I freely admit, the sight of Joy casually levitating a griffon minigun is terrifying, and so is the little flicker of fire on the tip of Cromach’s flamethrower. The tunnel we’re walking through is easily ten ponies tall, dimly lit, and wide enough to transport heavy machinery so that we can comfortably walk while Nightshade’s Corrupted are scouting ahead.
“My senses aren’t the sharpest down here,” Nightshade stops all of a sudden, “but I think something is coming. A group of small creatures from the next tunnel right. I ordered my scout to disappear and let them through just to see what we’re up against. Let’s wait.”
We stand in complete silence punctuated only by the clicking of the spinning barrel of Joy’s horrific heavy weapon and Cromach fastening the flamethrower on his back and grabbing his battleaxe.
I hear scratching coming from the distance, getting closer and closer.
A swarm of slick and doubtlessly rabid creatures half the size of a pony rush from the mentioned tunnel like a living carpet. As they spot us with their red, glowing eyes, they start screeching.
Only for a moment.
In the next instant, every single one of the dozen or so creatures is grabbed by a black whip from the ground. dragged down into a pool of black goo accompanied by its ineffective flailing, and they all disappear.
Nightshade burps, and we resume walking.
“Bleh, I hate using Corruptor traits. On the other tentacle, it’s been a while since I had meat without Twilight bitching that I ate some bandits she wanted to reform.”
“You COULD have left one for us to study,” complains Mana Burn, “Just to see what we were up against.”
A solitary small bone drops out of Nightshade’s belly and on the ground.
“There. Did you bring your microscope?”
Mana Burn sighs.
“Fine, what did you get?”
“They’re normal rats with something extra in them that made them grow. Feels a lot like,” she looks at the ceiling, “what I got to taste from our alicorn ‘friend’ here when we first met. Only a fraction, though. Any ideas?”
They all look at me.
“I had the feeling this would be the case. I think that after Joy fended off Harmony’s avatar last time, the god withdrew deep underground to recover. That means several things, I believe. One, the wounds we caused her or them both possibly were serious. Two, every even remotely dangerous critter normally living in the mines will have mutated into some feral beast. And three… I think they know we’re coming, or at least that I am. The good part is that if we follow Grimbash’s map to the istrium crystal mining operation, they’ll be there.”
Cromach opens a small book with ring bindings, flips some pages, and shows us the piece of the map he found.
“We should head straight there then. No reason to walk around, clearing out hostiles. No offense, Nightshade, but that’s your job.”
“I’m pretty sure that getting rid of whoever is causing this will make my ‘job’ a lot easier,” she studies the piece of paper before closing her eyes. She taps her foreleg on the floor, and black veins rush from the point of the impact into the distance, “Alright, we won’t get lost now. Let’s go, it’ll take forever with you slouches here anyway.”
I’m not one to question the mare the rest of the world is terrified of deep down, especially if she knows what she’s doing.
Few minutes later, the tunnel lighting is gone thanks to trashed ceiling, cut cables on the sides of the tunnel, and other signs of battle in general. Thankfully, aside from Cromach who’s now holding a Silver Sun flashlight in his foreleg all of us can see in the dark without a problem.
“Bats,” whispers Joy.
“Huh?” Nightshade tenses, her ears perking up, “You’re right, I thought the noise was from you.”
“It’s different. My echolocation is… evolved, you know, since I used to be a batpony, not a wild bat. I can hear them, thousands.”
“There’s a cavern ahead, and I could use a snack,” Nightshade shrugs.
I hear clicking from Cromach who switches his axe for the flamethrower again and grins at me.
“Bet they won’t be just any bats?” he shakes his weapon, the pilot light flickering slightly.
“Hard to punch, you mean?” I smile back, taking my place BEHIND the guy willing to unleash near-liquid fire in an enclosed space. Others take the hint, Nightshade who’s walking first excluded.
The cavern is massive, clearly a node or a base for mining operations. My tracing spell is strong enough, though, to reach the ceiling and spot the small nesting shapes hanging there.
