It's 1943, the Germans were pushed back almost to their homeland now. The Allies had already landed in Italy, the Fuhrer has enacted desperate measures to push them back, but to no avail. The valiant soldiers of the Allies knew what they were fighting for.
*Somewhere on the eastern front*
Karl was wandering around the trenches with his best friend, Friedrich. They had been friends since they were young and often would get in trouble. But after Hitler came into power, they joined the military. They went to the lowlands, France and now, Soviet Union. At first it was going fine, they were just getting tasks behind the battlefield, safe from combat. But as time goes, they were assigned to a more combative positions likely at the fronts.
Now they are here, in the trenches, waiting for some action. They kept waiting, but no Soviet soldiers showed up, no nothing, just gust of winds. They had been task with patrolling the trenches until further notice, they are also cut from communications and the only officer in the trench is a lieutenant. All the soldiers in the trench is desperate for food and water, as they have to ration everything. This includes Karl and Friedrich.
As they were patrolling the trenches, they were approached by another two hungry German soldiers.
"We are here to continue your shift; you may rest now," one of the soldiers said.
Karl and Friedrich quickly complied and headed to their communal beds that they share. Now inside the dug hole in the trench is a small room with 4 bunk beds. The room is empty as it is just used for storage supplies, well mostly just weapons and ammunition. They sat down on their beds, opposite from each other.
"This is a torture. When will the others get us?" Karl said disappointingly.
"I know something that we can do," Friedrich said as he gets up and searched through the piles of boxes and weapons.
Until finally he showed something to Karl, two grey cloaks with the German Iron Cross symbol at the back, it looks like it is made out of high-quality leather and would shine a bit when wet. "What are you planning to do with the cloaks?" Karl questioned as he to stood up. "I don't know but I found them when I was searching for extra ammunition," said Friedrich.
Friedrich gave Karl one of the cloaks and suggests that they should keep it. Hesitantly Karl tried to protest but just shrugs it off and puts it on. "We look great with these!" Friedrich remarks. Karl nodded in agreement, the cloak is sure very comfortable. "Oh, and one more thing," said Friedrich as he again searches through the piles of boxes and weapons. He then drops a large crate onto the ground. The crate is long, almost as long as their rifles, printed on it is a text, it says "EXPERIMENTELL" with a bold caption.
They both looked at each other before unboxing, inside is a rifle, similar to the Karabiner 98k but with glowing grey lines along the rifle. There is two of them, maybe destiny is exactly thinking about them.
Just when they were about to grab the weapons and leave, they heard an explosion. Likely from an artillery shell, quickly they grabbed the weapon and is about to head out. Then, an artillery shell had hit the entrance, blocking it with dirt. Karl and Friedrich knocked back because of the explosion. They hear orders and shouts outside.
They both are on the ground and coughed due to the shockwave. "Karl are you okay?" Friedrich asked. "I'm alright, just a few scratches," Karl replied. They stood up and looked around on how to get out of this situation. It looks grim, with nothing to get out of this room, they will both starve. "We'll just hope for a miracle or just end up starving here...," said Karl. Friedrich sat down on the ground with disappointment.
Until then, Karl continued brainstorming for something, anything that could get them out of this hell hole while Friedrich continued to search through the piles of ammunition and weapons. "Scheiße, Scheiße, Scheiße! What to we do!" Karl shouted as he walks around the almost cramped room while Friedrich just ignores that. Suddenly a purple circle slowly appeared but they hadn't notice it yet.
Once it has grown large enough and emits a glow, Karl notices it. He taps Friedrich on the shoulder and points at the portal as Friedrich looks at him. "What is that?" Friedrich asks Karl. "How should I know?" Karl angrily says. As the portal continues to form, they could see what is on the other side, a farm with a bright blue sky, it looks peaceful. "Well at least you can go first!" said Friedrich.
Karl wonders a little before stepping into the portal cautiously and then just disappeared into the portal. By the looks of it, Karl is not returning any time soon. Friedrich held onto his new unknown rifle, putting his trusty old rifle on his back and stepped in the portal. As soon as he stepped in, he saw a bright flash until it disappears. Everything around him is bright compared to the dark trenches. Infront of him is Karl. "Karl, where are we?" asked Friedrich. "I don't know but I am sure that this is probably somewhere far from this madness or maybe not even in Europe." answered Karl.
