//------------------------------//
// 68. First contact 
// Story: Rebirth of the Damned 
// by Borsuq 
//------------------------------//

	Twilight thought she was nervous before, when Celestia asked her through the letter to come to Canterlot for an important test. She thought she was nervous when everypony expressed their faith that she would pass.
She was wrong.
Nothing could compare to the nervousness at the thought of being responsible of finding a way to protect an entire empire.
The unicorn took few more deep breaths as she sat in the express train with her friends. Now that they knew what this was about, they were all serious, and tried to discuss what exactly was Twilight supposed to do in Crystal Empire. Matthias, after he explained how he came to know about it, stayed mostly quiet, deep in thoughts. The rest wasn’t that much helpful; since most of their suggestions resolved around her casting some spell that would protect the empire.
“That wouldn’t make any sense.” Twilight told them repeatedly. “Shining Armor’s protection spell is the strongest one there is, and Princess Cadance is an alicorn; if this was about casting spells, she could do that.”
“Then what could it be?” asked Rarity.
She didn’t know, and that scared her.
“Ar’ya okay, sugarcube?” Applejack asked her, most likely alarmed by the breaths she took.
“I just don’t understand why Princess Celestia trusts that I will succeed!” Twilight exclaimed. “I expected about a thousand different things that could be on my test, but not this! What if I failed?!”
“You won’t,” Matthias said unexpectedly.
Everypony turned their head to look at him. The paladin pony was staring blankly through the window; as he did ever since they’ve ridden into the arctic north of Equestria.
“How can you be sure?” Twilight asked, annoyed that he too seemed to have this confidence in her.
“It is a mistake to underestimate yourself as it is to overestimate yourself.” Matt told her, his eyes still on the window. “False modesty is as bad as false pride. Know exactly what you are capable of at any moment, and act accordingly, as any other path is folly—and could be deadly in battle.” he finally turned to them, and smiled at Twilight. “The Princess trusts you for she knows you are capable of figuring this out. This test is as much about proving it to yourself as it is about proving this to Celestia and everypony else.”
As Twilight listened to his words; she had found herself... calming down. She quickly thought about what Matt exactly said, about underestimating your own capabilities, and knowing what she could do and acting accordingly. The lavender unicorn went over in her head about what she was able off: she knew tons of spell, some easy and funny, other complicated and dangerous. She was smart, very smart, being able to come up with plan and answer for almost every trouble she encountered. Most importantly, however, she had...
“Besides, you’re not alone,” Matt carried on, as if reading her mind. “All of us will help you, as well as Shining Armor and Cadance. ‘If you have your friends with you, they can tell you when what you're about to do is wrong. Being surrounded by ponies you trust and have them advising you will always make you take the right course of action’.” he winked once Twilight jaw slightly dropped as he recited the exact words she said to him over three months ago.
“Thanks.” she said, smiling.
“Most of what I just said isn’t even my words, so there’s no real need to thank me.”
Having said that, his expression once again turned blank and his eyes returned to look through the window, as if being lost in his thoughts once more.
Twilight, now far more sane and mindful of her surroundings, exchanged a worried glance with everypony; mostly with Rainbow Dash, who was his sort of marefriend (she still thought a term ‘bang buddy’ to be too vulgar to use, even in her thoughts), all of them a bit concerned with his behaviour. Dash shrugged, but seeing the glares the others gave her - except for Spike, who didn’t know about her and Matthias and was probably wondering right now why the other five were shooting daggers at her - she rolled her eyes and then cleared her throat.
“Hey, Matt?” she asked, uncertain. “Is there something wrong? You’ve been staring at that window for a while now.”
For a long time, the earth pony remained silent. Twilight began to think that Matt was either too lost in thoughts to hear them, or just ignoring them, when finally he answered:
“I hate snow.” the paladin said in voice as empty as his eyes. “And ice, cold, frost... winter altogether while we’re at it, too. Everything bad always happens in winter.”
Twilight backed away a step; confused at this statement. Others were, too, if the puzzled expression were any indication.
