-Soar Way, Catacombs Aqueduct, Flamberge-
“Well… that was anticlimactic!” I rubbed at my head, feeling vaguely upset that the fight with the undead statue pony wasn’t as epic as it should have been, our skeletal earth pony friend had been far more dangerous than that. “I was expecting something a little bit harder, but I can understand your frustration with being unable to deal with this problem our skeleton friend! So… what are you going to do now?! I mean that Valkyrie did state that she couldn’t help you… she also said you had a living soul despite being undead, which is a bit strange don’t you think?!”
Our bony pony friend just froze up, she was helping us prepare the ‘Mists of Travel On’ for our journey. Not that there was much to prepare, the magical Viking gondola was already loaded with all our stuff. We were just making sure that the room was thoroughly destroyed, burning any chemical and or books that might have survived our entrance.
“She can come with us brother, there is nothing more for her here!” Which could take years and Fortitude didn’t like the idea of leaving her alone like that, I unfortunately didn’t like that idea either. “Unless she is wishing to guard the catacombs until the Valkyrie can get back to her, who knows how long that will take. She is obviously being very busy.”
-Port Turtle Toga, Gallant Bluster’s Tavern, Eir –
I am glad to be taking care of cruel soul preventing warriors from getting their eternal rest. I am also happy to be freeing those souls and saving the still living the trouble of fighting that cruel soul.
Will be remembering dragon, yak and skeleton pony’s faces, for they are being great heroes!
Unfortunately now there is another problem in Eir’s life. Seeing living soul in skeleton… that is going to be as tough as fixing broken unicorn horn and…
“Eir honey, if you can hear me, I think you’re pet rock is going on the floor downstairs!” I am rushing downstairs noisily to alert my husband that I am back, to see puddle forming underneath the boulder. “It’s your pet, so you have to clean it up before you can get back to me! I’ll be waiting, don’t leave me cold all night honey.”
“No… bad boulder!” I am rushing to find towels and a mop. “No dooming Eir and great husband’s home with increasingly destructive abilities as Eir’s pet!”
I am still needing to potty train large rock of increasing danger, it is not going very well in the slightest at all.
I make priority… after time with great husband tonight!
-Soar Way, Catacombs Aqueduct, Flamberge-
“I actually agree with that!” This skeleton was practically a hero of our people given how long she’s been holding the Draugr off, to let her fall into madness alone would be bad. That and I will begrudgingly admit that we are friends.
The skeleton did point out a nice gem for me to eat, which seems to have been the lynchpin in why she couldn’t destroy the statue and that statue pony had reinforced the door with that same white gold stuff he had been made of… wait a minute…
“That is a surprise brother.” Of course it was Fortitude, I didn’t think I’d ever say those words. “You are not very keen on her being around us.”
“Speaking of surprises, didn’t Sekhet mention something about her nemes being made of gold?!” The skeleton glared at me. “Sorry, I’m naturally this loud all the time!”
The skeleton rolled her eyes derisively, there was something I was missing here about that. There was just something I couldn’t quite put my claws on as being different about her, it wasn’t her silver mane or her skeletal visage.
“Yes, my brother has little volume control, please be excusing him.” Fortitude noticed that I was staring at him. “Oh right, her nemes is being made of electrum, which is magically charged gold! It is explaining why our friend is having trouble with evil pony dragged to Hel by Valkyrie… maybe without gem the Valkyrie could finally see his evil undead soul and take him away?”
“About the same as what I was thinking Fortitude!” I turned to our skeletal friend as did Fortitude. “So… up for a little adventure? We could use another companion!”
The skeleton pony seemed to mull it over judging by the way a bony hoof went up to her chin and her orbs looked to the ceiling, I finally noticed the one small difference about her.
Her eyes were no longer glowing red in color, they were now green. Not the same sickly glowing green that the Draugr had going for them, it was more of a bright and friendly looking emerald color. They hadn’t been red since that unicorn pony’s soul down was taken down by the Valkyrie.
