-EQUUS, CANTERLOT CASTLE, THRONE ROOM-
”Ah, it would seem that they’ve destroyed two of our orbs. Unfortunate... But of little consequence.”
“Are you just going to make me stand around here, Ocram?. You’ve sent our two pony allies to The Crystal Empire to enact our plans while I’m stuck here. When do I get to devour their terrarian magic?”, Tirek question’s with sleight impatience.
”You think we’ve forgotten about you?, don’t be soo short sighted, Tirek. An interesting turn of events has occurred and you will be our sword while Blueblood and Cozy Glow shall be our deceivers in the shadows. It is simply not your turn to act yet, however, we do have ways of satisfying your hunger. Follow us.”
Heeding Ocram’s request, Tirek follows the floating entity over to the same destroyed wall as before which allows the two allies to observe the outskirts of Canterlot. Then, the entire landscape shakes violently as a large entity suddenly erupts out of the infected grounds. The entity is revealed to be an absolutely gargantuan worm like abomination. Tirek’s eyes were shot wide open in both awe and, as much as he hated to admit it, fear.
“Looks like you all weren’t exaggerating about how big this thing is. So, this is The Eater Of Worlds... Impressive.”
”The Great Eater has agreed to allow you to feed on a substantial portion of its magic. Step forward, Tirek.”, Ocram then chuckles before the entity continues: “Don’t worry, it won’t bite. Well, you and us at least.”
Tirek was admittedly cautious as he slowly drew near the large monstrosity. The Great Eater lowers itself so that its maw was positioned just before the shattered wall to which Tirek and Ocram were currently positioned. Then, a purple sphere of energy starts to form in between Tirek and the large entity.
”Take it, Tirek. That right there is pure magic from Terraria, courtesy of The Great One.”, Ocram comments.
The centaur’s mouth was practically drooling as he draw near to what he saw as an orb of delicacy. Tirek opens his mouth and starts to devour the sphere upon which his size starts to grow exponentially. He was now three times larger than he was when he fought Twilight Sparkle some time ago and he enjoyed every living second of it. Incidentally, his new size caused the centaurs head to erupt through the throne room’s ceiling.
“Yes!, yeeeeeees!, this is exactly what I wanted!. It is truly glorious!.”, Tirek exclaims as the newly enlarged entity hops down from the Canterlot Castle and lands right next to The Eater Of Worlds, shaking the landscape in the process. Despite his new size, the centaur was still dwarfed by the large worm but it could definitely be argued that he was now the second largest being in Equestria. Tirek turns around and looks towards Ocram, his head now tall enough to look right into the shattered throne room, as he says:
“Simply call me when the time comes and I will happily go forth to crush them all!. Their magic shall soon be devoured as well!”
”That we intend to do, Tirek. You and The Great Eater should go and become more acquainted, you two will crush that pathetic empire when the time comes. We dare say... You are now also an ‘Eater Of Worlds’ in your own way. The magics of a thousand worlds shall be consumed, by you.”
-EQUUS, THE CRYSTAL EMPIRE-
A portion of the army from Ponyville are now marching proudly throughout The Empire as the crowd erupts into cheers and some among them are even tossing roses towards their brave defenders. Young members from each of the species present were running up to various individuals amongst the army and shouting praises of their own. Most notably, there were six individuals who observed the passing force as they say:
“There’s my brother, Garble!”
“Yak is soo proud of yak’s brethren, Yona just sad that she couldn’t help yaks fight monsters.”
“We’re kind of too young to do that. For now, anyway.”
“Oh, well, um, I hope this can end soon so we don’t have to fight at all.”
“Oh yeah, things are going very well... Just because they won one battle doesn’t mean that gross infection is destroyed.”
“This is soo exciting!, I mean, not the whole monsters and stuff but being able to meet everyone!, I love it!”
“Oh golly, they look pretty happy and satisfied. Did they just come back from a war or something?”, A new voice question’s which causes the six entities from before to turn towards the source of the voice. “Oh, where are my manners. My name’s Cozy Glow, wanna be friends?”
“Do I?!, of course!, my name is: Silverstream”
“Yak’s name is: Yona. Yak happy to meet you, tiny pony.”
