//------------------------------//
// 31- Through the Shadows 
// Story: Bound by Scales 
// by FrostTheWolf 
//------------------------------//


Bound by Scales- Through the Shadows




Shortly after exiting the mines, we all found ourselves in a small cave with the entrance not far from where we were right now. Outside, everything looked all red and smoky as if everything down below where we were was on fire right now. Yet, despite the gloomy nature of the surrounding area, Tina was able to tie it in well with the narrative in her storytelling quite well. “With the Sorcerer’s tower in sight, you think of what you’re going to spend your reward money on once you rescue the princess and queen.”

Honestly, I was personally thinking of using this reward money to get a good gift for either Pinkis or AJ instead of getting something for myself. It was the least I could do in order to show how much I cared for them. I would think that Garbuckle would want gems, Wuzz would use it on whatever he thought would be good for him and… well, I had no clue on what McBiggun would use the reward money on. Maybe some new armor or weapons? His sword did seem a bit worn after the last several fights we’ve had to survive through.

Venturing up the ravine, some orcs emerged from several of the makeshift hits we found as they proceeded to try and attack us. This didn’t turn out so well for them as we still had our weapons at the ready, defeating each of the orcs and destroying some of the explosive barrels nearby the huts to easily take them out as we moved closer to the dark citadel. Though, once we got closer to the gate, we heard something get launched from way high up on the keep as we heard Tina speak again. “What’s that in the sky!? It seems like the Handsome Sorcerer is catapulting in some Orc’s to fight you! Be careful dawg!” Right on cue, there were more orcs that just happened to crash land where we were. But, after fighting off the first group, we needed to rest our bones a bit as we moved out of the way and into a side cave that was off of the main path we were traveling on.

As we were resting though, I happened to pick up something on my ECHO as I answered the transmission. Turns out, it was a new quest that we were assigned while in the area. “Hey there, it’s Athena. Out here in Hatred’s Shadow, there lives an evil prince named Blueblood. He’s already murdered several innocent ponies and if left unchecked, he’ll become the most villainous king the world has ever known. I need you to find him, kill his guards… and then slap the bastard out of him.”

Well, this should be interesting at least… Speaking of which, I wonder if there was anything else that could be done while we were here. Yet, when I was about to look around a bit, I turned to find Garbuckle talking to a nearby pony that was the size of a filly, but still wore armor and had a sword and shield too with a tiara on the front of it. Now that I think of it… it almost looked like one of the fillies that was in Applebloom’s class. And the request she had for us was… well… an odd one. “Help me adventurers! EVIL is on the loose!”

“Umm… could you clarify on that?” I asked. Given the fact that pretty much everything trying to kill us fits in the definition of evil.

“Certainly,” The knight replied. “I had recently slayed a dragon with a party of fellow knights, but was unable to find a SINGLE rare treasure on its corpse! There can only be one possible explanation for this… my colleagues must be loot ninja’s! You must investigate them and return what they stole!” That… made me curious as to who were her colleagues. But soon, the objective changed to where we needed to investigate the first colleague, known as Sir Bloom.

“Wait… are ya talking about mah sister for this one?” I heard Applejack ask for a brief moment.

“Possibly… ah still got some more in store for yaz, so don’t jump the gun on this one cowgirl.” I really wanted to smack my head against something right now. Fortunately, I took out my frustrations with Tina on some of the orcs that were still dropping in the area as we made our way up the hill. Taking a small detour to the left as we soon approached the first of the knights that we were asked to see. And yes… it looked like Applebloom in knights armor.

“Ah stole nothing!” She insisted. “Sir Diamond has gone mad, mad I say!” Yet despite her pleas, it didn’t stop Wuzz from trying to peek into the crate that she had near the rest of her things.

“Well, that’s a bust. Only thing in here is apples.” Wuzz sighed. But the response we got from the knight was not exactly a friendly one.

“Ah shall not forgive this insult upon mah honor! Have at you!!” She declared, just before swinging the two handed axe she carried with just one hand as she almost tried to cleave our heads. It was only when I blasted her with my arm out of desperation and knocked her out that we could catch a break.

“Curious… she carried no loot. Still, track the others down. I will have my justice!” The knight that gave us this quest told us as we went to go find the next member of the group. Which was named Sir Belle. I’m already beginning to think that just by how the first knight was based on Applebloom that these other two colleagues were based on the rest of the Cutie Mark Crusaders… but why Tina chose that is beyond me.

Running along the same wall that we had to run alongside some time earlier, we had to fight through both Orcs and Knights as we tried not getting ourselves in the crossfire. However, before we can go up the stairs to move forward, we noticed a knight and a small tent nearby. But when we approached the knight, she was open to what we needed to ask her. “This is utter lunacy! I am no ninja of loot!”

Once again though, it did not stop Captain Wuzz from checking anyways. And all he found was just a diary and some old cookie crumbs. “I have no time for this! To arms!!” Her first move was to swing her mace as it struck Wuzz in the face and threw him back a few feet. Causing me to use my sword as a tool of defense to block and parry her attacks while Garbuckle used a spell to throw her off of me and into a nearby stone wall as he helped me back to my feet.

“Accursed luck, she carried no loot either… Ah, well… it must be the last member of my former posse that betrayed me. Of this, I am CERTAIN!” And now we had the last person to investigate. Sir Scootaloo. Yep… definitely referencing the Cutie Mark Crusaders. Though, it seemed like Tina was taking the crusader part of the name a little too seriously.

“Does this quest giver even realize that we aren’t actually… well, killing them?” McBiggun then asked as he looked back at all three of us now. All I did was just shrug for a moment as I looked back at him.

“I don’t think she’s wanting us to be really specific with what we do with them. Just as long as she finds out whoever stole her stuff.” I assumed, looking back at him for a moment. “There’s more than one way that something can be accomplished… it just all depends on what you think is the best course of action.” For a moment, Big Mac processed what I said, before shrugging a little in agreement as we proceeded to where the next knight was. Who had a small chest the size of a normal cache that contained ammo, arrows and what not. This time though, she was wielding a sledgehammer.