“What do you mean?” the unicorn asked, most interested in the last part.
“Everything bad always happens in winter.”
Matthias sighed and replied
“It would take too long too-” his words hanged in the aid as he unexpectedly sprung into the air and looked in the opposite direction, his eyes darting for side to side, as if looking for something.
However, what shocked Twilight the most was not the sudden change in behaviour, or that he was on alert for no apparent reason, but what she saw in his eyes.
Fear.
 
“What is this thing?!” Matthias wondered alarmed as he finally managed to point his eyes in the right direction.
When he felt something similar in Ponyville not so long ago, he dismissed it as just his own mind playing with him, on account of it disappearing almost instantly. But there was no way that he was imagining this.
A huge, deprived of any sympathy or mercy, vortex of malice.
Matthias stared at the direction he could somehow sense it coming, despite feeling whatever the hell it was to be far away, for which he was glad. Even he, as the Lich King, never before had known such hatred, such bloodlust, the power-hungry feeling of complete and utter domination...
“No.” he realized with dread. “I’ve faced it before.”
The paladin shook as he recalled those words:
It cannot be...A Forgotten One. Look to your defenses, death knight! Fight as you've never fought before!
Most people, even those among the Argent Dawn and the Ebon Blade who witnesses his retreat at Light’s Hope thought of him as a being without fear, ever since the day he claimed Frostmourne.
They were dead wrong.
He felt fear the day his powers begun leaving him, when his ‘loyal subjects’ turned against him,  when Sylvanas was about to kill him... but it was all momentary, fleeing emotions. They couldn’t compare with the terror he felt as he heard the terrifying crypt lord spoken with fear, and the sight of the avatar of the Old God Yogg-Saron.
The death knight Arthas at that day could almost taste its fury to all that lived; the sentiment he shared, but much deeper, unhindered by any remnants of humanity. He heard the whispers in his head as they fought, words that would tear a sane mind asunder; as the cursed being, if it could be even called that, spoke to him the only thing it could to hurt him.
The truth…
Deep down you know... that you deserve to die.
It was with great effort that the earth pony put those memories aside as he tried to figure out why the hell he and his friends were about to face this walking nightmare.
“Matt, what’s wrong?!” he heard them all ask, and as he turned his head to look at them, he realized he must have stood like that for a while now.
“We need to rendezvous with the Princess and Shining Armor soon.” Matthias said, glancing one last time in the direction of yet unseen enemy. “Or else, we might find pretty quick as to from what the Crystal Empire has to be protected.”
He didn’t say anything else on the matter, despite them asking. Not then, when the danger was far away, and he had yet to figure out how was he able to tell that. There was no sense in scaring them anymore than it was necessary - which basically meant that they would only know when they had to run.

The train stopped shortly after that, and all of them went into the blinding blizzard.
“Ha! And you all made fun of me for packing so many scarves.” Rarity said triumphantly as the other mares tried to shield themselves from the snow and wind, while she was less affected by it thanks to the pink scarf she was wearing.
“I didn't say a word.” Spike grunted, carrying her luggage out of the train. When he lost his footing and slipped, it caused the suitcase to fall on the ground and open, letting a few scarves to be carried off by the wind. “Whoa! Hey! C'mere...”
Matthias knew that he should help him - actually, he should have carried the bags instead of baby dragon - but at the moment, he was busy keeping tabs on the threat.
“Would you drop this ‘tough guy’ routine and tell us what’s wrong?” Twilight asked him, and he could tell easily that she was both worried and annoyed.
“I will tell you when you need to know.” he replied like before, glancing around the empty station in the middle of seemingly nowhere, while his mind paid attention to that thing’s position.
Twilight rolled her eyes and also looked around, probably searching for her brother who was supposed to meet them here.
“How come you’re not shivering with cold?” Rainbow asked as she trotted closer to him. “It’s freezing, and you’re not even twitching.”
Matthias snorted, and for once, he didn’t care about revealing anything about his past to them.
“This little breeze is nothing compared to the cold of the Frozen Throne.” he said, now also looking for Shining Armor.
