It was after dark, and Spike had already fallen asleep. Twilight, using her magic to levitate him, brought the young dragon to the bed and tucked him in. Upon looking at him asleep, Twilight started to reflect on how much Spike means to her, and how much she took him for granted. She reflected on how her actions caused Spike to turned into a demon a month ago. Yes, she and the others tried to make up for it this past month, but that's just small potatoes compared to the long abuse he suffered while being near them. Thinking about everything caused tears to form in Twilight's eyes. "I'm sorry Spike, i'm so sorry." she whispered as she leaned closer to the dragon. Twilight gave him a small peck on the cheek before wiping her eyes and returning back to Blueblood.
The prince glanced up from reading Starswirl's map to see Twilight taking a seat across from him. He noticed that her eyes were red; probably from crying. The prince ignored her and went back to reading the map. Wiping the last bit of tears from her eyes, Twilight looked over at the prince. "So where are we headed?" she asked; breaking the silence between them.
"Whitetail Woods." Blueblood answered. "It's just outside of Las Pegasus."
"Why there?"
"It's one of many places throughout Equestria where Starswirl built a hidden cave." he explained. "Probably to hide away hidden items he thought were too powerful for one pony to have; like his journal for instance."
"That makes since." Twilight stated. There was a brief moment of silence between the two before Twilight spoke up again. "Can I ask you something?"
"What?"
"How did you and Spike get a hold of that map?" she asked.
"Spike was the one who did." the prince explained. "He said he'd got it from the Starswirl the Bearded museum in Vanhoover."
Twilight was both shocked and excited to hear that there had been a museum dedicated to Starswirl. She wanted to ask more about it but could clearly see that Blueblood had no desire to speak to her. From the tone in his voice right down to his body language she could tell that he didn't fully trust her. His words to her the night Spike gave into darkness replayed over and over inside her head. Blueblood got up from his seat and put the map away. "It's late, i'm going to bed." The prince grabbed his things and walked off; leaving Twilight alone. Thinking she should getting some sleep as well; Twilight made her way to Spike's room. Climbing into bed, she wrapped her hoof around him and held him close. She soon drifted off into the dream world.
****************************
The next day, the train had made it to it's destination. Twilight, Blueblood, and Spike had gotten off and saw the entrance to the Whitetail Woods right in front of them. "Okay, the cave should be in the middle of the woods." Blueblood explained.
"Alright, let's go!" Spike said excitedly.
"Hold on Spike." Blueblood stopped him just as he was about to move forward. "Don't just run in like that. Who knows what kind of creatures are in there." The prince pulled out the map and took a quick look at it before putting it away again. “Let’s all go in together.” Twilight levitated Spike onto her back and the trio started to make their way into the whitetail woods; unknowing that they were being followed.
Unlike the Everfree Forest, the Whitetail Woods had wide open spaces and didn’t give off the feeling like everything was being crammed together. Light from the sun shone through making it that much easier to navigate across the area. “Ohmygosh, I can’t believe how close we are to Starswirl’s journal!” Twilight said; unable to keep her excitement in check. “We’re gonna be the first ones to see it!” Spike laughed at Twilight’s excitement while Blueblood rolled his eyes.
As the trio continued walking through the woods, Blueblood stopped suddenly and looked behind them with suspicious eyes. “Hey what’s wrong?” asked Spike.
“Nothing.” the prince answered.
****************************
“How much farther?” Twilight complained. “We’ve been walking for hours.”
“According to the map, the entrance should be right......THERE!” Blueblood pointed his hoof towards what appeared to be a dragon’s cave.
“I-I-I-It’s a d-d-dragon cave.” Spike stammered. Looking at the cave reminded Spike of the dragon cave he found after running away from home when he thought Twilight didn’t love him anymore.
“Relax Spike.” the prince reassured. “There’s no dragons around here.”
The trio began walking towards the cave when Blueblood heard another sound of somepony stepping on a branch. He quickly turned around to see who was there but saw nopony. The prince was sure that somepony was following them.
Upon entering the cave, Blueblood started staring at the walls. Placing his hoof upon it, he noticed that it wasn’t ruff and jagged as all cave walls were, these walls were smooth, and gave off the impression that they were recently built. Cave walls don’t normally stay that smooth for thousands of years unless they were.........
“It’s getting dark in here.” Spike said.
“I’ll make us a little light.” Twilight said as she began to light up her horn.
Blueblood quickly noticed that the cave walls started sparkling; reacting to Twilight’s magic. The prince’s eyes widen with fear as he quickly turned to Twilight.
