//------------------------------//
// XV 
// Story: Magically Saturated 
// by r4rBrok 
//------------------------------//

"Prince?!"

"Yes, are you surprised?"

"Yes! Why would you expect otherwise!" I was pacing at this point. Here I was expecting to be put into prison for the rest of my life if I was lucky, killed if I wasn't.

"I heard you were smart so I believed that you would be able to put the pieces together yourself."

I thought for a few moments about what had transpired before before coming up with the answer. "I don't have much of a choice about this do I?"

"Not particularly, I'm afraid."

I sighed and slumped my head in defeat. "At least tell me there is a good tailor I can get a suit from first."

"Pardon?"

"I want to at least look good before our wedding."

She looked at me in shock. As her disbelief fell off of her face I could see it being replaced. Her eyes lit up, her mouth turned upwards in a smile and her head tipped forward before some sound escaped from her. I tipped in closer to try and hear what she was saying. As I approached her voice became more defined but remained unclear. It wasn't until I was a couple of feet away from her that I understood what she was doing. She was laughing. "What the hell are you laughing about?!" I was a little upset that she would be so willing to laugh a out something as serious as a forced wedding.

The laughing quieted as her face turned back up to look at me. Then the smile dropped off of her face suddenly. "Pardon me, I am a mite unclear of your language idioms, but are you serious?"

"Yes..." I began to feel like an utter fool as I realized that I must have massively missinterpreted what was going on. 

"If I may ask, why did you come to that conclusion?"

"Well, your protégé first told you about me, in which you followed it up with sending your nephew to examine your suitor and have them live together for prolonged exposure. And when you had him talk to a literal god you found that he was close to your power."

"Well it couldn't be that..."

"And lastly you sent your protégé, who I am assuming is akin to a daughter for you, to bring him to your home. I doubt you would have said why to anyone why you wanted me here after all that would be a little awkward if you found that the groom was the last person to know about the proposal. And when he got here, you pushed literally everyone else out of the room so you could be together with him and then told him he was a prince."

She looked at me with a small amount of mirth, "Well, worst case scenario person, aren't you?"

I crossed my arms at her and said, "Lady, I just spent the entire train ride over thinking you would kill me when you I got here just for me existing."

"In that case you will probably be wanting some kind of explanation." she said before walking past me and out of the room. When the doors parted I looked at the others right outside looking at us. I couldn't read Blueblood but I could tell that Twilight had a look of relief and Spike a look of self satisfaction. "I would appreciate it if you all would enjoy the rest of your evening while I am with James and meet in the dining hall tomorrow for breakfast." I took the hint and quickly followed her while the others stayed where they were standing. 

We walked around the castle with bows by most of the staff wherever we went. There were a few who didn't notice our presence or didn't change their position like the guards and they did nothing at out passing. The rest gave quick "hey"s and nods at our passing in which the princess gave responds in kind. I could tell that these were those that either lived in the castle so the princess was just another resident or they had worked there longer than most and had built a friendly rapport with the princess.

After a few corners turned I became anxious again and turned towards Celestia. "Are you going to explain what is going on?"

She remained looking directly ahead and her mouth remained shut for several moments. That did not help my unease. I was about to ask again thinking that she didn't hear me before finally speaking. "In order for you to understand there must be something I need to show you first."

"And what would that be?"

"The past."

The rest of the walk was in silence as we descended deep into the castle. I have no idea how deep, but if I were to guess then we would have been close to the center of the mountain. The path down was lined with torches that were lit by Celestia as we approached them. The entire passage was carved in a dark stone that dripped water. It was wide enough that if Celestia were to open her wings to fly she could, but just barely. For the typical pony, like the guards above, I felt like two could stand side by side and it would just be a tight fit. 

We came to a widened section of the tunnel some way in. The chamber was large and smooth with dozens of ancient armour sets filling the room. They were large and bulky, but left almost no gaps or weak points throughout them. They also were coloured a dark purple that would stand more unnoticeable in the dark. The armours stood on individual platforms with a pool of liquid surrounding them all. It was the same liquids that dripped from the walls and had a mild purple colour to it. The other side of the cavern came narrowed again and there was a door a dozen or so meters down the hallway.

"The ancient sentry. Do you like how they look."

"Seem sort of useless down here, don't they?" She laughed at that retort. "What?"

"Useless are they?" She said standing in the center of the chamber. "Attention!" She shouted. At that moment all the armours had sprung up into a military attention position. The eyes of the armour glowed with blue flames and they each summoned a scimitar of blue fire to be held by some unseen force before them. "At ease." With that all the armours went back to their old standing positions.

"What was that?"

"The ancient sentry, a small army of magically animated armours. They guard this chamber for all time and will never break down from age."

"But what is so important that you have something like this here in the first place?"

"It is right over there." She responded while walking to the other side of the room. I was slightly more hesitant about walking through this cavern now that I knew what the armour was, but if I wanted answers I would need to go along with her.

She stopped a few moments later at a large stone door. It was carved with a sun and moon design at it's center with a hole at the center of that. There was remnants of colour left, suggesting that it used to have a more intricate design, but all  most of the colouring had been faded off so that the previous design was unable to be deciphered.

"I assume that Discord had informed you of our eternal nature?" she said before turning towards me.

"Yes...? What of it?"

"In the past we, my sister and I, had fought many foes that Decay had sent towards us. But there was no way to remove the person of issue. In turn we had discovered ways that allowed us to remove the power of the beings that threatened my little ponies. This then allowed us to much more easily deal with Equestia's threats."

"Are you going to do the same to me?"

"No, not if we do not have to. But you do have to understand what had come in the past." She leaned over to the door and stuck her horn in. The door lit up to this and began to open. Behind it was another large chamber. This chamber was lined in metal and held items on pedestals. A blue light lit the chamber from lines of magical origin. At the center of the chamber was a large vat of a purple liquid with tubes leading put of it. "I welcome you to the Vault."