//------------------------------//
// part 5 
// Story: Shatter Realm Chronicles 
// by keithsterling 
//------------------------------//

Altered History Part 5
Shatter Realm: Present Time

Back in the Friendship Kingdom and Ponyville, Imperator Alicorn Harmonia disguised herself as a strong earth pony and worked odd jobs around Ponyville to hide from the watchful eyes of the elite Solar Guard unit out of Canterlot. A year later, the disguised Harmonia got a huge opportunity when rumors started to swirl about disharmony occurring within the walls of the Castle of Friendship in Ponyville. The rumors Harmonia heard were that Princess Twilight Sparkle and her Friendship Assembly were getting stretched too thin with so many friendship missions they must do around Equestria that all were returning to Ponyville exhausted. 

Many of the friendship assembly members had other jobs to do in Equestria and were too tired to do them. So tempers began to flare, turning the friendship assembly into a hot headed group of fighting mares, pretending to be friends. Quickly, Princess Twilight Sparkle reined in the friendship assembly before it got too bad. To learn if the rumors were true, Harmonia disguise herself as a unicorn and got a job as a royal maid in the Castle of Friendship. With her disguise, she had free rein of the Castle of Friendship, with the exception of the throne room, at the center of the castle on the first floor. The throne room was always guarded by two Canterlot division Solar Guard troopers. They were hoof picked by Celestia for Twilight after Starlight Glimmer messed with the object inside.

Only one special unicorn maid was allowed into the throne room. She was hoof picked by Princess Twilight to clean the room when it was not in use. This maid was under very strict royal orders and was not allowed to speak about what was inside the room. That evening, Harmonia followed the special maid back to her home in Ponyville. When the maid turned-in for the night, Harmonia cast a very powerful sleep spell on her to keep her asleep. The next morning, in the disguise of the sleeping maid, Harmonia was let into the Throne room to clean it.

On the other side of the golden-framed green glass doors was a huge chamber. Hanging from the ceiling, was a gem-lined chandelier made from the roots of a huge tree. Under the chandelier sat seven crystalline thrones above a star-shaped dais on a golden dish. As Harmonia neared the chairs, something reacted to her and a table with a three-dimensional interactive map of Equestria rose to greet her. As she looked at the table, the holographic symbol of Princess Twilight’s cutie mark hovers over a place on the map marking north. After looking at it for awhile, she figures out the location. It was the Crystal City. With no idea why the cutie mark was hovering over the Crystal City, Harmonia transformed back to her original form of Imperator Alicorn.

With that, Imperator Alicorn inherited the ability of forever sight. Harmonia closed her eyes and concentrated on the location. Before long, her sight fell upon an enraged Princess Flurry Heart destroying several vases with her magic bolts in her bed chamber as her maids look on. After secretly reading Princess Flurry Heart’s mind (with the mind read ability) a malicious smile formed on Harmonia’s snout. ‘With this unskilled young Alicorn filly and her huge ego. she will make a worthy puppet ruler for me’ Harmonia thought as she cast a spell on the table that blocked the alert from going off and summoning Princess Twilight and her Friendship Assembly to the room.

With the block spell in place on the table, Harmonia charges up her horn and opens a wormhole from the Castle of Friendship to the outskirts of the Crystal City. Once through the wormhole, the opening at the Castle of Friendship collapses, allowing Harmonia to step out of the other side in the Crystal Empire. Once in the Empire, Harmonia uses her natural hide in plain sight ability and begins to learn all about the problems going on in the city and the Empire.

During one of her information gathering activities in the Crystal City, Harmonia is shocked to see a full grown unicorn mare wearing the Princess’s regalia of love walking about the city as the crystal ponies’ bow to her as she passes them. A cold chill runs down Harmonia’s back when she realizes who the mare was; Princess Celestia Silverlight’s younger daughter Princess Blueberry Swirl Silverlight. A wave of fear washed over her when she senses that the Princess is no longer unable to access her full magic energy. This thought causes Harmonia to rethink her whole plan for Princess Flurry Heart, for if Princess Blueberry discovers that she is in the Crystal Empire, everything she has planned up to now will come crashing down around her.

During the Winter Solstice (basically her Aunt Luna’s day) Princess Flurry Heart launches her impromptu power play for the Throne of Love in the Crystal Empire, which the Grand Princess of Love, Blueberry, had been planning for. But even the best laid plans have hiccups and that hiccup was a new advisor Rose Eventide (unicorn mare). Advisor Eventide stroked Princess Flurry Heart’s ego about being a natural born Alicorn. Princess Flurry Heart ate it up like candy and was soon obeying whatever Advisor Eventide would tell her to do as long as she kept pumping-up her ego. In that very moment, any order issued by Princess Flurry Heart would change the power play from simple depose of the Grand Princess of Love to the beginning of tyranny that would kill her mother Princess Cadence, the original Princess of Love.

In the throne room of the Crystal Palace, the noble Grand Princess of Love Blueberry Swirl Silverlight stood defiant. She would not let Princess Flurry Heart eradicate all Princess Cadence (Flurry Heart’s Mother) work in the Crystal Empire with her ego. Princess Flurry Heart lifted her hoof up and ordered the execution of a crystal pony maid in front of Blueberry. She promised she would kill one crystal pony for as long as the Grand Princess of Love Blueberry remained on the throne. Even with the loss of just one Crystal pony, Blueberry stepped down as the ruler of the Crystal Empire and was quickly imprison in the dungeon of the Crystal Palace. Princess Flurry Heart’s plan for Princess Blueberry was to use her as a symbol of the superiority of a natural born Alicorn to a half breed Alicorn.

But Advisor Eventide had other plans for Blueberry; she knew that Princess Blueberry would be a huge danger to her plans. So, Advisor Eventide secretly ordered the execution of Princess Blueberry right under Princess Flurry Heart’s nose. If not for a small group of loyalist in the palace, she would have been killed while she was in her cell that night. The loyalist got a critical message to a sleeper cell of the Solar Guard unit hidden in the Crystal city. With the message in hoof, the sleeper cell got Princess Blueberry out of the dungeon and out of the Empire before Princess Flurry Heart knew what had happened.