“We could go through unnoticed,” whispers Knowledge, “Bats aren’t known for-”
“No,” Nightshade cuts him off, “We’re here to clean out all the mutated fucks. Cromach, give me a second, then get ready for some purging.”
“Joy,” I whisper, “something for our ears, will you? Otherwise this will get ugly.”
“Good thinking,” Nightshade nods.
Joy’s horn glows, and suddenly everything is a little muffled.
A solitary tentacle sprouts from the ground, lunges upwards, and grabs a single oversized bat who screeches in horror.
...thousands of tiny eyes open… and in the black and white world of my tracing spell I can see every single one.
The bats look at us. There’s no chaos, no panic anymore, only bodies flowing at us like a wave and SCREECHING.
And then… then happens what can only be described as the result of somepony telling Celestia her ass is small and bony.
The focused force of the giant bats funneling themselves into a narrower tunnel meets a madly laughing tainted griffon with a full flamethrower.
Cromach wins. Flawless victory.
He tosses an empty fuel tank away, and pulls out another one, connecting it to the still glowing weapon. It must be nice being able to carry ten times your weight without flinching or even slowing down. The military-grade backpacks cost a ton, though.
Carefully stepping over the charred bat corpses and trying not to throw up as the sticky and heavy stench of gas and still burning flesh hangs in the air, we cross the cavern. The bats didn’t flee, they all attacked at once.
The ground is trembling.
“Uhh, do you feel that?” I mumble.
“LEFT!” Nightshade calls out.
On instinct, I jump to the right. I can’t help it, it’s just reflex. The stone ground bursts, showering everyone with rocks. A huge, spinning mass of flesh and scales barrels upwards, hitting the ceiling which starts crumbling.
Fast.
“TO THE TUNNEL!” I hear Nightshade.
“We can’t leave him!” I hear Joy as I roll on the unstable ground shifting under my hooves.
Rock from the right!
Mistake’s directions are different. They aren’t words, more like instincts given form.
Behind you!
I lunge forward.
More and more warnings come, giving me a clear idea that the whole cavern must be breaking down. I do my best to listen to them while jumping and dodging towards the closest reinforced tunnel mouth.
Directly above!
I-
-trip.
“Shi-”
Something far softer than a piece of hewn rock ceiling hits me from the back, propelling me into the safe tunnel.
I attempt to untangle myself from the ball of feathers and fur, with little results.
“Cro?”
“You didn’t think only few tons of rocks would separate us, did you?”
“One almost separated me from my rib cage, but I guess you’re more a part of me now than it is,” I chuckle, finally wiggling out of his grip.
“Just as I planned all along, heh heh heh,” he licks my nose, “Bleh, you’re all dusty.”
*Pop!*
“OWOWOWOWOWOWOWOW!” I hear Joy’s voice followed by an erratic flapping of wings.
My tracing spell shows her and Heavy inside the tunnel now as well, slightly smoldering and stumbling dizzily around.
“Please...” Heavy groans, “At least warn me next time you teleport us halfway INTO solid rock and then have to recast the spell blindly again...”
“Ughhh… but he was getting away from me...” she moans.
Heavy checks all his limbs.
“Well, there you have it, Blazing. If you ever think she isn’t crazy about you, remember this moment. She’s absolutely FROTHING INSANE about you.”
Joy shakes her head, taking some more uncoordinated steps away from the cave-in.
“I’ll take it as a compliment.”
“I wonder if Nightshade and others can get through this,” I tap at the rocks blocking our way back.
“Unlikely,” Cromach dusts himself off, then helps Joy pat out her smoldering tail, “She can ‘seep’ through walls, but from what I saw while flying through the rain of rocks I think the entire cavern collapsed as the worm pushed through. Not to mention, while she can shift her body to a high degree, Chilly, Mana Burn, and Knowledge aren’t that malleable outside of their territories. Besides, they know where we’re going, we’ve got the map and the shafts are fairly well-connected,” he pulls out the book, “Yep, it’s a short detour, but we’re not blocked off or anything. Minotaurs have this place nicely organized.”
