Awakening Alicorns
Chapter 3. A Lost Soul
The wind grew restless as sparks shot from the ground. The small island altar was rising from where it rested, revealing a dark figure looking over Lightning’s rotted body. Dark magic swelled inside the figure as Lightning’s body began to twist and pull. Ribs pulled through her chest as her mane turned black as night. Her eyes shot open, crazed with bloodlust. Clay had seen this happen before, back during the Great War. The figure had turned her into a Nightmare.
“NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!” Luna was ready to run, the fears and memories of her time as a Nightmare returning to her. There was only two ponies other than herself she had ever seen turned into nightmares.
Wings spread wide, the two Nightmares soared across the water, landing elegantly on the beachfront. “What should we do to them, Nightmare Gale?” the twisted form of Lightning asked the new enemy.
“Perhaps we should turn them into Nightmares as well, but much more painfully. Does that sound good to you, Nightmare Spark?” Nightmare Gale exchanged a wicked look with the newly turned Nightmare Spark. Clouds blotted out the sun, thunder struck in the distance. Waves in the water began slamming into the beach rocks violently.
“Do I actually have to pay attention to the fight this time?” Clay whispered into Luna’s ear.
“Now’s not the time for jokes! Our friend just got turned into a Nightmare!”
“Who the hell are you, and what have you done with Luna!?” Celestia asked.
“This is no joke! Nightmares are not to be trifled with!”
“As amusing as this is, can we get on with the Nightmareification? The master is expecting us soon,” Nightmare Gale rudely interrupted. “I’m sure he will be happy with a few extra slaves!”
“Listen to yourselves! You just admitted to being a slave!”
“Quiet fool! You have no right to talk to us like that,” Nightmare Gale began, “We are more powerful than you could ever hope to be!” A bow and some arrows took shape from the air around her. She shot one with deadly precision, striking Black Aroma dead in the eyes, killing her again. “The next one’s going right through your skull!” She eyed Life, sending another one flying. Just as she said, Life had an arrow sticking all the way through her head.
Nightmare Spark took advantage of her collapse, turning her into another Nightmare. “I was hoping for more of a challenge from the all mighty alicorns! You’re making this too easy!” Life arose, now in the same, twisted state as the other two Nightmares. Souls of fallen soldiers and servants pranced around her, protecting her from anything that got to close. Thunder Mist, Golden Strike, and Clover, being the most recently deceased, stood at the front of the undead guards.
“Where is Black Aroma?” Sun asked, seeing that her faithful servant was not among the demons before her.
“Her soul is mine! If anypony is going to take the dead, it’s me!” Death flared, his scythe slashing through a group of undead ponies. “I am lord of the dead! Not you!” He slashed again, but to no avail. More of the unholy demons spawned around the twisted form of Life.
“You no longer control them! From now on, I, Nightmare Soul, shall command the dead! Mwahahaha!”
“Nightmare Soul? Sounds a lot better than Nightmare Spark, that’s for sure!” Clay said as he smashed a demon’s head in with his hammer. The ground quaked from the impact, causing a cluster of the demons to fall to the ground. Stalagmites began shooting through the fallen bodies, making them evaporate into nothingness. The ghosts of Golden Strike and Thunder Mist flanked Clay, catching him off guard. His hammer was knocked away from him making it even more difficult to defend himself. His earth magic had no effect on the pegasi demons that attacked from above. Overwhelmed, he encased himself in a stone barrier that allowed him to charge a passage spell. If he could get away, then there was a chance he could round up the Royal Guard for reinforcements.
Cracking his shell just enough to see outside, he could see some of the other alicorns had the same idea. Sun and Celestia had a barrier of light surrounding them while Luna and Death were shielded by darkness. A flash of light and an eruption of darkness filled the air as the teleportation spells completed, leaving Clay alone with the demonic Nightmares. A hole in the ground opened beneath him, allowing him to escape into the ground. Caves and tunnels laid in every direction. He had seen them before, these were the tunnels he had been in when he returned to the world of ponies. The steady drip of water echoed through a tunnel that led to an underground lake.
He followed the tunnel until he reached the lake. It looked different from the first time he had been here. Moss and roots hung from the ceiling, boulders had fallen from their resting places in the walls, and the water had risen several feet. Approaching the water, Clay noticed something moving out of the corner of his eye.
“Somepony there?” he called out. He waited for a moment, listening for a response.
Nothing.
Clay turned back towards the lake, looking across at an opening in the wall.
That’s new he thought, moving around the lake. The cave grew colder the closer he got to the opening. Musty air tried pushing him away as thick roots hooked around his hooves and horn, making it difficult to progress.
“Ahhh! I’ll get nowhere at this rate!” Clay raised his hammer in his to swing at the vines, only to have it caught in the vine above him, “Damn it all!”
“You won’t get anywhere like that.”
*In the royal castle*
Sun sat alone in her room. “All is going according to plan. She lead us straight to the next Nightmare.”
“I made sure the dream would give her enough clues to find it. And what of the others?” A small, blue outline walked out from the darkest corner.
“”Life was turned and Clay escaped into the tunnels he returned from. All the rest are in the throne room discussing their next move.”
“Find Clay in the tunnels. He is not to return, not yet.”
“It will be done, this I swear.”
“They are not to know I have returned until we are ready,” the outline said before disappearing in the corner he came from.
“I will not fail you. Not again” She got and left her room, making way for the tunnels to get rid of Clay.
*Back to Clay!*
“Sun! What are you doing here?” She had startled him when she first appeared. “How did you find me?”
“I wish I could tell you, but if I am to save Equestria, you must die.” Sun pulled her gun from behind her, aiming it at Clay.
“What are you doing?!?”
“Good by, Clay.” Sun fired her gun, hitting Clay’s heart. The massive alicorn fell to his knees, as the mud colored outline of his soul left the body and floated towards Sun. “I wish there could have been another way.”
Using her new powers over stone and earth, she pulled his hammer from the ceiling. She looked at the fallen body of her former friend one last time before making her way into the tunnel he was trying to get to. “It’s done.”
“Excellent. Give me the soul!” The blue outline that had given her the orders to kill Clay walked out of from the shadows. Silver now outlined where his mane and tail would be, red eyes formed on his face, and the ground around him turned to ice. Clay’s soul left Sun and floated to the creature in the cave, vanishing as they touched. The figure became more visible as a cloak darker than the already present outline grew around it. Five tentacles consisting of wind, lightning, darkness, earth, and light protruded from its back, each holding a different weapon matching that of the alicorn that wielded them before. “Only fifteen alicorns left, and the Nightmares are causing unforeseen problems.”
“What would you have me do?” Sun asked staring at the creature with admiration. There had only been one alicorn to have ever been able to wield weapons beyond his own, and he had been dead since before the war. She pushed the memory aside as the horrors of what he had done to Equestria. It was his fault they had been numbered. His fault the ponies had been mutated. His fault she was the only one who could remember what happened. It was all his fault! “We can’t let them hurt anypony!”
“I know, but I have a much more important task for you. At the peak of the world, Time and Space have awoken. I need them dead and you're the only pony I can trust.”
“What about the Nightmares?”
“I will dispose of them. Now go, the others have begun looking for you.” The creature faded into the darkness.
“You will not be disappointed.” Sun turned down the tunnels, heading for her new targets.
Questions, comments, fan-art, other shit I don’t care about?
Send to warmuffin1@gmail.com