“I AM SCOOTALOO!” We all heard her say… which seemed kind of obvious as she looked back at the rest of us. Once more, Wuzz showed off his lock picking skills and inside… was a Rainbow Dash plushie and a pair of Wonderbolts goggles. Which didn’t seem to fit well with Scootaloo when she looked back at us. “DIE!”

“Loot ninja! Die HYPOCRITE!!” We all heard Sir Diamond shout… this time though, Wuzz used a strange dart that landed on her neck before causing her to pass out.

“What was that?” I asked, just out of curiosity.

“Sleeping dart…” He said, before looking back at us with a raised eyebrow. “What? Just because I am a ranger doesn’t mean I can’t have other tools at my disposal if I’m out of arrows.” I had to admit, he made a valid point there. And it still seemed to work out well with Sir Diamond too… even though she wasn’t aware of us not killing her former friends.

“What’s that then? She had no loot EITHER? Curious… nonetheless, you deserve a reward! Return to meeeeee…… Return to me.”

“Hey, how about I go back and get this taken care of, then you guys can teleport me back to where we were originally with Sir Belle?” I suggested. I thought of this being a better option than having to walk all the way back up to where we were, which would also save time since it wouldn’t be long until the Handsome Sorcerer was tired of waiting to kill us. Wuzz, Garbuckle and McBiggun agreed with that as I dropped back down into what would be known as ‘the pit’ before heading back to the side path where Sir Diamond was waiting.

“You’re back… Let’s get your reward, shall we?” She said, walking towards the chest that was in the back of the room. I had a feeling that something was up with this here, so I unholstered Hawkmoon and kept it behind me as the knight continued to speak. “Shame about my former colleagues… If none of them were stealing the group’s loot, I wonder who was,” she said before turning her back to the chest. “You may have ONE item from this chest! ONE!”

Before she could turn around though, the chest that was behind her revealed herself as a mimic as it proceeded to attack her and begin to devour her. “IT WAS THE CHEST ALL ALONG!? OH THE CRUEL IRONY!!” I fired off several rounds from Hawkmoon into the Mimic. Not skipping a beat as I almost felt like my heart stopped for a moment.

Then, we happened to hear the final remarks on that quest for now… courtesy of Mr. Torgue. “Man, that quest was dark and ironic. A true look into the duplicitousness of interpersonal relationships! NOW COME SEE ME SO YOU CAN EXPLAIN TO ME WHAT THE HELL I JUST SAID!”

“Yeah… maybe later.” I thought to myself as I stepped back outside. Signalling a thumbs up to Garbuckle and the others so they can teleport me up to their location real fast. Not only did it save me from having to unnecessarily have to use up my energy into grappling up there, but it also helped in making sure that I didn’t have to use up ten minutes in walking ALL the way back up to join them.

“So, what’s next?” McBiggun then asked, looking to me to see what we need to do now that the small side quest was out of the way. Looking at the map that was on my ECHO device, I could see that the objectives for both the main quest and the side quest that Athena gave to us were farther into the castle. Meaning that we needed to work our way up the tower first before we could even think about getting anywhere else.

“Right now, we just need to push forward. Our other objectives can only be reached once we get farther up on this castle, so we need to keep going first,” I advised them, before feeling something off as I looked around for a minute. “We should be careful though… something tells me that the Handsome Sorcerer is not the only evil wizard we would have to face right now?”

“Got it.” McBiggun agreed, along with Garbuckle. But it was then that Wuzz happened to mention something that even I didn’t notice at first.

“Hey Kendov, where’s Leona? She was with us a minute ago.” That… was actually something I now realized as I looked around for a moment. Only to realize her not being there… and on my shoulder, there was a message on my ECHO device… that was from her, strangely enough.



Going to take a rest in your Digi… ECHO… whatever the hell you call this thing. Good luck on your quest or… whatever the hell you’re doing. -Leona



Well, at least that answered my questions for right now. “Looks like she’s taking a break. Guess it’ll be the four of us for right now until she decides to join us again.” Wuzz and the others were on board with that… mostly because the ranger knew that the less members in the party we had, the more experience points that would be divided amongst the four of us.

“Okay, then how do we proceed. Do we have a certain formation or something we should follow?” Wuzz then asked, making me think a little marder on how to handle this from a… tactical approach.

“McBiggun and I should lead. We have tools and abilities that allow us to soak up damage like a sponge and redirect it back at whoever thought it would be a good idea to attack us. If we have you and Garbuckle cover us from behind, we’ll be able to move on without any problems.” My suggestion was a bit of a surprise to them, but it was one that they were willing to try out to see how it worked.

“I’m surprised that Ken’s being smart about this. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I know that he’s smart and takes battles and what not seriously. But I’m surprised that he’s serious about how he proceeds in a game like this one.” We heard Shayne speak as we all took up different positions and engaged a group of knights that we found at the top of the next stairwell.

“Actually, to be honest, this is kind of normal for him,” I now heard Aaron speak up as I took down another knight with my sword and took down an archer using Hawkmoon. “Back home, I used to play a lot of games with him. But each time we played something new, he always seemed to have some kind of plan or strategy in place. He knew character strengths and weaknesses and always seemed to tailor that into whatever he played.”

“So he would be the kind of person to learn a little about a particular boss fight or something before actually fighting them?” The Teen asked, just to clarify.

“Pretty much. Other times, he doesn’t need the research and finds out by himself.” Aaron could not be more true about that. I can’t remember the amount of times that my observation skills and awareness from back home saved my ass here in Equestria. Not to mention helping me whenever I run into another Displaced.

Which is also pretty much coming into play pretty nicely right now since along with the knights, squires, and archers that were trying to murder us, a badass sorcerer just decided to pop in and join the fray. Having us change our tactics a bit as we focused on killing it first before it tried to encase us in ice. Once the knights and archers were down, Garbuckle began to use his fire magic to counter the ice magic that the sorcerer was using while McBiggun and I were working on attacking the sorcerer once we didn’t have to worry about it’s magic.