Reassured, we let Cromach lead the way.
“What was that anyway?” asks Heavy, “The worm, I mean. One of the ‘devourers’ Grimbash told us about?”
“I guess,” I shrug, “I’m not a biologist. Although this would explain why minotaurs really had to leave the mines. The other encounters were pretty minor considering their equipment.”
“Something that can burrow its way through rock and is this massive… the mountain would crumble within few years, especially if there are more of them. They must have appeared recently with Harmony’s supposed arrival.”
“Yeah, let’s fix that.”
***
“Stairs? The map said nothing about stairs,” comments Cromach, shining his light directly into the book, “Though I doubt they’d point it out just like that.”
What’s strange about the wide, dusty staircase leading down into the depths is how completely different it looks from the rest of minotaur mines. Where the minotaur tunnels are rough, as if someone pushed a huge drill forward, then put up some supports along the sides, and railings for motorized transportation on the floor, this stairwell leading down into the darkness is carefully crafted and polished along with the rest of the perfectly angular shaft. Even the ceiling looks polished, and I can see that the layer of dust doesn’t reach further than the first few steps.
In short, this tunnel looks like a masterwork of art and function rather than a necessary connection between points A and B.
“Is there another way?” I ask, carefully tapping my hoof against the stone steps in case of a trap. They feel far more solid than all the tunnels up until now, though.
Cromach flips few pages.
“There is, but it’s yet another detour. Come on, I doubt a STAIRCASE is our biggest problem right now. To demonstrate, his pawsteps become completely silent as he steps on the smooth stone.
“Agreed,” I follow him. Heavy and Joy exchange glances and join our descent, “Speaking of biggest problems, where’s your flamethrower, Cro?”
“It was either it or you. Flying through darkness and a hail of rocks while trying to grab your sexy ass isn’t easy with that colossus in my talons. I’ve still got my axe so it’s okay,” he nods towards the oversized weapon on his back.
“And if we really need fire, I think I can help with that,” says Joy, winking at me.
On one hoof, I’m happy she’s in good enough mood to joke about that. On the other, I doubt I’ll ever forget nearly crapping myself at that moment.
As we walk deeper and deeper, the shafts become small enough so that only three of us can walk side by side and about double our size. That is, until our current tunnel opens into the biggest cavern I’ve ever seen, so vast that even my tracing spell can’t reach any distant wall or the ceiling.
“Is it warm in here or is that me?” asks Heavy, turning his head from side to side.
Come to think of it, it might. After the clammy tunnels, this place does feel a bit more comfortable. A Corrupted like Heavy can sense it far better, I guess.
“A little, yeah,” nods Cromach, beak in the map book again, “If this is in scale, then this cavern is waaay bigger than Canterlot castle courtyard, almost as big as the Royal Square in the Holy City.”
“Wooow,” Heavy and I say in unison. Joy looks uninterested. Either she’s never been to the core of the Griffon Empire, or she doesn’t really care.
“Anyway, there should be a bridge in the center leading across the pit.”
“Uhh, pit?”
We stop as his flashlight illuminates a clear edge of the beautifully worked stone plaza we’re on.
Edge leading into-
“Bllgh...” my eyes cross and knees go weak. Heavy’s tentacles wrap around my barrel and pull me backwards, “Sorry.”
“Yeeeeah,” Cromach is looking down… so deep down at the red and yellow river of magma.
“I would be falling down for minutes...” I mutter.
“Somepony strip him so he realizes he’s got wings. I volunteer!” Cromach grabs me. Heavy’s tentacle slaps his talons.
“Stop messing around and let’s go,” he nods towards the massive structure crossing the pit, “The bridge looks intact.”
