In the distance past...
Starswirl walked down a hallway, marking grades and reading new spells. His eyes were so intent on the knowledge, yet he never once crashed or lost track of where he was going. Instead, his concentration only broke at the sound of a hard crash and a scream.
The old wizard's head shook out of the notes. His eyes widened at the direction of the sound. He hastened his speed back to his classroom.
Entering the room he was shocked to find Fiend pressing Sting against the wall. The normally frail hippogriff glared at the old wizard before turning his attention back to his brother. "Why would you do such a thing?!"
"He just wants to heal you, brother?!" Sting argued. His normal rapping tone was gone in total fear of his brother.
Fiend stamped his foot on the ground, but kept his anger in check as he spoke. "Does it matter to you at all what he wants in return!"
"If it means keeping my family alive, I don't fucking care!!" Sting yelled.
"You fool!" Fiend squeezed his hand on his brother's throat. "You have no right to make such a bargain for me!!"
"Stop this now, Fiend!!" Starswirl rushed over, only for the frail hippogriff to throw him to the side so easily. "This has gone too far!"
"Do not think to tell me what to do!" Fiend snarled at his teacher.
Sting laughed and didn't struggle against Fiend's grip. Instead, he tried reasoning with his older brother. "How can you be so selfish?"
"I am not the selfish one here!!" Fiend pulled him back and bashed his throat into the wall. "It is you who is selfish! You are willing to sacrifice our sister's life for me!!" The hippogriff punched his fist into the wall beside Sting's head. He ignoring the fact that his bones cracked from the movement.
"That's not true!! I wouldn't do that!!" Sting protested.
"Then why did you agree to this deal?!" Fiend demanded.
"I agreed to the deal!!" Slang's voice interrupted them.
Fiend froze at that answer and slowly turned to see Slang in the room. Slang stared up at her larger brother with fear and remorse but stood strong. "I agreed to Ixion's demands!"
"What?" Fiend asked, his eyes wide in shock. He dropped his brother as his sickness finally kicked in. The other two siblings watched on in horror as he coughed, sweated, and heaved. "You... dare!!" He shouted at her before reaching for his respirator.
Slang recoiled at the sight of him falling apart in front of them but refused to yield. "Eldest brother!!" She clenched her hands together and moved closer to him. "You... are dying."
Fiend looked down at his health monitor and saw just how dire the situation had become. His heart rate was skyrocketing, and his blood pressure was rising steadily. Yet he didn't care, rushing at her, only to break his arm on the wall beside her. "I will live!!" He ignored his agony. "I will not die!!"
"Don't... do this to yourself..." Slang shook her head at him. "Please stop. Please."
"Shut up!" Fiend screamed as he ripped off his mask and threw it across the room. "I am the crown prince!!" He grabbed her by the shoulders but never hurt her in the same way he would his brother.
"And you need help!!" Slang pushed him away. "That's why I agreed." She leaned into his chest and pleaded. "Please..."
"But..." He gritted his teeth and padded his sister's head. "I can't... make you do this?!"
"I know more than anyone the price I pay!!" Slang screamed at him. "You aren't making me do this?!" She lifted her head and looked at him, deep in the eyes. "I know what that monster wants from me!! I've always known!!" The mare struggled but pushed him away more. "But, our species needs money and trade resources. It needs medicine and food... And it needs you!!" She grabbed him by the face and pulled his head down to her forehead. "You are needed here... I am not."
Fiend felt the tears welling up inside him and let go of her. He staggered back and grabbed his respirator, gasping for air. "Do not think... I take it lightly!!"
"I know..." Slang whispered. "Go ahead and hate me..." She walked over to Sting and picked him up off the ground. "But don't hate him..." She smiled sadly at her younger brother. "He's... been protecting us since we were little."
"Protecting?" Fiend growled. "You call that rapping protective?! This is sick!"
"No..." She cupped Sting's cheek. "He's horrible at it, but he always puts a smile on our faces." She turned to Fiend and reached out. "That's what I want from both of you now." Her voice shook as she continued. "I want you two to smile for me!!"
"Why?" Fiend asked.
