The mood among the ponies couldn't be more negative after their discovery of Professor Smart Spirit's death. Apple Bloom was inconsolable for many long minutes before she swore to at least save Smart Spirit's ghost from whoever was controlling them. And she also swore to make Pyrite and his ally pay.
Yes, they will pay. She will make sure of it. She won't rest before those two were sent to Tartarus.
Finding a note wrapped around the key that was with Smart Spirit's body telling to them that it opened the entrance to the Haunter Towers, the ponies took the stallion's body before Twilight teleported all of them back at the caravan. Twilight then placed the body inside a chest, intending to leave it here until they could properly bury it. Applejack then took the wheel of the caravan, and they started to move toward the Haunted Towers.
Nopony spoke a word during the ride until Apple Bloom said, "Girls..."
"Yes, Apple Bloom?" Rarity answered.
"Ah'm scared..."
"We are all scared. With this place full of ghosts..."
Apple Bloom shook her head. "Ah'm not scared because of that there valley. Ah'm scared for y'all." She looked at all the ponies, one after another. "What if... What if...?"
"I see what you mean," Twilight said. "And... as much as I would like to say that everything will be alright, I know that this would be wrong. If this being helping Pyrite is really as powerful as we think, then we are all in danger, no matter where. All we can do is remain close to our Poltergusts and hope to not get captured."
"But..." Fluttershy began. "But... What if he decides to target somepony back home?"
"No way. The Gem Family surrounded Ponyville with an anti evil ghost circle thingy," Rainbow Dash said.
"But this is not any ghost. This may not even be a ghost. This is a being possessing enough power to block the magic of an alicorn." She gulped. "As long as he's out there, nopony is safe."
Rarity became very pale despite her fur being already white. "So, you mean... Sweetie Belle..."
Twilight nodded. "This is why we must stop this being as quickly as possible before he decides to kill somepony else."
"Hey! Girls! We're approaching the towers!" Applejack shouted.
Hearing her, everypony went to the windows to look at the two towers in question.
Surrounded by dead trees, the towers really imposed, especially with that giant oak tree that grew between the two of them. They didn't seem as decrepit as the Gloomy Manor, so they were probably more recent, but this just meant that there would be fewer holes, no fewer ghosts. A huge water tower could be seen on top of the right tower, while the last floor of the left tower had its wall and roof made of glass, probably a greenhouse.
"Wowee! Seems like ya'll have t'climb a lot, Bloom," Applejack said.
"No problem," the filly replied.
"Ya still want to go alone? What with this killer that's lurking around?" the big sister asked.
"From what ya told me, Ah don't think this guy'll attack me now. He seems to want to see me struggle first. Why else Pyrite'd want to wait to attack me?" Apple Bloom looked at the other mares. "But again, Ah'm really scared he'll attack y'all while mah back's turned."
"And again, there is nothing you can do against this," said Twilight. "If he doesn't intend to attack you, probably because he seems to have an interest in you, then you must continue no matter what until you find him. And if he's a ghost, then capture him. We will try to help as much as we can on the way."
"But if this guy is that powerful, then how will Apple Bloom be able to fight him?" wondered Rainbow Dash.
"Ah was able to defeat Little Ghost despite her power, so Ah should be able to defeat him as long as Ah watch out for him," the filly said. "If he's a ghost, then he'll be as vulnerable to the Poltergust as any other ghosts. Ah just need to reach him."
"But again, he may not be a ghost," Twilight said.
"Well... That's why ya're here, right?"
"But he could stop us from intervening like he did with that spider,"
Apple Bloom frowned. "At least, we'll try. We must stop him." She sighed. "Too bad ya don’t have the Elements anymore."
"Couldn't we reuse that Rainbow Power we used against Tirek?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"I don't know if we can reuse it," Twilight said. "We will get to it once we find this being."
"Unless he finds us before," Fluttershy said.
"He already knows where we are. I think he's watching us, thinking his next move," Pinkie Pie said, her mane not as poofy as before.
Everypony gulped.
"W-well... Ah'm going to the towers. Ah'll have a lot of works. Ah don't know where Ah have to go in there, but if Ah remember correctly what the prof said about those towers, they work with some water generator. So if Ah want to explore them, Ah'll have to activate it first."
"A water generator?" Twilight asked. "That's rare. This explains the water tower at the top. If you need my help to start it, just ask, and I will be here. Also, while watching you, I will try to draw a map and to place in it any secret passage you find so I can guide you, so think to watch everywhere."
The filly nodded, then opened the door to exit the caravan.
The key obtained in Gloomy Manor opened the portal to the courtyard. Which had various plots of dirt with plants, alive or dead, planted in them. In front of her was another big portal with a pinwheel leading to the oak tree. However, it was at the other side of a pit that was meant to be filled with water to rise a wooden bridge. But right now, the pit was empty, so she had to activate the water generator before she could hope to reach the portal. At the left and right were doors to the towers, the right one being metallic.
This seemed important. So Apple Bloom opened the metallic door, and jackpot, she entered the room with the generator. A red ghost was here, but upon spotting her, it flew to the floor above.
"Darn. He probably went to warn the other ghosts that Ah'm here."
«Let's forget about him and activate the generator. You should look around and see if there's something stopping it from working.»
Apple Bloom did so and looked around the room to search for anything that could activate the generator, only to find nothing.
"There's nothing."
«Mmh... If the generator isn't broken, then the water must be clogged. You will have to go look at the water tower.»
"Okay. It shouldn't be a problem. Wait..." Apple Bloom approached the door leading to the rest of the tower, at the left of the entrance, and discovered that it was locked, and that it only could be opened by pressing a button beside it. "Darn it. That's what Ah thought."
«No choice then, you will have to go in the other tower. Don't worry, I saw that there was a bridge linking the two towers at the second floor, and another made of the branches of the oak tree at the fourth floor. You should be able to reach the roof thanks to one of them.»
"Let me look first if there isn't something hidden here. There's a chest."
After saying this, Apple Bloom went to open the chest, and indeed found a key in it. With this key in her possession, Apple Bloom exited the room and went to open the door to the left tower. It turned out that it was locked, and the key she found in the chest opened it.
She entered a room separated in two by a canal also empty of water. Like in the courtyard, the only way to reach the other size was to fill it with water to cause a wooden bridge to rise. The canal was too deep to jump from the bottom, and too large to jump from one side to the other. Apple Bloom could spot a door in the right wall at the other side, as well as a stair leading to a second level of the room.
Searching around in the first part of the room, she found nothing hiding a key, so she sat and rubbed her head, thinking.
