One month had passed since the Battle of Canterlot had taken place.
One month since Lightning Blitz, under the influence of the Alicorn Amulet, had attempted to take the kingdom for himself. The plan was at first, kidnapping seven mares by turning them to stone, one of which was Princess Cadance and instigated a city-wide battle that pitted the ponies of Equestria against each other. However, the mares were soon unpetrified, all thanks to Princess Cadance after she had released due to the other princesses. When this happened, Lightning then unleashed a deadly weapon known as the Thunder Tomb, which would have destroyed the whole city. Luckily, he was stopped and his Thunder Tomb destroyed, allowing the apprentice knight Flash Sentry to finally stop him and destroy the Alicorn Amulet.
Now, the ponies of the city were working on cleaning up the damage that had resulted from all the fighting, which had caused major property damage to many buildings and other areas of the city. The ponies of the city had just finished repairs to the main town square, and were beginning to get back to their usual lives.
This included a particular small group which was made up of almost nothing but fillies and colts, lead by an older mare. This was the class of Miss Cheerilee and her students, who were in Canterlot for a field trip. There, the teacher spoke to her class as they got closer to their destination. "Now remember everypony," Cheerilee said in a calm, yet shout-like tone. "Remain with your buddy and don't wonder off. This isn't like back home."
"Yes Miss Cheerilee!" the school ponies replied in unison.
"Good," Cheerilee nodded. "Now, I hope you're ready for our tour of Canterlot Castle." At that moment, they arrived at their destination, the home of the Princess of Equestria and headquarters for the Royal Guard. "And here's our tour guide for the day," Cheerilee commented as they spotted an earth pony standing at the doors of the castle. Three of the school fillies recognised him instantly.
"It's Grand Hoof!" Scootaloo cheered, seeing the familiar face.
"Hello everypony!" Grand Hoof said with a wave. "Glad to see you again."
"Hey Grand!" the CMC replied in unison, big smiles on their faces. The rest of the class soon walked up to the old solider, all of them ready to take the tour. With this, Grand let out a small cough, signalling Cheerilee that he was ready, which she nodded to.
"Okay, let's the tour started." Grand spoke up as they turned towards the castle. "I'll start off by explaining the castle itself." he began, pointing to the main front doors. "It was first built over a thousand years ago after the defeat of Nightmare Moon. Princess Celestia commissioned it to be built to replace the Palace of the Royal Pony Sisters, which was almost destroyed all those years ago during the final battle with the Mare in the Moon."
"Whoa!" They all said as they looked up at the castle.
"It can house more than three thousand ponies, which includes the Royal Guards, who live in the barracks." The ponies all nodded in response. "Now...since we're at the entrance here, what would you all like to see first?"
"The armoury!" Scootaloo called out.
"The kitchens!" Applebloom cheered.
"The Royal Chambers!" Sweetie Belle cried out.
The three fillies glared at each other, while Grand smirked at the sight. As the three said their suggestions, the class also yelled out several different locations as well. After a minute, Grand clapped his hooves, causing them to all stop.
"Since nopony can agree, how about we start outside of the castle with the Royal Gardens kiddos?" he suggested as he pointed to the garden on the side of the castle. "We'll see the rest of the castle afterwards."
"Okay," they all nodded, glad to go anywhere within the castle's limits.
With that, Grand Hoof escorted them to the gardens where a giant hedge maze stood. Tell them that it wasn't worth going into the maze, he directed them to a nearby area that was filled with stone statues of ponies. "Welcome to the Sculpture Garden," Grand said as they arrived. "These statues are known for being representations of many different traits and emotions."
It was then that they noticed a unicorn mare that was currently cleaning one of the nearby statues. She had dark green fur with an orange mane and tail. She wore thin glasses and her Cutie Mark was a stone mason chisel. It was here the crusaders froze, remembering this pony's identity.
"Gorgenia!" Grand yelled, trying to get her attention.
The unicorn mare turned towards them. "Oh! Hello Grand Hoof. I'm just finishing the renovations for this one." She then looked over at the school ponies, "I see you brought friends. What's going on here?"