The others glanced at him confused, but before any of them could ask anything, they all heard a familiar voice calling:
“Twilight!”
“Shining Armor?” the lavender unicorn asked who gazed into the snowstorm.
From within the blizzard, a big white figure appeared, whose face was hidden beneath the cold protecting gear he was wearing; but the unicorn took it off as his sister and their friends came into view.
“Twily! You made it!” Shining Armor exclaimed happily, and soon, the two siblings were hugging each other. It didn’t last long, however, and once they stood apart, the stallion became serious. “We better get moving. There are things out here we really don't want to run into after dark.”
“So you’ve noticed it, then.” Matthias said as he continued to observe the said ‘thing’ through whatever this sense was he had.
He could see his friends share uncertain looks, now even more startled.
“What kind of things?” Fluttershy asked quietly, barely being hearable in the blizzard.
“Let's just say the empire...” Shining Armor began, and glanced back to put more pressure on his next words. “Isn’t the only thing that's returned.”
“He means King Sombra?” Matthias wondered, as the other stallion lead them to the Crystal Empire. “But... if this is true, and it is him that I’m sensing... what the hell is he?”
All his thoughts on the matter were put on hold the very next second, as he felt a change.
“It is nearing…” Matthias thought.
 



 
“Something keeps trying to get in!” her brother said as Twilight and her friends followed him. “We think it's the unicorn king who originally cursed the place.”
“But Princess Celestia said I was being sent here to find a way to protect the empire!” she pointed out, confused. “If King Sombra can't get in, then it must already be protected.”
“How far away is the Crystal Empire, Captain?” Matt asked all of the sudden, causing few ponies including Twilight, to glance at him.
The earth pony was trotting at the very end of the group, the only one to completely ignore the effects of the bad weather, and despite looking straight ahead, he seemed to her that Matthias was keeping an eye on what was behind them somehow. Ever since he unexpectedly sprung on the train, he’s been acting weird, which worried Twilight. She didn’t miss what he said at the station, and wondered what unnerved her more: the fact that he could tell there was some threat nearby and decided not to tell them, which meant it must be really dangerous...
… or that she was so occupied that he mentioned something about his past.
Matt wasn’t the only one with good memory. Just as he remembered what Twilight said to him, she also memorized the victories he claimed when he fought those jerky dragons way back, and recalled one in particular.
I dueled the demon hunter Illidan Stormrage, the Lord of Outland, in front of the doors of the Frozen Throne and was victorious!
“What is this ‘Frozen Throne’?” she wondered briefly, forgetting for few heartbeats that they were in danger. “Is it a name of some fortress?”
Twilight decided to ask him later as she listened to her brother reply:
“It’s not far now.” the tone in which he said that sounded surprised, most likely wondering how come the other stallion called him by his rank. “Why do you ask?”
“Make sure they all get there.” Matthias said, not replying to his question. “Don’t worry about me, I’ll follow shortly.”
“Wha-” Shining Armor asked, not the only one confused here, but the paladin cut him off.
“He’s coming.”
The very next second after he said that; a terrifying roar sounded all around them.
“Not bothering with a sneak attack, huh?” Twilight heard Matthias mutter sarcastically as she frantically looked around.
She spared him a glance, curious as to where he was looking, and did so at the exact same moment as his eyes began to widen. Before she had a chance to ask what happened, he jumped to the front, with his Holy Avenger in hoof and charged at...
Words could not describe what Twilight saw, the best what came to her mind was that it was some kind of shadow-like smoke thing, with glowing red-green eyes that burned with purple flames.
“King Sombra...” the unicorn realised with a jolt, fighting off the urge to run away in the opposite direction.
And Matt just jumped straight to those eyes.
Everypony watched as he swung his sword. Twilight wondered if something that didn’t have a body could be actually wounded, by the crack in the smoke and pain-filled scream that followed confirmed it.
