//------------------------------// // Act 2 Verse 2 // Story: Dragon's Descent // by Compendium of Steve //------------------------------// Act 2 Verse 2 Recollections and... My mind cuts back to the night that ultimately brought me to this forsaken realm. Blade drawn, the king at my feet, and four armored griffons standing with spears and swords raised. I remained standing in that wrecked throne room, just waiting for something to happen, be it from the four guards or whatever. The deathly silence had begun to wear on me. A groan dissipated it, and Gladius pushed himself up from the ground, rubbing his feathered head. The lead guard stepped forward. “My liege!” “I am fine, Gordon. Only winded.” “But the intruder—!” “The altercation is over; be at ease.” The griffon king shook his head. “I’m feeling remarkably clear-minded, so worry not for me.” The guard stepped back and nodded stiffly. “Yes, Sire.” Gladius then looked up to me. “You have spared me, dragon. That attack of yours would have ripped me asunder and ashened the remains.” “Believe me, I was very tempted to do just that.” That got some stiffening from the other guards. “Then why did you avert your blow, when by rights you had earned such a victory?” I shrugged. “I felt we needed to cool down first.” There's a pause, then the king gave something of a chuckle. “I suppose we did.” He stood up to his full height. “In honesty, I felt like a griffon possessed during our battle. How that fire bent and twisted to my whim… sorcery most intoxicating. While being given mercy would have brought immeasurable disgrace in the old traditions, I find it better than to have been struck down not as a warrior, but as some blood-crazed fiend.” Gladius looked around his ruined throne room a moment. “I can see things for what they are now; my eyes see clearer than they have for years. A nagging strain seems to have lifted from my shoulders, as well as a persistent heat that has plagued my spirit. My thoughts are… becalmed. But such clarity brings regret, namely over my most recent decisions...” He bent his gaze at me. “Whatever it is that you have done to free me from my temper, you have my gratitude. Yet you must still answer for your trespass into my domain.” “I understand, your highness.” “Though I feel it better we discuss this matter in my private chambers.” “I must object, Sire: that's highly unwise! That creature has attacked you, and extinguished our Guiding Flame! Surely it would be more prudent to have him locked away in the dungeon.” “I cast the first blow; he responded in simple defense. As for the Flame…” Gladius looked to the smouldering pile that had been the blazing brazier for some moments, then huffed before looking to his guards. “It appears to be the time that we follow the fires that dwell within us to show the path.” He stepped to turn in the direction of the back wall of the throne room, then looked back at me. “Come, dragon. I believe there were alternatives you wished to discuss, perhaps after we have both had time to cleanse and recline.” “Yes. I could use a freshening up.” I sheathed my sword then, and immediately remembered something. “But actually, there were others that came with me. A party of six ponies and a Diamond Dog. They’re waiting a few kilometers from the easternmost gate into Griffonstone. Could you send someone out there to let them know I’m alright?” “Mmhm. I suspected there would have been more involved than just you.” Gladius looked to his guards. “Gibson, send a search party to locate this cadre. Make no sign of hostile intentions, and see that they are brought here to the castle without harm.” The lead guard bowed. “By your will, My Liege.” “And have two of your number accompany us to my chambers. A prudent compromise, we can agree.” “Aye, Sire.” The guard looked about him and nodded for two others to break away and walk to us, before he and the remaining sentry took flight back out the way they came. To everyone left in the room, the king announced, “Let us adjourn to more hospitable confines,”, then got on all fours and led the way. Seeing no other choice but to follow, I recall wondering exactly where the remainder of that freaked-up night would take me… A showdown with Equestria’s Most Heinous Rejects, apparently, as my mind switches back to the hornet’s nest I had so thoroughly kicked up. “Stop gawking and kill him you dumbasses!” At their leader’s command, the rabble charges. I slash at an incoming succubus and her sharp claws, then upslash a bleating satyr before delivering a sidekick into the stomach of a charging minotaur. I elbow him into the dirt, then spin around to slice off one of the card dealer’s arms, then back around to handle two more of them. A set of wooded vines spring up to try to ensnare me, but I chop through them before running at the dryad responsible and bash her with the hilt of my sword. My tail whips away a charging