//------------------------------// // Episode 162: Descent // Story: Equestria Girls: Friendship Souls // by thatguyvex //------------------------------// Episode 162: Descent Opening conduits between realities was no task to undertake lightly. Even the smallest opening, through which one could only project one’s mind and senses, was beyond the capabilities of the vast majority of mortal mages. Charybdis, for all of her immense knowledge, skill, and might would not be able to accomplish the feat without specific factors playing in her favor. One was that in her long and painstaking research into the “magic” of the soul she’d learned ways to harness incredible amounts of energy by using the soul as a source of power. This was not an overnight development, but rather something she’d gradually achieved over a lifetime far longer than any normal individual could live. Indeed her long lifespan partially stemmed from the ability to siphon lifeforce off of other souls, when need be. The soul was an incredible thing, even the most simple of which housed mind bending quantities of potential.  Centuries of study and even she couldn’t fully describe what a soul was. A spark of infinite possibility whose shape and quality defied quantification, yet was the undeniable source of all that a thing was or could be. Indeed, souls were not restricted to just “living” things, but all matter in reality had something akin to a soul. Charybdis, even before getting halfway through her teenage years, had become obsessed with studying them, despite the taboo nature of the subject among her magically inclined peers. She pitied those who stunted their magical studies by adhering to such restrictive dogma. Her mother had been especially harsh, though that had never dampened Charybdis’ love for her. Well, not by much at any rate. If Charybdis dwelt upon any one regret it was that she hadn’t learned enough of soul magic to preserve her mother and Scylla’s souls before their deaths. They were lost to her into whatever mire the “Cycle” represented, a fate Charybdis had no intention of joining in, nor allowing any of her people fall to. Except that bastard Soul Reaper, Flash Sentry, had already robbed her of some of them. He’d pay, soon enough, but her focus needed to be on her work. While utilizing tiny quantities of siphoned soul energy from the vast stores of souls preserved within the glyphs she’d engraved in Bastion Gnosis, she still had to work hard to maintain control of the ritual’s initial stages. Her incredible mass floated above the spherical remains of the ancient alicorn Bastion, the bottom of the crushingly deep chasm covered in a flickering haze of red from countless hundreds of magic glyphs that glowed upon the huge, bronze sphere’s surface. Around the sphere, spaced out at roughly fifty foot intervals, so that they formed the bulwark of a large circle, were dozens of sahuagin shaman. Beside each shaman were shrine bearers, younger shamans in training whose task it was to carry bloodshrines that the shamans would wield as amplifiers for the ritual. Each shrine was an edifice of fused bone, coral, and carved stone to resemble the shape of a cauldron clutched in an intertwining of tentacles. The shaman warbled ancient chants that Charybdis herself had passed down to them as they cut their arms and palms. Crimson blood floated in the darkness, only to be sucked up greedily by the enchanted shrines, the cauldrons pooling the blood despite the water around it. Magic thick, dark, and potent coiled from the shrines, slowly forming arcane glyphs to empower Charybdis’ ritual. Even this was not enough to truly rip open a permanent gateway to the world of the humans. No, Charybdis still had other factors she had to rely upon. Aside from the raw power she intended to draw forth, the location was actually important. If she could have she would have done this ritual almost anywhere else, if only because a ritual of this magnitude, if by chance it went awry in the wrong manner, would destroy just about everything around it. So doing it right on top of her people’s main settlement was not something she would have done unless the location itself was a necessity, which unfortunately it was.  One cannot open portals to other worlds unless the location already had a weakness in the barrier that separated those worlds. Granted only one such location was needed, so the portal could be opened up anywhere on the target world, but Charybdis had to do the ritual here, above Bastion Gnosis, for the old alicorn fortress of magic study itself had been used for interdimensional portal research. As a result everything around it was spatially unstable. Charybdis had only discovered this a fair amount of time after having found the sahuagin and taken over as their “Deep Mistress”. Opportunities had followed not long after as she experimented and worked out ways to project her mind and magic to other realms. It wasn’t even the human world she’d first contacted. No, she’d found herself making deals and allies before that, in a realm far more closely connected to Equestria. The Beast Realm. That had been a productive few decades, and from her allies there she’d refined her understanding of soul magic, for the denizens of the Beast Realm had similar arts and a far more innate capacity for intermixing the power of souls and magic. It was during that time she’d learned of the human world and its conflicts, but also came to understand that world had a wealth of possibilities for her and her sahuagin, given how much more rich in raw spirit energy that world was. In that world there was no need to fear death. Indeed she’d only become stronger through it. And her sahuagin would have a fresh start in an ocean where they’d have no competition. As it happened, her “friends” in the Beast Realm were perfectly happy to oblige her plans, as long as she helped them with theirs. As it turned out, the Beast Realm Tribes had a brewing storm of their own, and Charybdis’ brand of magic was just what her allies there needed to stir up their own brand of trouble.  It was that same mentality that eventually led her to discovering and making a pact with Gaia Everfree, setting in motion a plan that was only now reaching its fruitful climax.  Assuming a certain damned Princess and her entourage of wrecking ball friends didn’t manage to ruin it all. She kept a firm grim on the emotions broiling inside her, refusing to let her attention be drawn from the working of the ritual. Already above her leviathan form strands of power streamed out of her in a myriad of dark colors shot through with elements of raw light. A circle of energy nearly two hundred meters in circumference took shape from her magic, and a single point of light emerged at the dark center of that circle.  Prior to this she’d already established a mental connection to her waiting servant, one of the few she considered a “friend”. A Kraken, perhaps the last of his kind in Equestria, she had saved him from the captivity of Aqualania’s zoo, and ever since then Lusca had been her most loyal ally. It was through Lusca and researching his origins that she’d learned of portals connecting Equestria to the Beast Realm in the first place, as that had been his original home before magical mishap had landed him as a child in what the Beast Realm referred to as “Asgard”.  