-Many days later, Jungle, Kuril-
Equestria had forests, swamps and jungles, a madhouse if there ever was one. I loved living in the pony lands though.
This given area was like the Tenochtitlan Basin, which was actually nearby now that I thought of it. I recognized that place because Daring Do built a reclusive home near the place.
My expedition team consisted of Pique, Niche and Sugar. I’m sure Sekhet could handle Airship Mauled while I was gone, the goddess couldn’t mess up administration that much in the few days we’ll be gone.
Still worried about that though, since Sekhet had a lot of paperwork to catch up on after being gone for so long.
We weren’t going to get lost out here at all as I put a location marker on the maps own location, so the yellow dot was the map itself and we were moving ever closer to where Blade Bright was.
She had been stuck up there for so long, it made me wonder what had happened to her. What was happening to me currently wasn’t as interesting as finding out what happened after Nightmare Moon was let loose and then Luna was purified.
“Oh look, a Timber King.” I spoke lazily as the overgrown mass of moss, wood and leaves with glowing green eyes growled at us. It has a threat level that was barely two out of ten, it could be stopped with a large enough rock to the throat or loud noises. “How scary and frightening.”
I couldn’t keep the boredom out of my tone, the Timber King looked at me in confusion over the sarcasm.
While I could have ordered Sugar to attack it, Pique had preempted my request and pushed a nearby large tree over.
Said tree toppled directly onto the Timber King and it was now stuck under the bulk of it scrabbling at the dirt.
“What was today again? I know it’s not Tuesday or Monday…” No, only something as weak as the Timber King stated that this was a Thursday. The day after hump day was always boring.
Niche growled out an answer at me as she stalked forward past me. Pique was male, I was surprised to learn that Niche was female. Storm Creatures were really quite hard to tell apart at times, their genders were even harder to tell and Niche was vaguely more feminine than Pique was.
“Thank you Niche for confirming that today is Thursday.” I knew it, you ‘can’ always judge what day it is by the monsters you get attacked by while out in the wilder parts of the world. I turned to my large horned rabbit of imminent death for the unwary, not an inch of her had grown bigger than any other part of her. “Sugar leave the poor thing alone, the King’s suffering enough now that it or he has a girlfriend crushing on him.”
Sugar’s current size made it a bit harder to fool predators into attacking her, given how much dirt she tends to displace with every single movement. She at least gets enough nutrition from my food and a happily fed Mirage Rabbit was highly a protective one.
Sugar was also getting better at illusions and was hopefully a fully grown Al-mi’raj now, one with the potential to do that limited super growth thing to even bigger sizes than what I had seen previously. She could definitely grow beyond the size of a terra tortoise.
Sugar just chittered at me sadly that she didn’t get to at least gnaw on the Timber King.
We were getting ever closer to Blade Bright, or at least that’s what the map was telling me. Niche was busy clearing a path in the direction we were headed and eventually she made a loud grunting sound of awe.
I continued a few steps forward, before I decided to look up from my map. Pique stepped up next to Niche and looked on in awe as well.
“Huh, now that’s… rather unusual.” Hearing an agreeing grunt to my statement, I turned to Pique. “Well my enchanted map says she should here, so this must be a shrine of the stars or something given the décor.”
The symbol on the nearby maze like ruins wall had a four pointed star, at each point was a being.
The right pointed had what I believe to be a longma, I had done some research on them after seeing everyone at The Volcano on the map. Though why this one counted as east, I couldn’t even begin to describe given ‘The Volcano’ was within the realm of the dragon lands.
The left point was a Pegasus, which if it was representing the cardinal point of west, then that would be the general direction you’d find Cloudsdale from Ponyville as it floated lazy circles in the sky. It could represent something else though given the longma’s position.
The bottom point was that of a hippogriff, which originate from Mount Aris in the south. I wondered if Fizzle would ever be forgiven for that destructive raid on their home.
To the north was the one that I was after and what I was here for. The very depiction of a thestral.
Each depiction had something different to it. The Longma was shown to be a powerful leader. The Hippogriff was a bright, if cowardly, scholar. The Pegasus was a proud warrior. As for The Thestral...
Well it took me a moment to figure it out what that represented, the depiction looked sorrowful.
If the proud pegasus was a warrior and the cowardly looking hippogriff was a gifted scholar, then they seemed to all be playing off of one another. So if the longma was a great and mighty leader of many, then the thestral before it on a clockwise rotation would represent either a reluctant assassin or… a destitute lonely pauper or maybe even a forlorn hero. There were numerous interpretations for it.
I felt my heart clench in my chest and tears sprang to my eyes. Blade, you wouldn’t be alone for much longer.
As we entered the ruins I turned to Sugar.
“Sugar, sniff around!” Sugar chittered and started to snuffle at the ground. It didn’t take her long to pick up a scent of some kind, we followed her slowly as she set the pace for us.
We were coming at this place from the east, so I shouldn’t be surprised when we eventually encountered a longma among the ruins who dropped before us. His wings blazed outwards in a protective manner.
Sugar growled and pawed the ground, ready to pounce at a moment’s notice and she would not be losing this fight.
“Sugar, no… something is not quite right with him.” He didn’t look like a longma from The Volcano. In fact, if I didn’t know any better, he looked like he was from… Neighpon? From the distant east, or west, depending on how far you were willing to go in either direction.
Sugar stopped growling and backed down, but didn’t drop her defensive posture. I looked into the longma’s eyes and saw something strange.
He seemed, for lack of a better word, feral. He instinctively stood at ease as soon as Sugar stopped being threatening, but he was ready to fight if pressed.
The leader, knows when to fight and wisely knew when to not to do so at all.