imp, just as a stone golem comes rumbling at me. He’s a bit rundown, cuz my sword cuts through him like butter as I take away his arms and legs before kicking away his crumbling head. I spot a siren preparing to start a song and hurry over to drive my steel through its throat, forcing it to gargle blood instead. From above a lone harpy comes screeching with talons extended, but I bypass its dive and swing high, taking off a wing and sending it spiraling off into a hut. I punch a nymph in the face as she tries to jump me with a bone club, then I turn to see the dog fellow shambling over to me with fangs bared. I reach up and grab the bone that had been loosed by the nymph, grabbing the dog’s attention. I dangle it before his slobbering face while whistling before tossing it off someplace else, making one less freak to fight. Over the melee, I can overhear the slippery Ty having an argument (amazingly enough). “You were supposed to check him for weapons, Sal!” “H-He didn’t look like he had anything on him!” “That’s cuz he had a cloak covering himself, stupid!” “And he had those shackles on; how was I supposed to know he could break out like that?” “He’s a friggin’ dragon, of course he could! You seriously messed up this time, Saulos; you’re helping me straighten this out. Get over here!” “Wait boss what are you doing no no no—!” A bloodcurdling bleat of a scream rends the air as I punt away a riled-up pigmy. The rumbling at my feet foretells big Poly’s participation in the fray, and I turn around to see him and his red puffy eye barreling toward me. He wastes no time swinging those massive fists and arms at me wildly. There’s no focus or form in his movements: he’s just yelling and desperately trying to pulverise me like an angry child. Some of his swings swat away his fellows; it’s time I settled him down. When he delivers a straight punch into the ground, I leap onto and run up his arm. Poly pulls back and stomps about trying to grab at me, but I hop on his neck and make him bend forward. During this moment I bring my arms around his head and plunge my sword into his eye, then rip it out and jump away as he roars a pitiable cry of agony, one hand clasping his face while the other fumbles around either for his assailant or for some kind of help. It’s a little sad. That was needlessly cruel, even by my standards. A wet wallop to the back of my skull cuts the break short and I stumble, struck by momentary disorientation. I hold my balance and come to a stop, then turning around I see that Ty finally came to join his cronies. In one hand he’s holding a hairy arm with a bleeding stump on one end, and his other hand is balled up in challenge. “Come at me you little bitch!” All the invitation I need. I run at him and bring up my blade, which he smacks away with his severed arm club. He bats away my downward slash before he lunges forward to smack my head, but I parry it before hacking at his weapon. It’s still (mostly) intact after three direct blows, meaning that goat had more fortitude than he looked. My latest blow gets pushed sideways, leaving me exposed as Ty delivers a left hook. I duck under it then spring up with a rising slash, which severs his grim cudgel in half. He hops back a few feet before lobbing his stump at me, but while my sight is obscured by my batting away of the flying limb, something appears and latches around my throat, lifting me up in the air. Throat constricted and feet dangling, I look down to see Ty standing tall and smug, his right arm having turned into a long, scaly, whip-like tendril, which is what’s got me in this fresh predicament. “Didn’t see that coming, didja punkass? I’m just a bag of surprises.” So am I, I think as I bring a palm over to my sword. The tendril tightens around my neck, but I still manage to nick my palm deeply enough for a trickle. “Too slow there, stupid. And look: you cut yourself. Of course, that’s nothing compared to the pain I’m gonna be inflicting on you before I get around to snapping your neck, like the last dumbass dragon that came to make a ruckus in my domain. I think I’ll let my concubines eat the flesh off your lower half before I do you in. To make up for the abuse you’ve done them, you know what I’m saying.” Keep blabbering. Flick up my bleeding palm, get a decent splatter on the tendril. A nasty surprise coming for ya, buddy. “Oh come on, I’m not squeezing that hard. Can’t a tough-as-nails hardcore dragon like you stand a little asphyxiation? Just a mild burning sensation?” “C… Can you?” I breath out a small flame that sparks up the blood patch, getting a “YEEOOW!!” out of my captor before the tendril loosens and I go falling. Crouch land on the ground, and looking up I bring up my sword, slather, chant, breath and spin out a Jade Slider before Ty can retaliate. His tendril’s halfway through a whip motion when the Slider connects, searing through the scaled flesh and bursting