwarves that were attacking us.

“Simple… No spoilers…” Good lord, what did I get myself into this time? I swear, almost every time that Asphyxious is involved somehow, it’s downright shenanigans. First, there was him coming to the temple a few months back. Then there was chasing Sun while he was drunk. Not to mention when I found Orendi and how they crashed in on Ponyville when I finally reunited with Tina.

Anyways, where was I? Ah right, shooting dwarves with a booze gun and having them walk into mining equipment. That sounds just about right. Of course, having them walk into a press that smashes them into bloody bits and having their beards be left over was only part of what we had to do. The next step was to collect the beards that remained, but not all of them. Just five of them were enough, before she needed us to take them to the forge farther in the mines. “Okeydokey! Now we just need to take those beard pieces and re-forge ourselves a new beard! A beard more majestic than you can ever imagine!! To the Dwarven Beard Forger 9000!”

“Should I even ask why she sounds so enthusiastic and happy about having a beard?” Shayne asked before hearing Tina’s response.

“Well, according to Mr. Spikey down there, Twilight always wanted to put herself in the hooves of Starswirl the Bearded. So I decided that in here, she can be that… literally.” That just made me facepalm myself as I looked at Garbuckle, who seemed a bit too embarrassed to comment on the matter as we pressed on through the first set of corridors that were in the mines. Leona herself helped us out on occassion, but mostly it was both Sir McBiggun and I fighting through the dwarves while Wuzz and Garbuckle covered us.

When we approached one point though, where we could clearly see the lava underneath us and the scattered chests that had health, arrows and other items, we then heard Tina speak up, “Ooh, what’s that over there?” She said, just as a floating platform materialized some distance away. “It’s a rune… at the end of some super sick jumps and stuff!” That was followed by a few more rocks that served as platforms spawning in between like stepping stones.

“A JUMPING PUZZLE? UGH……” When I heard Aurox said that, it pretty much reminded me of how I felt about this same puzzle. Yet, that didn’t stop Wuzz from attempting it as he leaped into the fray… only to fall into the depths below… and then faceplant right in between Garbuckle and McBiggun.

“Tina, I’m pretty sure that this jump right now is impossible…” Aaron commented on it, which of course made her groan a bit before speaking up.

“Fiiiiine! I’ll make it do-able.” She commented before more stones soon on the side appeared out of nowhere. And yet, even if this was suppose to help us… it looked just as hard and tricky as what we were first having to do on our own. All this while Wuzz was trying to unstick himself from the stone floor he faceplanted on.

“Alright, how about we just find a way to cleverly bypass the whole thing and use one of us as ammunition for a plan involving launching themselves out of a catapult?” Wuzz soon replied, which got several strange stares from everyone as I decided to take matters into my own hands now.

“Sure… or I can just do this.” As I said that, I extended my dragon arm forward and used the energy I was channeling to pull the rune off of it’s ledge in the distance and towards us. “There, simple and no need to have anyone be launched out of a catapult.”

“Nicely done… Anti-climatic, but nicely done. You found the Dwarven Letter A!” Tina told us as I placed the second rune with the first one that we acquired a few moments ago. It felt good to have two of them now, but it still meant that we needed to find two more runes before we can truly get out of here. And the same dwarf that commented earlier had more to say on the subject.

“Celebrate while you can douche! You need two more runes to complete the passphrase and I have the last one!” When I looked back at everyone, they were pretty… surprised that this dwarf somehow knew modern day profanity. Then again, this is Tina’s game we’re talking about… and there were a lot of things here that we honestly did not expect.

But one of the things that caught us off guard was something that was going on outside the game. “Hello? Anypony home?” Oh god… don’t tell me… When I heard that voice, both McBiggun and I looked back at one another in shock. “Ah, hello everypony. Whatcha doing?”

“Oh hey AJ, we’re just playing a game of Bunkers and Badasses… Even if we’re out here, we’re actually watching Ken, Big Mac, Spike and Discord navigate the world inside the game. Come join us.” Shayne said, confirming that now Applejack was watching the game. Just as we encountered another group of dwarves that were trying to murder us.