Now Lusca acted as her conduit in the human world, “Midgard”, helping her channel soul energy to him and then onward to the waiting Gaia Everfree. In exchange, Gaia was pouring magic back towards Lusca, then straight to Charybdis. Magic generated by the unique geodes that had been discovered in that world. Even now, Charybdis started to feel a sudden and intense high from the influx of magic the ritual of exchange was generating. Oh, yes. Yes! This is more than enough power to finish opening the portal. I just need a little more time, and everything will be complete on this end, despite that damned Princess’ meddling.  She felt Lusca’s concern shot through her mind. He was not a being that talked with words often, instead preferring to communicate with raw feeling, and she could sense his worry for her through their link. He wanted to know what could possibly be meddling in her affairs, as he was incredulous who might challenge her power. Of course he had a somewhat naïve view of the world, given she was really his only friend and he tended to see her much as her sahuagin did, even if he didn’t outright worship her the way they did.  She sent back a confident and calming sensation to him as her thoughts spoke to his mind through the link between worlds. It’s no matter. Just a little interference from the surface. They won’t make it in time to stop my coming, although it’s irritating they found my sister’s old armory. You just maintain the ritual circle. We will need it again, soon enough. That much was true. She’d want the ritual circle in the human world maintained beyond the initial opening of the portal, for she’d need to make it permanent once she was through, and establish a new base of operations for her sahuagin followers in the area. Fully transitioning her people to their new environment would take several weeks, at least, and she didn’t intend to fully abandon Equestria once the portal was permanently open. After all, her ultimate goal was to spend however many centuries it would take to probe the secrets of the human world’s spirit energy and souls, and find a way to replicate that realm’s cycle of reincarnation to replace the Cycle that existed in Equestria. Everything else, including trying to obtain the power of the Eye of the Sea to assume Domare’s power, were merely steps towards that final objective.  And she was so close to completing two of those big steps; opening a permanent portal to the human world, and turning herself into an artificial Inheritor. For much to her rancor, neither she nor Scylla had been Inheritors, but through her research she’d developed a theory on how one might artificially take the place of an Inheritor, as long as one had a piece of an Inheritor’s soul to work with. How fortuitous it had been, what good fortune, perhaps even destiny, that so long ago a certain rare siren had found her way to Charybdis’ territory, desperately seeking power to fulfill ambitions of her own. Adagio Dazzle had been all too willing to pay the “small” price of a fragment of her soul for a little instruction on how to expand her own magical abilities, and given Charybdis’ exhaustive depths of arcane knowledge it’d been easy to teach the young siren how to make better use of her siren songs and her gem. The fact that Charybdis had already been researching the siren race as the species she most considered likely to have Inheritors to Domare, given the origins of the sirens could be directly traced to the supposed “goddess” had been coincidental, but in time she’d likely had sought out Adagio and her sisters regardless. Domare had not been an alicorn, but the alicorn’s Inheritor project had involved any being of sufficient magical power that had absorbed the power of worship at the time, including spirits, elemental entities, potent monsters, even dragons. Any being that had been worshiped and hence had their magic enhanced by that faith had been forced to give it up, at least for a time.  Charybdis had little care for the notion of the alicorns trying to repair the Cycle, as she intended to eventually do away with it anyway, but that was a matter for later. Now she just needed to make this ritual work. The transfer of power between her and Gaia was going smoothly, but Gaia was running into issues of her own, and with Princess Twilight bearing down on Charybdis’ home it was going to be down to the wire. But Charybdis was fine with that. Let the Princess come. Let them all come. Down to the very depths of the Abyss, where Charybdis would happily show them all the “hospitality” they deserved.  ---------- For an adrenaline junkie like Rainbow Dash, the swift descent straight down into the pitch black ocean while riding atop the deck of the Treasury was right up her alley. Wavecrest’s transformative magic struck at just the right time to adapt her and everypony else on deck back into a seapony form just as the waters closed over them. Fortunately the deck’s rails were more than strong enough anchor points for everypony to latch onto as the ship made its quick dive, and Rainbow felt the ocean’s freezing temperature even through the protective charms Twilight had woven over them just minutes earlier. “Ya be careful, ya hear me Dash?” said Applejack, who was holding onto the railing right behind Rainbow. Feeling a flush of mixed feelings at her friend’s word, she looked over her shoulder at Applejack and put on her best smile of beaming confidence. “Stop worrying, AJ. Not like I took the hard job in the plan.” Applejack’s emerald eyes flinched at those words, and Dash felt a stab of guilt. Maybe she ought not make light of things, given how much Applejack was obviously concerned, but a part of Rainbow Dash felt sure this was partially just due to Applejack still having trouble with those alicorn memories. A heated rush touched Dash’s cheeks as she quickly looked away from Applejack and focused ahead, remembering clearly that just after the meeting where they’d hammered out their plan of action, something awkward had happened... ---------- Everypony had left to go take care of their own preparations, with Rainbow Dash trotting down one of the ship corridors with light steps towards her quarters to grab a quick nap before it’d be showtime. However she heard heavy hoof steps behind her and saw Applejack coming up fast with a face half stormy with ire and half torn by worry. “Why’d ya do that, Dash?” “Do what?” she replied, although she knew full well what Applejack meant, “I just volunteered to be the decoy is all.” “Right over me doin’ the same!” Applejack said in a huff, near getting snout to snout, so that Rainbow Dash couldn’t readily see past her friend’s arresting glare, “In fact I spoke up first! Then ya go n’ convince Twilight yer the one fer the job.” “Uh, AJ, I totally am. Look you’re tough and all, but the decoy needs speed more than strength, and there’s nothing and nopony faster than me.” “Ain’t gonna do as much good underwater slowin’ ya down, but that ain’t my point. I don’t like ya takin’ on the hardest part o’ this without even thinkin’ o’ lettin’ another do it. Yer always like that, an’ you don’t got ta be.” Something about Applejack’s words were having a strange effect on Rainbow, interposing thoughts and feelings over her mind like a curtain being drawn over a window. Her stance shifted, leaning forward, almost intimate as even her voice changed slightly to a lower tone, “This is who I am. First into battle, last out. You’ve always known that, Althea.” It was as if the words just sort of appeared out of her throat without thinking about them, and in turn Applejack also stiffened to an altogether different yet vaguely similar expression. She leaned in and put her head against Rainbow Dash’s own forehead, grabbing her with a hoof and pulling her close into a hard embrace. Her voice lost its accent entirely. “I know that, damn you Tachys, but I’m no swooning maiden waiting for you