“I thought we didn’t have to deal with wizards until later,” Garbuckle panted for a bit until he regained his composure. “You know, like when we are closer to wherever the sorcerer is.”

“This is probably just a taste of what’s to come later. Keep on your guard though, we have no idea at all what they are capable of right now.” I told them, even though I personally had some idea as to what they can do. There were four types of magic based wizard enemies in Bunkers and Badasses. Fire Mage, Necromancer, Sorcerer and Wizard. Each one with different abilities, attacks and possibility to drop rare items depending on how lucky you are. The Sorcerer’s have ice based attacks, fire magi stick with flames, necromancy involved the undead and the wizards had shields and use lightning bolts. There were also badass versions of them that were pretty difficult to find depending on who it was or where you encountered them, but these foes were not to be taken lightly.

Once we came at a turning point not that far from where we encountered the knights and sorcerer, there were some chests up at the top that we managed to open up to see if there was anything useful inside. Of course, one of them turned out to be a mimic, which we disposed of immediately… but afterwards, we salvaged what we could get from the chests before moving on to find more knights… as they were trying to kill any orcs that happened to land nearby.

Sounds simple right? Well… The further we got in… the more difficulty we had in proceeding forward through the corridors and hallways. We even had little dragonlings, monsters we once encountered on the bridge leading into the dwarven mines, attack us and catch us off guard from underneath our feet as we ventured further into a place that told us that we may be getting closer to the sorcerer by now.

The Hall of Hyperion. “Well… this is something.”

“If this is a hallway where they worship that Handsome Sorcerer, then yeah, this is creepy.” Shayne added on before I heard her moving a bit. Before I could hear her speak again, I heard some doors opened as more of the knights we faced earlier soon spilled out into the room. Not to mention that the way forward was slammed shut. So, almost like every other situation that we have been put up against, the only way out was through.

No pressure or anything. “So what do we got here, Tina?”

“As of right now, you got several archers, a few knights and some more bad do's that will murder all of you if you don’t do something to help you out. The archers tend to fight from behind while the knights try to get in close. What’s your plan of attack, girl?” Tina replied to Twilight as we got out weapons ready for another fight.

“Go for the archers, then focus on the knights.” I said, using the same plan that we had used once before on the way up here as we took them down one at a time and made quick work of them. It wasn’t long until a few more groups showed up and we defeated them. However, that was also when we heard something from the upper ledge that caught our attention.

“Presto, change-o! Your face-o, rearrange-o!”

“Look alive! We got a badass!” I warned, just as the pyromancer overlooking where we were began to rain down fire on us. I shot at him with Hawkmoon, but it did little to affect him because of how far away he was from where we were and also that he needed to be closer for my hand cannon to do any substantial damage. Luckily, I had a backup option for dealing with that, but it required for me to use both hands so I can shoot him down with my bow.

Thankfully, I was able to get a shot off in time and prompt him and one other wizard that was with them to come down from atop the ledge they were on and face us in person. Heh… big mistake. Because not only did that allow for them to be close enough to where my hand cannon and swords can hurt them, but also allowed for McBiggun to effectively damage them too. Cutting them down to size and allowing us to press on.

Once past the door though, instead of the initial right hand we would take to the bridge that lead us inside the keep, we went to the left as the doors opened and we saw a unicorn standing on what looked to be a replica of the iron throne from Game of Thrones. “Who dares enter my court with weapons drawn!? Guards! KILL THEM!”

“You made it to Blueblood’s court. Take out his guards and the little jerk will have to take you on,” Athena instructed us as I noticed Spike looking a bit more determined to get to Blueblood than the rest of us as we took out each of his guards.

“I-impossible! Valiance! Silverwing!! Destroy that intruder!!”

“What’s… wait, are ya trying to refer to that one show ya keep talking about Shayne? Ah never really paid attention to it. Hay, I feel like I’m missing out on something…”

“Well, if you did see it, you would think this would be awesome!” I heard Shayne speak up as Garbuckle set both of the guards on fire with a pyrokinesis spell. Making it easier for both McBiggun and I in order to attack with our swords. Both of them were defeated rather quickly, prompting Athena to say the next step.

“Alright, now it’s just the two of you. Beat Blueblood in a duel and you’re good to go.”

“A duel to the death, so be it!” The prince remarked arrogantly… that was, until Spike used his staff to smack him upside the face. “Ow ow ow! Y-you swine! You bastard!!”

“Good job. Now, since we are not in the business of killing kids, you’re just going to have to slap the arrogance out of him.” We heard Athena reply, which prompted Garbuckle to take the first crack at him.

“How dare you! No one slaps the prince! The prince will do as he likes!”

Followed by McBiggun. “I’ll tell you what! I’m going to give you a present. After I raise an army and kill your friends, I’ll give you their heads!”

Followed by Wuzz poking him in the face. “Stop at once, I command you! …… Mommy, mommy-y-y!!

Then it was my turn. By now, we might have broken his spirit… and possibly his jaw, but who cares? This was fun. “I’m not THAT bad! I only ordered the deaths of ten… twelve babies tops!” Yet, around then was when we also heard something from Tina as we heard her speak up now.

“Uhh… That’s all I got… I don’t know what else to reference… I only saw the HBO show and I heard that they’re not done with the books yet.” Tina commented, which caught some attention from everyone outside the game.

“Y-you haven’t read the books!? They’re SO good!” Shayne responded. “They’re so good that I got Twilight into reading them!”

“Really? I heard they were kind of butt…” We heard Tina retort for a moment before Aaron was next to reply.

“Well, kind of… but there are still some good scenes… besides, the books are the reason why the show is being made.”

“True… though if you want to wait up for the show to catch up, that’s fine as well-.”

“What the HAY are ya people talking about!?!” We heard a frustrated Applejack trying to understand what was going on as all of decided to turn around and leave the broken prince alone in his courtroom as we pressed on to our next task. We had to cross a giant bridge and on the other side of it, we can finally enter in the Sorcerer’s tower itself.