“Halt vile villains!” All three of us turned to the bulky armored form that charged into the room. “I’ve come to end your reign of terror for I am Dispel Grace!”
“What makes you think we’re villains?” I questioned the pony whose entire body was covered in the worst looking angular armor I’ve ever seen, it looked like it was made of entirely of gold and not the electrum kind.
The only defining thing about the armor, other than being gaudy and god awful looking, is that it had a decent looking blue cape and an insignia on the chest plate. The insignia looked like a hexagon with round red colored crystals halfway between each of the six points and at the center.
“It’s fairly obvious… you are conspiring with one of the undead monsters that are plaguing this land! Well not so much plaguing as there haven’t been that many reports of them… but it is still my holy mission to destroy their kind!” He pulled a large object from his back and stumbled a bit, it was a really big sword even for a stallion as large as he was and he eventually got a good grip on it with both his hooves to point it at our skeleton friend. “That I have to slay a dragon and slaughter a yak that are helping build an undead army, it would only add to my heroic deeds!”
“She is not a monster, she is a friend.” Taking offense to this guy that just arrived, Fortitude put himself in front of our skeleton friend and glared at the armored pony. “Also how do you propose to destroy her?”
“I will rend her soul to nonexistence with my holy powers of course, for something so vile and not living should not deserve an afterlife!” The pony held the sword pointing towards the ceiling. “I’ll eventually work my way up to slaying all the gods in existence for GODLESS!”
“But doesn’t holy power sometimes come from gods?” Mostly gods of light or justice for instance, also did he just say GODLESS. That same organization full of nutcases that caused Jade to go away? I remember the revenge she got against me that one time, never will I ever make her go petty kitty on me ever again.
If I ever got another chance to have an accident around Jade, I’d plead on my knees and apologize for any transgressions I may have made against her as Jade was scary when given the time to plot things out. Well he’s definitely an enemy of ours and the entire no afterlife thing for our friend made of bones would be a certain cruelty of the greatest sorts, any god who gives this guy holy powers would have to be completely raving mad.
That skeleton has been a stalwart guardian of these catacombs, she stopped all those Draugr from getting out and has been doing that for long before I was ever hatched. I came years before my brothers and my slow aging has helped me meet them, I hoped to be a grandpa to their possible families in the future.
“I am not caring if I have to slay my own god eventually!” Oh great, we got a chaotic evil paladin guy here. “I will be holier than them after all, and then all the holy powers will be mine! Except… you know… I’m going to avoid becoming a god myself, because then I’d have to slay myself in the name of the great organization GODLESS!”
“I am thinking we are finally meeting someone dumber than us brother.” Fortitude whispered to me, I nodded in response. “Excuse me, but wouldn’t your god stop supporting you for speaking up against them?”
“No… Perun is mighty, loves nobles like me, likes violent tributes and welcomes good fights. If I can give him a fight to end all fights, given that he is a war god, he will welcome my eventual betrayal for what it is. Apparently his enemy Veles is messing with him by protecting cows everywhere from danger for some odd reason… I always thought that that vexing fiend Veles was in the business of kidnapping them.” He pointed the large sword towards the skeleton. “No matter, today I shall end your dark powers and reign of tyranny in this region foul monster.”
“She is not a monster and she is not tyrannical in any way!” Fortitude said in a calm, but extremely tight, voice.
“Oh… can you tell me a time whenever you’ve met a friendly skeleton with a demonic visage such as that?!” His sword start glowing yellow ominously as he pulled it back while his helmet pointed towards our skeletal friend. “Let the light of my blade strike true, may her cursed soul never recover to walk this or any other world again when my holy light slays her dark heart!”
The skeleton tightened her grip on the axe she had draped over her spine, Fortitude tightened his jaw and I looked down at my flaming sword and to Dispel's weapon. Yeah, there are things to be said about overcompensating for something, I’m glad I wasn’t the one that was currently doing so.
