(Garuu’s note: All characters will have plenty of time in the spotlight. Especially during Sidequests, such as a stealth mission with Rarity & Rainbow Dash. ...Chaotic Dreams, where the hay did you put my raisins? I’m hungry.)

(CD: I ATE THEM ALL!! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!)

Equestria RPG

Chapter One

Around and around the roulette went, the arrow rapidly warping between the heads of each pony. Rainbow Dash was hovering and biting her lip, just barely containing a squeal of excitement as she stared with optimism at the mystical construct that might, just might, choose her. Her heart was pounding, her breaths were short and her mind had already delved into a fantasy of herself in shining silver armor, pointing a spear out to the world like the figure of authority she would soon be. Her five cohorts would gather around her, following in her glorious, shiny footsteps. She was the Party Leader. She called the shots. And this was how it should be.

Everypony was silent as the arrow began to slow its rapid cycling. It was as if the air itself was holding its breath. Soon the beeping had slowed to only once or twice per second, like the popping of popcorn in an arcane microwave. This was the moment when a pony would extract their buttery feast to avoid burning it.

The arrow moved from Rarity, to Applejack, to Twilight, and then it seemed to hover still over Rainbow Dash. The pegasus felt her chest swell with energy, and she took a deep breath.

        And then the arrow moved backward, to Twilight, before flashing once with a loud ding!

        Rainbow Dash’s excitement shriveled and died, and she dropped to the ground, frowning as her dreams collapsed like a house of cards.

        Twilight, on the other hand, was smiling awkwardly at the incriminating symbol floating above her head. She hadn’t actually expected to be chosen. She was just here for... uh... moral support?

She felt the ground shake as her friends applauded her, stomping on the dirt and giving various congratulations. Except for Rainbow Dash. Twilight cast an apologetic glance towards the disappointed mare. She undoubtedly knew that her friend wanted to be the Leader, and in retrospect she would’ve probably made a better one, as she was a higher Level.

“Well shoot, Twilight!” Applejack approached the Party Leader with a friendly smile. “Guess yer gonna lead the pack this time around!” She blinked once. “So uh, what’re we doin’?”

As if on cue, a huge, burly Earth stallion seemed to materialize behind a tree before approaching the group. He had a bright pink coat that smoothly outlined the underlying muscles, a dark blue mane neatly styled up above his head. His presence carried authority and relaxedness at the same time.

“I need your help.” His voice was so deep and so smooth, it seemed to make the ground vibrate. “Something strange is going on in the Everfree Forest, and I need you to investigate.”

He had commanded attention from each of the mares present. Most of them were gazing with curiosity, ears perked in excitement, ready to receive their task.

Pinkie Pie, on the other hand, was looking at him much differently. She wore a completely blank expression, her unblinking eyes locked onto him as a small blush pervaded her features and saliva dripped out of the corner of her mouth. Ooooohhhh. Pinkie liiiike.

Applejack seemed to notice the way that her sugary friend was staring at the stallion like a starved wolf would stare at a pork chop, and sharply elbowed her. “Pinkie, look at his flank.”

Applejack narrowed her eyes. “That ain’t what I meant. Look — he ain’t got no cutie mark. That’s a Quest NPC. He was designed to be good lookin’, and he won’t be around for long, so keep yer tongue in yer mouth.”

The party pony seemed to deflate at that, looking up at Applejack like a young colt would look at his mother if she told him to give up his favorite toy.

“Be on the lookout for something strange. When you find it, you’ll receive your reward; two thousand experience points.” With that, the stallion seemed to disintegrate like he was made of paper mache, bits of him floating away and disappearing until there was nothing left.

Pinkie frowned, but Applejack slung a foreleg around her neck with a soft smile. “Don’t worry, Pinkie. You’ll find a nice colt for yourself one day.”

A few meters to the left, Twilight shrugged nonchalantly. “I didn’t want to do another Questline, but I guess it’ll be a good experience.”

Rainbow Dash perked up at that, raising a blue hoof with a lopsided grin. “Don’t you mean, it’ll be good experience, as in EXP, Twilight?”

Twilight’s purple mane whipped back and forth as she shook her head. “No! I mean... Oh, forget it.” She brought a purple hoof to her forehead and gently massaged it. Right. Another use of the word “experience” that was technically improper. Yes, it was an important part of the world, but it was... wrong.