It was while we were fighting though that Applejack soon commented on something that even I did not notice at first. “Uhh… Tina. I’m normally not one to comment on how you’re running this game of yours, but those dwarves look almost exactly like a displaced we met at Beacon. Red hair, short in height… and ah think his name is Nicko…” Oh god, she’s doing the dwarves based on him?! That’s even worse than doing them off of Salvador!

Now was when it seemed like Shayne noticed that too. “Hunh… now that you mention it, I do see the resemblance. But isn’t that kind of… well…”

“Yeah, I know Shayney… You think that’s racist or something? How about I ask him and see how he thinks!!” Oh god, don’t get him involved!! That’s the last thing we need to deal with right now… Wait, how can she-?

Yet, before I could even ask myself how in the world can Tina be able to contact another displaced, let alone know about Nicko, I heard her talking into her ECHO device.“Hey, Mister Nicko whatever your name is?! I’m playing Bunkers and Badasses with my cousin Ken right now. Is it okay if all the dwarves in my campaign somehow look like or resemble you?”

For a moment, I honestly didn’t think I would hear a response back… but as it turned out, she was able to get a hold of him somehow. “Wait, for real? That is… just FREAKING awesome! Go for it… and tell Ken I said Hi!”

“BOOYAH!! Not racist…” Tina’s comment afterwards did little to ease the multiple thoughts that were bouncing through my head right now as we were trying to focus on pushing through the caverns. Farther in was where we saw a battalion of Orcs and an army of Dwarves fighting each other. We could’ve went around the two of them if that was an option, but that did not seem possible given the fact that news of what Wuzz did to King Ragnar happened to travel pretty fast. Especially with how massive these mines are.

When we did get through both miniature armies though, we were luckily able to proceed into a different cavern with what looked like a forge on an offset path. Which meant two things. One, the next rune was in a puzzle that was here. Two, the Dwarf Beard Forger 9000 was also here… coincidently.

“Standing before you is a dwarven puzzle… to solve this, you gotta think real hard… TO THE MAX!” Shortly before one of us was near the forge in the back of the room as we heard Twilight speak. “Great! You found it! Now place the beard bits within it’s magical dwarven bowels!” That almost caused me and a few of us to snicker in response, shortly before hearing Shayne speak up.

“How long have you been waiting to say the phrase ‘magical dwarven bowels’?” She asked out of curiosity, while also whispering on the side to catch Applejack up to speed on what was going on as I was placing the beards on the anvil.

“Several hours…” Was Tina’s only response to the question, followed by a huge giant hammer that was lowered from the ceiling by a set of chains as it was hanging over the forge.

“Let me take care of this first before we attempt the puzzle.” I told everyone else, who nodded in agreement as I then heard Twilight tell me to strike the forge with the hammer while the forge was hot. Turns out, tapping it with a finger was all I needed to do before the hammer started smacking the beards on the forge.

That, of course, made Twilight feel pretty… excited. “Yes! YES!! I CALL UPON THE POWER OF THE GODS: MAKE MY BEARD GROW!!” Once the hammer had finished striking the forge, a newly forge beard was now floating from the anvil as I picked it up and added it with the rest of my inventory to give to her later. “Alright. Now come back to me so you can place the magical facial hair on my deserving face!” Now, at least we don’t need to worry about that anymore… Now for the puzzle.

“So… How exactly are we going to solve this one?” Garbuckle asked, while we were observing the cube floating above us. It was then I noticed that I paid attention to the switches that we were standing by as I looked back at them.

“Hunh… I gotta hand it to Tina, she’s pretty clever with this one,” I admitted, before looking at them. “Okay, here’s what we’ll do. First, we activate these switches in order to move things around with the cube. However, once we do that, we need to activate the switches again in reverse. It’s like a Rubik's cube.”

“What the hay is a Rubik’s Cube?” McBiggun asked, tilting his head a little.