Just as we reached the bridge, we soon heard the handsome Sorcerer speak to us and also the mood change around us a bit as we heard him speak to us. “Alright, hang on… Just… Wait up, I’m gonna release my dragon on you in a second… just getting my camcorder ready, there we go!” he spoke as we heard something being fastened in the background. “Gonna put… dubstep behind footage of you guys dying and get TONS of hits for it… It’s gonna be awesome…… Okay, ACTION!!”

Once again, just like when we started playing this game, we happened to have Revaan… or what looked similar to him flying over us as Tina then made an announcement. “The dragon from the beginning of the campaign approaches! Roll… FOR INITIATIVE!!”

And here… we… go.

Arming ourselves with blades, bows and spells at the ready, we charged forth. Attacking the Handsome Dragon with everything we had as the boss tried to burn us alive with it’s incinerating fire breath. I had to use the bow that I was able to conjure using some of my other powers since the firing speed on this bow, which from what the Servants told me looked like that of someone they knew called ‘Archer’, can replicate that of a smg or assault rifle. Which was helpful given the fact that this dragon liked flying around in the air and trying to rain death from above on us.

Eventually though, we were able to hurt it… and all that did was make the sorcerer angry. “Come on now, Smoky! Don’t let them hit you like that!” Yet, despite his orders, it did little to help the dragon in that present moment. Even if they had some dragonlings come after us, we were still able to hold our ground pretty well.

And it made the sorcerer even more irritated. “Smoky, remember what we practiced. Dodge and weave, dodge and weave! It can’t be that difficult just to kill a group of adventurers!!” Oh, this guy had no idea what we had in store for him. Not by a longshot.

Yet, despite the fact that we were doing well so far… Tina thought that we needed some help with handling the dragon. Even though I think we had things under control. “You guys look like you need some help. Imma summon Athena now.”

“Kinda wish ya didn’t, sugarcube.” We heard Applejack sigh for a moment. Not long after hearing that, Athena appeared right next to us, weapon in hand and ready for a fight. Even though it was… okay to have an extra party member on hand, the four of us had this under control from the start of the fight. So why did she bring her anyways?

Over the course of the battle, combatting the dragon took a lot of energy and effort since we couldn’t just stand in one place and fight it like that. Instead, we were constantly moving to avoid incoming attacks while also trying to fight back. Or as the old saying goes… run and gun. Even though we didn’t have that many guns and I was mostly using my bow… I’ll just not question it.

“What the hell, Smoky? Don’t leave yourself open like that. Duck and move, duck and move!” Unfortunately for the dragon though, it didn’t have the opportunity to duck and move as I infused some of my own strength into one last shot that took the dragon down. That’ll teach that stupid sorcerer not to mess with Revaan again!

Then we heard Tina congratulate us as a fireworks show of loot began to litter the entire bridge. “Looooooot, baby baby!”

“Alright!!” Shayne cheered in excitement.

“Hahahahaha!! That was awesome!!” Aaron yelled.

“Heck yeah! Nicely done!!” Applejack then followed up with as we now tended to grabbing anything that dropped. Which seemed a bit too simple for Wuzz since he pulled out what looked a lot like the vacuum pac that you would find in the Luigi’s Mansion games to suction up any cash or item drops while also making sure any gear that did drop was all in one place.

“Gah! What a bummer… fine, just get up here and I’ll kill all of you myself. Just… let me unlock the door.” With that, the sound of a huge iron gate had been lifted at the other end of the bridge as we proceeded to walk across. Only for Garbuckle to realize something.

“Hey Athena, aren’t you going to come with us?” He then asked, turning back towards the gladiator as she was cleaning any residue off of her weapons. In which the gladiator only had one response for that.

“I’m going to be taking a different route. I’ll be okay though, I promise.” She assured us… though I wasn’t exactly sure what Tina had in store for us as we ventured on inside the Sorcerer’s stronghold. Yet, once inside… things were actually pretty quiet.

One could say that it was maybe… too quiet, but there didn’t seem to be any hidden ambushes or anything once we stepped through the gate and inside where we were. Things didn’t seem… too out of place. The only thing though that was different than anything else in the room was the center platform with two chains attached to it and some kind of lever.

“Hey, do you think that’s an elevator or lift of some kind?” Garbuckle asked as we got closer to it.

“Maybe… if it is, then it could possibly lead us up to the top of the keep.” Even with the suggestion from Wuzz, something seemed rather… fishy. And that was besides the gross smell of everything in here.

Yet, when the ranger pulled the lever, instead of taking us up anywhere… or us finding out that we needed to pull another lever to prevent something from falling on us, the floor underneath us gave way as we began to plummet to the ground. “You drop down into the moldy dungeon… embarrassed by how easily you were able to fall into the sorcerers trap!”

“Good luck… escaping my dungeon… jackasses… it’s been real.” The sorcerer’s comment did little to help the situation… and neither did the conversation that Tina was having outside of the game with Shayne and the others.

“SO HOW ARE WE SUPPOSE TO GET BACK TO TOWN?” Aurox was the first to ask, surprisingly. I thought Shayne was the most likely to ask first since she seemed more interested in being a part of this game than him. Tina’s comment though… and the creepy mood in itself, had Garbuckle hugging onto my leg in a bit of fear.

“You can’t… you trapped son!”

“But we might want to do sidequests and stuff…” Aaron then added on, followed by Applejack and Twilight being in support of what he said.

“Oh… good point,” She spoke upon realizing her blunder. “Suddenly, THIS HAPPENS!” Shortly after hearing that, a small orb of light began to fly over our heads as one of the stone walls began to sink into the floor, revealing a hidden passageway.

Help…

The moment I heard that, I looked back at everyone else, asking them the first question that came to mind. “Did you guys… just hear that?”

“Yeah we did…” McBiggun replied, looking around for a second before gazing back at me. “Hunh… sounds like a prisoner or something. Ah mean, we are in what looks like a dungeon after all.”

“Perhaps they know the way out of here?” Garbuckle then suggested lightly as we went through the passageway into the next room. Now it seemed like there was one thing that we had to do in order to press on.