to return from battle. I’m there beside you, and just want you to stop taking things on by yourself.” For a moment it was as if Rainbow Dash wasn’t even seeing Applejack, or even herself, but instead was looking upon a golden alicorn mare whose eyes drew him (him!?) in like the very pull of gravity itself. He hated causing her worry, but in battle there were some tasks he was better suited for than she was, and that meant they couldn’t always fight shoulder to shoulder. That didn’t mean he didn’t love her any less or wouldn’t happily fight by her side against any foe, but... “Althea,” he held her face with a hoof, relishing the warmth there, “As long as we share a battlefield, we’ll both be stronger for knowing who we’re fighting for, even if our fights take us apart temporarily. I won’t throw my life away pointlessly, you have my word.” “I... trust you,” she said, moving closer, lips near touching his. Until Rainbow Dash blinked and realized that she and Applejack had just gotten caught up in the memories of their past lives, and she near threw herself up into the ceiling while jerking back from her friend. She bonked her head on the ceiling and dropped like a lead weight on top of Applejack, who just as confused and dazed was unable to dodge and the pair ended up in a heap. “G-guh! What in tarnation!?” Applejack rubbed at her head and tried to get up, only to get tangled in Rainbow Dash’s wings and after a second of flailing the pair ended up with Applejack on top, and Rainbow Dash blinking and blushing furiously on bottom. “Uhhh, whoa, um... okay, AJ, that was... not at all what I meant to say.” “Umm... yeah, me too, err...I’m gonna just step back offa ya, all slow an’ platonic like.” Very carefully the pair disentangle themselves from their physical predicament and then spent a full minute standing awkwardly a good few paces back from each other. There were a few sputtered attempts at restarting the conversation, until both of them just looked at each other and said near simultaneously. “Pretend this never happened?” “Yeah, never happened.” ---------- It wasn’t exactly the kind of thing that one needed clogging up one’s mind when rushing headlong into a life or death battle against an army of violent fish people and their crazy wannabe goddess. Rainbow Dash didn’t even know what to make of her feelings right now, and it was beyond annoying to have that Tachys guy’s memories making her doubt everything going on in her own head. It wasn’t like she wasn’t fond of Applejack, but the whole romance thing was about as far from Rainbow Dash’s mind as anything could be, most days. Last thing she needed were bizzaro alicorn memories clouding her judgment. She had to figure Applejack felt the same way, and that all that near-kissing stuff was all just Althea’s doing. Probably. Right? Maybe? Yeesh, I sure hope we get to the sahuagin death fortress soon, just so I have something else to focus on. ---------- Twilight went over the plan again in her head, despite the fact that it was hardly a complicated one. With the Treasury descending at full speed, they’d reach the edge of the Abyss’ trench system in less than ten minutes.  Once there, they’d begin following a path described by Ulgriv as the most general route towards Rift Mouth, the sahaugin’s primary settlement. There were other settlements dotted here and there along the various trench passages, but all of them were just tiny villages compared to Rift Mouth, which was the sahaugin’s only genuine “city”, such as it was. While there were several potential routes the Treasury could take to get close to the city, the only ones large enough for the ship to fit through were all defended by fortresses. Rather than try to select a passage that might take the sahuagin off guard, the idea was to head straight for the widest route, the largest passage, and consequently the biggest of the fortresses. However, just prior to reaching it, the plan was for Twilight and a select team to teleport to a different passage, one of the much smaller trenches that the Treasury couldn’t fit through, and hence would be much less likely to be guarded. Normally such a teleport would be impossible without familiarity with the location, but with Ulgriv’s permission Starlight Glimmer used magic to extract the young sahaugin’s memories of the trenches. Having spent his lifetime hunting and gathering resources for his kin in these very trenches, he knew them quite well. Starlight couldn’t transfer these memories to Twilight, but she could enact the teleport herself, selecting those who went and excluding herself from it if need be. The idea was that Twilight, Fluttershy, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Applejack, and Flash Sentry would teleport to the smaller passage and sneak into Rift Mouth to confront Charybdis. Meanwhile Rainbow Dash, with Starlight and Tempest’s help alongside Trixie, would make it appear like the full group was still on the Treasury as it make a fake attack upon the fortress guarding Rift Mouth. With Admiral Seaspray at the helm, Aria and Sonata on weapons, Grubber handling the ship’s sensors, and Wavecrest monitoring the engine room, the Treasury should be able to fight at full capacity even with most of the rest of the crew in action elsewhere.  Rainbow Dash volunteered to be the main distraction as at least one Inheritor who could transform would be needed to make everything seem authentic. Starlight and Tempest would add magical support, while Trixie’s job would be to generate illusions of Twilight and her other friends to complete the deception.  Ideally the sahuagin could be led away and distracted by the Treasury for a time, then when Twilight confirmed Charybdis’ location, Starlight could use a gem that she and Twilight had worked together to enchant as a locator beacon to teleport the rest of the team there. Admiral Seaspray would continue to lead the Treasury in keeping the sahuagin distracted, while Twilight and her fully assembled party would then do battle with, and hopefully defeat, Charybdis. It was a good plan in Twilight’s mind. She’d gone over it again and again, trying to figure out if there was any flaw she was missing. She knew they weren’t going to get a second chance at this. Things had worked the first time. Try as she might, she couldn’t think of any ways to improve upon the plan, and since her friends all agreed to it she had to accept that this was the best shot they had. She just wished she felt more confident. Oh, she was eager to confront Charybdis face to face, and with the power of the Relics she and her friends were now adjusting to, Twilight knew they were as prepared for this as they could be. Any concern she had stemmed simply from understanding that this was just one step on what was likely to be a much longer, harder road of change for her whole world, not just herself. Twilight, as ever, hoped she was up to the challenge. After a few more minutes of rapid descent Twilight felt the Treasury start to level out. She felt the water currents slow and she was able to relax her grip on the deck railing slightly. She was at the very head of the deck, staring ahead along the ship’s bow into the darkness. The emptiness of the deep ocean slowly gave way to the shape of an uneven and expansive ocean floor. Sharp, jutting ridges formed the edges of dozens of intersecting trenches, as if the bottom of the sea had been carved and split by massive blades. Twilight could see the darting shadows of underwater beasts sailing amid the abyssal void, and sucked in a breath as a bulbous fish near a third the size of the Treasury swam by, flanked by schools of sharks. The creatures didn’t seem to take much notice of the ship as it continued to glide down, and Twilight wondered if Charybdis might have larger creatures like the poor, mutated Terror Beast waiting in the trenches below.  