“And who is Rubik?” I heard Wuzz asked, which almost made me want to facepalm myself because of the kind of question he was asking.

“No, it’s not like that… It’s a puzzle cube that had multiple sides to it and different colored faces. Something I remember from back home,” I told them simply before looking back at the floating cube above us. “Just do what I said with the switches and then we can get the third rune we need.” Not even deciding to question what I was trying to tell them, everyone just went along with it as we carefully activated the six switches that were on three different ends of the cube… before doing the same process in reverse.

When we were done, the cube hit the ground, before unfolding and firing off two orbs of light that unlocked a set of gates on the left and right. The first one to unlock the rune we needed, while the second one unlocked a dice chest on the other end of the room. “Woah! You solved my devious puzzle! Nice!!” Tina complimented us upon completion.

“YOU GUYS ARE AS SMART AS F**K!!” That was… not the normal kind of compliment that I would receive from someone, but what the hell? I’ll take it. Shortly after the gates were unlocked, Wuzz called dibs on getting the next rune while I went to open the chest. Luckily, it wasn’t one of the mimic chests and when I opened it, it provided some good stuff inside. Including some shock based arrows that could work quite well with my bow. Especially if the next thing that Twilight wanted us to do was what I thought it would be.

“That’s the letter F, only one more left!” Tina told us… followed by Greedtooth seconds afterwards as I noticed Leona on my shoulder look a bit more… irritated than normal.

“I got the last letter, moppet! And with the sorcerer’s power coursing through my veins, you’ll NEVER get it!” He declared, which in turn caused the small digimon on my shoulder to… well… set off.

“Oh yeah? We’ll SEE WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I MELT YOUR FACE OFF AND BURN YOUR BODY TO ASHES!!” She roared, before making a personal vow to herself. “We’ll show him what happens when you call me a douche!” Note to self, do not suggest for her to go to an anger management class in the near future.

“So, who’s the cute fella on Ken’s shoulder?” Oh lord… Applejack, why did you have to ask that? I don’t want her igniting into a raging inferno on me here.

“That’s Leona… She just happened to come along for the ride, oddly enough.” Shayne then spoke up, responding to what AJ just said. “But she’s been doing a pretty good job of helping them… though, I would advise not calling her cute… it’s kind of a trigger to her rage.” Dully noted, detective Obvious.

Once we got closer and dropped down further towards where we need to be, we then heard Tina begin to narrate once again. “You now enter the lair of Greedtooth the dwarf… The sorcerer brainwashed him into running this place. You ALSO notice… a weird ass magic globe. Might be why Greedtooth’s so mean.”

“So wait… that globe may be how he’s being brainwashed?” Garbuckle asked for clarification as he looked back at the rest of us.

“Only one way to find out right now.” I replied, having my bow at the ready as we watched the dwarf got up from his throne and approach us.

“Welcome to my lair… NOW FREAKING DIE!!” He roared while… jumping into the lava.

“Wait, did he just kill himself?” Wuzz asked, looking back at all of us in confusion… shortly before we heard a huge rumbling noise and felt the ground shake as a huge golden golem emerged from the ground… and Greedtooth was in control of it. “Oh… crap.”

“Haha! A boss fight? Let’s do this!!” We all heard Aaron respond as we got ourselves for the fight. However, instead of attacking Greedtooth himself, we decided as a group that if we took out the… weird ass magic globe… first, we can break the curse that’s on the dwarf and maybe he can help us. Not before we weaken the golem a little first though.

As I aimed my bow at the globe that was around the room, Wuzz and the rest of the group, with Leona as well, worked on trying to get some of the bosses health down first. Then, at the right moment, I drew back my bow and fired off a single shot that destroyed the globe. Which in turn, caused the dwarf to act a bit… differently. “Woooooah… I feel… different,” He spoke, like he was someone waking up from a hangover. “Y-you! You broke the sorcerer’s control over me! You must want to get out of this really horrible place!”

“Umm… yes we do…” I said, though I had a feeling that there was some kind of catch to what this dwarf was saying.