“Yo!, my name’s Sandbar!”
“Name’s Gallus, happy to meet you, bla bla bla.”
“Oh, um, I’m Ocellus.”
“Name’s Smolder, the future Dragon Lord!”
-THE CRYSTAL EMPIRE CASTLE, DINING ROOM-
Princess Luna now stands before the other representatives, all of which are gathered around a large oval shaped table, as she had gathered them up after they returned from their recent victory in Ponyville. The leaders had reached the castle some time before their army as said force was still marching proudly outside the castle walls. Alongside her was a very particular broken horn unicorn mare: Tempest Shadow.
“We thank you all for coming, dear allies. Please, let us sit so we may begin our meeting.”
[SKRRRRT]
The doors to the dining room opens up as a white unicorn with a golden yellow mane walks into the room and takes his seat right next to Shining Armor, who in turn was sat next to his wife: Princess Cadence.
“My apologies for being late, everyone. I recently saved a filly by the name of Cozy Glow and had to see to her safe return.”, Blue Blood says proudly as he adjusts himself comfortably into his seat.
“Very well, Blue Blood. Now, we hath called you all here to inform thou of some grave concerns. We would like to call forth: Tempest Shadow.”
[CLOP]
[CLOP]
[CLOP]
“Thank you, Princess. Now then, thanks to recent events we are now certain that there lies a traitor among us. The giant floating orbs that were destroyed during our recent victory were strategically placed within famed landmasses. There’s absolutely no way that an infection from another world could know this from the very start. Someone is working with the infection; worse case scenario... There’s more than just one.”
These words causes everyone present to let out a series of reactions which range from surprise to anger:
“What?!, Domihaus doesn’t understand why anyone would want this to happen!” - King Domihaus.
“Yak agree with minotaur King, why traitor want to betray yak and allies for infection?” - Prince Rutherford.
“That is absolutely despicable!, what could they gain from that monstrous corruption?!” - General Seaspray.
“I can order some of my changelings to sneak around The Empire to keep an eye out for suspicious activity.” - King Thorax.
“I agree with the changeling King, let us deploy spies to expose those who are secretly our foes.” - Prince Zaku.
“When we find them, I say we burn them!” - Dragon Lord Ember.
[COUGH]
“You’re speaking my language now, Dragon Lord. These traitors shall pay dearly for this.” - Grandpa Gruff.
Blueblood was honestly shocked by this but hid those feelings well behind a mask of concern as he exclaims:
“I agree too!. Dear auntie, we must reprimand these traitorous fools at once!”
“Cadence and I agree as well. We remember speaking of this before but now that we’ve got proof, we must search amongst our ranks to expose those who plot against us.”, Shining Armor replies as he and Cadence takes on a serious expression.
Luna takes charge once more which prompts Tempest to whisper into her ear:
”If you’ll excuse me, Princess. We’ve got bait to set and a plan is in action.”, Luna nods in response to which Cadence notices and question’s:
“What was that about, auntie?”
“Worry not, dearest niece. Tempest was just informing us that the army outside has started to disperse as they join their loved ones in celebration. Now then, let us continue to converse dear allies!.”
Tempest starts to make her way out of the dining room however she passes by a certain white unicorn who glances towards the passing broken unicorn mare. No one else in the room realized it but Blueblood could sense something radiating off of Tempest. Something that even he was surprised to feel and wondered why he didn’t feel it coming from her before: Sin. The mare was literally reeking of it as he stealthily watches her open the doors to the room and takes her leave as they shut behind her.
Almost an hour passes by and Blueblood was still thinking about the broken mare as he suddenly gets off of his seat and declares:
“I would like to take my leave and start checking on those throughout The Empire. I shall also keep an eye out for any questionable individuals during my excursions. Have a good day, everyone.”, The other leaders nods in response to which prompts the white unicorn to walk to the exit, open the doors, and takes his leave while also closing the door behind him.