"So the way is blocked, no matter what?" Rainbow Dash asked.
"Seems like it, but... there must be one. Wait..." Apple Bloom activated the Dark-Light Device and looked around again. This time, she found an invisible door in the right wall. "Ahah!"
«Ah! Those ghosts thought they were smart!» Rainbow Dash proudly shouted.
«Good job, Bloom!» Applejack shouted.
Finally advancing, Apple Bloom opened the door and entered a greenhouse full of wooden planters filled with plants. There were also vases, chariots, and many vines creeping around, having caused many windows to break.
"Seems like the proprietor loved plants."
«But now that the towers are abandoned, they're going out of control,» said Twilight. «Watch out to not trip on a vine.»
Apple Bloom started advancing, only for a shelf to fall on her suddenly. She barely avoided it by jumping backward, and she could hear a ghost laughing. She quickly activated the Dark-Light Device, but the ghost was already gone. She continued advancing, keeping an eye on the other shelves, only for a vase to almost fall on her. Again, she quickly activated the DLD, and this time, caught the green ghost responsible.
As she caught him, two more green ghosts appeared and armed themselves with shovels, followed by a red ghost who started to throw vases at her. She went for the red ghost first and used him to slam the green ghosts and disarm them. She was free to capture them without more problems.
She reached the second door leading back to the previous room at the other side of the canal. Before that, she spotted through a window before the door that there was an outside area, as well as a hole in a wall leading to it, but seeing no door leading to the room with the hole, she activated the DLD and found another invisible door just at the right of the one she passed. The door actually led to some closet room with some tools, and the hole was here in a wall, leading to the outside area, a small garden in which the entrance was blocked by many vines that had destroyed the portal.
Among the vines, she spotted a chest. Thanks to her earth pony strength, she had no problem freeing the chest from the vines, and was able to open it to find a new key.
«Eheh. That's two times you find a key in a chest. It's like you're in a dungeon,» Pinkie said.
"Ah know a colt who would love it."
Taking the key, she returned to the previous room. She then climbed the stairs and tested the key on the door at the top, and it worked. So Apple Bloom entered a room with-
"GYAAAAHHHH!!!"
Apple Bloom immediately exited the room upon spotting the big carnivorous plant turning toward her, mouth opening and ready to devour her.
"Carnivorous plants! There're giant, pony eating carnivorous plants in there!"
«Wait here. I'm coming,» Twilight said before she appeared. "Time to remove some weeds."
Apple Bloom nodded and opened the door again, and Twilight immediately killed the plants with some magical beams, freeing another chest.
"Here we go."
"Thank ya, Twilight."
"You are welcome. Now, I must return to the caravan."
When Twilight teleported away, Apple Bloom opened the chest, finding another key.
«Ta dadadadaa!» Pinkie shouted.
"Pinkie..." Apple Bloom said with a giggle.
There was another door in the same wall as the one she passed to enter, but the key didn't open it because it was already opened, so Apple Bloom passed it. This led back to the previous room again, but only to a small platform separated from the rest and leading directly to another door at her left. This door led to the bridge that Twilight told her.
On this bridge, for some reason, crows (living one, not ghosts) attacked her, and she was forced to defend herself by bonking them with the handle of the Poltergust. She eventually just decided to trap them in the vortex of the machine and to slam them on the bridge, knocking them out.
"They left me no choice," she told before Fluttershy could say anything.
Not hearing any answer from the animal lover, she continued her way through the bridge and reached the door to the right tower. Which the key she obtained opened. She entered a room that looked like a laboratory with glass containers, and here again, the plants were growing out of control, to the point that they broke the flooring on the room above.
Three green ghosts armed with shovels and three red ghosts were waiting for her there, one of them probably the red ghost that flew earlier. Thankfully, there was enough space on the floor for Apple Bloom to move around and avoid getting too close of the ghosts. She used this at her advantage to force them to group together as they chased her, and she was able to trap all of them in the vortex of the Poltergust.
With six ghosts trapped at the same time, it was no surprise that some of them managed to escape, but she was still able to catch two of the green ones and one of the red ones. The last green ghost was rapidly captured, and Apple Bloom managed to trap again the last two red ghosts at the same time, and this time, they didn't escape.
Exploring the room, Apple Bloom entered a part where there had probably been an elevator, but it wasn't here anymore. However, there was now a weird purple balloon-like plant coming out of a wall.
"Uh... Okay... What now?"
«Use that balloon plant to fly up!» Pinkie Pie shouted.
«Are you sure Pinkie?» Twilight asked.
«It's a balloon plant, and you can use balloons to fly! Of course, I'm sure! Just blow air in it, and you will see!»
Having no other choice, Apple Bloom listened to her and sucked up the plant until it was stuck in the hole of the Poltergust. "Lucky the prof upgraded it so it'd blow air to expel stuff that Ah may've sucked in." At this, Apple Bloom pressed a button that caused the Poltergust to expel air instead of sucking it up.
The air entered the plant and inflated it. Luckily, the air was hot enough to cause it to float up and take the filly with it. Apple Bloom looked up and saw some plants with thorns in the way, so she blew air from her mouth at the balloon to make it move. Thanks to this, she was able to move and to go all the way to the fourth floor, entering the room where the floor was destroyed with the plants.
She landed in front of a door, almost out of breath. After taking away the plant from the hole of the Poltergust, she opened it and exited the tower, reaching stairs outside of it. As she climbed them, more crows attacked her, and she dealt with them like before. At the top of the stairs, she reached the roof of the tower under the water tower.
Some disgusting goo was dripping from an exit along the pipe into a wooden bucket placed on a conduit. Beside it was a big machine linked to the water tower with a big button, and another pipe was coming out of the machine into the tower below.
Apple Bloom also discovered that this wasn't exactly the end of the tower. There was another room on this floor, but no way to enter it from here. It wasn't her goal, anyway.
"Ah'm at the water tower. Ah suppose Ah just press this button and the water'll flow to the generator, right?"
«That's it,» Twilight answered.
Apple Bloom nodded, but as she approached the machine, the bucket suddenly rose into the air, floating alone. Looking with the DLD, she discovered that it was actually a green ghost holding it and ready to slam it on her head. She bucked the bucket out of his hooves before activating the Poltergust and capturing the ghost.
With the ghost gone, she pressed the button and activated the machine. Apple Bloom could see water filling it from the pipe, linking it to the water tower, before it continued its way out of the machine to the generator. Looking down toward the courtyard, she could see the pit filling with water, raising the bridge to the portal before the oak tree.
