//------------------------------// // 29. Ostracon // Story: A Ghost of a Chance // by Epsilon-Delta //------------------------------// “Um. Okay.” Zest shrugged. “Sounds easy.” “Wait.” Sugarcoat stopped her. “This isn’t a good place to be swearing any vows. We don’t know what’s listening.” Zest covered her mouth. Sugarcoat had a point! “So what is listening?” Sugarcoat watched Ostracon suspiciously. Ostracon watched her back, considering, waiting. Then he spoke. “I came here exploring avenues of powering the azoth spell, which I intend to destroy Nightmare Moon with, or at least die with the satisfaction I got as close as possible,” said Ostracon. “And you got one?!” Zest flew close to him, hooves on her chest. Ostracon paused another second, looking back north, back to the dark circle. “I suppose as a show of good faith, I’ll tell you what you asked of me before. The place I have been and do not want you to go to is the tomb of Lord Lexigraph. There is treasure there beyond your wildest imagination and I see myself as the rightful heir to it. I will consider any alliance between us over if you enter that place.” “We have no need for treasure,” Sugarcoat promised. “If there’s anything there that could destroy Nightmare Moon, I’m sure you’ll use it to that end.” “Am I supposed to know who Lord Lexigraph is?” Zest whispered to Sugarcoat. That name sounded familiar, somewhere from her history studies. “He was the original lich,” said Sugarcoat. “The one who came up with the idea of putting your soul in an object and the one responsible for his order. I’ve read he sided with the royal family during the revolution and retreated somewhere never to be seen again when his side lost.” “Lord Lexigraph is the wisest, most intelligent pony who ever lived,” Ostracon added a part Zest doubted she’d find in a history book. “He was unfairly denied the title of master witch despite being more worthy of it than any other, merely because his foresight was too great for the other witches to understand. His writings, his illuminations, could only have been created by an erudite genius not seen once every ten thousand years.” And this guy was part of his fan club. Great. “Do you have any idea the power a master witch possesses?” Ostracon asked. “Those now alive are mere mid journeymen. And they are already considered beyond reproach. There are none currently alive at his level.” “That part isn’t entirely accurate,” Sugarcoat corrected him. “There is one other master witch alive, isn’t there? Twilight Sparkle?” “Twilight Sparkle has sealed herself away from the world,” said Ostracon. “The curse will only allow one to find her if they arrive on both the 13th and 31st of October at the same time. Temporal meta-positioning is difficult at 18 seconds. 18 days is impossible.” “But can’t you break those curses with some cheeky technicality?” Zest started trying to think of some way you could technically be there on two days at once. “Like uh. Um. Huh. I got nothing. But maybe a smart pony could figure it out?” Zest turned to Sugarcoat who shook her head. “If there were,” said Ostracon, “somepony would have figured it out in the past three hundred years. Many geniuses have already tried and failed. We must accept that finding Twilight is simply impossible at this point. Lord Lexigraph is our only option on this front.” “Is he an option?” Sugarcoat asked. “Lord Lexigraph would have lived during the revolution, thirteen centuries ago. Surely he isn’t still alive.” “Not entirely alive, no. But not dead. Merely… waiting. Yes, perhaps I’ll tell you just a little more. There is something buried beneath the ice of the dark circle.” Ostracon carved small circles in the ice beneath him with that purple, feathered sword. “Can’t you sense it?” Zest could only feel a shudder. “I noticed there is an unsettling presence to this place,” Sugarcoat offered a more definite answer. “Nightmare Moons aura is being blocked by… what is it?” “I’m uncertain. Just that it’s been there a long, long time. He has been siphoning fel-energy from it, slowly, building up a massive pool of magic. He planned to take over once society collapses from the advent of democracy.” “Wait.” Zest counted the centuries in her head. “But we switched to democracy thirteen hundred years ago and pretty much everypony agrees things are way better now than back in the Royal Era.” “Well…” “Well what? You just said this guy was an infallible air... uh…” This was one of Zest’s vocabulary words, too. “Genius. Didn’t you?” “Alright. I suppose nopony is completely perfect. But he is the greatest genius who ever lived, at