“NO!” he yelled and tackled Twilight to the ground; stopping her spell casting.
“BLUEBLOOD, WHAT IN THE......!”
“You can’t use magic here.” the prince stated. “The cave walls are made out of Serpentine Rock.”
Twilight gasped.
“What’s Serpentine Rock?” asked Spike.
“It’s a special kind of mineral rock that reacts negatively to magic.” Twilight explained. “It causes them to break apart and explode upon contact.”
“It would seem that Starswirl made this entire cave out of Serpentine.” said Blueblood. “Make sense, seeing as how mostly unicorns would be the ones looking for his journal.”
“So then how are we gonna find our way through here?” asked Spike.
“Let’s go find a branch or something to make a torch with.” Blueblood suggested. The trio left the cave and walked back into the woods. There, Blueblood found a stick that was big enough to light a torch. Using his fire breath, Spike lit it up and the trio began making their way back into the cave, but not before Blueblood noticed something moving out the corner of his eye. Quickly turning his head, he saw a figure of a pony disappear into the woods for a brief second.
“We need to move.” he said sternly.
“What’s wrong?” asked Twilight.
“We’re being followed.” he answered.
Twilight gasped. “By who?”
“I’m not sure, but I get the feeling that they’re after the same thing we are.”
“Maybe they’re archaeologists?”
“I doubt it.”
“Hey, what are you two doing?!” yelled Spike; catching their attention. Blueblood and Twilight saw that Spike was already at the cave entrance waiting for them.
“Stay on guard.” Blueblood whispered to Twilight.
****************************
The trio spent what felt like hours walking through the cave until they came to a wall. “A dead end?” asked Spike.
“Not necessarily.” Blueblood said as he walked to the wall and placed a hoof on it. “According to the map, there should be a switch somewhere.” The prince began to feel along the wall until he pushed on a part of the wall that went inwards. The ground began to shake and open up beneath them. The trio fell through and landed on some type of slide. They slid through through the dark tunnel at a very fast pace; only to exit through hole in the wall. They found themselves in an open chamber with many torches hanging on the walls lighting the way.
“Ugh, where are we?” Spike groaned.
“It appears to be some kind of underground chamber.” Blueblood answered while talking a look at the map.
“There doesn’t seem to be any Serpentine Rock here.” Twilight said; looking at the walls.
“No, but there are traps here.” Blueblood added. “The map doesn’t say where they are or how to not trigger them but if we manage to get past them then it’s a straight shot to the journal.”
“Alright, let’s go!” Twilight said with excitement.
*click*
“What was that?” asked Spike.
Looking down, Twilight saw that she had accidentally stepped on a small button on the ground. Small holes began opening up within the walls and sharp metal knives stuck out.
“W-what the......” Spike started.
“GET DOWN!” Blueblood yelled as hundreds of the metal objects shot out of the walls from both sides. The trio quickly fell to the ground and covered their heads just barely missing getting hit. Sounds of the knives crashing into each other at full speed filled their ears. Suddenly, the sounds came to a stop and the trio found themselves covered in broken and bent knives. Slowly they emerged from the pile and took a look around.
“Is everypony okay?” Twilight asked.
“Ugh, barely.” Blueblood groaned. “Let’s keep moving, and watch where you step; who knows what other traps await us.” The trio began making their way through the chamber; being mindful of where they stepped. They soon came across a stairway that led them to a lower level. Upon reaching the bottom, they saw that the lover level had giant statues on each side of the walls.
“Whoa, look at them all.” Spike said in amazement as he ran towards one of them. “Who are they?”
“These are all of Starswirl’s enemies.” Blueblood explained.
“ Really?!” Spike said in shock. “There’s so many.”
“Back then, Equestria was constantly under attack by a new threat basically every other day.” Blueblood explained. “Starswirl took it upon himself to take on all threats as they came. He was the sole protector of Equestria.”
As Spike admired the statues, one caught his eye. It was a unicorn with a crazy smile on it’s face; similar to the one Twilight wore when she went crazy and caused ponyville to riot. “Who’s this?”
“That pony is called, Insanus.” Blueblood answered. “The less you know about him the better. Let’s go.”
Twilight levitated Spike onto her back and the trio moved on, but not before........
*click*
“Uh oh.” Twilight said as she looked down and saw that she stepped on another button. There was a loud rumbling sound that caused the trio to look up. The statues were all turning their head towards them and there eyes started glowing.
“Um, are statues supposed to do that?” Spike asked nervously.