Smiling at her victory, Apple Bloom spoke "Eh! Ah could've been a plumber in another life!"
«I don't know. I don't see you wearing green and saying 'mama mia',» Pinkie said.
"Wha-"
Apple Bloom was interrupted by something big suddenly entering the pipe from inside the water tower. Turning toward it, she could hear whatever it was slowly moving in it, some goo coming out by the joints, until reaching the exit above the conduit. Out of the exit then dropped a big, fat brown ghost that seemed to be a fusion between a slime and an earth pony. He was stinking like a pony that didn't take a bath for years, and goo was constantly dropping from his body all around him.
Apple Bloom put a hoof on her muzzle to stop the horrible odor from entering. "Ewwwww!"
At her reaction, the ghost laughed and even sniffed under his foreleg, enjoying his smell. He then spotted the bucket beside him, took it, and ate it, before farting, to everypony's disgust.
«How can such a disgusting ghost exist?» Rarity said.
"Ah don't know, but Ah'm putting him in mah list of the worse ghosts encountered."
The ghost started attacking, spitting goo at Apple Bloom. She quickly ran out of the way and activated the Poltergust. But the ghost was so big that he wasn't even moving. Worst, it was Apple Bloom who was getting closer to him, and she definitively didn't want to approach him, so she walked back while continuing to suck it up. The ghost continued to spit his goo at her, so she was constantly forced to move left or right while continuing to move backward. More and more of the goo constituting his body was entering her Poltergust until, finally, the ghost lost the fight and was captured.
«It was sickening...» Twilight said. «And we weren't even there with you. I can't imagine how horrible it was for you.»
"VERY horrible... Ah thing Ah lost mah sense of smell..."
«Let's change topic. Now that you activated the generator, you should be able to open that door back in the first floor.»
"And reach the portal with the pinwheel. Ah wonder where it leads, Ah didn't see anything at the other side, just the bottom of the tree."
«It may be worth checking. There must be a secret passage, or something.»
"But now, Ah have to return down here," The filly finished with a sigh.
So the filly returned to the laboratory where there was, thankfully, another 'balloon plant' for her to descend back to the second floor. Here, she had to fight four Greens armed of shovels, another Green armed with a bucket, and one Red. After dealing with them, she traversed the bridge (where she had to deal with more crows), traversed the room where there had been the carnivorous plants, and descended the stairs back to the first floor. With the water now flowing, she didn't need to pass by the greenhouse and simply traversed the canal by walking on the floating bridge. Some Greens attacked again, but they didn't last long.
She exited the tower and returned to the courtyard where she traversed the floating bridge to reach the big portal with the pinwheel. Not seeing any other way to open it, she activated the Poltergust and used it to make the pinwheel turn. Only for a Red to suddenly come from behind the portal to punch her right on the muzzle, sending her rolling backward.
"Ow..."
While the red ghost laughed, five Blues appeared and teared off five of the six vanes of the pinwheel and flew to the right tower. Growling, Apple Bloom rubbed her muzzle a little before getting up. She quickly captured the Red that punched her and ran after the Blues, entering the right tower. Back in the room with the generator, water now dropped on it to make the wheels turn.
Having only one way to go from there, she pressed the button beside the door at her left and opened it. She entered a small room where three of the Blues who took the vanes were here messing with them. Upon spotting her, they flew away in fear, separating into two groups: one went through the wall in front of Apple Bloom, and the two others passed through a door at her right.
Thanks to the fact that every door here had a carpet in front of them, she understood that there was an invisible door in the wall that the lonely Blue traversed, and used the DLD to reveal it. Now having to choose between the two doors, she decided to go after the lonely Blue first, entering a room that served as somepony's chamber and living room, with a bed, a table, a closet, and a stove, among other furniture.
She searched the furniture one after another in search of the Blue and found him in the closet. But before she could activate the Poltergust, the Blue threw a cloth on her eyes, and by the time she took it away, the Blue had flown away again, thought the floor.
"What?" She tapped the floor. "There's a room under here?"
«Maybe. I saw that the floor was weird under the bed, you should check it,» Twilight said.
"Mmh... But how do Ah remove that bed?"
«If you can't move it, look around. If you want, I can come to help.»
Apple Bloom tried to push the bed into the wall, seeing that there was a hole for it to enter, and it moved. "This won't be necessary." A few seconds later, the bed was fully inside the wall, and she could feel the floor lower under her weight, but it didn't cause anything. Apple Bloom looked around again in search of a solution, then looked at a bucket filled with water that was beside the bed. She took it and almost immediately, with her and the bucket's combined weight, the floor under her started to move down, revealing to be some sort of elevator.
At the bottom, she heard a click and understood that she could walk away without risking the platform from going back up. Leaving it, she saw that she was now in a very dark underground room that was actually another laboratory with one of those carnivorous plants inside a glass container. There were also some more of those 'balloon plants', so she could use one to return to the previous room without having to find a way to make the platform move back up. A path flooded with water to her right led to a door.
Twilight quickly appeared to destroy the plant before returning to the caravan while Apple Bloom dealt with some Greens wandering the room. With the Greens captured, she checked the drawers of a table at the extremity of the room and found the Blue she chased in there. Before he could escape again, she captured him, making him drop the vane he was holding. Like with the gears back in Gloomy Manor, Twilight came to pick it.
Pushed by curiosity, Apple Bloom went to the door in the flooded path and entered what seemed to be a sewer. A couple more Greens that were wandering here were captured, and she found a chest at the other side of fake bars with a key inside.
«Ta dadadadaaaa!» Pinkie shouted again, causing everypony to laugh.
Apple Bloom took the key and continued to explore the sewer, seeing a hole in the ceiling with something blocking it that seemed to be able to move down, like the platform earlier. Further, hidden behind some moss-like plant at the extremity of the sewer, she found a hole in the wall and passed it, entering a smaller room dig in the earth...
With two coffins...
"Oh... Oops... Eheheheh... Ah entered a tomb... Sorry..." the filly said, walking back to the sewer.
«Wait! What's a tomb doing here?» Applejack shouted.
"Uh... Maybe there's a family graveyard, like back at the Gem Manor." She looked back at the hole in the ceiling, seeing that the thing that was blocking it had the shape of a coffin. "So Ah'm under a graveyard." She gulped. "Ah hope the dead will remain dead here. Ah don't want to fight skeleton zombies again. Ah don't even have a chainsaw this time."
«What?!» The six mares shouted back in the caravan.
"Ah went through some stuff back at the Gem Manor, ya don't want to know. But Ah must say, cutting skeleton zombies with a chainsaw was very awesome, and very scary."