Twilight sighed, her hoof returning to the ground. “Girls?” she asked evenly, fixing them with an honest gaze. “Do you ever think that the world is just... just wrong, somehow?”

Twilight took a deep breath, looking beneath her at the soft, crunchy dirt. “I don’t know how to explain it,” she muttered. “Something just... It’s...” She raised her head to look back at the group. “You know how most fish don’t know that they’re swimming around in water, because that’s all they’ve ever known?” Five nodding heads. “But there’s a whole world outside of the water?”

Twilight looked at the farmer like she had just told her that the sky was green, before shaking her head. “No, no. It’s just that something about... here,” she gestured around her, “is abnormal, but we’ve never noticed it because it’s normal to us.”

“There ain’t nothin’ wrong with my farm, Twilight,” Applejack said with a warning tone, narrowing her eyes.

“I dunno what you mean, Twilight! I don’t think there’s anything strangey-wangey about Equestria.” Pinkie gave a good-natured grin.

“I think AJ’s doing a good job of taking care of her farm,” Rainbow added. “I mean, the cider is awesome!”

Rarity put a hoof to her chin before looking at Fluttershy, who was backed up against a tree. “Do you have anything to say on this matter, Fluttershy?”

The pegasus flinched at the sudden acknowledgement. “Oh! No, no. Twilight’s just being... uhm...” Her eyes flicked to several objects nearby. “She’s just imagining things. Really. I’ve never noticed anything... strange... about anything...” She bit her lip, continuing to look around.

Applejack was the first to notice how oddly shifty Fluttershy was acting. “Do you know somethin’ ya ain’t tellin’ us, Fluttershy?” Her stare drilled into the meek pony like two high-powered lasers.

With a small squeak, Fluttershy’s face disappeared behind a wall of light pink.

Twilight groaned softly and held her head in her hooves. “Fine, okay, whatever, maybe I’m just crazy.” She quickly tapped her chest, summoning her Menu screens, and scrolled through them with simple hoof drags until she stumbled across ‘Quest Info.’

Evidently, they were supposed to find a particular something to advance the Quest. She turned to her friends. “Let’s just... let’s just go.”

After Applejack had notified her family that she was going to be gone for a while, Rainbow Dash had convinced Fluttershy to come out from behind her tail, and Pinkie Pie had purchased a few mugs of cider, the group headed off to the forest.

A few drops of amber liquid dripped to the grass below, a long tongue rolling pleasurably out of a pink mouth.

“Wow Pinkie, how many mugs of cider did you buy?” Rainbow Dash chuckled, raising impressed eyebrows as the earth pony gulped down her next one.

“Mm’bout twenty.” Pinkie giggled drunkenly, a small hiccup escaping her throat. “Hmhmhm... hmhm...” Undoubtedly she was keeping them in her Inventory. There was no other way she would be able to carry that many with only one visible.

Applejack raised an eyebrow. “Y’know Pinkie, it’s ponies like you that make my family and I want to put a ‘limit per pony’ on our cider. Yeah, our cider gives a STR boost, but it also cranks down your INT...”

Pinkie’s face suddenly became well-acquainted with the ground. “Oh, hi there Mrs. Ladybug! I didn’t see you there! Ha ha... ahh... hah...”

Thankfully, INT was just a stat. It didn’t accurately reflect a pony’s literal cognitive abilities, especially if that pony chose to not assign many bonus stat points to it, which were awarded for each Level Up. Although, in the case of the effects of Apple Family Cider, it seemed to cause a pony’s INT to do exactly that...

They had just entered the Everfree Forest, which again presented its ever-present darkness and animal noises. Bzzzt. Awoooo. CAW! The group was following Twilight like a flock of sheep, none of them able to get a good look at the Menu that was pressed up against her face.

Twilight, on the other hand, was paying no attention to the rest of the group, trudging forward like a sheep herself as her eyes were locked on the Quest Compass function of her Menu. Her ears didn’t so much as twitch at the loud plop! that echoed through the air as Applejack pulled Pinkie out of the ground. “Girls, we should be arriving at the Quest location in just a moment...”