“Goldie, get our savior the passphrase rune,” Greedtooth shouted to another dwarf before redirecting his attention to us… More specifically, Wuzz. “Thank you for-. Woah woah woah, wait a minute! You’re the jackass that killed Ragnar the Emancipator!! DIE!!!”

“Dammit Wuzz!!” I cursed, now having to dodge more incoming attacks from the golem as they were directed towards us and the other dwarves were converging on our location.

“I said I was sorry!!” Wuzz frantically apologized as we were being pushed into a corner because of them pushing us back.

“So does anyone have any idea’s for how exactly we’re going to get the heck out of this mess?” Garbuckle frantically asked. It was then though that… one idea happened to come into my mind. And that idea was standing on my shoulder.

“Leona… You said you wanted to turn these guys into piles of ash right?” I asked, surprising her with the question I posed.

“Well yeah, but-” She originally said, before then realizing something. “Wait, you’re… not actually going to hold me back on this one?”

“We’re running low on options at this moment,” I sighed, looking back at the Coronamon. “So burn to your heart's content.” Now, if any of you are familiar with the LEGO movie at all, giving Leona permission to do what I just said… was just like if you told Benny (The 1980’s something space guy) that he could build a spaceship. And her response?

“Oh… HELL YES!!!” She growled, her body glowing as she began to take on a different form. One that was the same size of Greedtooth’s Golem, had a long mane that would make anyone who was familiar with Dragon Ball Z think of Super Saiyan 3, and was incredibly pissed right now. “I’LL MAKE ALL OF YOU REGRET INSULTING A GODDESS IN THE DIGITAL FLESH, YOU MOTHERF**KERS!!!!”

And just like that, she went on a massive rampage. Firing off multiple blasts of energy that took on the form of a lion’s head as it made any dwarf that was caught in the crossfire blow up to smithereens. Picking off all the smaller dwarves one by one, she then returned her focus to Greedtooth, who began to beat the living crap out of him and the golem with a flaming series of punches and kicks. “KURENAI SHISHI NO MAI!!”

Her attack, which translated to Red Lion’s Dance, brutally broke off the arms and legs of the golem. Leaving only the head left as she went with one more attack to finish off the dwarven bastard. “PURIFYING HOWL!!” The blast had the rest of the golem get thrown into the lava pit that was behind it as she now had felt at ease since there were no more dwarves that she could kill. A few seconds later though, she then reverted back to… well, I think she shifted into a different form as we were now seeing here like a small sun.

“If you compare me to Celestia, then you are next.” She warned, growling at the rest of us before taking refuge on my shoulder once more. With the golem destroyed, we were able to salvage the spoils that were behind the former dwarves throne along with the last rune that we needed for the door.

“Great job! You now have all the letters. Now just get back to Twilight.” Tina replied, shortly before someone else interjected.

“We gotta go all the way back? Aww man…” Aaron then spoke up, showing his disapproval for us walking all the way back to the other side of the mines.

“Alright alright, here…” She said as two glowing platforms manifested in the room now behind where we got the rune. “I made some glowy portals for you lazy butts.”

“Did you just say lazerbutts?” The teen asked again, which in turn even made us also chuckle a bit. Even going as far as Wuzz speaking up in response. “Whatever that is, I want it…”

“So wait… what was the last letter suppose to be?” McBiggun then asked, bringing up something that Tina forgot to mention earlier.

“I think we’ll find out once we get back.” I told him in response, being the first one to step through with everyone else behind me. It was once I was back that I soon heard everyone outside the game trying to unscramble the letters we have.

“Wait… R-A-T-F? What the heck is that suppose to spell out?” Shayne then asked everyone.

“Well, the closest thing ah can think of is Raft. Like from those old Huckleberry Filly books granny used to read to Mac and Ah when we were little.” Applejack then spoke, which lead to all of us placing the four runes we got in the order of that word. Followed by one of us having to speak the passphrase out loud.