“No!” said Twilight. “RUN!” Spike held onto Twilight as she and Blueblood started to run as fast as they could just as the statues took aim at them. Within seconds, the statues began shooting beams of magical energy from their eyes; just missing their targets by inches. The impact from the beams caused mini explosions which damaged the floor and caused the room to shake. “KEEP GOING!” yelled Blueblood as the beams kept getting closer by the second.
“Over there!” Spike yelled; pointing to a small opening.
“Go go go!” yelled Blueblood. Twilight and Spike were the first to jump through the opening with Blueblood right behind them. With no targets to shoot at, the statues went right back to their original positions. The trio found themselves in a small room with the only exit being the way came in.
“Now where are we?” asked Spike.
“I don’t know, but least those statues stopped firing at us.” said Twilight. “Come on, let’s get out of here.”
*click*
There was dead silence in the room. “Please, tell me you didn’t step on another one, Sparkle.” said Blueblood. Suddenly, their only exit was sealed off and a loud rumbling sound began to fill the room. To everypony’s horror, both sides of the wall and the ceiling began closing in on them.
“OH NO!” yelled Twilight. Frantically, they began looking for a way out of the situation. Inch by inch the walls came closer and closer forcing Twilight and Blueblood to push against them, to no avail. “I’ll cast a spell!” As Twilight’s horn started glowing, Spike looked up at the ceiling in horror.
“TWILIGHT!” he yelled then pointed up.
Twilight rose her head and saw what Spike saw. “S-Serpentine Rock!” she yelled. “The ceiling is made of Serpentine Rock! I can’t use magic!”
Spike ran over to the opening, put his claws through the cracks and desperately to pry it open. “COME ON, OPEN UP FOR CELESTIA’S SAKE!” It wouldn’t budge.
Spike took a couple of steps back and turned to see Twilight and Blueblood pushing against the walls as they closed in.
Was this it?
Is this how it ends?
No, not like this. It can’t end this way.
*click*
Spike had stepped on a switch which allowed the floor to open up beneath them. The trio fell through just as the ceiling and walls closed in. They slid down another passageway into a smaller chamber. “That was close.” said Blueblood.
“So where are we now?” asked Twilight. The trio looked around the room and saw that on top of a small staircase was the podium, and on that podium was a large book.
“That must be it!” Twilight said excitedly. “Starswirl’s journal!” Before Twilight could take one step forward, Blueblood stuck his hoof out and stopped her. He didn’t want her triggering anymore traps; if there were any. Spike started scanning the area for any signs of hidden traps and found none. Once the coast was clear, Blueblood allowed Twilight to run up to the podium. Once she got there, she couldn’t keep her excitement in check any longer. With the biggest smile on her face, she grabbed Starswirl’s journal off the podium and was about to open it when it was suddenly pulled out of her grasp by Blueblood.
“We got what we came for, now let’s get outta here.” he said looking at Spike. Putting the journal in his saddle pack, both the prince and Spike turned to leave but was soon confronted by Twilight. “What are you doing?!” she half yelled.
"We’re going to deliver the journal to the museum in Vanhoover.” Blueblood explained.
“W-WHAT?!” Twilight screamed then teleported in front of Blueblood. “Y-you’re not even gonna open it up and read it? It’s Starswirl’s journal!”
“And who’s to say that you won’t try casting one of the high level spells written in here?” Blueblood asked. “Based on what Spike told me, your spells never go right.”
Twilight glared at Spike who turned away from her whistling. Blueblood levitated the young dragon onto his back and proceeded to leave the chamber until he was once again stopped by a small barrier made Twilight. “Sparkle, what are you doing?” he asked, a bit annoyed.
“I just want a little peek inside.” she asked. “Just one page, that’s all.”
“You won’t stop at one page.” The prince shattered Twilight's barrier with his own magic and once again started to leave with Spike, but soon felt Twilight grab onto his hind leg in another attempt to stop him. “No. NOOOO!” she begged. “Come on, let me read it, it’ll satisfy my hunger for knowledge.” Twilight began speaking in a strange whispered tone that made her sound......suggestive.The prince and Spike both looked at Twilight before continuing on; dragging her and ignoring her cries.
“Come on Twilight, this is getting pathetic.” Spike said. Twilight just continued to beg and plead to read the book until Blueblood came to an abrupt stop.
“What’s going on?” asked Spike.
“We have company.” he said; catching Twilight’s attention. The trio were now facing three hooded ponies who showed no intention of letting them leave.
“Who are you!” Blueblood demanded. The three ponies removed their hood to reveal that they were light blue earth ponies with pure white manes and tails. Blueblood instantly recognized their appearance.
“The Snow Clan.” he growled.