“Let’s go find them then.” I told them, to which everyone else happened to nod in agreement as we continued down the next hallway where there was a functional lift at the other end of it. Yet, while we were doing this though, we could all hear something else that was happening right now.

“Tina… Back there, you can’t just have us fall into a trap. You needed to give us a chance to escape it or something.” That… was actually a very good point. Why didn’t Tina give us a chance to escape that pitfall that we fell into.

“I’m soooorry!! I didn’t think you guys would make it this far in one session!” She told us like if she was a child who made a mistake and asking for forgiveness… which just seemed odd for someone of Tina’s personality. “I didn’t plan this part in advance, I’m making it up as I go!”

“Yeah, but the rules say-.”

That was when Shayne was interrupted… by the most unlikely of individuals at that time. “Sugarcube, my friends and I have saved Equestria numerous times over the last few years from Nightmare Moon, Discord before he was reformed, Chrysalis at the royal wedding invasion, King Sombra in the Crystal Empire, Tirek when he broke out of Tartarus and now Ken’s got these aspects to handle and you’re here talking about rules? Seriously?”

“How does that even relate to what we’re doing right now?” the teenaged rogue then asked.

“What ah mean is that none of the threats that we have had to face before went by rules. Hay, that Tirek fella blew up Twilight’s old home, Golden Oaks Library.”

“Woah woah woah… seriously? That happened?” She then asked, sounding surprised by that as she heard AJ’s reply.

“Ya, the whole tree exploded when Tirek tried to pre-empitvely attack me after stealing everypony’s magic and was going after me since I had the magic of all the Princesses, but I think that’s a story for another time.” Twilight tried to tell her, but Shayne’s response was rather… surprising to say the least.

“God… damn, I’m so jealous of you right now.” Wait, what now? “Ever since I was a kid, I wanted to live in a tree house and now I’m finding out that your last home was literally a home inside of a tree. Sorry to hear that it got destroyed though.”

“It’s a thing in the past… besides, Applejack and the rest of my friends were able to salvage the roots of the tree that was my old home and turn it into the chandelier above our heads right now.” Oh so THAT’S what it was! Almost every time I’ve been to her castle, I have been having trouble as to figuring out what the hell that was actually suppose to mean. Now it all makes sense-!

Just before I could finally regain my focus, I noticed that at the end of the hallway was a rather familiar figure… Oh you have got to be kidding me. “Hey! Hey!! HEY!!! OVER HERE!”

“Tina, what is Orendi doing in the game and why is she there?” Shayne asked… yet that didn’t help things right now.

“Was that Shayne!? Shayne, SHAYNE!! Aurox sucks!! Team up with me!” That just made me facepalm myself for a moment before I heard Orendi’s voice change. This time… it sounded like the complete opposite of the crazy self that the vampimorph was. “Oh sorry, got sidetracked. Hi, I’m Orendi. Chaos witch, nice to meet you. MEOW!” At the last part, I saw her magic form from all of her hands as she blasted some of her magic at us.

“What… was that all about?” I asked, raising an eyebrow as I looked back at her.

“I just cursed you… Don’t be angry though, because it’s a pretty cool curse,” Wait, how can a curse be considered as cool? “You can talk to the dead. Anyways, in exchange for this curse, I need you to find my sibling that’s somewhere within this Lair of INFINITE AGONY!” And why did that last part have to sound overdramatic?

“For the love of gods, make it STOP!”

Orendi rolled her eyes at that… and also the eyes on her hands also did the same exact thing too. “Just visit the mass graves I dug up, resurrect some bodies and see if he’s one of them… Also, you can resurrect the dead now. You’re welcome.” Uh… thanks for the unnecessary curse and added tasks to do now? “Anyways, OFF WITH YOU!!” Shortly after hearing that, she disappeared in a pillar of shadowfire as we activated the lift to keep moving.

Upon going through the first two rooms, we had ourselves attacked by numerous spiders and almost covered in webs to slow us down. It didn’t help that the name of these rooms was actually ‘Crawler Hall’ as we blasted, slashed, sliced and shot any one of those arachnids that tried to bite us.

Once we approached the third room in the hall, one that was subsequently named the Chamber of Woe, the enemies weren’t spiders anymore, but instead they were more skeletons as some of them were trying to shoot us and others were trying to cut us apart. By the time we took them down and got over to where it looked like there was a sword in the ground, that was when we heard Orendi speak… again.

“Alright, you’re near one of my corpse stashes… just touch the bodies and you should be-” Before she was even done explaining, my hand already touched them because I was pushed backwards by a skeleton on the ground and onto the bodies. Which… was a bit of a mistake, but at least it wasn’t a major screwup. “Is he there? Nah, those are just some of the bandits I set on fire so I could see WHAT THEIR STOMACHES TASTE LIKE! Ehh, better re-murder them again.”

Before they could attack us, Wuzz helped me out by using some of his chaos magic to warp me over back with the rest of the group and on my feet again. Giving me a second wind as we made short work of them. Yet, afterwards… well, that’s when things got really freaking weird. “Oh and by the way, I don’t want you to bring him back to life or anything when you do find him. I just want to make sure he’s dead… I was trying to share the news to him that I was getting to the next level of my relationship with my penguin friend, he disapproved, I got angry blah blah blah… Anyways, when you do find him, please show him no mercy!”

“Wait… How do you know about Orendi’s relationship with Toby?” Shayne then asked, which got me curious all the same as we continued to venture through these creepy looking halls.

“I invited her to a tea party while Ken was busy doing some… things…” That was… vague. But who cares anyways? At this point, our focus was to keep on moving on ahead. Turns out, as we were following the small ball of light that was leading the way, we found the second pile of bodies that Orendi happened to leave for us.

But before we were able to do any of that, we made sure that the area was clear first so we didn’t get ganked by any wandering undead. This time though, I decided not to touch the bodies since the last time I did it was purely by accident. Instead, Wuzz did… and the first set of skeletons that we were put up against were actually the size of midgets.