«How did you get your hooves on a chainsaw?!» Applejack shouted.
"Three words: Cook of Tartarus."
«He was here?!» Twilight shouted, almost choking.
"Eeyup."
«I'm scared to ask, who was this 'Cook of Tartarus'?»
"A cannibal cook from eight hundred years ago."
«Oh...» Apple Bloom could almost see the ponies become green.
With nothing left to do here, Apple Bloom returned to the laboratory and used a 'balloon plant' to return to the chamber. Here, she took the time to look through a window and confirm that, yes, there was a graveyard, at the other side of the giant tree. She then returned to the small room and went to open the door where the two other Blues escaped, only to discover that it was locked. So she used the key she found in the sewer and opened it, entering a shed full of gardening tools. A Red was here, back to her, looking curiously at a fountain. Beside the fountain was another door.
Since the Red hadn't seen her coming, she was able to catch him by surprise. Some Greens armed with shovels came to help him, but she just used him to slam them, and she captured all of them before they could try anything. She then started searching the room and found a Blue inside a drawer. The ghost was quickly captured too, and he dropped a vane. Not finding any other Blues, she left the room by the door beside the fountain, Twilight having taken the vane.
She exited the tower, entering a garden. The third Blue was right in front of her, but he quickly flew over a hedge to a second part of the garden. She chased him, jumping above the hedge, only for one of those fat, stinky ghosts to appear behind her with two Greens armed with buckets.
"Not again!"
She quickly ran away from the brown ghost and waited for the Greens to come after her before she captured them. At least, a good thing about the Brown was that he couldn't fly, he could only do little jumps to advance, and he was so fat that he was very slow, so it left time for her to deal with the Greens. Once she was done with the Greens, she put the Poltergust to red and use its full power to capture the Brown in record time.
With the Poltergust back to yellow, she searched the vases and found the Blue, and captured him. Three vanes found, two to go.
Through a window, she saw that there was a secret room behind the fountain. Where she could see the bed that she had pushed from the chamber. So she returned to the shed and went to the fountain. Searching it, she found a well-hidden button and pressed it. In this order, this caused water to come out of the fountain and to splash on her face, and the fountain to suddenly spun, throwing her against the wall in the secret room.
She groaned and spat some water. "Ah'm starting to hate secret passages in this valley."
Rubbing her head, she got up and looked at the room. It was a four-story room with stairs linking the levels. However... the first staircase (linking the first floor and the second floor) had only a few steps moving up and down alone, and the second staircase (linking the second floor and the third floor) was broken.
So she carefully climbed the first stairs at the same speed as the steps were moving, and a Green ambushed her at the top, trying to punch her from behind. She felt him and immediately jumped forward before turning around and activating the Poltergust to capture the ghost. With the ghost captured, the steps of the first stairs all reappeared.
A door was just in front of the stairs, but when she tried to open it, the door suddenly crushed her between it and the wall.
«Woah! What happened?» Rainbow Dash shouted.
Apple Bloom groaned in pain and got back up, glaring at the door. "The door crushed me!" She went to open it again, but this time, she jumped out of the way and watched as the door slammed against the wall, revealing that it led to nowhere. "Fake doors that are actually traps... Greeeat..." She rubbed her muzzle. "Oww... It hurts..."
«Now you will have to be careful while opening doors...» Twilight said with a groan. «At this rate, you will have to watch out for chests trying to eat you.»
«I don't know why, but it felt like you foreshadowed, Twilight,» said Pinkie.
Apple Bloom groaned again. "Please, Ah hope not. Ah'd mah dose of things trying to eat me back at the Gem Manor. Ah've already the carnivorous plants to watch for here..."
Nothing more being said, she went to try the other door at the left of the stairs and carefully opened it, ready to jump away if it started any sudden movement. Thankfully, this door wasn't a trap and led to yet another lab, this one having a machine similar to the one under the water tower. This machine was connected to a pipe going toward a glass container at the center of the room, but there was a part of the pipe missing. Inside the glass was a small sprout. There were also many tables with dozens of glass tubes containing colored liquids beside two more glass containers with big flowers in them.
She started by cleaning the room of all its ghosts, five Greens and two Reds. One of the reds actually took her by surprise when he created a shockwave by slamming his two forehooves together, but she quickly recovered and captured all of them. A purple ghost was also there, waiting to trap Apple Bloom in his body, but the filly saw the purple puddle and captured the ghost. She didn't see however the second puddle behind a table. She made the purple ghost pay this.
With the room cleared, she searched the tables and other furniture to see if there wasn't one of the last two Blues hidden in them, but found nothing. So she went to the machine and pressed the button on it, activating it. But she forgot that the pipe was missing a part, and so she got the nasty surprise of taking a sudden shower.
"Seriously?" she asked with a deadpan look. She could hear Pinkie and Rainbow laughing.
Annoyed, she shook off the water and looked around again to see if she missed anything. Finding nothing, she activated the DLD and discovered that the missing part of the pipe was actually in its place, but needed to be dark-lighted. With the pipe back, Apple Bloom pressed the button again, and this time, the water dropped on the sprout.
She wasn't sure in which way it would help her advance, but then, before her eyes, the sprout started growing and became a large stalk that destroyed not only its glass container but also the ceiling. Strong red leaves then grew, and by a miracle (or maybe not, you never know with this place), they formed a stair for her to reach the floor above.
«Uuuuh... I'm not a specialist of agriculture, but I know enough to know that plants are not supposed to grow that fast after being watered,» Rainbow Dash said.
«Excepted with magic,» Twilight said. «But I think this growth spurt was actually caused thanks to those experiments they've done in this room. Just look at all those liquids.»
"Well, whatever caused it, it worked for me. Now, Ah can continue."
Carefully, she climbed the stairs formed by the red leaves and reached the room above the laboratory. Which was yet another laboratory full of potted plants where she could hear somepony play an organ above. Two Greens were fooling around with the potted plants, and Apple Bloom spotted a Purple ambushed before the door back to the room with the stairs. She went for the Greens first, taking them by surprise since they hadn't seen her coming. The Purple went next. She then searched the room and found one of the Blues, getting a fourth vane. Only one left to find.
She passed the door back to the room with the stairs and climbed them to the fourth floor where she passed a door to the next room above the lab. It was a room infested of plants crawling around, with many broken wooden planks, tiles, and armchairs littered around. In the center of the room was an organ with some plants surrounding it, 'balloon plants' being among them.