However, her question wasn't answered, but instead greeted with fear. "We know her," Scootaloo gulped as she spoke up first, trying to backpedal away before hitting her friends behind her.
"Yeah!" Applebloom slightly growled, her fear slowly being replaced with anger. "She's the one who turned my sister into a statue!"
"And tried to take over Equestria!" Sweetie added with a stomped hoof. "What is she doing here?!"
"Oh," Gorgenia replied, blushing as she did. "You know about that." Gorgenia then took off her glasses to clean them, letting out a small sigh as she did. "Well relax foals, I can't turn ponies to stone anymore. Not without...Lightning's help anyways."
"Right...sure you can't." Scootaloo growled with suspicion.
Grand on the other hoof, decided to change subjects and back to the original reason he spoke up, "Gorgenia, why not help me show these ponies around? Who better to tell them about these statues then the one who is currently renovating them?"
"Eh, I guess I could." she shrugged, her face lighting up and a smile appearing on her lips. "Very well, follow me." With that, she lead the group through the sculpture garden, and began to explain the significance of the different statues. "This statue," she pointed to one of three small ponies on top of each other, "represents friendship."
As this happened, the CMC all looked up at the statue, Applebloom coming to a stop and causing Scootaloo and then Sweetie to bump into each other.
"Moving on," Gorgenia went on as she pointed towards a statue of an earth pony holding an actual flag while surrounded by stars. "This next one represents victory."
"How cool would it be to have that as a cutie mark?" Scootaloo asked, nudging Apple Bloom as she did.
"Very cool." Applebloom replied before a snarky smirk appeared on her face, "if you were actually victoryful at something."
Scootaloo glared at the yellow filly, while Sweetie just rolled her eyes. "That's not a word," she told them.
"What are you, a dictionary?" Scootaloo grumbled back.
"GIRLS!" Cheerilee called out, grabbing their attention. The rest of the group had moved onto the next statue, causing them to realise what had happened. The three quickly rushed over to where their class had gone, near a statue of some strange pony, snake, lion, goat and dragon combo statue.
"Now this is one of the oldest statues in the gardens," Gorgenia told them. "Though uh...I'm not sure why. Its definitely not something I would make."
Grand just chuckled at her comment before explaining, pointing at the statue as he did. "This creature is called a draconequus. Its a powerful hybrid creature, not unlike griffons and chimeras."
"Can anypony guess what it symbolises?" Cheerilee asked.
"Confusion," Applebloom guessed.
"Evil," Sweetie said as she bumped Apple Bloom, only to get bumped herself by Scootaloo.
"Chaos!" Scootaloo added.
"It's not chaos you dodo," Sweetie told her.
"Don't call me things I don't know the meaning of," Scootaloo replied with a snarl, "and it is to chaos."
"Is not," Sweetie replied.
"Is too!"
"Is-"
"You're both wrong!" Applebloom interrupted. "Its confusion!"
This quickly resulted in a hoof fight, concerning two of the adults.
"Shouldn't we stop this?" Gorgenia asked Cheerilee.
"Just let them blow off some steam," Grand Hoof replied with a waved hoof. "Its good for the kiddos."
Gorgenia just rolled her eyes. "I think I'm starting to see why Lightning and Script had problems with you."
Eventually, the three, now exhausted, stopped and laid down on the ground, panting. Seeing this, Cheerilee let out a sigh before explaining. "Now you three, in a way you're all right." She looked up at the statue. "This statue represents discord, which means a lack of harmony between ponies." She then looked back at the three fillies. "In fact, you three have demonstrated discord so well, that each of you is going to write me an essay about it."
The three fillies moaned at this, as the rest of their class laughed.
"Now," Cheerilee said with a slight grumble. "Let's move on, and I don't want to see anymore fighting."
"Yes Miss Cheerilee..." the trio groaned in unison.
With that, the group headed out of the sculpture garden.
Had they remained there a moment longer however, they would have seen a small crack appear on the statue of discord. That one crack unfortunately, soon grew and grew, until more cracks branched off. It wasn't long till the whole statue was covered in cracks.
It was at that moment that a new sound filled the air. A deep, evil, laugh. A laugh filled with....chaos