through a hut, decimating it. Everything quiets down, except for the loud whimperings of the blinded cyclops, and the groaning curses of Ty as he’s writhing and kicking on the ground, clutching his stumped arm. (Irony) Irony. “Agh my arm you son of a bitch, goddammit! What the hell was that?” I go up to his squirming self and stomp hard on his chest, level my sword tip at his face, and get to the point. “Tell me about the lampads!” “Lampads?” “Yes: far distant cousins of Breezies. An ancient breed of fairy, believed to have carried torches that instilled madness into anyone bathed in their warmth. It’s the one thing that seems to match up.” It had been five days since that fateful night in Griffonstone. Me and my team were shipped back safely after a day of being kept under close but comfortable watch, sent on the same skiff that brought us to the continent. After laying low in Canterlot castle for a few days, I had been called to Twilight’s personal study (not as big as the old one, but cozier), where she shared the results of her investigation, and where I first heard that word. “The samples from the brazier you brought over has the same lingering magical signature as those that I recorded from the prisoners,” she elaborated further, looking over her notes (oh Twi and your notes). “It’s very faint, but I’ve concluded that it’s a form of chaos magic at work here.” “Chaos magic?” She turned to me and nodded. “Yes. It has boundless applications and effects, meaning it can perform what any other kind of magic can and more, though at the price of being more unpredictable and volatile. That being said, going by the reports of erratic, aggressive behavior shown by the griffons in the presence of their torchbearers, as well as the reaction it caused when it came into contact with your own innate draconic magic, it began to paint a clearer picture. You said you weren’t feeling quite yourself when in the throne room with Gladius.” “Yeah. I felt more agitated than how I usually am in those situations. Like I needed to lash out.” “Then there was how Gladius could manipulate fire willingly despite having no prior training in magic, and he calmed down considerably the moment the fire was put out. That just proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that that flame was the source of this unknown influence, if nothing else. And only chaos could potentially grant magic to those with no affiliation to it.” After I sent the all-clear to Twilight, me and Gladius had a nice sit down to discuss all that had happened: the invasion, why I had been sent to Griffonstone, and how relations between our two kingdoms stood in the aftermath of the whole mess. He was calm, patient and reasoning during our talk; nothing at all like the raging monarch that seemed so desperate to expand his domain. He agreed to make direct talks with Twilight on how to repair the damage that had been done on both sides, imploring me to hand deliver his scroll stating his intent before sending me and my crew on our way. As for the decimation of his attacking soldiers at my claws, he felt it to be fair’s fair: they sucker punch us, I leave them with a bloody face. There’s considerable risk in stirring a dragon, after all. “Once I had all this information in hoof, I immediately went to poring over all text, tomes and scrolls that involved ancient chaos magic,” Twilight continued. “And only a few hours ago I found this nature log recorded during the pre-Equestrian era, a millennium before the three tribes united. There were far more dangerous, magical creatures that roamed the land, lampads being among them. Somehow one of them, or at least someone carrying one of their torches, must have appeared over Griffonstone to deliver that spark that Gladius mentioned in his story. A flame that stokes madness would surely lead a group to a more aggressive, even warlike disposition, given enough time.” “So a random fairy flew by and accidentally lit a fire that coincidentally drove a nation to war. That’s pretty weird, but I guess that means case closed.” “Not quite.” Oh brother, I had thought as Twilight levitated a dusty book down from a shelf. “Lampads were recorded as being servants to the ancient gods that once walked the earth, incapable of making their own decisions and taking action unless told by a master. Furthermore, there hasn’t been a recorded sighting of these creatures in millennia, so it couldn’t have been one just wandering around aimlessly.” “Meaning someone sent one out there to Griffonstone.” “Precisely. It’s still an open case, I’m afraid.” Terrific. “Then we need to know where they came from.” “And I may have an answer for that.” She opened and laid out the book onto a table, flipping through some pages. “While lampads haven’t been seen for thousands of years, it doesn’t mean they have gone extinct. It’s likely they were sent away, banished alongside other such