Ulgriv’s information suggested that Terror Beasts of that size were rare, and that more likely the fortress the sahaugin would make their stand at would have groups of smaller but still quite deadly sea monsters to aid the sahaugin in battle. She’d have to trust in Rainbow Dash and the others who’d stay behind to manage on their own for a time, even against such heavy numerical odds.  Deeper still the Treasury flowed out over the entrance of one of the larger trench branches, where the rough cliffs of submerged stone left a wide area that the ship could have easily fit in length-wise three times over. Now fully parallel to the trench’s surface, the vessel began to descend without dipping its nose, and in seconds they were enveloped on all sides by the stone cliffs. Moving forward now as it continued to go lower, the Treasury kicked on its external lights, stabbing beams into the murk. They weren’t trying for stealth, after all. They wanted the sahuagin to know they were coming this way. In all likelihood they’d already been spotted by scouts who’d simply remained hidden around the trench surface area. Twilight would be shocked if both the sahuagin, including Morgawr, weren't going to be well aware of their position soon.  With a deep breath, she began channeling her magic into a long range detection spell. Ulgriv may have given them a route to use, but she wanted to make sure she could monitor the build up of magic in the distance that was no doubt Charybdis’ gradually building ritual. As her eyes gleamed with purple light, Twilight could all but see in the vast darkness ahead an unnatural light that would only appear to her eyes. The magic that Charybdis was making use of felt as if it was filling the water with an unhealthy resonance, and to Twilight’s senses it was like feeling a distant but ever increasingly warm flame, but one that made her hide itch and crawl. Beside her, Flash Sentry wore a sour look, “I feel it too.” “Soul magic,” Twilight said, “I hope she isn’t actually sacrificing anypony.” “We know the seaponies lost some people to raids. If they were taken here...” Flash left the rest unsaid, which Twilight was grateful for. She didn’t want to think of what condition any seapony prisoners might be in at the sahaugin’s home city. Much as she might carry some sympathy for the sahaugin’s situation, that did nothing to make her dismiss the horrors they were capable of or what they could do to their prisoners.  “Let’s hope that once we defeat Charybdis, the sahaugin will be too shocked to do much resisting once we free any slaves or other prisoners we find,” Twilight replied simply, although she knew what she proposed was in no way simple. Much as they could plan for getting to Charybdis, and much as she also felt like they had a fair shot at beating her, the question of what came after was a whole different matter. They’d have to find a way to escape without the sahuagin overwhelming them, free anypony they could find, hopefully with the Treasury having enough room to fit any and all escapees. Then...? Well in some ways it would be a question for much later. Ideally Wavecrest, upon returning to her people, might be able to lead a movement to try and begin some kind of reconciliation with the sahuagin, but given the sheer amount of bad blood between the two species it could be generations of work to even get them on neutral terms with each other. And that was assuming the sahuagin didn’t just entirely implode as a culture with Charybdis’ defeat, or go on some kind of war of revenge. Much as Twilight wanted this to be a clean, simple victory, she somehow doubted it’d be that straightforward. Today was going to have consequences for a lot of lives, one way or another.  The chasm ahead started to bend and turn, with branches splitting off seemingly at random. Admiral Seaspray had a precise map drawn from Ulgriv’s memory to work with, so the Treasury began a smooth process of graceful turns through the craggy labyrinth. For a time, all seemed eerily quiet, almost peaceful. However the bitter cold and dead, sharp rock walls around them was a reminder of where they were. Twilight saw nothing to indicate that the Abyss was hospitable. It was not without signs of life, but this was no great reef or lush aquatic paradise. To live in a place like this was likely a daily struggle, hunting for food amid creatures who could hunt right back with deadly effectiveness. Sharks, giant squid, great eels, the very kind of beasts the sahuagin rode were in evidence, and were likely the main source of food. No doubt sahuagin communities had to fight hard for their daily meat, while finding what warmth they could amid underwater caves in this freezing environment.  “I can’t imagine living here, surrounded by nothing but cold and darkness,” said Fluttershy. “Gotta hand it to Ulgy and his folks, they kinda make they best they got out of a raw deal,” Pinkie Pie said, “Even the rock farm felt a bit more cheery than this place.” “I truly do not know if they’d been allowed to thrive in more bountiful waters if the sahuagin wouldn’t still be a deadly threat,” Wavecrest admitted, her gaze shifting around their environs with narrow unease. She had insisted on remaining on deck until the ship actually engaged the sahuagin, wanting to see the Abyss with her own eyes before going to the engine room. “Allowed to grow into greater numbers and hold more territory, mayhap they’d have swept over all the oceans.” “Little late to be questioning things now,” Tempest Shadow said with a bitter note, “Right or wrong, you bottled the murderous fish folk down here, and even if we win this you’re still going to have to deal with them.” “Hmm...” Wavecrest didn’t so much reply as grunt in a contemplative manner. At least she wasn’t dismissing the point out of hoof, but Twilight did wonder what the seapony was thinking. Wavecrest had come with them with the clear goal of aiding her people by uncovering Aqualania’s secrets and finding Domare’s Relic. Once that was in her grasp, what came after?  “Wavecrest,” she said, “Whatever happens, I can at least promise you that you and your people will have aid. Since we’re here as representatives of Equestria, we’re responsible for what happens today, so we’re not about to abandon the seaponies to clean up the mess alone once all is said and done.” “I appreciate that, Princess,” Wavecrest said with a deep bow of her head, “For now I cannot let my mind get mired in tomorrow. Not until we cast the shadow that this Charybdis out of the Abyss.” “Right, focus on not dyin’ an’ all,” Applejack said, “Worry ‘bout the rest later.” “Speaking of not dying, I’m sensing something fishy coming our way!” Pinkie Pie shouted, her back left leg twitching with a tremor that then went on to a strange swirly motion in her tail. “Lots of fishies!” Before Twilight could inquire as to what precisely Pinkie meant, she saw the gloom ahead ripple with the motion of scores of shadows. These shadows then resolved into the shapes of what appeared to be a school of darting barracuda, if barracuda were the size of wagons and had teeth larger than most daggers. The school of predatory fish rushed the Treasury's deck, but fortunately they bounced off the flashing light of the vessel's protective shielding. The fish swarmed to either side, smashing rows of teeth into the transparent field of magical protection, but to no avail. Yet any relief Twilight felt was momentarily halted as an even larger shape appeared around a side passage of the trench, this time flailing out eight wide, barbed tentacles. The octopus wasn’t as large as a Kraken, but it certainly had an impressive mass of dark, rubbery skin covered in odd nodules like giant barnacles. While the shield of the Treasury still flared brightly to protect the ship as the giant tentacles of the octopus tried to wrap around the ship, the vessel shuddered from the impact and was nearly pushed into the opposite side wall of the trench. “Looks like our host has sent a welcoming party for her guests,” Rarity said.  “Ya sure this ain’t just the local wildlife chekin’ us out?” Applejack said back, holding onto her stetson as the ship rumbled from another impact from the octopus. It was trying doggedly to try and keep its tentacle latched to the magical barrier, but even as it reached its limbs around the spherical shell of magic, the turrets of the Treasury went into action. Stabbing lances of light shot forth and boiled the water around them, penetrating the giant cephalopod's rubbery flesh. A shrill cry rocked the trench as the octopus peeled off of them and fell behind the Treasury as the ship made a sharp turn down another trench passage. Admiral Seaspray’s voice spoke over the external communication system. “Just hang on, ladies. Our siren sisters seem quite able to handle the cannon controls, and I’ll not be allowing us to be delayed in delivering you to your dance with destiny! On my word as an officer of Queen Novo’s Navy!” “Heh, he sounds like he’s having the time of his life,” Rainbow Dash chuckled. “I suppose things must have been quite peaceful before the current troubles,” Fluttershy said with a hint of envy in her voice, “Oh my, here come more.” Ahead the trench chasm opened up a little wider, and it was as if the very walls crawled with all manner of deadly sea-life. Twilight quickly understood that there was no way this many native inhabitants of the Abyssal trenches could be so suddenly in their way, so surmised this had to have been Charybdis’ doing. A delaying tactic, to try and make them waste more time in reaching her. Well, if that had been the intention, it was possible Charybdis had underestimated the Treasury. Even as more monstrous underwater beasts glided at the ship from all sides, ranging from horrid crustaceans to twisted eels and everything else in between, the ship’s magical cannons blazed a white hot trail through the horde. Anything that got close found that jaws or pincers were inadequate to the task of penetrating the vessel’s magical shields. At least for now. While this teeming mass of sea creatures might not stop them, or even slow them down much, it was likely going to drain some of the ship’s energy reserves for the real fight to come. Yet there was no choice but to continue forward, until they were in range to enact the teleportation. By Twilight’s estimate they had to at least endure an hour of navigating these trenches before they’d get to the location of the fortress, at which point the real battle would begin. ---------- Charybdis could feel the bloodlust of the sea monsters she’d summoned to form a perimeter guard around the furthest out trenches of the Abyss. No doubt the damnable ship that her sister had built and that Twilight and her friends had raised from the armory was at that very moment slicing a bloody path through those creatures. Charybdis knew that no ocean beast short of another one like had been forged from the sperm whale would do much to slow the Treasury down. While she could have invested some magic into making another Terror Beast, or assigned some shamans to do so, that would have taken power and shamans away from enacting the portal ritual. It simply made more sense to keep the ritual going rather than divert resources that would only slow the ritual’s completion. Besides, the Princess and her band of Inheritors still needed to break through the fortress guarding the entrance to Rift Mouth, and although she was aware her champions could not hope to win a battle against full fledged Inheritors, she had some confidence that they could be slowed down. As long as Charybdis could open the portal, secure it’s permanency, and enter into the human world, then victory would be all but secured. Better still if she could get her limbs on Aria and Sonata in the process. While the ritual to open the portal was important, it was just as important to secure the influx of soul energy from Gaia Everfree so that, once she had a piece of the souls from Adagio’s sisters then she could also take hold of some Inheritor power of her own.  On that note, she hadn’t simply sent that host of sea monsters after her sister’s toy boat for the fun of it. She could project her mind more easily at a distance as long as she had a medium to work with, like the Kraken in the human world. The Abyss’ fauna acted as ideal conduits, and so she could observe the Treasury directly without any real loss of focus on the continually building magical energies of the portal ritual. She could see the ship now, in all its gaudy yet admittedly impressive glory. It cruised with remarkable maneuverability through the trench’s many winding paths, the brilliant light of its magical cannons ripping through the swarms of creatures that surrounded it.  Charybdis ignored the carnage and instead focused on the ship itself, on its occupants. She could sense Twilight and her companions, like potent torches in the darkness. She sensed that Twilight, too, was using magical senses to keep a lock on Charybdis’ location. No doubt the alicorn was keenly focused on reaching her at the fastest possible speed. The fact the ship could navigate the trenches so nimbly and with confidence told Charybdis that they had gained knowledge of just where to go. Not surprising, given Charybdis was well aware they’d taken a sahuagin prisoner. The poor lad must have either given up information or had it torn from his mind. Charybdis did not know Ulgriv on a personal level, yet she was aware in a peripheral sense of any sahuagin whose faithful prayers burned strongly enough to actually reach her as a form of empowerment. It was part of the reciprocal manner in which her soul magic allowed her to empower shamans and champions alike. The shaman she could teach much more easily the stronger their worship was, and champions could gain greater physical might simply through faith that allowed for more potent engraving of the ritual markings she used to invest magic into her chosen.  This same connection worked to a degree, even with common warriors who lacked ritual markings or a shaman’s training. She couldn’t fully empower such a sahuagin, but touching their mind was not difficult. At least not normally. She could sense Ulgriv, but when she sought to touch his mind, she encountered resistance. With a hiss she noticed that the room he was locked in was surrounded by warding enchantments. Potent ones, created by both seapony magic and alicorn magic. So, Wavecrest and Twilight both had thought of the possibility that she might try and reach Ulgriv’s mind? She admired their foresight, even as she was irritated by it. But perhaps they had underestimated her, and the power influx she would gain from the magic pouring in from Gaia Everfree? Ever so cautiously, as to not alert the wards’ defenses, Charybdis started to probe them for weaknesses. If she could get in contact with Ulgriv’s mind, then her opponents were in for a nasty surprise. ---------- It was with the distant warble of underwater thunder that the Treasury broke out of the relatively narrow trench passage it was coursing through like a titanic, bronze whale, and entered into a vaguely shaped long oval canyon area. Slightly inclined, jagged rock walls spread out around the ship and led on into the wider trench canyon for at least five hundred meters, terminating in another rock wall. However upon this wall was the mouth of a truly gigantic cavern mouth, the rough hewn stalactites and stalagmites that rowed the entrance giving the cavern the appearance of a monolithic maw.  