“Nooooope, nothing there but the troop of filly scouts that my brother happened to traumatize accidently before I ignited them. But, in my defense… It was his fault and I was in a hurry.” How the hell is THAT justifiable!? Better yet… why am I wasting my time trying to make sense of anything that Orendi says? She probably doesn’t see any fun in making sense anyways.

Boink! Oww… and why did Wuzz just hit me over the top of the head. “Don’t steal my lines.” Wait, I stole that? How the hell am I suppose to know that’s his?! Yet, who really cares? At this point, I can just ignore that like the echoes of what sounds like Asphyxious begging for mercy or something. I honestly could not tell.

“Pleases… Don’t use the wipe any more!... I didn’t say stop~” Oh god… DAMMIT Asphyxious! We have Garbuckle playing this game with us and you are just… really crossing some boundaries there.

“What is he talking about?” And speak of the devil, he just had to ask that.

“Uhh… That’s just… Tina, where did you come up with that?” Shayne then asked, sounding a bit creeped out by what had transpired in the last few minutes.

“Orendi told me that would be something he would say if he was captured and forced to do things against his will… She really helped me out with that.” And that is something else that I rather not remember by the time we were done with this. But at least by now, we were done with having to handle all of the bodies we have brought back to life… by disposing of them a few minutes later.

As for Orendi herself… we could hear that she was in a bit of a personal dilemma as we were beginning to make our way out of the room. “Rrgh! Dammit, Orendi!! This is the reason why you never get drunk on power before a murder!! Even if it does taste like LEMONS! I remember making sure to burn his house down, but I forget to check to see if he was INSIDE first! Gah, so irritating!!”

“Uh… should I even ask what’s the deal with her?” McBiggun asked before I sighed for a moment and turned to face him.

“Orendi’s a chaos witch… and no, she doesn’t use the same kind of chaos Discord would. Instead, she uses shadowfire magic and some other forms of sorcery, but mainly… she has a bit of a crazy personality… which oddly enough, reminds me of Tina.” I sighed before looking around to try and find the right words to explain what I mean.

“That and the part where many people would think she’s clinically diagnosed as batsh*t crazy because of some of the things she’s said or done,” We heard Shayne tell the others in agreement. “Believe me, when we were tending to her wounds one time before meeting Ken, she thought that she was going to die and that she couldn’t die yet because she had… overdue library books.” That… was ironic. Given the fact that they were previously talking about libraries and also the quest with slapping the prince was referencing the Game of Thrones books, I would not expect to hear something like that… then again, this is Orendi we’re talking about here.

Back to the main objective at hand, it was around now that we heard the same voice from before speak to us again.

Over here…… Keep going…

That lead to us reaching another lift that moved up to the next floor. In which there were more skeletons that awaited us at the top. Some of them being mages and gladiators that made advancing a lot more difficult. Especially when the mages kept on disappearing in order to avoid our attacks and also ambush us. Which got very annoying really quickly since it made it harder to open the next door that was locked.

Once it opened, we ventured into the next part of the lair. The hall of the dead… which almost seems like a nickname for Asphyxious’ laboratory. I was looking around and had my back turned for a moment… until I got nailed into the head by a fireball, followed by being slammed by something that had me tumble into another wall.

Or at least, I thought they were fireballs. When I was able to get back up on my feet again and my eyesight readjusted, it turned out that those fireballs… were burning skulls. “Ken, you alright?” I heard Garbuckle ask as he used some healing magic to help me back up on my feet.

“Other than feeling like I just got slammed by a freight train and hurting all over…… ehh, I’ve handled worse.” I sighed. Luckily, I did not suffer a concussion from whatever hit me. So McBiggun now was up front to cover us and be the group’s tank while I was trying to recover. Course, that didn’t mean I couldn’t help out at least. I could use my abilities and ranged weapons to support the group while my body was beginning to heal.

Going through the Hall of the Dead was one that required us to think outside of the box since I was partially hurt and it forced us to change tactics. It wasn’t too agonizing, but we could only get back to the strategy that actually worked once we were out of the hall, killed the necromancers that was at the next that was connected to this point, We’ve been through many oddly named areas at this point, including the Temple of Misworship earlier while traveling through these catacombs. Hell, a whole lot of odd names in general. Yet, where we were going next had one last pile of skeletons to bring back.

This time though, Wuzz had something to say. “Okay, the last two times we’ve done this have been nothing but dead ends… Pfft, get it? Dead ends… since we’re dealing with dead-.”

“Ah think we got that already, Wuzz,” McBiggun pointed out. “What do you suggest we do?” Wuzz himself scratched his chin for a moment, before thinking of an idea.

“Once they rise from their graves…” he said in a dramatic tone of voice, “Garbuckle should use a fire spell that burns all of them in the same area before coming at us. Besides, Kendov is still sore from what happened earlier.”

I rolled my eyes at that. “Yeah right, I can fight on my own-.” I told them, trying to move my arm… only to be greeted by a violent surge of pain. “Nope, never mind. It hurts… still…”

“My point exactly… If Garbuckle can have them all burn to ashes, that could give me the chance to give Ken a remedy so he can recover.” Wait… was he… trying to be smart about this? Wuzz always seemed like the kind of person who liked to joke around on these issues instead of being serious…

Ehh, who cares? As long as I can actually get up and move again without feeling like my whole body was broken, then I’m all for it. We stuck with Wuzz’s idea and to our surprise, it was actually rather successful. His idea lead to Garbuckle making short work of the undead while also applying a remedy of sorts to my body so that way I can move without feeling pain every few seconds.

“Ah for the love of-! Oh, you know what? I got a better idea. I captured this sorceress a while ago in the Seers Sanctum because she seemed to have stolen my brothers old gear and disguise. I’ve been trying to get the information out of her regarding where did she place my brother’s corpse, but with no luck. How about one of you come here and give me a hand… or two… I need ALL the hands! I DEMAND SATISFACTION!!!”

What… the hell… was that? I mean I know Orendi can get pretty strange… but seriously, what… the hell… was that?!

“Oh Yes! Don’t stop… that feels wonderful!” Around now was when one would normally have the entire group walk in… but with the way that things have been escalating… I think I’ll just take this one by myself.