“Is it… Raft?” I asked, yet despite my hopes, the door did not open.

“The hay? Was that not it?” We heard Applejack ask as we began to take off the runes. Yet… someone else soon figured it out, but they weren’t so enthusiastic about it though.

“OH GREAT……” We all heard Aurox mumbled shortly before saying the reason why he was groaning. “I JUST FIGURED IT OUT…”

“So say it, big guy… Come on now…” Shayne tried encouraging him, which only lead to him grumbling even more before actually speaking.

“FINE, IT’S…… FART. HAPPY-?” Just as we heard him say that though, Tina bursted into a fit of uncontrollable laughter. Almost sounding as if she lost control of herself before hearing Discord speak up in response once we finally got the door open.

“Well… that was a rather… stinky thing to say… am I right?” Yet, his futile attempt at humor did not exactly run well with Tina.

“You ruin everything…” Was all she said, before I looked back at everyone else and sighed for a moment.

“Hey, before we get out of here, let’s go see if Twilight wanted us to do anymore tasks for her.” I suggested. Which in turn everybody soon agreed with as we began to backtrack to where the Alicorn Wizard happened to be. Leading me to placing the beard on her as we heard her shouting out loud and… what looked like her attempting to dance.

“I have the POWEEEEEER!!! Ah ha ha!!” She declared, just before I turned in the quest. “I feel wise as f**k right now!”

“Okay, what the hay is going on in here?” That had me look at everyone else for a moment, before hearing what was going on from outside as we heard someone else respond.

“Oh hey, Twilight. We’re playing a game with Tina and she imagined you as an all powerful wizard.” Great job, Aaron… You just had to-.

“Oh… can I watch?” Wait, what now? First Applejack, now her? This is getting a bit out of hand.

“Didn’t you have some kind of friendship summit thing going on with the girls or something?” Aaron then asked her.

“Yeah, but we already finished that some time ago. I was going to relax with reading a book, but when I heard you guys playing your game and having fun, I was curious to see for myself.” She replied, clearing her throat a bit.

“Well, perfect timing, Twilikins. I got two more side quests for your character right now actually,” Tina spoke, before the Twilight that was standing right next to us then spoke. “I’ve got my magic beard, but I seem to be running low on the magic juice I need to cast spells. Take this.” She said, handing me what looked like a flask for a potion with a few ingredients inside.

Going along with it, I took the flask as she began to explain what we needed to do next. “Alright. Now I need you to jam that into some magical creatures that are nearby and then kill them. The juices in their blood, combined with the ingredients already in the flask, will help create an elixir that should recharge my magic. First step, golem magic… for stability. Find a magical golem.”

“Hunh… I’m beginning to like this already… Alchemy was one of my favorite subjects back at Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns.” I heard her say, all while rolling my eyes as we happened to notice the golem we needed to blow up nearby. Once we got closer, I placed the flask on an arrowhead and aimed at the exposed backside of the golem.

“Insert the flask in there and it should start charging… You noticed how I didn’t giggle there? I feel like I’m growing.” I just rolled my eyes at that and ignoring Twilight outside the game asking Tina what she was talking about as I fired off that arrow. “Alright, the flask is wedged in there. Now, blow them apart.” With it, I prepared one of the explosive arrowheads that Tina gave me and used it to blow the golem up to smithereens a few seconds later.

“Great! The wands partially charged. Don’t forget to grab it!” She advised as Garbuckle picked up the flask and gave it back to me. “Now, the wand needs some Arachnid magic. For Flexibility. Find one and stab it with the flask I gave you.”

That may sound simple in theory, but it involved a LOT of backtracking. Like back towards the entrance of the mines. And unlike Discord or Twilight, who could teleport themselves over there, that was something I couldn’t really do. Thankfully though, I had some shock based arrows for the next task we need to do once we actually got closer to it.