At the base of this cavern was a series of tall, carved spires, interested by crossways and walls of stone, creating an almost web-like appearance. This, Twilight knew, was the fortress that guarded the tunnel that led directly to Rift Mouth. Around the fortress itself she could just barely make out the faint specks of shadow that showed hundreds of sahuagin were present, possibly thousands, it was difficult to count as the distant shapes darted amid the cover of the fortress spires. The thunder originated from the Treasury's cannons as they finished dispatching a ten ton, thirty foot long lobster monstrosity that had been trying to pound its way through the top shield. As it’s shell was broiled by spears of magical light, the beast fell away, nearly the last of the teeming horde that had assaulted their journey to this point. A bare hoof full of sharks, smaller squid, and numerous far stranger aquatic creatures still dogged the ship’s wake, but they were cautious now, wary of the vessel’s mighty array of magic defenses. “We’re here girls,” she said, then spoke via a spell to communicate directly with specific individuals, “Trixie, be ready with your illusions. Starlight, be prepared to teleport the moment Trixie’s spell begins to take shape.” “Trixie shall craft the most believable version of you imaginable, Twilight Sparkle. I’ll take extra care to ensure to get the smug look just right,” said the showmare, earning a prickled eye twitch from Twilight who forced a smile and nod. “I’ve already got the location locked in my mind,” Starlight confirmed, “We’ll be where we need to be in a literal flash.” “Please be careful, Rainbow Dash,” said Flutterrshy, “There’s a lot of them out there.” “Don’t worry guys, I can take care of things here,” Dash assured them all, giving Applejack a specifically long and pointed look, “I promise, okay?” “I... trust ya,” Applejack said with a held back sigh. Rarity, her eyes looking far more sharply about than the rest of them, suddenly said, “Hold on. Admiral Seaspray, slow the ship and turn to port. I see something amiss on the cliffs to our right.” “What do you-?” Twilight began to ask, but then suddenly there was a rumbling noise from above and to the ship’s right. She couldn’t quite make it out, but amid the cliff face some hundred or so feet up there was a darting form of shadow that cut its way through several outcroppings of rock. Twilight sensed dark magic at work, not unlike the power of Charybdis that had empowered Morgawr. Whoever was up there had to be another sahuagin champion, although they weren’t attacking the ship but rather appeared to be slicing through sections of the rock wall. A moment later she realized why as those sections of cliff began to crumble, then triggered more portions of the wall to begin falling right towards the Treasury!  Fortunately Admiral Seaspray had clearly listened to Rarity’s warning and had swift reflexes, having already slowed the ship and put it into a turn. This allowed the vessel to nimbly glide past the worst of the sudden rockslide, although there were still more than a few cacophonous strikes upon the ship’s magic shields that flared bright white light into the dark gloom. “Yikes, how embarrassing would it be for a rock farm gal like me to die by rocks!?” Pinkie Pie chuckled, “Maudie would never let me hear the end of it.” “Twilight, I’m ready to throw up the illusion,” spoke Trixie through the same spell Twilight had used to communicate at a distance. The showmare was staying inside the ship’s bridge, keeping an eye on things from behind its reinforced canopy. This wouldn’t affect her ability to target areas with her magic, and she’d been weaving up the spell energy needed for her illusions. Twilight could all but feel the potent spell ready to layer over the ship deck like a tingling blanket.  “Do it,” Twilight said, taking a deep breath, “And good luck to all of us.” Starlight and Trixie cast their spells at the exact same time as to ensure that there’d be no visual clue to any sahuagin watching as to what just happened. To any eyes watching the ship’s deck it would simply look like Twilight and her party remained exactly where they were. In truth, Trixie’s expertly crafted illusion covered the fact that Starlight Glimmer had just teleported, Twilight, Fluttershy, Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Flash Sentry away to a passage several miles away and much smaller than any of the other passages leading to the sahuagin settlement of Rift Mouth. Meanwhile the illusionary members of the group would be controlled by Trixie while the only real ponies on the deck would be Starlight, Tempest Shadow, and Rainbow Dash.  “Alright, time to do this,” Rainbow Dash said, pumping herself up mentally as she unsheathed the swordbreaker that was her Relic. Having practiced with it a few times already, she found it quite familiar and easy to focus upon the object and mentally call out to the power within. In mere seconds the sword flared up with a scintillating pillar of blue and white light that swelled up around the pegasus for a moment, bathing the whole trench canyon in it’s colors. Then once the moment of raw power and light faded, a transformed Rainbow Dash in her brilliant armor of silver and bearing the larger, curved swordbreaker in her ready hooves, shot out from the deck in a streak of wind born turbulence.  “Hey sahuagin jerkwads!” she shouted, her voice now amplified by pure magic and a burst of wind force that rumbled through the water like a tremor, “You think you can take even just one of us!? My friends can just watch from the deck while I kick all of your ugly flanks! Bring it!” The plan wasn’t complicated. Starlight and Tempest would keep enemies too far away from the Treasury's deck and hence hopefully prevent them from realizing the other mares were just illusions. With Rainbow Dash playing up her cocky attitude she further hoped that the sahuagin would assume she was being brash and overconfident and had decided tot ake them all on herself... which wasn’t wrong per se, but it did cloak the truth that she was, in fact, by herself. Well, mostly. The Treasury itself would provide fire support, but the idea was not to slaughter sahuagin, but rather just tick them off enough to engage her and chase the ship. As long as they did that, every minute bought was a minute Twilight and the rest had to go deal with Charybdis. The question was how the sahuagin would respond to the challenge? If the wall of guttural war cries and bloodthirsty yowling from the fortress was any indication, the response was pretty clear! Rainbow Dash saw schools of warriors rising up to beat spears and tridents together to egg her to come at them. They weren't foolish enough to leave the fortifications of their fortress yet, and Dash noticed the red gleam of shamanic magic building up around several of the spires.  Yet rather than charge to attack, she noticed just two sahuagin rise up from outside the fortress’ cavern mouth. One she recognized even at a distance as Morgawr. The other was unfamiliar, a dark purple sahuagin who was thinner than Morgawr but held a very wire cord grace to... her?  