A Red was playing the organ, and the last Blue was occasionally coming out of the tubes, having fun. Since the Red was back to her, and since in his fun, the Blue wasn't spotting her, Apple Bloom was able to approach and to trap the Red, stopping his horrible music. Two more Red and a Brown appeared.
Apple Bloom slammed the Reds with the one trapped by her Poltergust, then used him on the Brown to stop him from spitting goo before the Red was finally captured. She then trapped the two last Reds at the same time, only to be dragged into a puddle of goo and to slip on it, causing the Reds to escape. Before the Reds could return, she turned to the Brown and put the Poltergust to red before she activated it. She managed to capture the Brown just in time to be able to avoid a shockwave sent at her by one of the Reds, and she was able to easily capture them in turn.
With all the ghosts gone, she approached the organ and rubbed her forehooves together, smirking. She then jumped and slammed her whole body on the keys, causing a real cacophony, and the Blue was thrown out of one of the tubes. Before he could recover, he was captured, and he dropped the last vane.
Twilight appeared and took the vane. "Alright. Do you want me to teleport you back at the pinwheel so we can start to repair it?"
"NO! No. No teleportation, please. Ah..." She turned to look at the opposite side of the room. "Ah still've to go check over there." She then pointed up. "And there may be something up there, so Ah'll also use one of those balloons."
Twilight nodded. "Very well. I will wait." At this, she teleported back to the caravan.
So Apple Bloom took one of the Balloon Plants and used it to ascend to the ceiling of the room. Here, on a platform partially broken, she found a door leading to a small balcony where a key was waiting for her. This balcony was just above the famous bridge made with the branches of the oak tree, and it was so! Scarily! High!
Gulping, Apple Bloom returned to the previous room and used a Balloon Plant to descend back. She then used the key she just obtained to open the door to the bridge and carefully traversed it while dealing with the many crows nesting here. Reaching the other end of the bridge, she opened the door and entered a small room similar to the one on the first floor (that was leading to the chamber and the shed). Here too, there were two other doors, one in front of her and one to her right. She carefully tested the two and found out that the one to her right was locked, so she opened the other one and entered a bedroom with three beds.
On the beds, three Blues were sleeping, but they heard her coming and woke up. She still managed to get one before the two others went to hide in their beds. The two Blues then quickly moved the beds, challenging Apple Bloom to find the beds they were hidden in, but the filly was able to follow the beds, and when they stopped moving, she found and captured a second Blue. The last one used the same game, moving the beds faster, but the filly wouldn't let herself fooled by such a childish game, and the last Blue was captured. A key was found in one of the beds, which opened the door at the other end of the room.
She entered a solarium with three flights of stairs leading to the floor below, and she entered a cozy room (as cozy as it could be with how old it was), with a table, three chairs, and even three portraits. One was showing a fat purple earth pony mare, the second was showing a thin aqua pegasus mare, and the third was showing a small yellow unicorn mare.
Probably the old owners of the towers.
The room was actually separated in two by a wall, and the second part was what looked like a kitchen with a door at the left.
Two Purples were all the ghosts in the room, so Apple Bloom quickly traversed it and passed the door in the kitchen part, entering a very creepy room with a big doll house, some jack-in-the-boxes, alphabet blocks, and a LOT of dolls, including a big mare-sized one beside the doll house.
And when she entered, the heads of ALL the dolls turned toward her, causing quite the fright among the mares back at the caravan. But the real horror started when the dolls started approaching Apple Bloom. The filly looked at the approaching dolls, then returned to the kitchen. There, she searched in the drawers and took a knife. Armed, she returned to the room with the dolls and started slashing at them as they jumped at her. She slashed, bucked, grabbed, threw, and slashed again, and even teared their heads with her teeth.
Before long, all the dolls were in pieces, even the big one, and the room was now full of Greens with a Red. Apple Bloom put the Poltergust to red and cleaned the whole room in ten seconds flat. She, however, had to empty the Poltergust from the remains of the dolls she sucked up with the ghosts.
"Did ya really think your little doll play'd scare me? Ah fought a house-sized doll, and it's much scarier!"
«Wow... You have my respect, Apple Bloom,» Rainbow Dash said.
"Thanks."
After some searching, she found the key inside the dollhouse, and she guessed that it opened the last locked door back in the small room above. So she returned to it (dealing with a lone Green armed of a knife on the way) and unlocked said door, entering a large bathroom with, of all things, a reclining chair.
A Brown and two Purples were in the room, and Apple Bloom decided to start with the Purples first, not risking them trapping her while she was busy sucking up the Brown and avoiding his goo. So it was only when she was done with the Purples that she started sucking up the Brown, only for two Greens to come. So she stopped sucking up the Brown and dealt with them, being careful of the puddles of goo starting to be everywhere. Once the Greens were gone, she finished the Brown.
Finding nothing special in the room, she went to inspect the very suspect reclining chair, even more since she spotted a circular hole in the ceiling above it. She looked around it, then climbed it, and suddenly, the floor around the chair started to rise, and she entered a new room.
She recognized the room to be the one with the walls and ceiling made of glasses at the top of the left tower, and it turned out that it was a room with a pool, invaded by plants too.
She quickly remarked that one of the frog statues at the corners of the pool was missing and used the DLD to reveal it. A key came out of the statue and fell in the water, and the filly jumped in the pool to get it, the pool just full enough for her legs to reach the bottom while keeping her head out of the water.
That's when she felt a ghost passing behind her, but when she turned around, nopony was here. However, she saw something invisible moving away in the water and getting out of the pool only to come back to try to creep behind her. Apple Bloom didn't leave the ghost its chance and activated the Poltergust at him, revealing him to be a new type of pink griffon-like ghost. Seeing more ripples in the water as she captured this one, it seemed that he wasn't the only one in this room, and they seemed to love sneaking to attack her from behind. Too bad for them they choose to ambush her in this pool, but this may not be the same story in other rooms if more of them showed up after that.
With some slamming, she was able to stop all the Pinks in the room, four in total, from approaching her, and before long, they were all captured. With this, she was done exploring the two towers.
But then, what was that key opening?
Probably something behind that pinwheel portal. Apple Bloom remembered there was a graveyard somewhere behind the oak tree. So she descended the towers, returning to the bathroom, traversing the bridge, descending the stairs, using the plant, descending the stairs again, and returning to the courtyard.
"Okay, Twilight. Ah'm ready to repair the pinwheel."
«Alright, I'm coming. Like in the manor, I will repair it while you watch for the ghosts.»
"Okay, but be careful. Remember that Red who punched me through the portal?"