the least.” “Uh-huh.” Zest crossed her forelegs, growing ever more skeptical of this mystery tyrant. “If you’re suggesting waking him up, that could pose a problem in its own right,” said Sugarcoat. “We may just be trading one tyrant for another.” “Lord Lexigraph is a pony whose wisdom is beyond compare,” said Ostracon. “He would be a great ruler.” “Oh yeah? Like what’s his economic policy?” Zest asked. “His economic policy is a sort of ‘sudden death libertarianism’. He believes that a completely unregulated market has enormous benefits, but one fatal flaw. It allows power to accumulate and consolidate until eventually, a few hyper-powerful corporations strangle out all competition. To solve this, he will brutally execute anyone who gets too close to a monopoly in the most horrific way possible. This will be done without warning or chance for appeal. And he’ll continue to slaughter those involved in the would-be megacorporation until it has lost suitable power. By doing so, he can curb anti-competitive behavior and the rise of mega-corporations you see.” “Uh.” Zest backed away slowly toward Sugarcoat. She hadn’t processed a single word of what this guy just said! “So? What do you think of sudden death libertarianism?” Ostracon asked. “I uh.” Zest shrugged. “I just remembered I don’t know anything about the economy.” “Then why did you ask?” Ostracon seemed to narrow his eyes despite having no face. “It was supposed to be a gotcha question! I didn’t think people like you had actual answers to this stuff!” “For your information, he has written a great many books on his policies,” said Ostracon. “I wouldn’t consider this if I didn’t know anything about him.” “I can’t read a great many books.” Zest put her hooves over her headphones and retreated behind her superior. “Sugarcoat, did that make any sense to you? Are we going to risk waking up the mystery guy?” “I’d be very hesitant. But tell me. You’re saying this well of power enough to destroy Nightmare Moon?” Sugarcoat asked. “And if so, why haven’t you used it?” “Yeah! And what does this have to do with me?” Zest leaned out from behind Sugarcoat. “Can this Lexigraph guy hear me? Is that it?” “It still wouldn’t be enough.” Ostracon dismissed Zest’s question for now, instead producing a small notebook from his cloak. Inside was a diagram depicting six gemstones. A line moved from each gem to the other, creating a hexagon filled with crisscrosses. “I’ve made the spell more efficient. Dividing it into six sources of power rather than… well you’ve heard what it was before. Lord Lexigraph could provide one of those points. I have a second here.” Ostracon lifted the sword with the feather attached to it. “And a third is nearby.” He swept the sword slowly in a wide arc. “I believe I can use you to try and recover it.” “Whoa! Is your sword really that powerful?” Zest inched closer once more. “The feather.” “The… feather?” Zest looked at the white feather dangling from the hilt back to the blade. “I always heard that the sword is mightier than the feather, though. You’re saying you can kill Nightmare Moon with a feather?” She looked back to Sugarcoat who shook her head, unable to make sense of it either. “With six, perhaps.” He lowered his sword. “This is the feather of an alicorn, of the Queen of Light. Only six still exist in this world in any form. It is a treasure worth more than all the land in Canterlot combined.” Sugarcoat considered this more seriously while Zest continued to stare at the innocuous pegasus-clipping with disbelief. “Really? What does it… do, exactly?” Zest asked. “In its current state?” Ostracon shook his head. “But it can be used as a reagent to create something truly extraordinary, such as the artifact I seek. Have either of you heard of… an element of harmony?” Elements of harmony. Elements of harmony. “Nope.” “No.” “I wasn’t sure if you found that camp nearby,” said Ostracon. “It is a crystallized version of an alicorn feather, the embodiment of some aspect of reality, a god unto itself. One of them already forged, the Element of Laughter, I know, is not far from this very spot. That is truly an object of immense power.” “And what does that do?” Zest shifted her eyes. “It is said that the wielder can never fail so long as they do not give in to despair, sorrow, hopelessness, etc. That the more hopeless your situation becomes, the more strength you will be given to rise to it. Again, so long as you remain undaunted in your quest.” Zest’s situation was pretty hopeless right now. That sounded like the best possible weapon to bring to such a lop-sided fight! Then again, just