Twilight squinted at the sudden increase of ambient light, shielding her eyes with a hoof. They had just entered a clearing in the forest, dense canopies surrounding them but none daring to creep closer. Nestled neatly in the center of the clearing was a large structure of neatly-chiseled stone, a large circular slab of bedrock undoubtedly concealing an entrance of some sort. Twilight noted that the ‘doorway’ was glowing faintly with an eerie green light.

Rarity’s eyes sparkled as she quickly approached the structure, so enamored was she with the stone to notice that she had walked through a chest-deep puddle of muck. “Such... such expertise! Such amazing craftsmanship!” she gushed, running her muddy hooves over the strange glyphs carved into the walls. “Whoever designed this lavish work must have been an absolute master at stone carving! Why, I’m—” Upon lifting her hoof to her forehead in one of her swoons, she had a realization. Her eyes widened as she brought her hoof in front of her to examine it, noticing the trail of mud mixed with something else dripping between her hoof and her forehead. Her irises began to shrink, her throat swelling slightly as a small whimper escaped from it, her ears folding flat against her head. Looking at the rest of her body, she noticed that the majority of her form was coated in... in... filth!

The other mares held their hooves to their ears as Rarity released an ear-piercing shriek, causing nearby tree-dwelling birds to flop over each other in an effort to vacate the area.

Rarity was hysterical as she ran around, wiping her entire body on anything she could find to cleanse herself of the muck. She tumbled across the grass, brushed up against trees and rubbed herself as hard as she could on the stone structure. “IT’S IN MY MANE! IT’S ALL OVER ME! AAHHH!! GET IT OFF! I NEED A BATH!!”

Unfortunately, in her panic she tripped and submerged herself entirely in the very same mud puddle that had so tarnished her perfectly-groomed figure. Upon crawling out, she screeched even louder, prompting the shoving of an orange hoof into her mouth.

“Rarity! Quit screamin’ at the top a’yer lungs!” Applejack shouted, her ears still ringing.

Rarity swallowed, gazing up at the workhorse with tear-filled eyes. “But... but...”

Twilight was paying no mind to Rarity’s antics, too focused on the structure. Her Menu blipped, drawing her attention.

Twilight’s mouth moved to one side of her face. Well, that was... anticlimactic. Nevertheless, her Quest Info Menu promptly gained some new text.

“Did we find the strange thing? Is this it?” Rainbow Dash asked, suddenly poking her head over Twilight’s shoulder to look at the unicorn’s Menu. Twilight flinched and backed away in surprise.

Dash shrugged. “I’m sorry? Anyway, is this the strange thing?” She jabbed a hoof at the glowing structure. “Where’s my EXP?”

“Maybe we have to go inside,” AJ suggested, mostly occupied with consoling Rarity on her ‘ruined’ mane. Blinking in realization, she raised an incriminating eyebrow at the muddy mare. “Wait a minute, didn’t ya’ll cover yourself in mud fer the Sisterhooves Social with yer li’l sister?”

“But that was different!” Rarity sobbed. “That mud was delightfully thin and I could just shake it off! This...” She jabbed a brown hoof into her mane, pulling out a sticky glob of... earth. Her eyes welled with tears as she stared at the gooey substance. “This is... sticky! It won’t come off!” After shaking her limb in a mostly-futile attempt to cleanse it, she tapped her chest, a transparent white-tinted screen shimmering into existence in front of her. She gasped, horrified. “It’s even reducing my SPD by thirty percent! Oh, how uncouth!”

“Okay, then.” Rainbow Dash nodded in understanding, completely ignoring their local drama queen as a grin crept onto her blue face. “We go inside, then we get EXP. Sweet! I think two thousand is enough to Level me!” With that, she darted up into the sky, spending a superfluous amount of time doing loop-de-loops and other unnecessary tricks before diving at full-speed at the door.

Rainbow Dash slid to the ground with an unceremonious squeaking noise, not a crack left by her high-speed impact. However, her life bar was noticeably shorter. She groaned, slowly lifting herself back to her feet.

Fluttershy, who had been playing with some bunnies in a nearby patch of tall grass, lifted her head like a meerkat at the noise. Upon seeing Rainbow Dash with an incomplete life bar, she gasped in horror, galloping to the mare. “Oh, you poor thing!” She slid to a stop before her friend, gasping again as she noticed a small trail of red liquid dripping down Dash’s forehead.