«Yeah, I remember. I will try to keep an eye.» The next instant, Twilight appeared. She nodded at Apple Bloom and spoke, "Let's go."
They approached the bridge to the portal, and Apple Bloom stopped before it to keep guard while Twilight continued to the pinwheel, the five vanes floating beside her with a wrench. Just as she started repairing it, ghosts appeared and started to approach. Apple Bloom saw Greens, Reds, and a Brown. Just in case, she activated her DLD and found out that Pinks were also here.
She put the Poltergust to red and activated it. Greens and Pinks were quick to be caught, and the Reds soon followed, but Apple Bloom had to pause to avoid overheating the Poltergust too much, which would lead to an explosion that would destroy the whole courtyard and its surroundings. A Pink took the occasion to push her right into a Purple that Apple Bloom hadn't seen appear, and she was trapped in him for a couple of seconds before she was able to free herself. Those two seconds were enough for the Brown to approach her, and he almost body slammed her. She jumped back and restarted sucking around, catching the Brown, the three little Purples that resulted from her breaking out of the original one, the Pink who pushed her, and a lot of other ghosts who were about to reach Twilight just as she finished.
As soon as she was finished, Twilight teleported away, leaving Apple Bloom to focus back at fully defending herself. By now, only three Greens, one Pink creeping around, and one Red were remaining. So she put the Poltergust back to yellow and quickly trapped the Red before using him to slam the other ghosts. The Pink still managed to creep his way to her, and she barely avoided his claws as she let the Red drag her away. The Red was then captured, soon followed by the Greens. The Pink was harder, but she managed to find his location thanks to her DLD, and he was captured.
«Ah don't think they like Twilight that much...» Applejack said.
«No kidding...» The alicorn said. «They really don't want me to help you. Thank you, Apple Bloom.»
«One of them even came here, but I captured him!» Rainbow Dash shouted proudly.
«Dashie's first ghost!» Pinkie Pie shouted.
Apple Bloom giggled, then went to the pinwheel. Like before, she used the Poltergust to turn it, and this time, no ghost came to stop her. Before long, the portal was open, and she could approach the oak tree. She saw that there was a circular door at its base, carved in the wood, and when she approached it, it opened, letting her enter the tree that was revealed to be hollowed.
The place was rather well lighted by torches. The center of the room was covered in water, and at her left, right, and front were three alcoves. At the left and right of the alcove in front of her were stairs connected to more flights of stairs continuing for the equivalent of four levels, always by pairs.
The alcoves at the left and right led to dead ends with a few big spiders, but Apple Bloom understood that the alcove between the stairs probably led to the graveyard, so she decided to climb the stairs first and see what was at the top. However, when she climbed the first flight of stairs, it suddenly turned into a slope, and a Green appeared at the top laughing at her.
"Grrr... Not again..."
The Green was quickly captured, but the stairs didn't return to normal, leaving her with no choice but to take the other flight of stairs. As it turned out, it was a game of 'choose the good path'. Every two flights of stairs, if she chose the wrong flight, the stairs disappeared, and she had to fight a ghost. If she chose the good flight, nothing happened excepted the fire of a torch beside the flight turning from blue to red to reveal that it was the good path.
Once at the top, she found a round entrance to another room. However, as she approached it, a door suddenly slammed closed in front of her, the door looking like the face of a monster with evil eyes and sharp teeth (the door opening in two at the teeth). It also had a big keyhole for a nose.
Apple Bloom jumped back in fright at this. And she wasn't the only one.
«Darn it! That stupid door almost gave me a heart attack!» Rainbow Dash yelled.
«It almost chomped Apple Bloom!» Pinkie said. «It seems like this is where you must go.»
"Y-yeah..." said Apple Bloom before she took a big breath. "But first, Ah must find the key. It'd be in the graveyard."
«You are very courageous to talk about exploring a graveyard so casually,» Twilight said.
"Ah explored a lot of graveyards since Ah started ghost hunting, Ah'm now used to it. Ah made some good friends in those."
«Yer becoming one weird filly, ya know?» Applejack commented with a laugh.
Apple Bloom giggled. "Ah know."
At this, she descended the stairs back to the last alcove she hadn't explored yet. The alcove turned to the right, going slightly downward with many roots growing in the dirt walls and floor. It ended in a dead end with a big root and a layer of moss with mushrooms. Behind the moss, she spotted a suspiciously small green root hanging from the ceiling. Studying the root, Apple Bloom decided to try something and jumped at it to grab it. Using the weight of her body, she pulled the root down, and in the next instant, a part of the big root opened to reveal a platform.
"Yes!"
«There are really secret passages everywhere,» said Twilight.
Apple Bloom jumped on the platform just big enough for an adult to stand on it, and suddenly, the wood under her rose. The next thing she knew, she was spat out of the beak of a big statue of the head of a crow.
She groaned as she got up. "Why... Just, why..." She then looked around and saw that she was at the extremity of the graveyard. There was not a ghost in sight, but a lot of crows who, thankfully, didn't attack her.
"Ah swear, if one of them say 'nevermore'..."
«You know The Raven?» Twilight asked.
"We studied it in school."
She started exploring the graveyard, staring at the tombs and daring any zombies or skeletons to come out of them. But surprisingly, she was not attacked once, not even when she approached what looked like a crypt, which seemed to be the only place of interest here. Using the key found in the pool, she opened the door and entered it.
«And you enter a crypt, just like that, without even hesitating?» Rarity asked.
"Part of the job. Before ya ask, yes, Ah already went in a crypt. Some ghost was throwing the coffins in it, and we were called to deal with him."
«Okaaaay...»
The inside of the crypt was in really bad condition. The shelving was damaged, and many coffins were missing. The wall at the end was also very weakened, and Apple Bloom could see that there was something behind it through the small holes, seeing some light. So she bucked the wall and caused it to crumble, revealing a secret room lightened by two torches at the end, at both sides of a big chest. Apple Bloom opened it, finding inside a big, creepy wooden key with the same face as the door in the tree.
«TADADADAAAAAA!!!» Pinkie shouted, making again everypony laugh.
"Pinkie... Thank ya... for making us laugh after... what happened."
«No problemo! We must continue to smile no matter what happens! This is what Smart Spirit would want. Also, he's not really gone.»
"Ah know, but him dying this way still sucks."
«Language,» said Applejack.
"And Pyrite and his ally'll still pay for this. Even if they rest as ghosts, ya don't kill mah friends. And Ah swear, if they touch to one hair on any of y'all, Ah'll find a way to bring them back to life to make them regret being born in the first place."
