King Sombra galloped away from the spirits that chased him tirelessly. He ran over the shadowy outlines of the world of Equestria. Buildings, trees, other parts of the land loomed out of the endless gloom that surrounded him. None of it was truly there; if he ran through it, it dissipated into specks of shadow for a few moments before reforming behind him. The walls didn't stop the spirits that chased him either. They ran through the walls as if they weren't there.
Though Sombra didn't seem to truly need sleep, he longed for it. With each step, he could feel his energy draining. Eventually, he would fall, exhausted, and the spirits would fall upon him, seeking their vengeance for his actions in life. But then it wouldn't be over, it would just start again. Some of the spirits seemed sated for a while, and at first, his pursuers would be few. But then, eventually, they would be a horde chasing him over the shadow landscape.
There was no tracking time in this world, Sombra could see neither sun nor moon, nor the ponies of Equestria to track the passage of days. Though he didn't know the actual time, he knew it had been decades. He couldn't prove it but he knew it in his bones; he had done this hundreds of times, and would keep doing it hundreds of times again. Seeing a small house on a nearby hill, he turned towards it. Though the walls would not stop the horde, they did block their vision. Sometimes he could buy himself time in such places.
While Sombra would never admit he had been wrong in life, he did what he thought was perfectly acceptable in a world of dog eat dog. However, if he knew that this would be his fate for leading such a life, he would have lived as a pauper his entire life. No life of luxury and power was worth this eternal torment. He shook his head as he ran up the strangely familiar hill to a house he somehow thought he recognized. He couldn't put his hoof on why but it seemed like a place he should know.
The mystery was resolved when he got there. He looked back to see his crystal empire, this house on a hill on the outskirts of it. Where he had been left as a colt to die to the elements, being deemed a threat to the succession of his brother. It was here that a simple shepherd and his wife had taken in the royal unicorn, and raised him as their own.
Sombra chuckled his dark chuckle, looking back at the horde starting up the hill. He could keep running, but he didn't, he entered through the door, looking about at the insides of the small cottage. A single room, he and his parents had shared as he grew up. They hadn't been rich, and though he longed for more, longed for the silk sheets he saw in the markets, hoped for the sweetmeats and the vibrant clothes, he had been... Content with his parents.
Then that stallion found him, told him of his heritage, and told him of his destiny to rule the empire. He was lured away from his contentment with the promise of power and riches, and he took it. A path of blood-drenched his way to the throne, that was indeed rightly his. That he could justify, even in this place where he was damned. But after that, his paranoia, his lust for power, drove him to madness.
Not actual madness, sadly. He couldn't justify his actions by saying that he was insane, no, he chose to do everything he did. He trusted no one, his advisors were imprisoned and executed for treason. His guards were punished for not being properly respectful. His servants scourged over the tiniest things. The stallion who found him executed for attempting to gain favor for his actions. And, most egregious, his own adopted parents executed under suspicion of treason. He hadn't even had proof, just suspicion, and he destroyed probably the only two ponies that loved him. He looked out at the horde climbing the hill after him. For just a moment, a flicker of doubt entered his mind.
Sombra shook his head, trying to dismiss the doubt from his own mind. But it grew, it tried to devour him as he stood there, watching the horde. It wasn't some mindless mass of ponies, it was individuals. Every pony in that horde was a pony that he had killed, or at least wronged. There had been so many he couldn't be sure that he had them all executed, but there was enough that he wouldn't be surprised if that was so. He had, at least in the minds of others, wronged so many, that they could have surrounded this large hill a hundred thick.
He knew a few would be among the number, his birth father who had him abandoned, seeking vengeance. The stallion who would have been his top advisor, who found him when he was just a shepherd's son. A maid that he had executed for simply dropping a cup. And so many others that he had put to death or extreme punishment for trivial things. But he had had to do so to establish his power, he had to make sure no one would move against him like the old king. His own birth father had been overthrown because he had not been hard-hooved enough to ensure no one would dare move against him!
But as the doubt grew in his mind, it whispered one truth to him. His parents, the shepherd and shepherdess had never been in the horde. They had never pursued him to take vengeance on him. He had executed them for a suspicion that was likely false, and they did not seek him in this hellish place. They let him be, they did not hold against him hatred like all these ponies did. They, wherever they were, in whatever peaceful afterlife they had found, no doubt loved him still, as they told him on the day of their execution.
Something inside him broke, shaking his head as he tore himself away from the window. He was so tired, he couldn't keep running. No matter what the horde did when they caught him, he couldn't run any further. He walked over to what had once been his bed, putting a hoof through it and sighing, slumping down next to it with a dejected sigh. He could hear them now, they were close enough for their hooves to be heard on the ground outside. He looked hopelessly up at the ceiling, smiling faintly. He had forgotten, but it was strung with ropes of wool in different patterns. They hadn't had riches, but they had spent their hours happily together, making the many designs and pictures that the ropes formed for their ceiling. He could hear them now at the door, closing his eyes and whispering. "Father, what must I do to earn even a single night's rest?"