“Ugh... I-I’m fine,” Rainbow muttered, gripping her head with both forelegs. Her expression was two parts dazed and three parts frustrated.

Fluttershy ignored her and reared up, her forehooves glowing with a heavenly white light as a strange ring expanded outward from them. The ring had a design in it, almost like ancient runes, and sparkled with an otherworldly power as it began to rotate. It spun faster and faster, the glyphs within becoming incomprehensible before Fluttershy’s hooves slammed powerfully into the ground, white energy rippling across the grass.

Rainbow Dash’s splitting headache suddenly began to dissolve as the same white ring appeared around her, etched into the ground as if by an experienced stone carver. Waves of light rose from it, bathing the pegasus mare in a strange sense of contentment, a relaxing warmth that flowed through her as if she had just gulped down a mug of hot cocoa on a chilly night. The incomplete red bar floating just above her head swiftly refilled, complemented by a glowing green “123.”

Fluttershy then tackled her, holding Rainbow Dash on her back. “W-what the—” Rainbow was interrupted as a yellow hoof fitted a tongue depressor into her mouth. “Ellhh?”

“A-are you okay now? Did that Skill work? Does your head hurt?” Fluttershy drilled her friend with doctorly questions, to all of which Rainbow Dash responded with a incoherent grunt.

Dash’s eyes narrowed and she shoved her friend’s hoof away. “I-I’m fine now, Flutters. Thanks, by the way.” She smacked her lips once, her face scrunching up with revulsion at the awful taste of the tongue depressor. “Awgh! That was nasty!”

Fluttershy visibly shrunk. “Oh! Oh, I’m sorry... I was just...”

Meanwhile, Twilight’s eyes were wide with absolute fascination, her mouth slightly open. “You learned a healing spell, Fluttershy?”

“Yes,” the quivering lump of yellow fur replied. Two eyes poked out of it. “My animals sometimes get hurt, and I figured that I could save some money if I just learned a healing spell instead of buying a bunch of medical supplies...”

“Well, that saves us some trouble too,” Twilight added with a grin. “I haven’t even touched the Restoration tree...”

“Yeah yeah, Fluttershy can heal now, big whoop.” Rainbow Dash impatiently waved a blue hoof, her face fixed with a slight apathetic scowl. She pointed at the stone structure again. “How do we get in there?”

Twilight’s chin was met with a purple hoof. She sat down on her haunches, staring with a cold, calculating gaze at the “Crypt.” She had absolutely no idea how to enter it. Did they need a key? Could Applejack bust the door down with her ridiculous STR? Could Twilight teleport inside and open it from there with a conveniently-placed lever? Nah, that last one was wishful thinking. The Developers wouldn’t have made it that easy.

Standing up, she trotted slowly to the large, glowing stone disk that sealed the entrance. Could it be rolled out of the way? Was there a password? Did she need to solve a puzzle? She placed her hoof on one of the glyphs, using it to support herself as she reared up slightly to get a better view.

And then she suppressed a yelp as a purple-tinted rectangle appeared in front of her face.

She took a quick glance behind her, her cheeks burning up. It was so obvious, and she hadn’t even considered it. Thankfully, none of her friends seemed to be looking her way — they were sharing a spirited discussion of what they would spent their next sets of Skill Points on.

Twilight swiftly jabbed the green check mark on the Menu, and the ground began to shake as the unmistakable noise of stone grinding against stone echoed through the air. The stone doorway rolled aside (of course), revealing a staircase that descended into absolute pitch-black. Twilight took one breath through her nose and immediately regretted it, frowning.

“Sweet!” Rainbow Dash cheered, immediately jumping into the air and soaring to the entrance of the dungeon, only to collide with a shimmering, transparent blue wall. Thankfully, this one didn’t drain her life bar.

Rainbow Dash scowled at the message on the blue Menu, before directing her scowl to Twilight, whose ears promptly folded. Twilight shrunk slightly as she turned around to face her other friends, who were staring at the entrance with awe. “A-alright everypony, let’s go in...”

“Wait, where’s Fluttershy?” Applejack asked, looking around before she laid eyes on a quivering pink tail sticking out of a bush. Sighing raggedly, her eyebrows fell flat enough to build a house upon as she approached it. She quickly took hold of it in her jaws, giving a hard yank and extracting a wide-eyed pegasus.