Walking in… it turns out how Orendi was ‘torturing’ this sorceress… was actually just tickling her with a set of feathers she ripped out of a old pillow. Not to mention that this captive looked more like a lich than anything else. “Okay, what the hell is going on? You’ve been keeping my group and I in suspense for the last half hour or so and the amount of innuendo’s we’ve been hearing is making Spike- I mean Garbuckle question what is real or not.”

“Ah BRILLIANT! You’ve arrived just in time,” The Chaos Witch eagerly replied, handing me some feathers. “I want you to get her to beg-.”

“What?”

“-begin telling us some answers,” She clarified, clearing her throat as her voice changed. “We believe this witch ganked my brother and robbed his grave of his possessions. Even having THE NERVE to try and tell us that she is actually our brother. If you don’t want to do that, you can always punch her. That’ll probably solve ALL OF OUR PROBLEMS!”

“For the last time… I am Asphyxious.” Said the woman on the table. “I changed forms to get away from all the creepy things.” That was a likely story… but given the fact that Orendi’s story was conflicting with what we’ve been hearing… this is getting increasingly difficult by the minute.

“You seem to have a dilemma involving these two. Depending on how you think it’ll solve the problem, would you choose to follow Orendi’s request… or press on.” That information from Tina now gave me two possible choices to make.



Listen to her story.



Or…



Punch her.



Hunh… tough decision.

“Oh come on! Please, I don’t like it here! It horrible, and Orendi acting strange.” Complained the woman on the table… wait, that was a table? It looked like an altar from the way it was described.

“Ken, what’s going on in there?” I turned to the other end of the hall to see Garbuckle come in. “And why are you using feathers to tickle torture somepony?”

“Wait, you know what that is?”

“Why do you think I always dreaded it since Twilight got wings?” He then asked, looking back at the woman at the table before sighing for a moment. “I’ll just say it’s taking longer than expected for you to finish what you are doing.” With that, Garbuckle left us alone as I sighed for a moment.

“Great… that and the voices we’ve been hearing don’t exactly help us right now.” I groaned, thinking that the best way to get this done and out of the way was option b. That was of course… I heard some other ideas.

“Guys, I think that woman is telling the truth… I mean, who else do we know is either A, a displaced… or B, a freaking undead lich?” Shayne told them, shortly followed by Aaron.

“What sort of proof do you have on that?”

“I’ve been to his world, Aaron. Everypony he knows is basically a constant tease… whatever the hell happened here, it probably involved some accident in his lab and then Orendi going batsh*t crazy once she saw him.” Shayne’s theory was… plausible. I have to give her that. I mean, Asphyxious isn’t exactly the kind of person that would be all “safety first” whenever it came to something that he was working.

What I didn’t expect was for that theory… to actually be right. “If I say that what happened, will I be let go?” She asked looking at me and Orendi.

“Yeah, but Big Mac, Discord and Spike are probably not going to look at you the same way again… along with everyone else outside the game,” I whispered the last part, looking back at him. “After all, Tina’s already said enough things to probably make Mac question my relationship with AJ.”

“What the hay is he talking about?” Applejack asked shortly afterwards.

“Tina once accidently said that Ken’s gear gave him Sexterity instead of Dexterity, but said that you would probably like the first one better.” ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME, SHAYNE!!? That when I felt something wrap around my leg. Looking down, I saw that it was the woman tail and she was smiling at me.

“Now Ken, you’re making it sound like I don’t like being in this form~” Okay, that is just… beyond weird… I didn’t want to do this but…

SMACK!

Yep, that was pretty much a reason why to stick with option B. “I’m just in this game to have fun, not forced to do something against my will. Besides, Applejack is watching and we’re getting married soon, jerk!”

“Ow… You could have just said all that, no need to hit me.” She grumbled, sighing a little. “Okay, Orendi let me up.”

“SHADOWFIRE NUUUUUUUUKE!!!” If casting a powerful spell of shadowfire magic that would throw Asphyxious into a wall Orendi’s way of… getting up, than what the hell? I’ll take it.

“Yeah… That hurt, but.” Asphyxious made popping sounds as she stretched. “Man, does this feel so good~”

And that was my cue to get the HELL out of there before things escalated even more. “Seeing as you did as sweet orendi ask, you get loot.” Asphyxious smiled as she reached behind her back and pulled out a bag of bits… or whatever currency we were using here in game along with throwing a handgun that smacked me in the forehead.

It didn’t help any that the side of the handgun said Tediore on it... and then exploded in my face. “Come on sweetheart, it time for us to go home~” Asphyxious said as she and Orendi locked arms and started to walk away.

“Tina, did you seriously come up with all of this on your own? Like with Asphyxious and them? I mean, everything seemed a bit… too realistic.” Shayne then asked as I decided to keep the weapon given so I could sell it later for when we needed the money for items and curatives.

“Well, I came up with the lines for Orendi myself… Asphyxious though…” Oh god… don’t you tell me… Tina, what did you do? “Think about how Leona and that Jace guy got in here, then give her a makeover with a gut full of dynamite and a booty like pow~”

Tina, that is beyond uncalled for. Just… I barely could be able to process everything that just happened. Matter of fact, I don’t even WANT to process everything that just happened. Rejoining the rest of the group, we heard the same voice from before calling out to us. Followed by hearing Tina speak up.

“And then Athena came in to kick some butts!”

“Tina, why are you always trying to bring in Athena to make her look like the hero? What is exactly going on-.” Yet, unfortunately for us and also Shayne… we never got to know the answer to that question.

“Yeah girl that’s cool and now you hear a voice that’s SUDDENLY crying out in pain!” She shouted, following up with more voices and pleas before saying something else. “Alright. Once again, we’re rolling to see who does the talking with the prisoner.”

One dice roll later… “OH FOR THE LOVE OF-!”

“Haha! TWENTY!!” Oh god, if Aaron got it again… then that means… “I punch her-!”

“Wuzz NO!!” I shouted, stopping him before he did anything stupid. “She’s our only ticket out of here!”