hearing about the existence of such a thing gave Zest hope. Did that mean her situation was no longer so hopeless that it wouldn’t work? Or? Her head started to hurt going around in circles like that. Zest shook herself out of her self-induced dizziness. Maybe this, the Element of Laughter, was it. The thing that would give them an actual chance other than running away! “And more importantly, it is one of the few artifacts capable of powering the azoth spell,” Ostracon added. “We did see a camp on the way here,” said Sugarcoat. “It appears some other pony, and now you had a great deal of trouble finding this object despite knowing where it is. Why is that?” “It has a mind of its own,” said Ostracon. “Only those deemed worthy may find it. The fool from the camp you found spent years wandering about this place without realizing that. ‘Worthy’ in this sense is someone who never losses their optimism. I was trying to prove myself worthy by putting my life in its hands, in the hope that it would come to me. I believe your appearance was its way of rejecting me. However.” Ostracon pointed the sword back at Zest. The feather swayed about whenever the sword pointed at Zest, she now realized. “This feather also has some will to it,” said Ostracon. “It wants to be with the other feathers, its sisters if you will, and I have held it long enough to feel that it thinks you have something to contribute to that end. So I suspect, perhaps, that the Element of Laughter finds your personality more… to its tastes.” “Really? Me?” Zest pointed at herself. “I could wield something like that?” Zest had never seen herself as particularly strong, just useful to Sugarcoat given her rare abilities. The temptation to try and wield something of truly legendary power, to rise above what she was, in this situation? She turned her head back to Sugarcoat. “Maybe. I don’t know everything about it. The only characteristic I know it to favor is that of optimistic boldness. So if you display that, the willingness to fight to the end, then perhaps.” Ostracon pointed his sword to a distant pillar of ice. “Surprise's body is pinned against that glacier. I suspect it’s still around her neck. I know at least she was the last wielder of this artifact. Perhaps, if you go there alone, with the optimism to succeed, it will allow you to see it.” “Yes!” Zest nodded her head as rapidly as she could before spinning around to Sugarcoat. This was the first time Zest thought, however distantly, that there was even a path to victory! “We gotta do this!” Zest pumped her hoof up. “Or… I gotta! Just wait here for me.” “No.” Sugarcoat grabbed Zest as she tried to fly off. “What?! Why?!” Zest flailed her forelegs, pretending she was trying to get free. “We don’t have any idea even as tenth as good as this one!” “This isn’t something we’re going to rush into.” Sugarcoat stopped her. “You need to be careful when dealing with anything related to the gods. I want to ask around about this element of laughter first. The pony at that base camp must have been looking for that, from the sounds of things.” Zest frowned. Sugarcoat had a point, but… “You can take what you will from there,” said Ostracon. “That pony is already dead. He was sent by the pirate kind Bloodstorm to find the element decades ago. This was as close as the fool got.” “Has that stuff been there for… what? Fifty years?!” Zest looked to Sugarcoat. “Things would rot exceedingly slowly in such a dim, still, and cold place,” Sugarcoat said. “I think we’re going to return home for now. Thank you for the information, Ostracon. We’ll decide what to do soon.” “For my part, I would recommend rushing into things,” said Ostracon. “From my understanding, it despises the wary and favors those who hold onto hope. That’s why I think it best if Lemon Zest goes alone, without a pony such as yourself.” Zest nodded along with all that but deflated when she found Sugarcoat again undaunted. “If it’s at all reasonable, it will understand that I’m the one being wary,” Sugarcoat told her. “If it’s not reasonable then we don’t need it.” “I guess that makes sense, but…” Zest looked towards where Surprise’s body should be. But she really wanted to try. “I will linger in this place for some time,” said Ostracon. “I do have much more I can show you if you’re interested. Your underling has got my curiosity.” Those blue flames that made up his eyes moved towards Zest and he gave a hum. For the briefest of moments, Zest thought she understood Sugarcoat’s cautious wisdom. “We’ll keep that in mind.” Sugarcoat bowed her head and led Zest back towards their robots.