It is. Over ten ponies wide, the massive slab of excellently worked rock is held by pillars leading down to the hole as well as all the way up to the ceiling. At least that’s my guess because I can’t see that far up.
We rush, expecting any problems, but the bridge’s construction is sound, and we’re soon on the second circular plaza with another simple yet beautifully carved staircase leading further into the depths.
It’s difficult to keep time down here, but at least twenty or so minutes later, Heavy stops by a pillar in the center of a tunnel, looking at it closely.
“Hmmm… Cromach, light, will you?”
We gather around, and I realize he’s looking at some strange writing.
“Crumbling... Vein... shaft,” Heavy slowly reads the alien script.
“Waaaait… I’ve seen this before,” a realization hits me, “Heavy, you can read it?”
“It’s an ancient earthpony script. Shadowstep has some books written like this, and Cross taught me.”
I look closer.
“Where did I…? The Silversmith outpost! Joy, do you remember this writing?”
She shrugs.
“It looks kinda similar to some messages on the walls. They were a bit blurry, considering we were running at the time.”
“I wish Des and her group were here. They might know what this means.”
“It means that this is a shaft named after somepony called Crumbling Vein, Blazing,” says Heavy dryly, “I told you, I can read it. Come to think of it… huuh… I did read some legends about dwarf ponies living deep underground.”
“Cro, how far to the istrium crystals mining base?”
“If we don’t run into anything… fifteen minutes? Give or take.”
I resume walking.
“Tell us on the way then, Heavy. These mines seem rather clean as opposed to the minotaur shafts. No monsters or anything.”
“You had to jinx it, didn’t you?” Cromach nudges me.
“We could use some warm up before Harmony’s avatar inevitably attacks us in the end,” I shrug.
She must be waiting down there, and ‘down there’ is close. Anything, even the worm, is just a minor inconvenience at this point.
I realize I can feel her. I can feel Harmony’s power faintly twisting in the air. I’ve been so on edge all this time, listening for the faint grinding and trembling of rock being shredded by a giant worm which never came, that I completely missed the tiniest spark of divinity everywhere around.
Breathe in.
Breathe out.
“Get ready to end this.”
There is only one path now, so I lead the way.
The beautiful stonework eventually gives way back to wide open minotaur tunnels, which we navigate into yet another enormous cavern. This time my tracing spell shows shiny reflective surfaces in the walls. Crystals buried in rocks? I have no clue how mining works.
I don’t need light. I recognize the white equine outlines I see waiting a short distance away from the entrance immediately.
She looks up, doubtlessly not needing light either, but alerted by Cromach’s flashlight.
“Well well well… took you a long time to get here,” her rumbling voice echoes through the cave.
Cromach affixes his flashlight onto a holder under his barrel.
“So here’s the mare who’s been trying to pound my Blazing into paste,” he draws his axe which crackles with lightning, “The only one with pounding rights here... is me.”
“Empty words,” she stands up, cracking her neck and shoulders, “We all know you’re here because you don’t have the means to kill me, and because I am already here as well… you won’t be getting anything.”
The ground shakes. The tremor comes closer and closer as everyone tries to stay steady.
The edge of the cavern erupts into a fountain of rocks before a circular toothy mouth easily taking a fifth of the whole floor slides out and flops to the side, motionless.
I smell trap, but Harmony’s host is watching the giant limp worm with suspicion as well.
Black goo pours out of the holes between its armor plates, forming a puddle on the stone floor. One foreleg comes out of it, and heaves as if pulling the rest of the equine body behind it from deep water.
“WOOOOOO! I need to get one of these things back home,” Nightshade laughs as other Corrupted reform around her. In the end, she shakes, and all her black mass splatters around, revealing she was covering Chilly. Real Nightshade reconstructs herself next to him, and narrows her eyes at the sight of Harmony’s mare, “I guess it’s time to finish the job then.”
Without hesitation, she charges at Harmony.
“Joy, can you provide light for Crom and me?” I ask, “Just in case.”
“On it,” her horn shimmers, and the entire cave fills with daylight.
