The cave was dark and spooky. Shēdo advanced, cautious, peering ahead, intrigued by the pale blue light that she saw. Her paws made no sound as she crept along, she walked on shadows and was little more than an amorphous grey shape against the sloping wall. Shēdo’s sharp eyes had no trouble seeing in the faint light, indeed, she was at an advantage here.
“Shēdo—”
“Hush,” Shēdo whispered, hushing Limey.
“Shēdo, no one can hear me but you, now listen to me.” Limey cleared his throat, an impressive act for something that didn’t have a throat. “There is something dangerous here, I can sense it. That lousy, good for nothing silver dragon has tricked you into coming in here, and if you aren’t careful, you are going to die. Even worse, that works out to the silver dragon’s advantage, as he can promise the next adventurer that comes along that there is a magical sword in this cave.”
Upon hearing this, Shēdo paused for a moment and rested her back against the wall.
“I’m not certain what lies ahead, but I don’t like it. This isn’t the usual send the hero to kill all the rats in the cellar quest. Do you know what it takes to threaten a silver dragon? Silver dragons do a lot more than just breathe fire, they use magic, Shēdo.”
“What do?” Shēdo breathed.
“We could back out—”
“No. We do this.” Shēdo drew in a deep breath to steel her nerves, and then began creeping ahead once more. “We gave word to do right. Give help. Silver dragon honourable. We also help earth ponies.”
Limey sighed, an odd sound when heard inside and outside of the head. “The Warlord should be a figure of great renown…” He sighed again, let out a faint chuckle, and then added, “I’ll do my best to protect you. Trust in me Shēdo, I need you just as much as you need me.”
“Uh huh.” Nodding, Shēdo dropped down to all fours, but remained pressed up against the wall as she approached an unknown shape up ahead. She sniffed, but didn’t recognise the smell. It was dead though, or at least she thought it was. Nose almost to the ground, she kept going.
She couldn’t be sure, but what might have been a goat lay on the ground. It was dried out, shriveled, and desiccated. Sniffing it made her brain feel jumbled, as all of the scents were wrong. Not too far away from the goat was a puddle of glowing blue liquid that had a foul stench.
Lo, not only is our heroine confused, but so is her trusty sword. His memory isn’t exactly what it once was, and this bothers him, because he is genuinely concerned for his bearer’s safety. A glowing blue puddle of urine is quite a warning sign and if our beloved, wonderful sword still had his magnificent turtle-tortoise body, he would be hiding inside of his own shell right now.
Of course, hiding inside of a shell isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, especially when some snotty, overbearing, dominating filly comes along and decides that you’d serve the universe better as a head separator. Why she would think such a thing is beyond me, but here I am, a head separator, and I no longer have my lovely shell, just a sheath that looks an awful lot like a turtle-tortoise shell.
Ignoring the narration, Shēdo focused on sniffing as she snuck ahead, and she was little more than a silent shadow amongst the shadows. She moved past the dried out remains of what might have been a goat, beyond the glowing blue puddle, and she came to a halt when she found more remains on the ground.
There was no mistaking it, this had once been a foal. It too, was dried out and little more than a husk. The pinched, mummified face was frozen in a rictus of pain and terror. Almost holding her breath, Shēdo placed a paw upon it, not knowing why she did, but she gave the remains a gentle pat to comfort them perhaps, or maybe bring comfort to herself.
She understood why Chromium chose to keep Conifer safe and gave up his seeing stone.
Whatever was down here, it was awful. Shēdo’s ears lifted a bit as she tensed, trying to listen. She pressed her diggy-diggy claws against the stone, hoping to feel minute vibrations that might give away her enemies. There was a wet musty smell, decay, and something rancid… something wrong. Whatever had sucked the foal dry had a wretched stink to them.
“I just can’t seem to remember,” Limey grumbled to himself.
Breathing deep, Shēdo tried to remember what Minori had told her about walking on shadows, all those lessons, lessons about the Black Hound and how he walked on shadows. If you walked on shadows and not on the ground, your paws never touched and you never made a sound… that was the lesson. Long Ears and Kabuki didn’t walk on shadows and didn’t get this lesson, this was a lesson just for Shēdo.
Beware the Black Hound
For he walks on the shadows
And comes for your head.
Feeling most peculiar, Shēdo could no longer feel the rough stone against the pads of her paws, just something soft, silken, almost velvety. Her claws did not click, did not clatter, no sound gave her away as she slunk forwards, not even the sound of her breathing. What were those awful verses that Minori recited called? She couldn’t remember. So many of them made her shiver and some were so awful that she whimpered while covering her eyes with her paws.
The Black Hound hungers
How he seeks the blackest hearts
With bitter black souls.
The diamond dog pup seemed to glide forwards and she was almost impossible to see. She had become shadow, she was Shēdo. She had become the silent, vengeful hunter, and she caught sight of her prey. She did not draw her sword, no, as that would make noise, but continued creeping ahead upon the odd, floating creature made of many eyes. It was a small one.
Beholder!
She ignored the voice that had no source and continued her stealthy advance.
Beholder kin! Gazers! Eye tyrants! Eyebeasts! Get out of here, Shēdo! RUN!
Diggy-diggy claws at the ready, Shēdo pounced. Nothing more than a shadow, she drifted through the air until she collided with the floating horror that had far too many eyeballs, some of them protruding from the ends of long, slime dripping eye stalks. She rammed her diggy-diggy claws into the creature’s main eye, which was much larger, and hot, bitter-salty jelly spurted from the punctures she made. The creature crashed to the ground with a wet splat, and Shēdo continued stabbing it with her claws, over and over, she sunk her diggy-diggy claws into its disgusting, puffy, flabby flesh.