The mares couldn't see her expression, but they knew she was actually giving a really hateful one.
«Ya know revenge isn't the answer, right?» Twilight said.
Apple Bloom sighed. "Ah know... Revenge or not, Pyrite and his ally must be stopped. But after what they did, and what they may do, ya can't blame me to make it personal."
Twilight sighed. «You're right... We can't...»
With this wooden key in her possession, she exited the crypt, only to see a stone thrown at her. She barely moved her head out of the way and saw an Orange laughing at her before becoming invisible. A dozen Greens, and some Red and Blues were also here, the Blues going to hide in the vases on some of the tombs.
Putting her Poltergust to red, she started running around assembling all the Greens and Reds into a single group, then activated the vacuum to suck up all of them rapidly. She then put it back to yellow and started hunting the Blues while keeping an eye on the Orange. Once all the Blues were captured, being careful of stones thrown at her, Apple Bloom went after the Orange, using her DLD to find him and capture him.
That's when the ghosts of three familiar, beautiful mares appeared, chuckling at her. A fat pink earth pony, a thin aqua pegasus, and a small yellow unicorn (so small that she was barely bigger than Apple Bloom). They all had vain expressions, the pink mare and the aqua mare were wearing a hat while the yellow one had a bow like Apple Bloom, and the three were holding mirrors that they sometimes used to admire themselves.
The pink mare tried to hit her with her mirror, but she jumped to the side and activated the Poltergust on her, only to be rammed from the side by the aqua mare. She was sent to the floor, but quickly recovered and rolled to avoid a magical beam from the yellow mare. The aqua mare charged at her again, but Apple Bloom trapped her and quickly used her to slam and stun the yellow mare, stopping her from firing more magical beams. The pink mare then came to attack her, and she wasn't much affected by Apple Bloom slamming the aqua mare on her. She tried to get away, but the mare followed her very closely and was about to bonk her with her mirror, leaving Apple Bloom no choice but to let the aqua mare escape before jumping away.
She trapped the pink mare who used her big weight to drag her and try to make her hit the tombstones, but Apple Bloom knew the trick and jumped above them. She also started to move left and right to avoid the magical beams from the yellow mare who had recovered. When the aqua mare came back to ram her from behind, Apple Bloom jumped at the last second, letting the mare pass under her, and she violently pulled down on the Poltergust, using the pink mare to crush the other. She then trapped the two of them in the vortex, and they were both captured in the next few seconds. The yellow mare didn't last long by herself.
"Those are the first ghosts looking like real ponies that Ah catch in this valley. Ah wonder if there'll be others."
«Speaking of. Were those other ghosts even... ponies, griffons, or whatever before?» Twilight wondered. «They look like ponies and others, but aren't exactly the same. They don't even talk.»
"Yeah. Like Pyrite's painted ghosts. Smart Spirit said that this valley's inhabited by many ghosts originating from the spiritual world. Maybe they're species of ghosts born in the spiritual world. Or maybe ghosts become like that after passing enough time in it."
«It's so fascinating! But we would probably have to go to the spiritual world to answer all those questions,» Twilight said.
"Ah don't even know if we can go in the spiritual world," said Apple Bloom.
«Something we will have to explore someday, but not now.»
Apple Bloom nodded and looked around. "Now... How do Ah go out of this graveyard? Wait..." She remembered the hole in the sewer with what seemed like a coffin blocking it. "Ah think Ah know." Exploring the graveyard a little more, she eventually found a coffin not in a tomb. After some hesitation, she climbed it, and the coffin started moving down. "And Ah was right."
«Using a coffin as a secret passage... It's such a bad taste,» Rarity said.
Apple Bloom shrugged. "Ghosts."
«The towers were built before they were haunted,» Twilight reminded.
"Right."
Now back in the sewer, she returned to the courtyard passing by the underground lab, the chamber, and the generator room. No ghosts stopped her, excepted an unexpected one.
As Apple bloom approached the oak tree, the white ghost dog she had seen back in the Gloomy Manor came out of nowhere and jumped on her before licking her.
"Hey! Stop it!" The filly shouted with a laugh, trying to stop the dog.
But then, the dog spotted the wooden key that she had dropped, and he barked happily before taking it and playing with it.
"No, dog! Give me this key! It's not yours!"
The dog looked at her, then ate the whole key before he ran to the right tower and passed through the wall.
"No! Bad dog! Come back here!" The filly yelled as she started chasing the dog.
However, when she entered the generator room, she saw him nowhere. So she activated the DLD and looked around until she found his footprints and followed them until finding out that the dog traversed another wall toward the shed. So she opened the door with the button, traversed the small room, and entered the shed. She then used the DLD again to follow the footprints and find out that the dog had entered a drawer. So she opened it only for the dog to jump on her face and to lick her again before running away.
«Awww... The doggy is playing hide-and-seek with you,» Fluttershy said.
"But he still has the key. Even if he's just playing, he's giving me no choice," Apple Bloom said with a groan as she got up, rubbing her head from the drool.
She didn't see where the dog ran, but the DLD revealed that he passed the wall to the garden. She quickly found the dog waiting for her only to run away again, this time passing the wall to enter the room with the stairs. Groaning again, she returned to the shed and used the fountain to enter the room, making sure to not get thrown against the wall this time. She found the dog climbing the stairs and quickly chased him, but in her haste, she didn't see the purple puddle, and before she knew it, she was trapped inside a Purple that she quickly captured.
The dog calmly waited for her to climb the stairs, then he climbed the wall and went to the floor above. "Come on!" she yelled. As if to tease her, the dog looked back at her from the platform above and barked. Apple Bloom growled, but slowly, her growl turned into a smirk. "So, ya want to play? Alright. We'll play."
«Here's some music for you!» Pinkie shouted before she started playing some music.
Apple Bloom ran into the lab and climbed the plant in record time before returning to the room with the stairs, only for the dog to pass the wall immediately. So she quickly returned to the previous room, only to see him climb a wall and walk under the ceiling before passing it.
Huffing, Apple Bloom returned to the stairs and climbed them to go to the room with the organ, only to discover that the organ wasn't here anymore, and the dog's footprints were leading right to it. So she used the DLD and made the organ reappear. She slammed the keys and caused the dog to come out of a tube, only for the dog to circle her to the point of making her fall before he went to hide behind the organ. Apple Bloom went after him, only to get trapped by a Purple again, and the dog escaped!
Apple Bloom captured that stupid ghost and ran after the dog toward the bridge of the fourth floor, only to be stopped by a Brown dropping right in front of the door along with a few Greens.
