hours upon hours of walking all around the palace, looking in every crack and crevice, around every pillar and crystal, and yet still no sign of any secret room, vault, ir anything.
"Argh horseapples?!" Flurryheart cursed as she slammed her Hoof against the floor in frustration, which caused Cadence to turn around with a look of disapproval.
"Flurryheart Language!" Flurry sighed.
"I'm sorry mom but, I'm just so frustrated. It feels like we've looked everywhere and still haven't found a thing. I just, I just really wish we could've found sometime, anything. "
Cadence sighed in return, walking up to her daughter and lifting her chin up. "Don't give up so easily flurry, the sides, it's only been a few hours and there's still a few places to search. You never know. " Cadence leaned against the wall. "It could just..."
Before she could finish, the wall opened up behind her, causing the alicorn to fall over backward in shock. "Appear.....?" Cadence said as she got up and looked around the strange room she had accidently found, all around the large room was several pedestals displays artificats that, even from a distance, she could feel the magical energy.
Flurry immediately hugged Cadence, excited. "You did it?! We actually found it!" Cadence laughed as she hugged her back. "Told you so~ let's take a look, just be careful, we don't know what any if this stuff does."
Flurry only halfway heard her mother's warning as she began flying around the room, looking at all the different displays. It was almost like a private museum, with plaque giving brief descriptions of the items in question, while others only gave warnings, or at least what she could think was a warning. Some were written in the ancient tongue of the three tribes, which she only had a passing understanding of.
"You have any idea what some of these say?" Cadence looked at a few of the plaque.
"It's definitely ancient ponish, but I um, well Language class wasn't exactly my strong suit." Flurry rose an brown to that. After all, cadence didn't seem to have any trouble when dignitaries came to the empire, and Caspian knew they spoke in languages flurry. I wasn't even sure it quantified as language. But, as these thoughts ran through her mind, one particularly display caught her eye. It looked unassuming at first, a small pedestal holding what looked like a normal styling mirror, yet flurry couldn't help but be drawn to it.
"Hey, mom, check this out." Cadence turned from the plaque she was struggling to read and turned her attention to the mirror. It was a bit strange, didn't seem to be out of the ordinarily yet, underneath mirror, was another plaque with that same ancient language, but, yet again, cadence couldn't determine what it said. 'Be careful, flurry. We don't know what any of this does.
"Relax, mom, I'm not going to touch anything," yet as she stared at the mirror, she felt odd, as she began to lose herself to that endless windowed pace within the mirror. It felt good, really good, like a warm bath on a cold winter night or a nice beverage on a hot day, this energy simply due her in deeper and deeper as she gazed into the mirror, completely unaware that some strange force was washing over her, completely engulfing her form. But, she was completely numb to it, not even hearing cadences voice as she was screaming at her to back away, to move or something, but it was no use as the energy engulfed flurryheart, and only when her vision went pink did she realize something was wrong.
But, as quickly as it came it was over as a flash of pink light filled the vault and cadence, shielding her eyes with her wings looked over to see what had become of her first born was abit stunned. Flurry looked different. Her fur and mane were as pink as cadences now, her wings a bit larger, and a prominent heart like symbol above her forehead just under her horn. Her eyes glowed with an aetheral glow as she looked at herself.
"M..mom what. What happened, I look at I. I look like you, I feel, weird".
Cadence could feel the magic coming off of Flurryheart, and why shouldn't she, she recognized it, it was the same type of magic she commanded, the magic of love, but, this felt different somehow. Was it because it was mixed with flurrys own energy? Possibly, but she didn't know.
"Flurry, do you feel alright?" Flurry nodded, not feeling much differently just, a bit wobbly.
"I.. I think so, just wobbly. " Cadence wasted no time and teleported both herself and Flurry to her own room as she began looking for something, anything to do with the mirror. She wasn't a book horse like Twilight was, but, if her daughter and somehow been infused with the same or similar magic to her own, then she was sire she'd be able to figure sometimes out.
"Oh, cmon, where are you, finally!" She grabbed a large velvet stained book and put it on the table and began looking through it with haste.
"Um, what is that?" Flurry asked, looking abit confused.
"Amoromicon, the tome about everything regarding love magic and all its facets. Celestia gave it to me after I had acesended. Since I can literally feel the magic coming off you is similar to mine, I'm hoping there might be something in here that can tell us what happened. "
However, as the two alicorns looked over the tome, a royal guard walked in after hearing the sudden commotion.
"Your Highness, is everything al....ri.ght," the guard stuttered. The Guard didn't finish his question, instead locking eyes on Flurryheart.
"Um, are you alright soldier?" The Guard didn't respond. Instead, his head began twitching erratically, then his limbs before finally his body relaxed as his eyes turned into large hearts and he jumped at Flurry, wrapping her in a bear hug, squeezing her tight.
"Ahhh, what the, get... off of. Me!" Flurry pleaded.
Cadence was a bit shocked at first but had to fight down the reaction to laugh as Flurry teleported out of the guards grip and chased her around the room.
"Mom! Don't just stand there! Help me?!"
Cadence smirked and fired a beam at the guard restraining him.
"Argh, ahh, what the hay was that?!"
Cadence didn't know, but she had a theory and began reading the book again, look up more, forbidden spells until she found what she was looking for.