King Sombra moved out of the way, and was about to lunge at Matthias, who just landed back on the snow. In response to that, the paladin lifted his forelegs, and slammed his hooves into the snow. A surge of Light’s energy erupted from the ground around him, doing no harm to ponies and baby dragon, but plainly painful to the huge shadow as he further backed away.
“GO!” Matt shouted to them, and prepared to once again face this monstrosity.
Everypony, Twilight included, snapped out of their dazes and listened to what the paladin told them. While she hated that they were leaving him like this - and suspected that Rainbow must be feeling even worse, on account of the ‘never leaving pony behind’ policy - she knew that Matthias had the best chance of coming out of that unharmed, and that he would soon follow them.
 
Matthias had to admit, he was surprise how quickly the fallen unicorn king managed to pass them underground and emerge right in front of them. However his theory of Light being really harmful to him seemed to be right.
He had no doubt that it was the self-styled king, Sombra. He saw in Luna memories how the Princesses’ powers ripped his body to shreds, which in truth, happened only because of the heat of battle, he doubted that either of them could actually go this far knowingly. His spirit somehow survived, although weakened, and then the two alicorn sisters proceeded to imprison him within the ice of north. While Matthias had no idea as to how he returned, or what he was, he recognised his hate-filled eyes.
Sparing a glance to see his friends run towards the empire; he addressed the shadow.
“You shall not pass, Sombra.” he told him, pointing the Light’s sword at him.
The huge shadow laughed in response and looked into Matthias’ eyes.
 
The paladin blinked. All of the sudden, he was in Ponyville, but...
… the dead were everywhere.
Each and every pony that he knew laid dead, their corpses being now feasts for maggots and crows. Daisy (whom he and Fluttershy left their pets with), Mister and Misses Cakes and their foals, Cheerilee, Mayor Mare, Cloudchaser, Flitter, Thunderlane, Blossomforth, Big Mac, the Cutie Mark Crusaders... they were all dead.
And soon, they started to move.
One by one, pony after pony the dead began to rise, and the worst part was not that.
The worst part was seeing hatred in the eyes of the one that was still alive.
Twilight stood in the middle of Ponyville, surrounded by bodies of her friends; looking at one another, as if expecting them to wake up. They did so, but not in the way she wanted. As Rainbow Dash, Applejack, Rarity, Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie rose, it was clear what they were going to do to the last of the group that was alive.
The lavender unicorn gaze shifted from her friends to Matthias.
“How could you do that?!” said Twilight, in such a sad and angry state.
The paladin pony remained silent, despite the anger that rose in his heart.
“You’ll regret this, Sombra.” he thought as he bit his lip and concentrated on the pain.
 
Matthias opened his eyes in the exact moment as the evil unicorn was about to descend upon him. The paladin once again asked for Light’s help and it answered, this time in the form Light’s storm that swirled with bright make-shift hammers around him, making the self-styled king scream in pain and fall back.
The earth pony wasn’t about to do the same quite yet. Before Sombra had a chance to recover, he unleashed a wave of Light at his enemy, causing him to back away even more. The shadow’s eyes flashed with rage as it changed shape, forming a sort of like head, with a twisted, red horn on it.
The paladin readied himself as the horn shone, and before he knew it, the blizzard seemed to focus solely on him. While Matthias could once again felt the cold, he was much more resilient to its effects thanks to the long years he spend as wielder of Frostmourne, but even his durability had its limits. So in a heartbeat, the Light’s shield formed around him, protecting him from the attack.
“By the Light, be purged!” Matthias shouted, while pointing a hoof at the gigantic smoke in front of him.
The Light struck Sombra directly, hurting him and dispelling his control over the blizzard at the same time. Almost a second later, a magical beam hit the fallen unicorn, making him back away even more.
“Shining Armor!” he realized, grateful that the other stallion didn’t listen to him.
Matthias took the opportunity and run towards the empire. While he seemed to hold the upperhoof, he wasn’t going to repeat the mistake he made in Canterlot not so long ago; he would resume the fight with Sombra once he had more information about him, no sooner.
As he run, a familiar purple barrier appeared over him while the Light’s disappeared, granting him safe passage to the...
…giant blue bubble shield!