“Wait, no!” Fluttershy begged as she was forcefully dragged to the dark, scary staircase. She scraped at the ground with her front hooves and planted her rear firmly into the dirt, trying as hard as she could to fight against the strong earth pony. “No! I don’t wanna go in! It’s dark! And scary! Nooo!!”

“C’mon, Fluttershy,” Rainbow Dash groaned through the blue hoof over her face. “Don’t do this again... I want my EXP, so suck it up and be brave!”

“I am being brave!” Fluttershy cried, still trying to get away as she and Applejack rejoined the group. “I wanna be brave at home! Locked in my closet!”

“I think this Questline might be rather difficult without you, Fluttershy.” Twilight pursed her lips. “Every Party needs a healer.”

Rainbow Dash nodded mutely, all of her muscles tensed up as she gave Fluttershy a hard glare, causing the coy pony to release her hold on the ground and curl up into a tight ball. AJ appreciated the reduced friction as she continued to drag her along.

As Twilight passed through the shimmering blue field, it dissolved with a descending ringing noise.

And the six mares, walking or flying, pulling or being dragged, enthusiastic or not, trudged cautiously into the darkness.

Twilight’s ears perked up as she focused on her sense of hearing, unable to see anything. They had reached the bottom of the staircase, but it was pitch-black and the spellcaster had forgotten the mental combination for her Illumination spell. She instinctively brought up her Menu to look it up, only to have her hopes dashed as she realized that she couldn’t see it. It would have been very useful if Menus gave off light, but the Developers most likely didn’t program that in because it would allow ponies to cheat in dark areas by using their Menus as flashlights.

“Smoking is absolutely dreadful for your health, Rainbow... It reduces every single one of your stats and doesn’t provide any buffs.” Rarity sounded genuinely concerned.

“Girls? How do I cast the Illumination spell again?” Twilight hoped that Rarity in particular would answer her.

“The combination is red-yellow-red-blue, Twi.” If anypony could see, everypony would be staring at Applejack.

“Wait, you know how to cast an illumination spell? Well then, why don’t you do it?” Rainbow Dash’s voice was dripping with her trademark impatience.

“Just because I don’t have the INT to learn most skills doesn’t mean I don’t use my Menu to look at ‘em every night before I go to bed, wishin’ I could get ‘em,” AJ snapped, her voice just barely above a low growl. Apparently this was a sensitive topic. “Everypony can learn magic, but only some races can do some spells. Illumination is for Unicorns only.”

There was a pregnant silence. “J...Jeez, Applejack, I didn’t mean it like that...” Rainbow’s voice was bordering between indignant and apologetic.

Twilight decided to let the situation simmer down instead of adding to it, wordlessly thinking of the color combination in sequence. She felt a tingling in her horn as it sparked, before a purple light spawned at its tip, revealing the surrounding area.

Applejack was looking at Rainbow Dash like she was something that needed to be scraped off of her hoof. Rainbow Dash swallowed. “Applejack, I-I’m sorry, okay? It’s... it’s just a few skills!”

The farmpony heaved an angry sigh as she tore her gaze away, leaving Rainbow Dash hovering anxiously. “Ya don’t get it, do you?” she muttered under her breath.

Her blue ears folding, Rainbow chose to be silent for the moment, softly fluttering along as everypony continued to walk down the narrow hallway. She wasn't very good with social situations like this.

A soft growling noise suddenly met their ears, drawing everypony’s attention. Out of the darkness stepped what looked almost like a pony. A solid black pony with glowing, soulless red eyes and sharp teeth. The six Party members got into fighting stances, Twilight taking the front.

“Here we... uhm, go,” Rainbow Dash muttered from the back, guilt stunting her excitement.

Everypony’s ears perked up as they began to hear something. It was an extremely grating, high-pitched buzzing. It sounded unnatural, and it was getting closer. Twilight began to notice that the environment around them seemed to be flickering, parts of the walls and floor turning to static for fractions of seconds. The light level even flickered, briefly becoming as bright as daylight.

The ground was vibrating and things were phasing in and out of existence. Twilight could’ve sworn she saw the Quest NPC stallion walking towards her before his form split in several different directions, flashing with static, disassembling and jerking every-which way. “E-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h,” he droned, incomprehensible. The high-pitched buzzing only grew louder.