Yet, things got complicated once we actually found the spider and shanked it with the flask. “Ponyfeathers!! That spider is growing a shield! If you don’t murder it with a shock weapon, the flask won’t get the blood it needs for the potion!” Already one step ahead of you, Twilight. Aiming my bow, I fired several different arrows towards the spider. All of them shock based as it disintegrated from the amount of electricity that was frying it’s body. “Awesome! Now it only needs one more source of magic!”

“Okay… and what exactly is this last source? Land Magic? Weather? What is it?” Twilight asked, sounding like a kid in suspense when their parents were planning on surprising them with something. Just as we picked up the wand again.

“Now the wand needs a source of orc magic, for power… You know what to do.”

“Wait, we do?” Garbuckle asked, confused while looking at me. Now came the easier part of all of this. All that had to be done was find an orc… stab it… and then shoot it in the face.

“Why is nobody helping me!?”

“WAIT YOUR TURN!!!” Tina snapped at what sounded like Asphyxious again, making him sound like a whimpering puppy afterwards. We got the last of the blood that we needed for the potion as the ingredients began to mix, turning into a white like blend of all three magics as she soon responded once we had everything in hand.

“Alright! The potion is ready! Just bring it back to me… and don’t worry, that last mishap with the orc happened to teach me an important lesson,” Oh really now? I wonder what that lesson is then… Fortunately, she happened to share it to me once we returned the potion back to her. “The lesson is… Magic is awesome and I should keep doing it!”

Yet, shortly afterwards though, she asked for us to follow her over to a nearby cliff as Twilight spoke again. “Thanks for helping me with the potion and sweet ass beard by the way. Y’know, for being a wizard, I’m the one usually asked to do the favors for other ponies. Like, ‘make Princess Celestia fall in love with me’ or ‘hey, give me unlimited power!’ or ‘stop talking to yourself and get out of the way, you stupid egghead… Having someone do stuff FOR me is a pretty nice change of pace.”

“I wonder how that feels like…” Garbuckle mumbled, rolling his eyes for a moment before looking back at us. All before we heard something out of the ordinary.

“Hey, Twilight. You alright?” Applejack’s question was only answered by a squeaking sound that you would normally hear from Fluttershy. Which in turn, lead to us hearing Shayne laugh to herself.

“Oh my god, she looks too cute when she’s embarrassed.”

“I am NOT embarrassed!” Twilight snapped before Shayne immediately shot back.

“Denial is proof!!” The teen declared, just as we arrived at the top of the ledge that Wizard Twilight was leading us too. Once there, she got up on the pedestal she was standing on before speaking to us once again in a tone where she sounded both proud of herself… and also sounding like she was getting a little ahead of herself.

“I think it’s time to show off my true powers, apprentice,” Wait, apprentice? Since when did that happen-? “I’m gonna summon a terrifying arch-demon, and then destroy it with my amazing skills. I need you to clap loudly and tell me how awesome I am!” Why do I have a feeling that she’s going to really mess this up somehow? “Come thunder, come lightning! Touch this altar with power frightening.

It didn’t help any that while she was saying that, there was a lighting storm occurring behind her and while that was going on, we can all here her maniacal laughter. That… before she said the second part. “Ahem… Magic beard gods, as my skills deepen. Let me test them against an EVIL DEMON!!”

There was a crack of lightning as it struck the ground nearby us, before hearing Twilight say ‘Ta-da!’ proudly. Yet, it turns out that she didn’t exactly get the arch-demon she wanted. “What is that? A broom? Gah, I screwed up the spell! Just a second, I’ll get rid of it.” The wizard replied shortly before chanting another spell. “Gods of power, gods of fear! Get this dumb broom OUTTA HERE!!”

Despite her efforts though, that only caused more brooms to show up… And these brooms looked like the same ones during the old Disney cartoon for The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. “Ta-daaaaa hell?” she said, looking a little embarrassed. “I’m uh… noticing a problem,” Really? What was your first clue? “Can you handle these guys while I work on a counterspell?”

Just as she asked that, those brooms, which Wuzz thought were harmless, began attacking us. Leona herself hid under my clothes because the water in the buckets she was carrying was what she saw as her… mortal enemy while they were giving the rest of us a hard time. That was because after the first few were killed, more of them spawned shortly afterwards.