"Because... I'll be okay..." Slang answered, her eyes fluttering closed. "After all, what could make a girl happier than to become a bride!!"
******
In present day...
Fiend slowly drifted back awake inside his dozens of respirators. The scene from before had long faded and was replaced by a blackened cave entrance, near the Earth Pony Conglomerate. He couldn't tell how long he had been asleep, only that his strength was still very low.
The first thing that came into view was a freshly beaten pony at his feet, alongside ten other long-dead ponies. Those were attached to his machines. While the beaten pony was still breathing but too weak to move.
The hippogriff rolled his eyes at it and leaned back. He knew the pony wouldn't get very far. Frankly, he wanted to go back to that dream from before. However, his eyes moved around at the sound of footsteps approaching.
Sting entered with another tortured pony, whistling. "Yo, bro?!" He waved at Fiend. "You're finally awake enough to feast." He placed the other pony down and continued. "Come on and take what you can, at least!"
"For your information," Fiend answered in a flat voice, "I have no desire to eat any more souls today."
The hippogriff stallion's face fell. "Why not?! They're good! You need to eat and should!"
"Fine... if it will stop your rapping!!" The older hippogriff growled and reached down. He pressed his hand on the forehead of the nearest pony and a light glowed out. The pony's eyes lit up with new forms of agony as his soul was wrenched out. All it could do was convulse and twisted under Fiend's grip.
"This wouldn't be needed if you didn't lose to Starswirl so badly!!" Sting leaned against the wall and tried to think of a phrase that rhymed with that.
"Neither of us was told..." Fiend grabbed the other pony and stole its soul as well. "That demon, Lord Red, would be with him!!"
"True, but he didn't expect us either!" Sting gave an inner cheer as the words came to him. "Yo, that grey wizard thought he was so cool. But he needed a false pony to be his tool!!"
"I said... stop!!" Fiend threw the wasted corpse at Sting's feet.
"Don't dis the player. You just can't understand my layer..." Sting smiled boldly at him.
Fiend conceded and leaned back into his respirators. "Just get more souls!"
"For sure!" Sting swung some gangster symbols at him, and his older brother just rolled his eyes. He turned away and dropped his rapping voice for only a moment to give one final line before leaving. "You know... Today is Slang's birthday..."
"Hmm," Fiend gave a wicked smiled and turned his attention in the direction of the Giant Blue Hourglass in the distance. "So it is... How ironic?" He leered closer as smoke rose from it and a giant of ash and madness tore through the rubble.
The shadow of the resurrected corpse of the centaur could be seen even from this far away. "A shame... that we aren't there to see her revenge play out again for a second time."
*****
In the distant future... Beyond the reach of Hearth's Warming... just days before Twilight and Starlight got trapped...
Three pegasi flew through the long-dead ruins of a giant blue hourglass. The shattered pieces were now scattered across the land, moss-covered with them. A lone pegasus stood before the broken remains of the hourglass, her eyes glowing like fireflies as she stared into its depths. "So cool!!" Rainbow Dash shouted.
"What?" Quibble Pants asked, looking up at Rainbow Dash as he studied an old scroll they brought with them.
"The hourglass!" Rainbow Dash said excitedly. "It's still here! After all these millennia!!"
"We can see that!" Daring Do commented. "Now will you get down from there?!"
"Never!!" Rainbow Dash bounced around the edge of the giant shattered piece of glass. "Just follow me inside!!" The pegasus asked calmly.
Daring Do rolled her eyes, but obeyed. She followed Rainbow Dash into the Hourglass and inspected every nook and cranny for safety concerns. Last time she trusted Rainbow Dash with a treasure hunt it ended in total failure. This place stunk of problems she would need to rescue them both from. "There has to be something here," she whispered.
"I'm sorry for her recklessness." Quibble Pants flew up beside Daring Do. He was just as worried that his friend might be going too far. "It's dangerous to fly so high, especially when we don't know what lies beneath us!"
"Don't worry! I'll be fine," Rainbow Dash bounced higher than ever before.
"You will not!" Daring Do stomped her foot louder. "Now calm down!!"
"Why should I?" Rainbow Dash asked innocently.