Thanks to his gifts from Ocram, Blueblood was able to literally follow the trail of Tempest’s sin as he looks around and makes sure that no one else was present. The trail took him down various hallways and even through the main entrance as he exits the castle and starts to walk down the flight of stairs. Once he was on ground level, the trail practically beckoned him to walk towards the city of The Crystal Empire.
The streets were still filled with celebrations as various members of the army were still celebrating their recent victory in Ponyville. Blueblood simply ignores it all and continues to follow the trail of sin as he says internally:
-Disgusting peasants.-
Now, after walking down the crystalline streets of The Empire for a few more minutes, the trail suddenly turns into a dark alley to which Blueblood looks around one more time before entering. As he continues to make his way through the dark alley, the white unicorn started to pick up faint voices which causes him to watch his footing as he stealthily draws near the voices.
“Our time to take over is soon at hand, that foolish Princess Luna seriously thinks that I’ve sworn allegiance to her. Heh, as if... Long live The Storm King.”, Tempest declares.
“You tell em’ Tempest, those Princesses will pay for what they did to him.”, Grubber replies as he eats a piece of cake.
“I’ll say. Also, y’all better keep your side of the bargain and give me my pony slaves to sell in Kludge Town. I messed up when I tried to sell Rarity and the others but I learned from my past mistakes. This time, these ponies won’t escape me again.”, Capper comments.
“Speaking of which, are you able to aide me in poisoning King Thorax, cat?. I assume you procured the poison you mentioned before?”
“Of course I did my changeling friend. You’ll get your place as the Queen Of The Changelings once more by the end of the week.”, Capper replies which causes Chrysalis to grin devilishly.
“Thanks to a spell I learned from Starlight, you and I can drain the magic from all the unicorns of the Empire, Sunset Shimmer.”
“Very good, Trixie. I can’t wait to overpower and destroy Twilight’s precious brother. Oh!, maybe I could drag her niece back to my world and raise her up to be a true Princess like me... and not the friendly kind.”
“And I shall continue to drive The Pillars apart so that I may take their powers for myself. The Pony Of Shadows shall rise again!, the darkness shall not be stopped!”, Stygian exclaims.
As the group continues to converse of their scheming, Blueblood’s mouth was practically drooling from the amount of sin that was radiating from the group as he hid around the corner. Were it anyone else, they’d without a doubt report this gathering of beings who were clearly up to no good. But, he absolutely needed to get involved as he reveals himself and says:
“Perhaps I can help you all.”
These words causes everyone present to stop instantly and turn towards the source of the new voice: Blueblood. Everyone simply stares at him before Chrysalis exclaims:
“Capture him!, he’ll expose us all!”
“Now, now, there’s no need for that.”, Blueblood replies which causes everyone else present to look at him suspiciously.
“How do we know that we can trust you?, you could easily just turn us in.”, Sunset Shimmer question’s.
“Simple... Because I too have associates who are working against The Empire and it would be in our best interest to unite together as one. The sins I’m sensing from you all practically empowers me as we speak to which I ask: Would you all like to join The Corruption?, I have connections with the one who's in charge.”
Everyone plays his words into their minds to which Tempest is the first to recover and says in response:
“You’re saying that you can get us in contact with that infection’s leader?, I didn’t even know it had one.”
“Indeed, Lord Ocram would be ecstatic to see such amazing sources of sin.”
Tempest looks back to her allies as they all look at each other, then back to her, and nods their heads in unison to which the broken unicorn says:
“Well then, Prince Blueblood I believe it is?”
“For now... But soon everyone shall refer to me as the God-King. Since you had no way of knowing I’ll allow that to slide.”
“Very well, God-King Blueblood. Take us to this: Lord Ocram.”
Blueblood nods in response as he grins mischievously and conjures a portal which, upon Tempest and her allies inspection, leads to The Corruption Biome. Tempest allows him to enter first as she then says internally:
-Hook, line, and sinker. Got you, motherbucker.-
As the group disappears into the portal which closes and dissipates behind them, a shadowy figure moves forward as a certain dark alicorn manifests herself and comments:
“Thou disappoints us, Blueblood. Celly loved thou as if ye were thy own child and thou dares to deceive the world she loved. When the time comes and we can end this charade... we shall personally collect thy head. Traitor.”