He swung it forward and unleashed a crescent wave of light and with Fortitude already in front of her, I place myself in front of him and swung my sword downwards.
The flames from my sword slice the slow moving crescent wave of energy in half, the impact still sent me stumbling forcefully into Fortitude and the flames on my sword puttered out seconds afterwards. That has… never actually happened before, now that I think of it. The split blast of energy cut furrows into the floor where they struck and that probably wouldn’t have been pleasant to be hit by.
Whatever that light did to my sword had knocked it out or stopped its power temporarily, this probably meant I wouldn’t be able to block another beam of energy like that again. Still I held my position in front of Fortitude and our new friend, she hasn’t planted an axe in my back and proved herself a strong warrior in battle and worthy of my friendship.
The skeleton ran around us and was raising her axe for a fight, but Fortitude wrapped his left leg around her waist and lifted her off the ground. I was picked up by his right leg and I looked up at him as I sheathed my sword.
“Brother what are you…” I tried to ask before he bellowed out.
“I am Fortitude the fantastically fragrant, you shall not harm my friends!” He was being rather protective of us in this moment. “We are not wanting to fight you, we were just leaving…. also I do not wish him to destroy your sword in an effort to protect us brother.”
The skeleton wanted to get from Fortitude’s grasp to attack the guy before us, but she stopped to look at him questioningly and lowered her axe. Fortitude started backing away towards the waterway where the Viking gondola sat.
“Like I’ll let you leave while that unholy pony is in your grasp!” Smacking his large sword against the ground, Dispel Grace’s large great sword started to light up once again only it was slow to do so. The sword probably took a lot of magic from its user and he seemed quite tired after having used it only once. “My sword will cleave your souls from this world.”
He swung his sword again in a high arc, this sent another crescent of light flying towards us and Fortitude pushed off and backwards with his hind legs. The crescent beam narrowly missed us as we fell into the gondola, it took out a huge chunk of the wall behind us though and sent a large amount of debris raining into the water.
“Cut the rope, we have no need to fight him.” Fortitude ordered and given that she was the closest one to it, the skeleton’s axe swiftly went through it and that set the ‘Mists of Travel On’ adrift. “I am sorry, but we will be leaving now!”
“You cannot escape the holy powers of a pony who seeks to become the holiest above all else!” The armored earth pony started dragging his sword in our direction, scraping against the stone loudly as he made his approach towards the stairs. “There is no dark place or corner you can run into to hide from my mighty mission to end that darkness you are clinging to, I will snuff out all of the darkness that those of your ilk represent!”
His sword started to charge up again, but even more slowly than before.
“How do you make this boat do its thing?” My brother let me go and I took a seat.
“I am not knowing, but I am hoping it does its thing on its own.” Fortitude still had his eyes on the pony wielding that massive sword, I had my eyes on the skeleton pony eyeing the oar with curiosity as she sat her axe down in the boat. “We are not being in any condition to fight that pony and I do not want our new companion to be felled by him if it means her soul does not get a justly deserved rest.”
The skeleton looked at us fondly, before turning a glare to the guy raising that oversized sword above his head for a downward swing. We all felt the boat hit the wall and looked at the small opening that filtered water out of the catacombs, we weren’t going to squeeze through that.
“Know that you will be the first on my road to greatness and I will tell stories of how I defeated the three of you villainous curs, be happy for you are about to be felled by the might of Dispel Grace!” He started to bring his sword down.
The skeleton pony finally grabbed the oar and swung it into the water and started to wag it back and forth rapidly, this kicked up a lot of water and caused a mist to build up.
The beam of vertical light surged towards us threatening to slice us all apart, until a thickening mist blinded our sights
We heard a scream of rage that became increasingly faint and distant.
When the mists died down, we found ourselves in a lake.
A pegasus flew down looking around in confusion.
“Excuse me, but why do you have two lit torches tied to your horns like that?” Looking away from the boat, I saw that we were in… Ponyville?