"Ah've no time for this!" she yelled before she put the Poltergust to red. Ten seconds later, she entered the bridge, traversed it, and spotted the dog through a window in the bathroom, rolling on the floor looking at her. "Wait 'til Ah get ya," she said before she entered the tower.
Entering the bathroom, she saw the dog disappear into a sink beside the toilet. When she approached it, the dog came out. But this time, Apple Bloom was ready and avoided him. But the dog was able to pass the wall behind her before she could activate the Poltergust. Resisting the urge to yell, she exited the bathroom, quickly captured the Purples that appeared in the small room on the way, and entered the bedroom. Following the dog's footprints, she went to a bed and removed its cover, revealing the dog. The dog tried to trip her to escape again, but Apple Bloom, while unbalanced a little, remained up and finally trapped the dog!
"Gotcha! Woah!"
The dog started to struggle strongly to escape, still having a lot of energy despite the chase. He forced the filly to spin and move in all directions and almost escaped more than once, but Apple Bloom was determined to not let him escape and was able to keep up. Eventually, the dog was captured, and the key was dropped. However, as she took it, the Poltergust started shaking, and the dog burst out of it, licked her, and escaped.
"WHAT?! How did he escape?! The only ghost who escaped until now's Little Ghost! Don't tell me that dog's actually that powerful!"
«Or maybe he had too much energy for the Poltergust to contain,» Fluttershy said with a laugh.
«Don't worry, Apple Bloom. Once you come back, I will strengthen the crystal. If you encounter this dog again, he won't be able to escape!» Twilight said.
"If Ah encounter him, and Ah hope not."
«Come on, Apple Bloom. You know as well as all of us you will see that doggy again,» Pinkie said.
Apple Bloom just groaned.
Apple Bloom was able to return to the giant oak tree without anything special to happen on the way to make her lose more time, just a few ghosts trying their luck. Once in the tree, she climbed the stairs and used the key to open the door, the door opening like a jaw.
"Finally. Now, time to find out what... what..."
As Apple Bloom entered the room after the door, she found herself at the bottom of a very big staircase made of twenty flights of stairs divided into three per rows. And it was clear that it was another game of 'find the right path'.
Apple Bloom stared, jaw dropped, speechless, at the eerie staircase as if it was Tirek himself, before she looked at it filled with determination.
"Challenge... accepted..."
By the time she reached the top of the staircase, Apple Bloom was almost crawling on the ground, out of breath. "Ah... Ah wish Ah was Tirek... so Ah'd destroy... that place..."
She then spotted a crow perched on a vine. "Caw! Nevermore!"
Apple Bloom looked at the crow with bloody murder, but was too exhausted to do anything to it. So she just growled and said, "Ya're right... Nevermore..."
She then fell on the floor and remained here, recuperating her breath for many minutes, the crow flying away. Once she recuperated enough, she got up and approached a weak wall of wood with a ball of vine stuck to it. She used the Poltergust to grab the ball and pulled, and pulled, and pulled again until the wall was destroyed, opening the way to a path among the branches of the oak tree. At the end of the path, she pulled a cord to drop a ladder, and she climbed it to enter a wooden platform with a small staircase leading to a tree house.
She then started to climb the stairs to enter the house, only for the stairs to start moving and to expel her. When she recovered and looked up, she saw that the stairs were possessed, now forming a face with a jaw full of shards of wood looking like very sharp teeth. The back of the staircase was also covered in blue fire.
It then started chasing her, jaw opening and closing.
"Now stairs want to eat me! They want me to've the phobia of stairs or what?" she yelled while she tried to escape the stairs.
"This is Wild Oak," she suddenly heard Pyrite speak. Looking toward the tree house, she spotted him, smirking. "Why don't you feed him? He seems very hungry," he said before disappearing with a cackle.
Apple Bloom growled, but quickly got Pyrite out of her mind to focus on the immediate threat: the staircase trying to eat her. Oh, and also trying to burn her. Apparently, it could shoot blue fireballs from its 'eyes'. Yay.
But eventually, she got the idea to go on the edge of the platform and to wait for the staircase to charge at her. At the last second, she rolled out of the way, and the staircase couldn't stop in time to avoid falling to its doom. The ghost possessing it, a Bogmire-like ghost looking more like a tree, came out of it to avoid the fall, and Apple Bloom immediately trapped it. However, the ghost started to use the tree to defend itself, trying to hit her with its branches until it was able to escape.
The ghost then took possession of the tree house, the two windows at both sides of the door filling with blue fire to become eyes while the door became a mouth. The house couldn't move, but it fired bigger fireballs more often, and it used a piece of carpet as a tongue to try to grab her and to bring her so it could chomp her.
But Apple Bloom used the Poltergust on red to grab the carpet and pulled hard, then pulled again, and again, causing the branch on which the house was to bend toward her. The house clearly understood what she was planning and looked at her in panic. Apple Bloom waved at it with a smirk, then released the carpet. The branch on which the house was was sent back with such a force that it broke, and the house fell. Again, the Shadow escaped it to avoid the fall, leaving it at the mercy of the filly.
She had no mercy.
But the ghost still managed to escape, and this time, it went to possess the tree itself, and its leaves turned into blue fire as it started to bend to make her fall beyond the edge of the platform. A face then appeared on the floor of the platform, and the tree bent to make her slide into its mouth. She hung to the barrier surrounding the platform and looked around to find a solution. Fireballs then started to be fired from the branches, and she got an idea. She let herself slide toward the mouth, but jumped above it and caught the barrier at the other side to not fall. As she passed above the mouth, the ghost accidentally fired fireballs into it, burning its inside.
It stopped bending to try to eat her and decided to use its branches and fireballs to attack continuously, forcing the filly to run around until she was able to jump above the mouth again, and again, the ghost accidentally firing fireballs in it. A last passage, and as the tree started burning from the inside, the Shadow had enough and got out only to be welcomed by Apple Bloom who was able to capture it this time.
The Shadow dropped a key, and Apple Bloom quickly took it before she escaped, descending the ladder from which she came to get away of the fire that was rapidly spreading. Followed by the fire, Apple Bloom returned to the eerie staircase and descended it before returning to the main room of the tree. She descended the last few flights of stairs before the first floor and got out, the tree now absolutely covered in fire.
But the fire didn't last long, because it was at this moment that a strong storm started extinguishing it. But despite that, the tree was now, so to say, dead.
But she, at least, was alive and in possession of the key to the next manor. Judging by the clock on it, it was the key to the Old Clockworks.