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// Prologue 
// Story: Children of the Sun 
// by Vanner 
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Prologue: The War to End All Wars

If you hadn’t been born five years ago, the rising of the sun seemed routine. Fillies and colts took for granted that the sun would come up every morning, and that the moon would come out every evening. If they had been there to watch the sun falter, or if they had seen the moon hang in the sky for weeks on end, they too would have praised the miracle of the sunrise every morning.

Everypony had seen the cost of the Lunar Rebellion: A tyrant banished to the moon, a goddess left in tears at what she had been forced to do, and a populace that had been left broken in the wake. As it was, no pony had seen Celestia in those five years following the banishment of Nightmare Moon. So shaken by what she had done, the goddess went into exile, and walled herself in her castle at Canterlot.

When the armies of the night marched on the palace, they thought they brought with them the ideal of a republic headed by Nightmare Moon. What they failed to understand was that the Lunar Republic was just another despotism hiding under the guise of freedom. It was often said that Luna herself would have never approved of marching on the palace, but Nightmare Moon had pushed aside the quiet alicorn’s desires to replace them her own. Honeyed words whispered into the ears of the Princess, along with her own loneliness and some unknown force from beyond had taken away the love between the sisters, and created the monster that ascended to power.

The followers of Nightmare Moon had called themselves the Lunar Republic, and at the low levels they operated as such. Elections were held, representatives chosen, and issues were voted upon. The biggest supporters of the Lunar Republic had come from the ranks of the so called lesser equines, that is, the donkeys and mules. Maligned by their pony-centric world, the voices of the rebellion urged them to join the struggle for the Lunar Republic, and throw off their shackles of slavery.  

It was all a farce. The flaws in the system began to reveal themselves as the lesser equines realized that power didn’t flow from the ponies, but was instead wielded as a hammer from the top of the heap. The ponies tried to make slaves of the mules and donkeys again as Nightmare Moon would make slaves of them all. The equines left the fold, and searched for a way to bring their Luna back from Nightmare Moon’s grasp.

Through the fighting and revolutions, ponies had come to revel in the art of war. Before the Lunar Rebellion, Equestria had come to symbolize peace and harmony throughout the world. After the Lunar Rebellion, ponies had forgotten what peace was like, and like a mother who leaves her children home alone for too long, the ponies of Equestria began fight amongst themselves. They came to expect violence against each other, and they reveled in cruelty toward their fellow ponies. They sought to divide up their country, and make their own fiefdoms. A dark time had swept over Equestria since Celestia’s exile. It had only been five years. How could Equestria stand for even five more?

Many ponies did little more than complain about their failing empire. Others moved on into the Zebra territories to start a new life. Some simply found the highest cliff to throw themselves from and dashed themselves against the jagged rocks. Still others sought to take advantage of the creeping anarchy, and made their own greedy bids for power.

Power wasn’t hard to come by in those days. You simply told ponies you were in charge, and if they argued, you beat them until they complied. It wasn’t quite slavery, but it was the sort of brutal anarchy that comes without a functioning government. True, there was a charter of sorts for the Princesses to follow, but no pony had seen either one for five years. Without the monarchy to guide them, Equestria had descended into squabbling fiefdoms that routinely fought for land and power. Combined with the threats from the outside world, and the growing blight that had become the Everfree forest, the future of Equestria was grimmer than ponies were willing to admit.

A few brave souls weren’t willing to let the glory of Equestria fade that easily. Remnants of Celestia’s Knights sought to keep order where they could, but their heavy handed tactics of interrogation and inquisition during the time of the rebellion had left a bitter taste in the mouths of most ponies. Celestia’s Knights sought to redeem themselves for their crimes of the past by bringing hope of a new future, but without the support of the citizens, they were powerless to stop the flood of despair that threatened to drown Equestria.

Even those most devoted to Celestia had taken to zealous worship outside of the summer palace at Canterlot. Hundreds of monks chanted and prayed everyday at her walls. Every day they begged for a sign from her, and every day they were greeted only by sunrise and sun set. The palace square had become a little more than an echo chamber for hundreds of prostrate ponies begging for their ruler to return.

Still, even in the darkest night, there are the star lights of hope that emerge from the most unlikely of places. Some ponies had decided to make their world a better place; normal ponies with normal lives that were willing stand up for the common folk. This is the story of four heroes who, in finding each other, found that Equestria was worth saving after all.