It died, and as it died, its keening cry filled the cave. A growing blue puddle of glowing blood spread from the creature as it died, which was thicker, goopier than the see through liquid Shēdo had found near the dried out victims. The eye creature deflated, making squeaky, squirty sounds, like her backside sometimes did when she ate ruint meat.
“Shēdo, we need to flee!”
“No.” Shēdo’s voice was calm and her breathing slow.
A long low moan of frustration came from Limey, then he said, “Fine, draw me. I can shield your mind from their control rays and insanity rays. You can also use me to parry their spells… Shēdo, beholders are changelings that have gone horribly bad… mutated… some unknown magic turned them into… whatever they are now. They are fantastically dangerous!”
A burbling sound filled the cave, and Shēdo rose into a bipedal stance while she drew her sword. It was time to kill. No more time spent as a skulking shadow. No more hiding. It was time to make these creatures pay for what they had done. The dried out foal was fresh in Shēdo’s mind and her soul cried out for blood, no matter what colour it might be.
The first of the creatures floated into sight and Shēdo readied herself for combat.
“HAI!” Shēdo flew through the air, her ears flapping, her sword raised overhead. A blast of energy shot from the approaching gazer’s eyestalk and she clubbed at the bolt of bright energy with the flat of her sword, swatting it aside. Still in the air, she brought her sword around and came down upon the beholder with a fierce, cleaving chop.
The gaseous creature exploded on impact, spraying gas propelled ichor and effluvia everywhere. A foul blue mist enveloped Shēdo, who landed with her sword raised and ready. She sidestepped an incoming orb of bright yellow light, a mad, chaotic light, unpleasant and grim. It was not a healthy shade of yellow, but rather, the yellow of putrefaction, of sickness. It was the yellow of an infected wound made rotten with disease and fever.
More orbs were incoming, Shēdo smacked one with her sword, sidestepped another, and then was struck by one. She felt delightfully mad and for a second, she wanted to run herself through with her own sword. Try as she might, she was unable to do to so, it resisted her, and after a few confused blinks, her mind cleared.
“KAI!” Leaping, she hurled herself at the eye tyrant, took a swipe, and missed. The creature let out a gross flatulent sound and gurgle-squirted away, leaving behind a foul-smelling cloud. Her sword might have missed, but she managed to rake it with her diggy-diggy claws, which sliced it open and made blue goo geyser out.
Bringing her sword to bear, she lifted the blade in a mighty upward chop and connected with what she believed to be the beholder’s backside. The strike lacked force and the creature, much larger than the first she had encountered, was only sliced open. “BANZAI!” Kicking out with her hind leg, she kicked the gross creature in its blue bloodied backside, and then connected with a sweeping sidelong strike, cutting off several eyestalks.
“FLURBLEBLURBLUB!” the creature flurbleblurblubbed in agony. “GLORPNISHU!”
Lunging, Shēdo impaled the creature on her blade, the tip protruding from its central eye, which was facing away from her. Raising a hind leg once more, she braced it against the now dead creature and yanked her blade free, sending boiling hot jets of bright blue blood spraying out all over the room.
“Here comes another, Shēdo! Strike with fury! Make them fear the Warlord Ketsueki!”
Turning sideways to make her profile thinner, Shēdo advanced in the Ochs position. The incoming eye tyrant launched a blizzard of spell orbs and beams at her, some yellow, some green, some blue, and one had a distinct plaid colour. She sidestepped some, dodged others, parried a few, and was struck by a blue glittering orb that originated from a square pupiled eye atop an eyestalk.
It hit her in the left elbow and she felt her left arm go numb. The whole left side of her body felt heavy, it was even difficult to blink her left eye. She was stiff and found it difficult to move, to advance. The diamond dog pup had trouble raising her left arm and was forced to keep using her sword with one paw. Snarling, she lunged forwards, took a yellow orb right to the face, and she felt her mind lapse into madness once more while her blade slipped into the gazer’s central eye.
Yanking backwards with a swift, sudden jerk, she yanked her sword free and watched as the creature tumbled down to the ground, its eyestalks flailing as it made gross squishy noises. Raising her left paw, which was heavy and didn’t want to move, she leaned over the creature and brought her left paw down, stomping on it. It popped in much the same way a cyst or a boil popped when pressure was applied, and the gaping hole in its central eye spurted out clots of quivering, quaking jelly as the beholder collapsed beneath Shēdo’s paw.
Off balance, she slipped in the slick eye-jelly and took a tumble that left her sitting on her backside. Somehow, she kept her sword in her right paw, and didn’t cut herself. Growling, she smacked the creature away from her with a spank of her sword, and it’s flaccid, deflated corpse tumbled away, its eyestalks slapping against the stone.
The last and final beholder advanced, emitting a never-ending stream of spells from its various eyes. Shēdo rolled away, her left side still limp and unresponsive, which made movement difficult, though not impossible. Stumbling, she raised her blade in front of her face, causing the witchfire glow to reflect in her eyes, eyes filled with savage ferocity, eyes that had turned a sickly shade of yellow with bright scarlet irises.
Barking with rage, Shēdo hurled her sword at the last beholder and through the air it flew, going end over end. More spells flew from the eyebeast and some of them struck Shēdo. The sword flew true though and cleaved the creature, severing it into two halves. With a bright green flash of witchfire, Limey blinked out of existence, only to reappear in Shēdo’s paw an eyeblink later.
It was over, the dreadful creatures were dead. Shēdo let out a ferocious howl and then began to wait for the madness to pass, for the paralysis to ease off. Growling, she gripped Limey, her yellow eyes glaring in the pale blue light that emanated from the spilled blue blood. She was drenched in blood once more, not scarlet this time, but a brilliant, glowing azure.
“Breathe, Shēdo… let the madness out!”