Were they coming out to challenge her to a duel? That’d certainly work in Dash’s favor!  A flicker of instinct, or perhaps a shouted warning from the many battle hardened memories of Tachys, screamed in Rainbow Dash’s head. She threw herself to the side, although visually it looked more like a flicker of near instant movement as she temporarily became wind itself and slid to the side. Something cut by where she’d just been. A shadow so fast it looked like it had hardly moved as it sliced by.  Dash caught sight of a sahuagin shape, covered in black oil, blending in without color or heat with his surroundings. He moved fast, large and curved knives of bone spinning in his hands like tops as he sliced at her again. Dash bent with the grace of a storm, the knives never touching her as the sahuagin flipped past her in a darting motion and then suddenly backed off of her. She finally saw bulbous eyes, a gray so dark they were nearly black themselves as the sahuagin grinned, showing teeth that also had been rubbed black by some manner of tar or oil. “You evaded me twice. Twice! Hah, prey worth killing really is so rare. Maybe Morgawr wasn’t exaggerating.” “You mean the dude whose butt Twilight kicked?” Rainbow Dash said casually, bouncing her swordbreaker over her shoulder in a nonchalant manner, “You one of his buddies?” “Hmph, a peer, of sorts. I am Berokar, the Unseen.” “...Dude, I’m looking right at you,” Dash pointed out, to which Berokar’s grin of teeth only slightly faltered. “Perhaps, but not for very long. The glory of the first kill will go to me. Let us see if you can keep up, obnoxiously colorful surfacer.” Rainbow Dash had not been present for Morgawr’s skirmish with Starlight and Tempest, and she’d been busy with her own part of the fight in the Treasury's hangar so she’d only caught some of Twilight’s clash with him. However she still recognized the faint sensation of pressure that stemmed from these sahuagin champions drawing upon Charybdis’ power. Where Morgawr had grown lager and gained bulging muscles, then folds of almost organic armor, the change that overcame Berokar was wholly different. It seemed each champion went through different changes when high on Charybdis.  His limbs grew longer and sleeker, while his body grew somehow even more melded with the darkness of the water around him. Spikes like that of a sea urchin started to sprout upon his tar black body, and the crest upon his head grew larger and sharper as the quills of it took on bladed qualities.  She’d have almost been impressed if she didn’t already have the power of her Relic singing in her veins. As it stood, she doubted Berokar realized yet that when she’d dodged him a moment ago she hadn’t exactly been straining herself. “Feel free to make your move,” she told him, noting out of her peripheral vision that the rest of the sahuagin were not remaining idle. The purple female was directing formations of warriors to roll out what appeared to be huge harpoon throwers that extended out from the mid-portions of the fortress spires. The army of fish people still weren’t advancing out of their fortifications, instead making it clear they were here to bar the Treasury's way, not chase the ship down. Smart on their part, as they were probably under orders to just delay the surface invaders. Morgawr and the female champion seemed entirely content to let Berokar have his supposed “glory”, too, which suited Rainbow Dash just fine.  At this point the Treasury was making a close, circling approach towards the fortress. Magical light bloomed along the port side of the ship as several cannons discharged lances at one of the spires, melting down a harpoon thrower. In response not only did the other harpoon throwers let loose, using powerful spring mechanisms to launch their payloads through the water at the ship, but the small circles of shamans clustered amid the catwalks between spires finished using their own blood to empower cauldron shrines erected nearby. Boiling red and purple light bubbled up and formed the shapes of angry shark jaws, dozens of the magic projectiles launching in response to the Treasury's attack. The ship’s shield sparked and flared in numerous places from hits as the ship raked past the fortress, its belly cannons losing a volley of their own to strike down another pair of harpoon throwers. Aria and Sonata were being as cautious as they could with their targeting, seeking to damage the fortress while inflicting minimal casualties. They’d given their word to Ulgriv to harm as few of his people as possible, and the loyal streak in Rainbow Dash was glad ot see the sirens doing their best to fulfill that goal. If the sahuagin wanted to play it safe and not chase the ship, that only played to the favor of the ponies.  Berokar, despite seeming rather like a prideful jerk who liked to boast, was deathly silent now that he was juiced up and focused on the kill. He came at Dash in a mass of shadowy strikes so fast and difficult to see that had Rainbow Dash not been, well... Rainbow Dash, evading might have proved difficult. Never mind her now that she was filled to the brim with ancient alicorn magic. Her body transmuted into air, pushing back the water around her immediately into a twenty meter bubble. This completely threw off Berokar’s motion as he suddenly didn’t have any water at all around him. Rainbow Dash could control the wind her body produced with thought alone and held the bubble in place while she used her partially transmuted body to streak right into the confused Berokar, striking him with a flying kick of such potent wind force that there was a sonic boom inside the bubble that then shook the water for a hundred meters in all directions. He wa launched right out of the bubble and into the water like a dark torpedo, and Dash didn’t even wait for him to impact with the ground he was barreling towards before letting out a bellow of enhanced volume, “You really thing one of you is going to be a challenge!? Morgawr, purple fish chick, if you don’t get your butts over here to even up the odds for your idiot friend, otherwise this is going to be the most boring day of my life!” There, gauntlet thrown.   She hoped Twilight and the others were having as much fun as she was. ---------- If anything the tunnel in which Twilight and her strike team had been teleported to was even colder than the main trenches had been. It was an enclosed space for the most part, but the roof of the tunnel did open up in places to a larger trench above, with numerous uneven but natural columns of rock forming a sort of honeycomb around the party as they swam through the dark. According to Ulgriv, this tunnel was a lesser used pathway to the north east end of Rift Mouth’s outskirts, one that he had used since he was just old enough to leave the spawning pools. It was hunting territory, where young sahuagin sharpened their skills in stalking the dangerous but nourishing eels that made their homes in the various nooks and crannies of the tunnel system. Twilight had spotted a few such eels peering at them from within alcoves and small holes in the floor or walls, but none had ventured to strike at the passing ponies more than once, and Flash had dealt with that one readily enough with a swift strike of his Zanpaktou... after which most of the party had looked on with unpleasant expressions as the unfortunate eel was devoured by it’s companions. Every now and again the shadow of something large would pass by one of the ceiling holes overhead, but Twilight could never tell just what it was. A larger eel? A shark? Something