“Please… if you can understand me, lead me to the others.” Waiting for my response, the longma with the slicked back mane tilted his head curiously as we looked into each other’s eyes.
His wild eyes softened a bit, he tentatively trusted his back to us and started walking away. Seeing that we were not following, he looked back at us and grunted while making a gesture for us to follow him with his head.
His flaming wings soon dissipated and I looked to Pique, Niche and Sugar. I started moving forward and they fell into step behind me.
The hallways of the ruins were a bit confusing and yet the longma seemed to know where he was going by instinct, we eventually got to a room where we found a hippogriff crafting bedding and blankets out of makeshift materials of woven grass, leaves, clumping mud for binding and sticks.
Not the cleanest method of staying warm, but it worked. The nights around here tended to get quite chilly when we had to set up camp.
The scholar, always knows how to make what is needed.
Upon hearing us coming, the yellow female hippogriff cowered. At least she did until she noted that the longma was leading us. She calmed down rather fast, the longma had her full trust at least.
It had been several days since Blade reappeared on the map. So if she were rendered feral like these two… then she wouldn’t recognize me as soon as we saw one another.
A male pegasus and the thestral we were here for soon came in for a landing through a hole in the roof of the ruins on this sunny day.
The thestral I recognized immediately despite her looking older. Her golden eyes and white mane couldn’t be mistaken.
Blade looked relatively healthy and had some makeshift baskets loaded heavily with fruits, nuts, freshly dug up vegetables and berries. The pegasus seemed to have been battered pretty badly recently in some kind of fight.
The warrior was likely ordered to protect the last of the lot… Blade, who I now took to be the gatherer.
The warrior, would always protect those who were important to survival.
The gatherer, who is good at finding food and materials for the scholar to work with.
These four were representing what was needed for a stable kingdom to thrive. The Heart, Mind, Body and Soul of it all.
I looked to the longma and he looked to me, I was asking to help with my eyes and he nodded in understanding even if he had lost the capacity for speech at this moment in time.
“Pique, Niche, stay back and set up our camping supplies.” I pulled out the medical kit and made my way towards the wary pegasus, he seemed defensive until the longma barked at him in an angry manner and then he relented and let me tend to him. “Sugar, don’t harm any of them and protect them like you would me.”
It wouldn’t take long for everyone to notice that I was shooting the thestral glances almost constantly as she shared the fruit she had gathered with the others. The thestral also seemed curious with me as well, but she didn’t recognize me at all as she sucked the juices from a fruit.
That would tear my heart in two, but I had expected this after seeing the state the longma and hippogriff were in.
I sighed, but I was still going to bring Blade home no matter what or how long it took. First, I had to do something that might make them all like me. None of them looked like they’ve had a decently cooked meal in these past few days.
I moved over to the longma and looked him in the eyes, silently asking for some of their food. His gaze was questioning, curious and reluctant to part with the feast their gatherer provided. Eventually he nodded to me. The pegasus was slightly upset with this, but was more curious than angry.
“Pique, fill the pot with water please. Niche, build a fire with whatever wood we have left. We’re having vegetable soup tonight!” The appreciative sounds from, Pique, Niche and Sugar made the four feral being curious as to what I had just offered. “Sugar, go have fun and please gather some wood on your way back.”
Sugar was off and out of the ruins before the longma or the pegasus could even react.
It was time to work my magic, food that was both excellent and filling should bring these four back into the fold. It would be my way of convincing them all to follow me home.
I may have come for Blade personally, but I would be taking all four of them with me when I leave. I pulled out a knife and Blade’s interest in me shot up a couple of notches. Her special talent was still present at the very least, given her gaze was squarely on the cutting knife I held.
I sat down with my legs crossed, with my cutting board in my lap and a container off to the side to scrape the food into while Pique busy filling the pot for the fire. I took up a few vegetables and began to chop them, Blade sat down in front of me and watched as I worked.
She might not remember who I was, but she at least looked like she remembered something. I was using one of the knives I used to teach her how to chop things with.
-The next day, Blade-
Something… something wasn’t right.
Food maker was familiar. So very familiar that my head hurts to look at her and I didn’t have a voice with which to tell her how familiar she was.
All that came from my mouth were painful screeches.
I needed to follow food maker, I didn’t want her out of my sight. The other three important ones that were with me couldn’t talk either, it was one of the things we were all missing.
We had understood food maker’s words at least and started to follow her and the two strange beings, with an equally familiar dangerous beast that heeded the food maker’s words.
She, the food maker, was leading us somewhere and excitement was bursting from within my chest whenever I looked at her. The rapid thuds were telling me something that seemed odd, why would I want her presence more than anything when she was not another of my kind?
I have forgotten something very important, but food maker’s presence is making everything better somehow.
Deciding to take a chance, I moved closer to the food maker and put my right hoof against her left paw and curled it around the paw.
That felt… good.
Something within me is telling me that I should do more of this.
-Kuril-
I jolted when I felt something grab my left paw on our way out of the jungle, and then I felt a weight press into my side.
I looked down at Blade and she looked up to me with a smile. Still feral, but there was some recognition in there. Blade was still in there somewhere even though she came back to me missing large pieces of herself, but I could tell she was still Blade Bright.
I let go of her hoof to resettle my heavy backpack loaded with gear, then held out my paw. She eagerly grappled onto it with her hoof like she was in a desert while dying of thirst.
Maybe she could learn to assist me in the kitchen again by the time we got back to Airship Mauled.
-Ryu-
The food maker knew the gatherer.
At least the gatherer had been found by someone that knew her.
It was just her the food maker came for, but she wanted to help us all.
As we traveled, I dreamed of being close to a being with eight legs and a large butt.
There was a place I belonged and it's location was lost by me.
What was all that was taken from us?