creatures deemed too dangerous to co-exist with the likes of ponies. Which leaves only one possible location: Tartarus.” Twilight stood back from the table to let me get a good look of the page she stopped on. An artist’s rendition of the most infamous, damned prison in existence. Pretty ominous, even with the fancy curls. “It could be that a single lampad had escaped undetected and flown all the way to the Griffon Kingdom, having no direction or bearings in this changed world of ours. But I’m not very sure…” I couldn’t have that. “Then I guess we need to investigate and see what’s up. And by ‘we’ I mean me.” No surprise it got a surprised look from her. “You would go to Tartarus?!” “It’s the only way to know for sure. It could have just been a freak happenstance like you say, or there could be someone cooking up something else to try and tear this world apart. And if they’re someplace where they’re surrounded by dangerous monsters unseen for thousands of years, then you’d need someone who can hold their own against monstrosities great and small. Making me the most qualified to go have a look.” “But, Tartarus is meant to be inescapable, where unfortunate souls are cast to never see the light of day again. How would you get back?” “I’m not saying I should go right away. We have to think this sort of thing out long and hard first, right?” I looked to her, sincere and unwavering. “It may be dangerous, but I don’t want you to worry over the possibility of another invasion, or something worse. Anything that dares to threaten this country, this peace, I will go out and put a stop to them. Whatever it takes.” She looked aside a moment, flash of uncertainty. Gave way to understanding. Trust. “Okay… Better to be safe than sorry, after all. But no one's going anywhere unless I can find a safe means to extract someone from Tartarus. And if there's no such way… that will be that. We will then face any new threat as it comes.” “And I'll be right on it the moment it shows.” “I know you will, Spike.” She turned to peruse her collection before saying, “I'll start searching for extraction methods. You go home and surprise Sweetie Belle. You deserve the rest.” “I appreciate that, Twi. Don't overwork yourself.” “I won't.” She was bound to anyway, knowing Twi. Though it may only be one all-nighter; she's been doing a good job pacing herself over the years. Shouldn't be long before she found a solution or none at all. But until then I picked up some books on classic mythology before leaving. Might as well do some studying of my own. Certainly gave me some idea of what to expect, thinking back. Which brings me to the sorry sap sprawled under my foot. “What are you talking about?” I dig my lower claws into the base of his shoulder. “Gach! What the hell, man?!” “Those things flying around with the torches, who's controlling them?” “Huh? Why’d you want to know that?” “Tell me!” Ty manages a smackable grin before making a defiant chuckle. “You're crazier than any of us; they did right sticking you in here.” I'm about to poke him a new nose when he says, “Those pixie-ass squirts belong to the warden. They're like monitors, her eyes in the sky. Also really damn hard to catch or swat.” “Where can I find the warden?” “And you got a serious death wish to go with the crazy. Fine by me, slim. You can find her further in, holed up in one of the deeper caves.” He nods in a direction outside the village's borders. “She doesn't like being bothered, and tends to rip up anyone who does. But I bet deep down she's awful lonely after all this time, so who am I to stop a strapping guy like you from saying hello?” “You talk way too much.” I agree. “Just copin’ with losing a damn arm, you figure that? But yeah, keep walking out there and you'll bump into her. And if you happen to change your mind, then you best stay far away and hide in some hole, cuz if I find out you're still alive out there, I'll come slit your throat and dance in your blood. But not before I rip every scale from your body, one by one.” “Noted. Thanks for the info.” I lift back my foot, only to slam it hard into his head. Not enough to kill him, but should keep him down a while. I look around to see who has recovered. Good number of dead goons, some knocked out, some writhing and grasping severed limbs. Only sounds are Poly blubbering on the ground and a dog happily gnawing away at a bone. Sheathing my sword, I step off the stricken Mr. Edgelord and make my way out of this craphole of a shantytown. Could’ve been him talking more BS, but it’s still better than no lead at all. Though an idea of there being a warden around down here is kinda interesting. Living amongst cutthroats, deviants and forgotten relics of the past, as trapped as the rest of them. To be considered a figure of authority in a place without law, they must be pretty powerful. Hopefully I can make a better impression then I did with that lot.