Around them is a standard orchard or a farm with trees that stretches onto the horizon and behind them is a barn. It also looks like Karl brought that mysterious weapon along. The duo is also very hungry, as they wander around this new strange land, Karl tripped on something and with a loud thud. "Crap! That hurts!" Karl complaint. As Karl grumbles, Friedrich heard something coming out of the barn and immediately grabbed Karl by the collar. They jumped into a bush, "What was tha-," Karl was cut off by Friedrich muffling his mouth with his hand. "There is someone coming." Friedrich whispered.
As Karl calmed down, Friedrich let go of his mouth and they both observed carefully about what will come out of the red wooden barn.
"Who goes there?" a voice with a very American accented but a more southern counterpart. Then from the shadows of the barn, out comes what the two soldiers do not expect. A horse? No a pony. The pony is yellow maybe orange-ish from afar. Her yellow-white hair or mane is messy and she is sweaty from all of the work, maybe. The duo waited until the pony was gone. "What the hell was zat?" Karl said with bewilderment and still in the bush. "I don't know so don't ask me. I'm also starving!" Friedrich answered as Karl's stomach grumbles. They will need to eat, now. So, the duo had to do something, exploring and scavenging.
They stick together as they explored the area, all they see is peace and tranquility. No soldiers, no flags and no nothing all they see is a place that is unaffected by war at any means. Until when they hiked up a hill, they saw something in the distance, a town. Still, they approached it cautiously and finally found a great place for a lookout. They looked down, onto the town, it is filled with the same 'people' from the farm but with different skin tone and some of them had horns or even wings to fly. Well if they'd remember from stories when they were young, the ponies with horns are unicorns and the ponies with wings are Pegasus.
"What world have we been transported into? This is weird!" Friedrich commented. Karl nodded in agreement. Both of them put on the cloak and its cowl. They look friendly enough but will they be welcomed in this new world?
Twilight's frustration grew as she continued to search through the seemingly endless shelves of books. She had organized her library meticulously, yet the elusive spell book she sought remained stubbornly hidden. Twilight couldn't shake the feeling that it had to be there somewhere, it was also a gift from Celestia when she was still at Canterlot, as she vividly recalled placing it among her collection when she first settled in Ponyville.
"Lankot's Summoning Guide, Lankaster Spellcasting...," Twilight whispered the titles to herself as she pulls out every book out of the shelf. She had been trying to search a book about dimensions and portals and also Princess Luna's most trusted friend, she has heard stories about this 'friend' of Luna from, well... Luna herself. When Luna told Twilight about this friend, Luna remarks this was far before 'Nightmare Moon' but still, she can't remember their name since it was a very long time.
On one of the story, Luna told that the friend is a very talented at magic and often would compare it to Star Swirl but a more inferior version. Luna also don't remember their gender but if she recalled the pony is a mare. Luna remarked that the mare is very gifted in a specific category of spells, dimension hopping and creation. At first, dimension hopping is useless, only optional in every magic schools. The only important thing about it is teleporting which is taught in every magic schools today but in the past it was scarce.
Creation on the other... hoof, was some sort of shapeshifting spells, similar of what the Changelings do. Creation is very hard to learn and cast, resulting in a shortage of masters and teachers of it. It was always bound to get extinct. Creation is also fun to use as you can transform yourself temporarily, you can add an extra horn to your head, you can even add wings to yourself, but none of the transformative are functional you can move your wings and feel it but it can't let you fly though. Only for looks, deception and making simple stuff like vases, plates and other culinary things.
However, this mare is different, often would learn about creation and dimension hopping every time she gets the chance to do so. Suddenly out of the blue, her friend just disappeared and without any trace at all. Her room looks like it had been rummaged by a stubborn griffin trying to find its money. All that is untouched is a book, possibly a diary. Luna was perplexed of how did her friend just disappeared like that. Luna then kept the book and did not open or even read it.
The rest is history, Nightmare Moon, banished to the moon, stuck on the moon, returned from the moon, defeated by six random ponies, returned to normal, tries to fit in, had a talk with Twilight, tell Twilight a story about some random wizard master and now here.
After another few minutes of rummaging through her library, finally, she found it. The book was a little different from when Princess Luna gave her, but she did not mind it at all. She trots to her desk and sits down. She put the book on the desk and opens it. The first page is blank, but there is something, a card. It looks like a simplified version of a pony, it looks like a portrait, Twilight puts it aside, for now.