“I-I don’t know!” Twilight almost screamed as the monster-pony lunged toward her before turning to static, splitting apart, teleporting backwards and disappearing. It was almost as if reality was falling apart at the seams. Nothing was staying how it should’ve been: the walls kept reforming and changing shape, every object she could see couldn’t decide on what it wanted to be, and the light kept flickering from ultra-bright to pitch-black, and every magnitude in-between.

But yet, something spoke up at the back of Twilight’s mind. It was a part of her, a more cold and calculating part. It said something that made her feel an alien, unwelcome mote of satisfaction amidst her fear and confusion. I was right, it said. Right about what?

Rainbow Dash, on the other hand, was gasping like a fish out of water, shaking like Fluttershy. Her blood froze solid as something crossed her mind. She knew exactly what was going on. “Glitch!” she screeched, gripping the pony nearest to her — Applejack — and trying to drag her back towards the entrance. She hooked her forelegs around AJ’s back legs, planting her own back legs on the stone floor and heaving for all she was worth. “Guys, run! We need to get out of here right now! Forget the Questline! If we stay here, we might get corrupted, or even deleted!”

Glitch? Was that some kind of monster that was playing tricks on them? Twilight mentally scoffed, staring down the rapidly-disintegrating environment with a cocky smirk. If it could do this to them, it was undoubtedly strong. Maybe defeating it would Level her a few times, and she would be better-suited for the rest of the Questline. “It might be good EXP. Let’s fight it!”

“WHAT!?” Rainbow Dash’s voice cracked like a window, her eyes filled with fear. “No! This isn’t... it... Just run! I-I don’t want you guys to end up like Mom!” She pulled harder on Applejack, trying to drag her back toward the entrance.

“M-maybe we ain’t strong enough to fight it yet,” Applejack said, quickly turning tail and galloping away from the approaching tear in reality. Pinkie had finally snapped out of her drunken stupor, her expression horrified as she quickly joined her fellow Earth Pony. Rarity, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash soon followed, leaving Twilight standing on the edge of the crumbling, fluctuating, warping, disintegrating hallway.

Twilight finally took a deep breath and bolted backwards, clamoring up the staircase with the rest of her group. The solid, pleasant light from the sun outside beckoned to them, promising a safe haven from... whatever was happening to the Dungeon. She was the last one out, and just as her tail passed through the entrance barrier, the entire structure split and hissed, succumbing to the same fate as the hallway. The buzzing grew so loud that each mare had to cover their ears, before it abruptly stopped as the Dungeon turned to static and vanished into thin air. In its place was an enormous flashing red Menu box with a large X on it. Underneath was the caption “ERROR.”

“C-can somepony tell me what the hay just happened?” demanded Applejack. Having set aside her anger at Rainbow Dash, she looked helplessly at her Party members.

Twilight was sitting on her haunches, staring blankly at the place where the Dungeon used to be. All that was left was a hole. Not just a hole in the ground. A hole in... everything. Instead of a pit carved neatly into the ground, there was... It was hard to explain. Peering into the hole, she saw... the sky. Looking up, she saw the same sky. She looked back down, and her eyebrows rose with confusion. How did that even work?

Pinkie was lying on the ground, rubbing her head with her hooves and taking deep breaths.

Rarity and Fluttershy were standing near Rainbow Dash, who was curled up on the ground, trembling like a small foal.

“Rainbow Dash?” Rarity asked, her face twisted with concern as she placed a muddy — but fortunately dry — hoof on the mare’s cheek. She didn’t respond.

“It... It... It... It almost happened again... A-again... It... I...” Rainbow Dash continued to tremble, her expression suggesting that she had just re-lived a very bad memory. “J-just like... Mom... N-not again... please... not you guys too...”

“What? What happened to your mother?” Fluttershy’s voice was even softer than usual.

Rainbow swallowed, clenching her eyes shut as she took a shaky breath. “A Glitch... I-I was a filly... our house... it... she was just... just gone...”

Fluttershy hugged the distraught mare in an attempt to comfort her, but the ears of everypony present rose again at a quiet, distant bout of spirited evil laughter, sounding as if it came from somewhere miles away but was carried to them by the wind.