“Okay, let’s try this now. They’re made of wood, so let’s see what happens if I burn them!” That did seem hopeful at least… yet, one thing to keep in mind was to never get your hopes up. “Beard of power, thick and wiry! Burn these fools with something FIERY!” There was the sound of thunder again and more lighting as we all witnessed the brooms being set on fire.

Yet there was one small problem… they were still alive… and now coming at us. “Ohhhh CRAP!!” Now we now have to deal with burning broomsticks that could swarm us if we aren’t careful enough. Just freaking brilliant… I get that wizard Twilight right now was trying her best to not mess things up… but it looks like luck was not exactly on her side today.

It didn’t take her long in order to try and come up with another idea to solve this problem. “Okay, better idea-- I’ll shrink ‘em!” Please, for the love of the ancients… I hope this works… “Eeny meeny meeny miney! My beard will shrink you TINY TINY!”

For a moment, it looked like it worked-. But then karma happened… and it made things worse. Instead of shrinking them, the exact opposite happened as they were now twice our size… and still on fire. “Whoo- okay. Exact OPPOSITE of what I meant to go. Gimme a second.” So now we were defending ourselves from brooms that were not only giant, but also on fire! Well geez, why don’t you just make them extremely harder to kill while you’re at it!!

Oh god, I think I jinxed us. “I’ve GOT IT! Something bad always happens when I do a good spell, so I should try a bad spell, so something GOOD will happen,” What kind of weird ass logic is that-!? “My other spells incited groans… and so I summon BADASS CLONES!!”

Cue the screwup to the sound of lighting in three… two… one… “ARE YOU KIDDING ME!? THE ONE TIME I WANT MY SPELL TO FAIL AND IT WORKS!?!” And now I feel like I definitely jinxed us a few minutes ago. Not only were we having to defend us against freaking broomsticks, but they were on fire, giants, and badasses!?! Good lord, this is getting way too out of hand.

“Dear lord, it’s just one screw up after another,” We all heard Aaron comment after I had to destroy a few more brooms using my swords. “What’s next? Twilight messing up a spell in order to try and help them this time?”

And like it was on cue… “Don’t worry… If I can’t get rid of them, I’ll make YOU stronger,” Oh no… don’t do it-! “Lords of facial hair, give me license… make these adventurers gods of violence!!” We did not get any sort of buff from that. Instead, I felt as if I was drained of my energy and couldn’t be able to run. Whatever she did killed my speed, broke Garbuckle’s concentration, reduced McBiggun’s stamina and also messed with Wuzz’s accuracy based on how his arrows were not hitting his intended targets at all. “AHH! I’m SO SORRY!! I’ll try to reverse it!”

Now we were not only crippled and drained of some important traits that affected our performance, but also now having to still fight these brooms. Princess, with all due respect… you suck at this. She was still trying to recite some spells while we were struggling to defend ourselves… yet what Twilight was struggling on was to try to find a word that could be similar to rhyming alongside orange.

Now, I know nothing rhymes with that, but that still didn’t stop her from trying. “Uhm, borange? Forange? Uhhhhh… gods of beard magic, red and orange, un-curse my apprentices like you’d un-grease a…… door hinge?” I’m not sure what she did… but I felt as if something came back to us as I could now dodge out of the way of oncoming enemy attacks a lot easier than before. “HOLY CRABAPPLES, THAT ACTUALLY WORKED!! Finish them off, finish them off my apprentices!”

Now that we no longer had any problems with brooms as we dealt with the last of them, the Alicorn said one last thing before we turned in the quest to her. “Yay! We’re safe!! I think I’m through playing with magic for now. Come on back, apprentice!” We finished that up and high tailed it out of there faster than a pegasus in a race as we ran all the way back to the exit out of these Mines of Avarice.

We wasted too much time with Twilight’s screw ups… and now, I hope that didn’t make us too late to save the queen… Whoever she is.