Quibble Pants could only watch in horror as Rainbow Dash continued her climb. "She knows no fear..." The male pegasus shivered into his hands. "I knew I should have just taken my wife's offer for tea!"
Daring Do groaned, watching as Rainbow Dash flew higher and higher. "Damn it, so reckless..."
"Unfortunately..." Quibble Pants agreed. "She never gives up on any mission she takes on, even if it means risking her life!"
"I know..." Daring Do answered so bluntly. "And having her biggest idol and her best friend here is only going to make her push harder."
"But that's what makes her such a good representation of the Element of Loyalty." Quibble Pants couldn't help but giggle.
"More like the embodiment of stupidity." the mare whispered under her breath. "How are we supposed to find anything without her flying into more danger?"
"Easy!" Rainbow Dash screamed out, "Just look for something shiny!" She hit something loud, making them race to her faster.
"Damn it." Daring Do shook her head. "Careful what you are touching--" She stopped at the sight of Rainbow Dash throwing rocks at something within the cloud layer.
The two pegasi flew up to meet Rainbow Dash. She stopped, cheered, and hugged them both tightly. "See? It's perfectly safe up here!"
"She doesn't know what danger means!" Daring Do told Quibble Pants.
"That doesn't matter!!" Rainbow pointed out to the distance. "Look over there!" She picked up another rock and threw it, much to the annoyance of the others. It hit something loud on the other side of the cloud layer.
"What is it?" Quibble Pants questioned.
Daring Do looked where Rainbow Dash was pointing, only to see nothing. She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "Is it a mirage or something?" She could hear the same thing they were hearing but couldn't quite see it.
"No! Look closely!" Rainbow waved her wing over her friend's head.
"There's nothing over there." Daring Do examined what Rainbow Dash was pointing at more carefully.
Annoyed, Rainbow Dash flapped her wings heavily, kicking the air around. Soon enough something finally came into view. It looked like a piece of permafrost. "A piece of ice... That's what you wanted us to see? Those are everywhere."
Rainbow Dash facepalmed and flew closer to it and moved away from more clouds. "I know that! But look bigger... Doesn't it look like a rather strange shape for permafrost?" The two other pegasi leaned back as the shape of a giant blackened claw peered through. It seemed to be fused to the permafrost. Its fingers alone were hundreds of feet in diameter. "There was no way this could be natural."
Daring Do raised an eyebrow and flew closer. Tapping it revealed that it was just as hard as the permafrost, if not harder. Where the ice was cold, this was warm like a fire. She touched the tip of the claw and felt a tingling sensation run through her body. "This isn't permafrost..."
"I know right?!" Rainbow Dash cheered at the discovery and pushed away more clouds. Yet no matter how much she removed there was no sign of a source of ending. It could reach all the way down to the ground, or somewhere too high in the sky for her to reach. "It's so damn big?!?!"
"It seems impossibly big..." Quibble Pants noted the detailing of the arm connected to the claw seemed so real. "What is it?"
"Find of the century!!" Rainbow Dash cheered. "This is worth a fortune!"
"It's worthless until we catalog it." Daring Do pulled out a pickaxe and stabbed into it.
Without warning a loud echo shook around them. It was so strong that it tossed them all into the air. Their eyes widened as the source was coming from the claw itself.
"What was that?!" Quibble Pants yelled.
"I don't know..." Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes and rushed at the pickaxe once the noise calmed. She pulled it out and stabbed back in the same place Daring Do did. Again the same reaction came from the claw, only this time even louder. "Wow..." The mare smiled boldly and smashed the pickaxe in again and again. Each time growing the noise even louder and stronger.
Quibble Pants landed as the sound began to hurt his head. "Stop!!"
"We need proof!!" Rainbow Dash gritted her teeth and pulled back, swinging forward with her hardest hit yet.
Even stranger was the sound didn't repeat this time. Instead, the tip of the pickaxe bent backward and cut her hand. Rainbow Dash screamed in pain and threw the tool to the side.
Daring Do caught it and was perplexed at the strangely bent shape it had now. It was twisted a full ninety degrees yet the wood never tore once. There weren't even cracks on the handle. "How the buck?!"