“Cadance.” he thought, amused and impressed as he realised what stopped Sombra so far from attacking the empire. “So you aren’t that far behind your aunts in terms of power, huh?”
To be able to spread love around all of the Crystal Empire, and use it as protection against evil... like Brann said, alicorns were basically demigods.
Despite seemingly out of danger, Matthias speeded up towards Shining Armor, still able to sense Sombra he could tell that he was about to unleash his magic at the barrier.
“Watch out, he plans to attack!” he shouted as he neared the other stallion.
Shining Armor nodded, but a second after Matthias passed him a large explosion shattered the shield, and forced the Captain to his knees.
The paladin halted, which wasn’t easy in the snow, and rushed back for Shining Armor; and at the same time, King Sombra attacked.
 



 
Twilight panted as they stopped on the other side of the barrier, her run hardened by the weight of the baby dragon on her back.
“Everypony okay?” she asked her friends, and listened to their confirmation.
All of them were out of breath, but none of the hurt. Twilight was about sigh with relief, but then the sound of crossing barrier sounded twice more, and she turned around to see Matt and...
“Oh no, Shining Armor, your horn!” she exclaimed as she run up to her brother, who was surrounded by Light.
Shining Armor’s horn was covered in something resembling small crystals at the end. Twilight tried to touch it, but the shield Matt’s summoned wouldn’t let her. Instead she watched as her brother tried to cast a spell, only to fail.
“Oh no, it must be blocking his ability to use magic!” Twilight realised, panicking. To her, magic was almost like air, to be deprived of it... “Wait, maybe Matt could heal it...” she thought and turned to the other stallion, but the question she wanted to ask froze in her throat as Twilight got a better look at him.
Matt barely holding himself on his hooves, and his face was twisted in pain. He coughed few times, as Rainbow and Pinkie patted him on the back to.
“You should have put one on yourself, too.” Shining Armor said as he got up to from the ground.
Matthias, who appeared to feel better, smirked.
“It was safer to concentrate on just one shield than two.” he rasped, coughed again and continued: “And besides, compared to what the Forsaken put me through at Angrathar, this was merely a fart. Give me a second, and I will see about your horn.”
Twilight didn’t bother thinking about whoever ‘Forsaken’ were or whatever ‘Angrathar’ was. Instead, she looked with admiration at stallions, both of which she loved. Her brother, who disregarded Matt’s words and came to help him; and her friend, who selflessly risked his life to save Shining Armor’s instead. She longed to embrace both of them, but she knew her brother would frown at that and since he was right about her and Matt all along, Twilight had no doubt that it would end poorly.
She hugged her brother after the shield disappeared on its own, while Matt finally shaken off whatever it was that King Sombra did to him. The earth pony trotted to her and Shining Armor, and pressing hoof to his horn, murmured something.
The Light quickly enveloped the black crystal-covered end of horn, but at the same time, her brother screamed in pain. Twilight was about to tell Matt to stop, but he was faster than her.
“They’re harder to remove than I thought they would be...” he said thoughtfully one he stopped his earlier efforts, much Shining Armor’s relief. “And it seems that they go all the way to the nerve...”
“Can you remove them?” Twilight asked.
“Not without inflicting him great deal of pain.” Matt replied. “And even then it would take a long time. The fact that most paladins can heal the effects of poisons and diseases doesn’t actually help with this. It seems more on the lines of curse.”
“Well, time is one of the luxuries we cannot afford.” Shining Armor said. “I’ll be fine for now. Let’s go to the crystal castle.”
Twilight nodded, and it just then hit her to look around.
Unlike the surroundings from few minutes back, this place was warm and completely without snow. Everywhere were meadows, and right in front of them that’s far behind the two crystal pillars marking the entrance, was the Crystal Empire. Twilight gasped as she saw the sparkling buildings and the huge, rightly named crystal castle, towering above everything else. There were no words to describe-
“Sparklerific!” Pinkie Pie shouted.
Despite the ordeal they’ve just been through, Twilight giggled at Pinkie’s word.