more dangerous? Whatever it was, it was too big to fit through any of the holes, and paid no mind to the ponies passing below, if it even noticed them at all. Rarely they encountered a cluster or two of algae or other odd underwater plant life, but it was sparse, and Twilight understood by now that food wasn’t plentiful enough down here without extreme risk in hunts to support a large population. Little wonder the sahuagin struggled. She wondered just how large a settlement Rift Mouth really could be? Ulgriv had told them that he’d grown up there, but in comparison to other settlements it was many times larger due to being nearest to the only real plentiful hunting grounds in the Abyss. If this was plentiful, Twilight shuddered at the notion of what might count as “sparse”. According to Ulgriv, the tunnel would open up after a time, leading to what was essentially an underwater crevasse. On the other side of that crevasse would be several other tunnel openings that all would lead to a small outpost, a lookout point of sorts. Theoretically it would be lightly guarded, easy for Twilight and the others to sneak past or quickly overwhelm. Then, beyond that, would be a short series of tunnels that would lead to the outermost homes of Rift Mouth, and the spawning pools in which Ulgriv had been born. Twilight was more than a little nervous about having to pass through these spawning pools, but her hope was that any sahuagin “civilians” they countered would be non-combative. With any luck they could sneak through using the same heat dampening spells that had worked fairly well back in Aqualania.  If not, at least she hoped it’d be a relatively straight shot out of the residential tunnels and into the large rift that gave Rift Mouth its name, the deepest trench in which Charybdis supposedly made her lair.  Ulgriv’s information proved accurate, as after only a relatively short time of traveling down the dark, winding cavern did it open up abruptly. One end of the cavern opened upon the wall of a crevasse, with stone towering high above and descending to unseen depths below. Directly across, at a distance of about twenty meters, was the opposite wall, equally massive in size. Quietly Twilight motioned for her companions to group up close to her as they gathered near a rise of uneven rocks near the lip of the cavern exit, and she used her magic to both cloak their heat signatures and put up an invisibility screen. While not on Trixie’s level in terms of illusion skill, Twilight could maintain the two spells readily enough while she and her friends observed what lay across the crevasse and spoke in whispers between themselves. “Lookn’ like we got ‘round five sentries,” Applejack said. She was speaking of the figures of barely visible sahuagin who floated in a milling but alert group near a trio of cave openings in the other side of the crevasse. The fishmen were keeping a careful eye out, but Twilight’s party had approached quietly enough to avoid notice, and her spells were keeping them from being seen as they observed the exterior of what she assumed was the outpost. “Count seven, darling,” Rarity corrected Applejack, motioning upward with her horn. They all looked to see that there was a small rock outcropping that extended from the crevasse wall a good thirty paces higher where two more sahagun watched upward, keeping an eye on the trench above. “There’s also something below us,” Fluttershy said, and the mare’s prediction proved accurate as moments later the darkness below disgorged a humongous shark. It had a flat head like that of a hammerhead shark, but it was covered in sharp barnacles, and the beast’s body had bits of armor forged of bone wrapped around its main body, which was close to forty feet long. The humongous shark rose and it was now possible to see it was being ridden by a small band of six sahuagin who all warbled greeting cries to the sentries at the outpost, who in turn gurgled back shouts of their own. “News, brothers! The surfacers strike at the main fortress guarding the great cavern into Rift Mouth!” “What!? They have the gall to face the bulk of our warriors where we are strongest? Bah, if only we weren’t assigned here.” “Are we to join the hunt, brothers?” “No, orders from warleader Rezarra are to maintain our posts. We go to inform the other outposts. Be watchful, brothers!” The shark continued on with its passengers, clearly couriers relaying messages to the various outposts from the main sahuagin force. Twilight was glad to see the behemoth beast go, as while she knew she could readily dispatch it with magic, it wouldn’t have been simple to do so silently. As it stood, the group’s experiences in Aqualania had accustomed them all to a stealthy approach. While going all out on the attack would have worked easily enough, Twilight wasn’t here to do damage to anyone other than Charybdis. After a minute or two of quiet conference with her allies, they went into action. The sahuagin sentries had no idea what even hit them. Flash took care of the pair on the outcropping higher up, using Flash Step to appear behind them and use the hilt of his sword to stun one with a precise strike to the back of the head, while using his hind legs to kick the other one right under the chin with a jaw breaking blow. The five clustered around the main entrance were swiftly surrounded by colorful equines as Twilight dropped her stealth spells. Stunning bolts form her horn knocked out a pair of sahuagin before they even had a chance to move their spears, while Pinkie Pie’s lute smacked the head of another into senselessness. Applejack didn’t even bother with her shillelagh, instead clocking one sahuagin across the face so hard with a hoof that he went spinning head over webbed feet into the wall, falling unconscious instantly. The last sahuagin, barely opening her mouth to shout, was firmly grabbed around the throat by a pair of white hooves. Rarity, displaying surprising skill, kept the sahuagin in a tight sleeper hold, cutting off the warrior’s gills and throat until they fell unconscious.  Letting out a slight and ladylike, “Whew,” Rarity adjusted her mane after setting her unconscious victim down, “So glad Zosimos’ memories seem to include quite a bit of this clandestine activity.” “It’s a tad unsettlin’ just how easy it comes, but I ain’t gonna complain,” said Applejack, stretching her punching hoof, “Ain’t got no jitters, save where Dash is concerned. Hope she’s doin’ okay.” “Hmm, I don’t have any weird squiggles concerning Dashie, so i think she’s doing A-okay for now,” said Pinkie Pie, her tail suddenly doing a slight series of twitches, “Eeew, but I’ve got a nasty feeling for whatever’s ahead of us.” Flash Sentry appeared next to them in a blur of movement, “Top’s clear, and I don’t sense any other sentries. I feel a lot of life signs inside, however. At least twenty to thirty.” “Do we want to try sneaking by them? I’d like to sneak by them,” Fluttershy said, and Twilight gave a nod of agreement. “Same. These openings were too narrow for us to sneak past these sentries, but once we’re inside we’ll go back to stealth until we can’t use it anymore. The closer we get to Charybdis without alerting the entire settlement, the better.” “How long do ya figure ‘fore some fish bugger realizes these fellas are out cold?” asked Applejack, indicating the downed guards. “Could be minutes, or hours, either way, we have to move fast,” Twilight said, having her friends gather around her once more so she could recast the spells to help them remain hidden. Then, as quietly as they could, the group ventured forth into the outskirts of Rift Mouth.