For a moment… that actually got some sense knocked into him… without actually having to hit him. “Fine… I talk to the prisoner.” He groaned. Looking back at the… prisoner, it almost looked like the exact same person that would be Angel in Borderlands 2. Just with some scars and other add ons to actually simulate being tormented.

“Release me and I can show you the way to my fathers keep…” She begged weakly. Looking back at the guys, while Wuzz was just pouting with his arms folded, Garbuckle and McBiggun shrugged for a second before looking back at me and speaking up.

“Sure why not? What’s the worst that can happen?”

Why do I have a feeling he just jinxed us? Because the moment that we set her loose… the mood of the prisoner did a complete flip as she glared at us in return. Darkness forming around her eyes as it made Garbuckle shiver in place. “Now I am free… to WRECK MY VENGEANCE UPON THE WORLD!! STARTING with YOU!”

“I told you! I TOLD YOU WE SHOULD’VE PUNCHED HER!!! I TOLD YOU!!” Dammit Wuzz, this isn’t the time for that!!

Whatever we were facing, it was lashing out at us in full force, going as far as forming claws of shadows that ravaged the cell that she was in. And yet, the Handsome Sorcerer himself did not have much to say on that subject either… “Oh yeah, I probably should’ve mentioned that I only trapped you in my dungeons so you can release Sombra… like what you just did so… have fun getting killed by my freakass daughter I guess.”

“Uh… Tina, don’t you know that Sombra was a king?” Twilight tried pointing out to her while we were struggling to fight her right now. Forcing us to keep on dodging and barely giving us a chance to attack.

“What are you saying then? That name sounds like a mares name, so she’s a MARE!! Also, are you saying that mares can’t be kings?! Shame on you! That’s Sexist! SEXIST!!!”

“What-!? No, I-!”

“SEXIST!!!” For the love of god, Tina, did you seriously have to do that? Nevermind that, why the hell am I focusing on that when we should be trying to figure out how to actually beat this boss right now!

Only problem though was that when Wuzz got over to where we were, he could tell that something was wrong with Garbuckle. “Uh oh… That’s a new status effect I haven’t seen before.”

Wait, status effect? Nevermind that… “What happened?”

“The moment she got out, Garbuckle was afflicted with fear. Putting him in a terrified status. He’s paralyzed by fear that he can’t move a muscle right now.” Well crap, that puts him out of commision. Now we’re down a man and need to change plans.

“Can you get him out of it?”

“I could, but I used my last Remedy with trying to restore your body earlier… I can help, but I need time,” Wuzz said, snapping his fingers to open a nearby cell door for us to take cover in. “You three figure out a way to defeat her. There is a possibility that if you defeat the one who afflicted him in this stated, he won’t be afraid anymore.”

Wait, three? “I’m not going down that easily, freak!! I’ve killed dragons, liches and dracoliches more scarier than you!!” Ah right, Athena… wait, what the hell did she just say? “You two, get moving! I got a plan!”

When I heard that, I knew she was referring to McBiggun and I since she was pointing back at both of us as we took cover behind a broken boulder. “Listen up you two because I’m only going to say this once,” She instructed us as we saw her get out her shield. “I’m going to draw her fire away from both of you and distract her. While I do that, both of you need to coordinate your attacks. Do this and we can kill that thing. Understood?”

I looked at McBiggun for a moment, who looked at me for a bit before nodding his head as I turned back around to tell her. However, it didn’t seem like I had to tell her anything because shortly after seeing the stallion next to me nod his head, she rushed into the fray. Forcing us to play catch up as we followed Athena’s plan of attack. Moving in a circular pattern to not only confuse the boss, but also disorientate her as well. Which was working out surprisingly well.

Until one of her attacks caused McBiggun to trip and fall forward. The moment that happened, out of instinct, I broke formation. Ignoring what Athena was yelling at me for as I charged at the monster as it was trying to close in on him.

“My father has lured you all to your deaths! He’s the only one to blame for this! DIE, ADVENTURER-!!”

“Not TODAY!” I yelled, using whatever energy I could muster in my arm to blast the boss in the face and blind her. To my surprise though, after that happened, McBiggun pulled off a risky maneuver and threw his claymore for me to catch. Forcing me to use both of my hands to grip the weapon as one last slash caused the boss to explode in a fury of light. Tiring us out… but holy sh*t, I was glad that was over.

Now I just need to help get McBiggun back up on his hooves. “Uhh… Sugarcube?” We heard Applejack ask Tina as she cleared her throat. “Did we really have to kill that… Sombra thing? It just seemed like all of the problems are more on the sorcerer and everything else that works for him is just… expendable. I mean, is the Sorcerer really that bad?”

“Pfffffttt…… What? Naw man, the Sorcerer is the worst. If it wasn’t for his dumb butt… everything would’ve been fine and nothing would’ve gone wroooooong~” Okay, something about that did not feel right… What the hell was Tina talking about?

“Alright, you know what? I’ve had it with you adventurers ruining all of my plans. Let me unlock the gate for you so I can kill you myself… for real this time.” Hold that thought for a moment, please.

“Hey guys… should we continue from here or head back to town first?” I asked a few moments after getting McBiggun back on his hooves as I looked back at Wuzz and Garbuckle.

“I say town,” Wuzz told us, looking back at everyone now. “We’re getting increasingly low on curatives and I ran out of Remedies to heal you guys of any status effects. That took a toll on us just now since it made Garbuckle unable to fight.”

Speaking of which, that reminded me… “That’s a valid point. Garbuckle, you okay buddy?”

He first nodded his head for a moment, before rubbing his eyes a bit as he looked back at Wuzz and the rest of us. I was relieved to see that he was okay, but also concerned about if he would be in good shape to keep fighting. “Yeah, I’m alright… I know a recall spell to bring us back to town as well as a spell to get us back here once we take care of everything. You guys want me to cast it?”

All of us nodded our heads in agreement for that. At least with going back to town… we can be able to clear our heads a bit, get some rest and acquire anything that we might need in order to prepare for when we come back… and before beginning our assault on Dragon Keep.




End Chapter 31