Twilight’s Menu automatically opened, startling her again. She would never get used to that. Stupid Questline. Regardless, It blipped once as the information changed.

        “THE CRYPT” PROGRESS: -12399430024.432%

        DUNGEON CLEARED

        REWARD EXP: 2,002

This garnered a single raised eyebrow from the unicorn, but she ignored the improper progress value. Golden light flowed from the ex-dungeon into each of the Party members. Looking at them, she noticed that their Menus had each automatically opened as well. Each one was the same color as the coat of the pony it belonged to.

The number in the bottom-right of Twilight’s vision quickly climbed from 45% all the way to 100%, and she flinched as a small explosion of white light burst out from her form, accompanied by a chorus of chimes. Above her head floated glowing purple text that read “LEVEL UP x2,” casting light in all directions. It lived for only a moment, soon disappearing into the wind. She smirked. Apparently the Quest was far above her Level, and as a result it had given her a higher percentage of EXP than the Developers intended.

Similar events happened to Rainbow Dash and — surprisingly — Fluttershy, minus the “x2.” It had thankfully snapped Dash out of her traumatization, enabling her to sit up, gazing in wonderment at the blue text above her head.

Fluttershy was smiling widely. She took a deep breath, her chest tensing to deliver a joyous shout. Unsurprisingly, all that came out was a quiet “yay!”

Applejack looked morosely at the ground. “I only got about two percent from that...” The average Level of the Party was much below hers, so sadly, she did not receive many benefits.

Rarity looked almost petulant with the way she was pouting. “Oh, drat! I wish I had Leveled Up too!” Twilight had no doubt that Rarity was referring to how a Level Up automatically dispelled any negative status effects on a pony, including being coated in mud. She giggled with amusement.

Rainbow Dash was scrolling through her Menu, her hoof pawing softly at it. Even from this side, Twilight could tell that she was looking at available Skills.

Pinkie was still lying on her back, frowning painfully with a foreleg draped over her eyes. She most likely was suffering from the Hangover status effect.

“I’m gonna... uhm... put my skill points into Heal, i-if you all would like that...” Fluttershy smiled softly, ducking her head. At a few nods, she gleefully tapped her Menu a few times.

“Cyclone, creates a tornado... Throwing Knife Mastery... Ooh, Backstab? Forty percent more damage from behind?” Rainbow Dash’s face lit up with a wide grin, putting the hearts of Rarity and Fluttershy at ease. She was okay now. “So many choices, and such riches aplenty...”

“Not a bad problem to have, if you ask me...” Fluttershy gave a cheesy, knowing grin to her fellow pegasus, her eyes sparkling.

Applejack rubbed her chin for a moment, before she, against all laws of reality, snapped a hoof. “Oh, I get it! That’s part of the song you two sang way back when, when ya’ll were tryin’ to pick a pet for Rainbow, right?”

Applejack was answered with two snickering pegasi. Rainbow nodded, before adopting a confused expression. “Hold on, how did you just do that?”

The farmpony tilted her head, adjusting her hat so it wouldn’t fall off. “Do what?”

“That... thing. With your hoof.” Rainbow tried to mimic the action, but couldn’t do it. She stared at the smooth blue surface of the bottom of her hoof, her face scrunched up in confusion.

“This?” Snap. A lopsided grin crossed Applejack’s face as Rainbow nodded at her again. “Pinkie taught me.”

Rainbow raised her hoof, her mouth hanging open, before looking at Pinkie and back to AJ. It was Pinkie Pie. Sort of. “...Okay?” she conceded with a shrug.

Nevertheless, the options were still displayed before her. She knew from previous Questlines that the Party Leader always selected their Class first, usually after the first challenge was completed. After that, each subsequent major challenge would allow the other Party members to choose their own Class, in order of highest Level to lowest Level.

Whether the Party really had accomplished anything yet or not, though, it seemed Twilight was meant to choose her Class here and now. She thought back to the classes she’d held in her previous Questlines (the only time anypony ever held a Class was during a Questline; they had to give up their Classes after completing it). She’d been hoping to reprise a few of those Classes, but the options before her were, as always, new.

“Hmm...” Twilight murmured to herself, scanning the options, her hoof raised to click.

Equestria RPG

by Chaotic Dreams

Chapter 1