As I turn my head back to the fight, I see Nightshade look up in surprise as a towering tentacle the colour of sea water smashes her so hard her body splatters around and leaves a black smear on the floor.
Nightshade’s maw appears under Harmony, the Corrupted fluidly pouncing out of solid rock and ripping Harmony’s barrel open. Without any swing, just a quick jab, Harmony punches Nightshade’s head off, her ‘lethal’ wound healing completely before Nightshade hits the floor.
The Corrupted Queen reforms a short distance away, measuring her opponent.
“Alright, you got my attention.”
I see cracks of light shimmer under the surface as the rocky floor slowly grows softer, transforming into corrupted biomass. When the supreme queen is away from her territory, she just claims whatever land she wants.
“Guys, let’s help,” I levitate one Blade, “Without my power weakening her, even Nightshade is a joke.”
Mistake, use the other Blade.
Will do.
The second greatsword slips out of the sheath on my back and joins the first one.
“Took you long enough,” scowls Harmony, “And here was me thinking I’d have to kill them all before you’d come out.”
“Funny,” I give the Blades a swing, “After all these years you still know nothing about me.”
“And you still underestimate me-” she looks at the thick black tentacle spearing her barrel clean through, wraps it around her foreleg, and rips it out of the ground upon which it dissipates, “You Corrupted were an interesting experiment as a tide, but clearly too weak as a singular entity.”
Dozen of Harmony’s pillar-like tendrils sprout out of the ground again.
“DOOODGE!” I call out, jumping and rolling out of the way of the closest one slamming down.
Okay, we can’t fight like this. Harmony’s host is ready, and my balancing power isn’t reacting properly because I’m not alone against her.
Alright, switch tactics.
“I’ll stop the tentacles, you get her!” I scream, sit down on my butt, and focus.
For each unnatural watery appendage, a one made of phoenix fire appears, wrapping around it.
“Owwwwwww...” my horn feels as it would explode any moment, then two hooves press against my temples, and start rubbing.
“I’m not much of a fighter,” says Joy softly, yet understandably over the noises of battle, and presses her barrel against my back, “but you’ve got plenty of those already.”
With her breathing tickling my neck, I focus both on my power stopping Harmony from smashing us all, and the fight itself.
“HAHA HAHA HA HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAA!” Cromach’s axe leaves a blue electric trail in the air as he cleaves Harmony’s fetlock off, and then rams into her as hard as he can with his shoulder. The lost fetlock regrows in the next instant, and a quick reflexive jab sends Cromach tumbling backwards, “Ooof… strong, aren’t you?”
Harmony spins on one hind leg without looking, roundhouse kicking Chilly sneaking up on her from the back in the neck so hard his spine snaps and he flies away. Granted, for a Corrupted or Separated of his power this isn’t lethal, but it will make him rethink his strategy.
Nightshade’s segmented bladed tail wraps around Harmony’s hind leg, twists, and shreds all flesh from it in one pull. Before she flicks the gore away, the leg is back.
Heavy attacks from the side, his staff with a short scythe blade on each end reinforced with corrupted biomass scoring a deep slash into Harmony’s side. The mare ignores it, punching Mana Burn in the neck, and following it with a hook upwards which sends him backflipping away.
This is pointless. They can’t harm her.
There are no Nightshade’s Corrupted around. Nightshade must have reabsorbed them when she realized they would only get in the way.
Cromach’s overhead swing cleaves Harmony’s head open halfway through her neck, and leaves it buried in there while the griffon’s talons pierce the mare’s eye sockets and he rips off the top of her head.
She just swats him away with her foreleg before prying the axe out of her body.
With a bored expression, her tail turns into a long tendril, casually wraps around Nightshade’s neck, and tenses up.
Despite her spine clearly bent into an angle incompatible with life, Nightshade grins.
“Gotcha.”
Claws grow on her forelegs, she grabs the tail and starts pulling towards herself.