Quibble Pants rushed over to Rainbow Dash with a bandage only to stop at an even stranger sight. Her blood floated in the air and toward the claw. Each drop vaporized on contact with the surface and the mare winced in pain as if she sensed the destruction of each drop. "What's happening?!" She twisted around in the air. "Why did that hurt so much?!" The mare grimaced at such a small cut.
"Blood magic..." Daring Do's eyes widened and she flew over to Quibble Pants.
"Blood what--" Rainbow Dash was stopped as Daring Do took Quibble Pants's finger and cut it.
"Ouch!" He wanted to know why she did that but her answer was given upon his blood doing the same thing as Rainbow Dash's, with one important difference. It floated to the claw and was absorbed, not destroyed.
Daring Do cut her finger as well and watched her blood flow toward the claw and vaporize. "Thought so..." She grumbled and pulled Rainbow Dash away. "Don't get near it."
"What about Quibble Pants?!" She reached out to her.
"He'll be fine. It doesn't hate his kind!"
"What do you mean by his kind?!" Rainbow Dash pushed her away only to fly back. her wound reacted, filling her body with pain. Yet Quibble Pants could fly right up to it and even touch it with his wound and suffer no pain at all.
"Daring Do?! What is this?!" he questioned.
"Blood Magic Claw... is an ancient form of cursing. When a dark magic user or a light magic user commits a grave sin according to legend a giant claw formed of their blood shall rise."
"What?!" Rainbow Dash reached out to Quibble Pants and touched his shoulder. The stallion finally looked at them as if for the first time.
"Sorry." He apologized and flew back to them.
"Don't be... Your family line must contain light magic or dark magic... Depending on the type of claw." Daring Do pulled out an old map and took the scroll from Quibble Pants. She overlayed them and continued. "As long as your family tree matches the type of magic they were using when they formed this you will be fine..."
"How do you know so much?"
"I don't..." Daring Do answered so bluntly. "This is the first time I've seen one up close. But rumor is there are four others in Equestria that have been recorded." She pointed out the spots. "The ruins of one near an old village just on the other side of the Everfree forest. Another deep within the Celestial ocean... one said to be buried deep beneath... Ponyville." She turned back to the claw in front of them. "Finally, there is one in the far north, on the highest mountain of Equestria. Counting this one makes five within Equestria's borders. But there are dozens outside of Equestria and a few supposedly in the thick blizzards around the Crystal Empire near Yakyakistan."
"Wait, wait, wait?" Rainbow Dash pointed to Ponyville. "I've lived there most of my life. There's no way there's one buried there."
"I know. I've checked nearly every tunnel near there. Started to think they were just legends..." Daring Do rolled up the scrolls and gave back Quibble Pants's copy. "Where did you find this scroll?"
"It was among Discord's old stuff," Quibble Pants pointed out the rim. "According to him, they belonged to an old umbrum friend of his."
Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow at the tag name. "Rex... Umbrum, never heard of such a species."
"Either way, I'll need to have a talk with Discord," Daring Do agreed. "And the sooner the better." She turned to Quibble Pants. "Do you have any idea where he might be?"
"Fluttershy said he was heading to Canterlot." Quibble Pants led them back to camp.
"Okay, we'll head there next." Daring Do nodded and placed down a beacon gem. She stuck it on the side of the giant piece of glass facing the massive claw. "For now, I'll have some pals keep an eye on this site."
"Wait, what?" Rainbow Dash questioned. "You want to leave now?!"
"We can't do much else right now." She placed her arm over Rainbow Dash's shoulder. "Neither of us can get near it."
"Right..." Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes and kept a watchful glare on the claw as they flew back. She grimaced as the clouds covered it once more, unveiling it from all sight.
As the three left, the gem beacon shined on, waiting for help to arrive. It stayed on for several minutes... when without warning an orange hand reached up and crushed it. A white cloaked figure slowly rose up from behind the glass and watched the three pegasi carefully. His crooked horn slipped out of his hood and K shaped mask glowed at them.
Suddenly, he stopped as his hand rose over his face. The hand shook and twisted against his will. He huffed and stopped the glow in his horn. "Fine, they can live."
******