"Flurry, look at this!" Cadence said, gesturing for Flurry to come see as she began to read.
"The Hugmare Hex, a highly addictive and contagious love spell that, when preformed, can fully embrace the host like a warm hug and, whomever lays thier eyes upon the user, shall come over the embrace of the hex, wishing for nothing more to embrace the user, or anypony else they may lay thier eyes on. This hex should only be performed in a closed environment due to its incredibly contagious nature. "
Flurryheart looked at the book and then looked at the mirror they had brought from the vault.
"But, I didn't perform any hex mom, I just looked into that mirror? How could a mirror give me a hex?"
Cadence looked at her, and then the stallion guard still had his eyes clung to Flurry.
"It all depends on the hex Flurry. Items can be infused with magic. It's pretty simple if you know how to do it. As for this, well, somepony must've infused the mirror with the Hugmare Hex, as to why, I don't know".
Flurryheart was getting abit irritated as the stallion guard looking at her with those heart shaped eyes was beginning to creep her out.
"So, you can get rid of it, right?"
Cadence looked through the book and nodded. "I think so, I just need time to read through. The...book" Cadence looked into the door way and noticed that several other ponies, staff, guards etc had wandered in, most likely hearing the commotion, and they were all twitching, with heart shaped eyes.
"Oh no..." Flurry and Cadence immediately booked it down the hall as they were being chased by the horde of ponies infected with the hex, unfortunately, whomever saw Flurry, and whomever was hugged by any of the hexes ponies immediately became hexes themselves, it was like a love plague, quickly overtaking the whole palace.
"This is not what I wanted when I said I wanted an adventure!" Flurry screamed as both she and Cadence flew to the library and barricaded the door.
"Now what is" Scribe Hoof asked walking around the corner.
"Scribe close your eyes, now! That's an order!" Cadence yelled.
Scribe immediately did so without question, scared since Cadence was using her canterlot voice.
"Yo...your magesity, I'm sorry, what's going on" Cadence sighed as she summoned a blindfold over Scribe eyes.
"I'm sorry for yelling but, we're in abit of a crisis right now. The palace has been infected with a powerful love hex, anypony who looks at Flurryheart immediately becomes a carrier".
Scribe took in the information but, was confused.
"All but, you your grace?" Cadence then realized it, she hadn't thought about it in all the chaos. She wasn't affected by the hex. She could feel it sure but, she didn't succumb to it.
"She has a point mom, why weren't you trying to hug the life out of me?"
"I suppose I must be my own love magic, it must canceling out the hexes effects though, it's only a theory. But, that doesn't matter, we need to find a cure for this, if those ponies get outside the palace, the entire empire will become infected. Flurry, use telekinesis like I taught you, reach out to your father and tell him to lock down the palace, and try and stay out of sight. Scribe Hoof, I need you to help me with researching a cure.
"Of course your magesity" Scribe carefully walked back to her desk to prepare but, Flurry was shaking, as she felt awful. No wonder her dad didn't want her outside the palace, all she did was mess things up. Was it her fault? No, not entirely, but, she had found the book, she had Cadence open the vault, even if it was an accident, she didn't heed cadences warning and looked too close at the mirror, if she hadn't been so restless for excitment this wouldn't have happened. Now Flurry was showing she was definitely her aunts niece as she began to panic, rocking back and forth, muttering to herself.
Cadence immediately noticed this and walked over to her, wrapping her in her forlegs.
"Sweetie it's OK, were gonna figure this out".
"It's all my fault, I did this, the empire is gonna become a stupid hugging harem and it's all because I wanted to look for that stupid vault." She said though tears, running down her cheeks and staining her fur. Cadence felt pity for her daughter. This wasn't her fault, yes she looked into the mirror but, they didn't know what it was going to do, and they only found the vault by accident. That's all this was, an unfortunate accident.
Cadence made her look into her eyes, wrapping away her daughters tears as she spoke.
"Flurry listen to me. This is not your fault, we both looked for that vault, neither one of us knew this would happen, if anything it's on me. I should've been more cautious when we went in there. But, what's done is done. I know your frightened and upset, but, everything will be OK, and cmon, out all the things the crystal empire and this family has dealt with, is a hugging plague really the worst thing?" She asked smiling trying to lighten the mood abit.
Flurryheart couldn't help but, laugh abit. "Beats changling invasions".
Cadence nodded smiling. "Sure does, now, cmon. Get your dad informed, I'll find that cure, and will have a good laugh about this tonight. Can I could on you?"
Flurry got it together nodding as hugged her mother. "Thanks mom".
Cadence smiled hugging her back. "Just doing my job sweetie, now, let's get to work".
Flurryheart nodded, immediately Flying up to the ceiling so she was out of sight and began focusing on shiny armors magic, trying to find him and Inform him of the hex while Cadence and Scribe Hoof looked through the Amorinomicon to try find a cure.
Unfortunately, outside the library doors, more and more ponies were coming under the Hugmare Hexs sway, servant running in fear to not be infected. Guards either looking perplexed or fighting off the infected ponies. Some barricaded themselves inside rooms or those that could fly jumping out windows to escape. That wasn't the best decision, as those infected pegasi also, felt out of the palace and into the streets, hugging anypony they saw, and spreading the hex further. If something wasn't done soon, the entire empire would become a hug house.