I finally see a hint of surprise in Harmony’s eyes as she faces physical strength on the level of hers. Unfortunately, all she does is take a step backwards towards the Corrupted Queen to gain balance on her forelegs, and bucks backwards.
Nightshade’s body from the neck down flies off, and Harmony’s tail tosses her head away.
Should I give Crom the Blades? No, they won’t be enough.
I must be the one to end this, because I am the only one who can. Time for plan B.
“NIGHTSHADE, TAKE CARE OF THE TENTACLES!” I call out, getting up but not letting Harmony’s tendrils move before our Corrupted companions get the message.
She’s quick. Not even two seconds later, every single Corrupted is already away, their biomass forming black appendages taking place of my power in stopping Harmony’s.
That, however, means Crom and Heavy are alone, and Harmony notices she has more space.
Her absurdly quick dodge backwards means Crom’s swing goes wide. She cocks her foreleg backwards, Crom looks up.
Do I see his panic, or is the sudden cold dread only mine?
He knows a blow like this physically destroyed Nightshade’s heavily armored body, and Crom’s corruption has been steadily disappearing for the past days.
The punch connects before I can get halfway to them.
Cromach is tossed away like a rag doll, black flesh splattering all over him as Harmony’s hoof crashes through Heavy jumping at him to soften the blow.
Both land and roll on the floor, unmoving.
Harmony’s movements slow down when Mistake and I swing the Blades at her, but she manages to avoid my rushed attack.
Being a unicorn has an advantage at not holding things, so I don’t stop running, ramming straight into her.
She’s TOUGH, as if I hit a wall of dead, rigid muscles which nonetheless have the power and build of an dragon blacksmith.
Now, though, she’s not blindingly fast anymore as my power takes hold. It takes her a moment to get back up, a moment I use to do the same.
Mistake’s Blade slices her side open, but my telekinesis split this way isn’t strong enough to fight effectively.
She turns her head, growling, to the wound now finally slowing her down. She coughs out blood when she looks back at me, my own Blade buried in her chest.
She grabs my Blade with her fetlock, pulling it out of herself.
“Can’t you just fucking die…?” I whisper, too stunned to use my telekinesis to keep my Blade inside her.
Yes.
Mistake’s Blade, now the only thing levitating around, hacks her head off with one wide flying swing.
Her forelegs grab the separated head, intent to put it back onto the neck.
“No… NO! JUST NO!” suddenly, everything is on fire, gold and pink fire, “I NEVER WANTED ANY OF THIS! LEAVE ME AND MY FAMILY ALONE! STOP RUINING OUR LIFE, YOU INSANE PILE OF TENTACLES! JUST DIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!”
The floor is scorched all around me, pieces of my charred robe floating down in the air. I pull my foreleg back out of Harmony’s neck hole and the hole in her head still held in her forelegs in a shower of ash from the seared wound.
The mare keels over, hitting the floor with a wet thud. I wait and wait for her to get back up.
She twitches, I grit my teeth, and feel tears well up in my eyes.
“...it never ends...” I whisper.
Shimmering blots of light rise from her body, leaving immediately rotting spots wherever they’re gone. Soon, the mare is barely a dried up mummy, which is swallowed into a black lake of goo.
“Nuh uh. The secrets of such body should not go to waste,” I hear Nightshade.
I don’t care. She can get all the knowledge about every mutated molecule Harmony used to make this body as powerful as it was over the years, but she won’t get the divine power.
The same divine power floating and shifting in front of me, changing into a standing serpentine shape with two arms ending in talons. I can feel its nonexistent eyes on me.
“I will destroy you,” its voice echoes through the cavern, “No matter how much time it takes. You will remember with bitter regret the day you thought you were the gods’ equal, mortal.”
Heheh, Heavy, Joy, Cro, Guiding… I called them my family.
Looking around at the crystals covering the walls, all ready to be mined. As much istrium as I could ever need.
In the famous words of a furious orange pumpkin:
“Wrong.”