//------------------------------// // Unholy spirits and desert brews // Story: Twilight's book of the most dangerous creatures in Equestria // by The Psychopath //------------------------------// Today was particularly scary thanks to a loud and powerful thunderstorm outsiden and its every crackle sounded like the roar of the Pourpros. Twilight slammed the door open while wearing a black cloak, giving her the apperance of the reaper. Her book floated in the air as did her trademark orb. "Tonight is the time of the fallen souls." Twilight muttered. "The time where those who were too greedy or bad come back to seek revenge on the living." "Twilight?" "Today, I speak of spirits!" she yelled. Thunder emphasized her fearsome demonstration. "Okay then. Which one first?" Cheerilee inquired. "How about the Dorammo?" The orb morphed into what appeared to be an armor from the far-east. Beautifully decorated and standing with pride, but, there was nopony inside. It did not move, yet it could stand upright perfetly with no supports. It was not tarnished either despite the gold and red linings shining brightly despite the lack of light. It had the shape of a pony, but seemed to morph into the shape of a griffin, then a centaur, and so on and so forth. "The Dorammo is a spirit of vengeance and comes when a pony wishes for revenge. While they aren't very quick, they are very dangerous and have been known to destroy entire buildings just to get to the one that summoned them involuntarily. Why am I saying that they attack the one who seeks vengeance when they are, themselves, spirits of vengeance? Because they don't like it, and were cursed because they did something horrible during their lives to end up like that, so they prefer killing the one that has a powerful need for vengeance instead of having the pony become just like them." The children and Cheerilee didn't seem to budge. Apparently, they didn't find this one to be too scary, and Twilight frowned in response. "Hmm. How about the Stifus?" The orb twisted and reshaped itself again into a very tall creature with flabby, grey skin. Its arms nearly reached the floor and ended in four very long digits. Its face displayed the wrinkles and fatigue characteristic of very old ponies, and its three eyes did not stray from this appearance. It was also slightly hunched over as if its back had just 'blown out', as some would say. As the children leaned forward to get a closer look, its mouth opened to such a size that it managed to reach the beginning of its legs. "The Stifus. They shouldn't be confused with trolls. These spirits, unlike the others, are still exist in the physical realm. What makes them truly terrifying is their size. They can be found in areas that are generally perceived as 'dark', such as caverns and thick forests. They usually just wander around, doing nothing useful, until they spot something to eat. When that happens, run as fast as you can, because the second you hear a bellowing moan, it means one has found you and is now chasing after you.. Run towards light, and make sure that it isn't a small patch in the forest, because they can and will wait forever if necessary for you to leave your perch. What is intriguing about them, is that, once they find a prey, they walk through everything like a ghost despite being solid like us. It will keep chasing you and chasing you, and, once they catch up, they open their insanely huge maw and devour you whole." "Twilight, that seems a bit violent for the children," Cheerilee disapproved. "Well, they ARE scary beings," Twilight scoffed. "They're supposed to be like that. Well, the next one is simply called 'traveler'." The orb morphed into something very short but clothed in a massive amount of clothes and cloaks of various colors. Some were degraded, others were new. One thing in peculiar was where the face was and the fact that it was bipedal. Two glowing white eyes were on the right side of its face and placed vertically upon it whilst the other side was blank. The face itself was hidden in a black veil of shadows. The hands of this creature, which barely left the clothing, were small, lumpy, and black, and held a staff made of bones in the right hand. "The traveler. There is only one in the whole world. It is named such as it goes around everywhere without paying attention to any species present in that location. It travels during the night, and rests at the spot it last was when the sun starts to rise. The traveler can be linked to the deaths of several ponies, griffins, and other creatures, because the places that it rests at see a brutal carnage occur suddenly, out of the blue. When it is attacked, it ignores everything but what attacked it. However, there are those that it attempts to warn. Seeing as it doesn't talk, it hasn't had much progress using just body language. The few who have managed to annoy it found themselves ripped of all their bones in front of many spectators. It then eats them or uses them as ornaments for its staff and outfit. Those who see it eat the bones say that it integrates them into its own ethereal body. While it is debatable if this spirit is an actively dangerous one, the few times that it stayed in a town or city for more than a week, said location found that it had become a ghost town soon after." Twilight readjusted her cloak a bit. "Now, for the final lost spirit, I'll talk about the Ghajit." The orb morphed into a tripedal lizard-like creature with a face so twisted it looked like there was a singularity in the middle. It had two very long arms that were quadruple segmented and ended in bladed fingers. "The Ghajit is considered a demon by many ancient civilizations and has been known to bring out your innermost darkness. They creep on you during your sleep or while you aren't looking, and pierce you with their bladed fingers, slicing up all the good within you and allowing the evil to come out unhindered. They can even tear one into two, leaving the good in one body while the evil gets its own. They can only be scared away by using a white filly with a singing voice." "What? Why a white filly? And why a singing voice?" "I don't know. There are several mysteries surrounding demons, and this one has a great mystery surrounding it. No pony knows why they strike at random, nor how they have come to be, but I think it is another spirit created from the amalgamations of twisted desires and hatred." She coughed "It would kind of explain its face, honestly." She grabbed her book and looked at its contents again. "Now then...how about I tell you about the creatures dwelling in the desert?" "Yes please! Those monsters are scary," one of the foals whined. Twilight let out a single laugh. "Let's see. How about the Pama'Di'eye?" "The what?" CHeerliee repeated. The orb morphed itself into a pile pf sand that spread all across the floor. After a brief wait, several tentacles that looked like they were armored by scaley armadillos erupted from the eroded stone. They were the same color as the sand and began to swing around the air, searching for something to grab. When they didn't, a gigantic beast armored just like its tails erupted from the ground, revealing tentacles to be part of its back. It was a quadruped, and had no eyes, and had three rows of very sharp teeth in its mouth. "A desert hunter, these beasts stay in the sand until they detect movement on the surface. When they do, their tentacles erupt from the ground to ensnare its prey and drop them into its mouth. When the tentacles can't grab anything, and this is rare, they come out of the ground to sniff around. They can literally smell fresh blood, which is pretty nasty if you ask me. If the prey is too fast on the surface, it dives down and takes off like a cannon ball, allowing it to easily catch somepony and devour them. Some say that they can cause small, local sandstorms. They sometimes walk out in the open if they need some more heat, but usually hide in the same spot of sand for the majority of the day. If you can get one, and make a suit out of their scales, you'll be able to walk in any desert under any intensity of heat, as the scales block the majority of heat, and leaves a minimum to keep you from freezing. Next, we have the Buzzard." The orb turned into a simple vulture. This confused everypony. "Hold on. Let me throw this nonexistent piece of meat." Twilight gestured her hoof, and a piece of meat magically appeared close to the vulture. As it sniffed the meat, it suddenly grew to enormous sizes. It was now more a sickly greenish color, and, for some reason, it had a surprisingly, zombie-like appearance. Holes and rotting bits of flesh everywhere, two new arms that ended in gray claws dripping a brownish-green liquid. Its yellow beak now became jagged at certain points, while another part had rotted off. The kids and Cheerilee all nearly vomited at the sight. The wings, which were bare-bone at some areas, were now on the back. "This disgusting creature is a creature of decay. They contribute to nature more than any vulture. Unfortunately, they are extremely violent and vicious, as well as being very big. Some say that they like to fight the Ejge associated to poison, thinking that the rotting juices they secrete are corrosive enough to kill them. Unfortunately, every encounter ends in disaster for the buzzard. The Ejge may be fragile, but they are still the true rivals of the real dragons. They have a nasty habit of going to the towns in deserts and spreading virulent diseases and death at their leisure. They then feast on the corpses they created by taking this form. When you are cut, you die, although some say that you actually become zombie. The goop they secrete is so corrosive that it can easily melt through a magical shield made by a professional group of unicorns. In order to scare one, you must use fresh, fruity odors and perfectly ripe and fresh foods. It hates those." The orb disappeared, and Twilight bowed before disappearing after another flash of lightning, making everypony wonder where she had gone. "W-well. That was interesting. Now then, back to--" A ticking sound entered Cheerliee's ears, and they immediately perked up. "What is-AHHHH!" "AHHHHHH!" There was a vulture tapping on the window outside, and it didn't seem too "fresh". It squawked loudly once, before flying back towards the forest, leaving everypony to wonder why there was a vulture at Ponyville.