Coal Slitter sat down on the only bench that wasn’t completely destroyed. He lifted his gaze to take in the scenery before him. The ruined fountain, the bent lamp posts, the burned houses, a whole destroyed village which gave home many ponies in the past made him feel like he was in a post-apocalyptic scene. The explosion had taken place outside of the town, but it was powerful enough to turn almost every building into ruin and litter the streets with debris. Coal was glad that he hasn’t stumbled upon any dead body yet. That could have been too much for him, not that walking in the village was pleasant to begin with. The magical radiation, the aftermath of the explosion disturbed the natural magic in every living being in the area, especially in unicorns. He was an earth pony, but special talents were based on magic, and that meant he wasn’t immune either.
He reached into his saddlebag and pulled out an old and creased map, held it in his hooves and observed his surroundings. There was a ruin of a big, circular building before him, which meant he was sitting where the town center had been, so he had to go northwest on one of the main streets to reach his destination. He folded the map in half and put it away. He stood up and started walking, wondering what could still be there after all this time that made his talent so busy in the past few weeks and finally lead him here. As he slalomed between the obstacles on the street, he couldn't free himself from that strange feeling that lingered throughout the place. It made him feel alerted, caused the muscles in his neck tense from time to time, and here was an uneven wave of thoughts in his head, confused signals coming from his special talent. He was warned about these symptoms one would get from being in the zone of a magic-fueled explosion, but he also heard that it was only dangerous for unicorns. To pegasi and earth ponies, it meant supposedly a mere discomfort. He hoped those rumors were right.
When he reached his destination, a wide tree trunk, he sensed the magical radiation become stronger again, just like when he first entered the town in the morning. It was like standing in the way of a wave in the sea. In one moment the trunk seemed just like any other trunk in the nearby forest. In the next, he felt an urgent need to search it thoroughly without missing a detail, because everything about it promised an exquisite treasure. Coal stood firmly on his hooves, fighting the sensation, just as he had been advised. When the magical wave subsided and everything became normal again, he shook his head to clear it, stepped closer to the tree and looked for a clue that'd suggest that it wasn't an ordinary trunk.
He noticed a doorway, not far from where he stood, embedded in the trunk. Next to it was a smashed in window. Coal peered in. It appeared to be a house, carved inside the tree.
Coal eyed the concrete block that obtruded the doorway, and decided against clearing it from the way. He was a strong earth pony, but even with his strength, it was far too big to move away. He decided he will use the window instead. He climbed in with some difficulty and hopped down on the wooden floor inside. He looked around in the spacious inside.
The ground level was one big room. At the opposite side, a staircase led up into the tree’s now gone upper floors. To his right, he could see a doorway which led downwards, probably to the basement. To his left and between the staircase and the way down the walls were lined with bookshelves, carved directly into the wood. Most of them were empty, and the floor was scattered with books and scrolls. A big amount of them lay in heaps where the floor and the walls met. At the center of the round room was a small table, with the remaining of a wooden statue on top. His talent came to life, and it told him to go down on the stairs. The doorway wasn’t clear from debris either, but this time the obstacle was only a pile of branches and broken furniture parts. Coal walked closer to the doorway to clear the way.
The small cellar, surrounded by old roots, was dark and full of dust. When Coal tried to open the door at the bottom of the stairs to go inside, it simply fell off from its hinges and hit the ground, and caused the dust do explode. Coal instinctively closed his eyes and held his breath, but couldn't stop a pair of coughs. He waited a minute or so to let the dust settle down, then he opened his eyes and observed the camber.
The basement also consisted of one room, although it was smaller than the one above, and had been spared by the shockwave's destruction. Dust sat in thick layers on every surface. It looked like there wasn't a single soul down there for ages. Coal put a flashlight on his head to compensate the lack of natural light.
The walls of the basement were covered with bookshelves as well, but here they were packed with books and scrolls. Cardboard boxes sat in a far corner in neat towers next to big, strange looking machines, decorated with lamps and tubes. They were probably magic-powered devices for scientific purposes, similar to the ones he saw in Canterlot once. Coal stepped deeper into the room, the wooden floor quietly cracking under his weight.
He tried to read the titles on the books on the nearest shelf, but succeeded only a couple of times. Those appeared to be unicorn spell books, others were in a language he didn't recognize, and sometimes even the letters were unfamiliar. The next shelf contained more legible history books, some of them predating even Celestia's realm. Before he could pick one to look at closely, he felt another wave coming.
In an instant, every book appeared peculiar, every box held great importance, every scroll demanded more attention. However, there was one item which was different. It seemed utterly important too, but in a calmer way, like an adult among children. Coal turned his head in the direction of that signal.
Among the old boxes he spotted his target. He held his gaze on it, and waited the sensation to fade. Eventually it did, leaving everything to seem common, but Coal knew he found the treasure he was looking for.
It was a cardboard box, almost a size of a head. It was seated on top of two others, sitting almost at eye level. Coal walked closer, carefully opened the lid and looked inside.
The beam of the flashlight reflected off from a golden necklace with a big, pink gem in a form of a butterfly embedded in the front. It was seated on red velvet, in the center of a smaller glass box. As he looked at it, his talent made it almost glowing.
Coal smiled at the jewel. He finally found what had brought him to the destroyed and widely avoided town of Ponyville.
***
The mare looked up from where she lay with weary eyes. Do they want her to work again? The last time was only, like, two hours ago? No, probably not. That wouldn't be logical, her sense of time has surely stopped functioning. That didn't surprise her too much, albeit it was an unnerving thought, losing yet another thing she had control over. It didn't matter much anyway. Her chances of breaking out have long ago reached absolute zero, a probability of a rescue seemed weaker than paper. She wasn’t sure of the location of her prison, but with some easy spell she could tell that she was deep underground. What was worse, her memories preceding her current state were blurry, uncertain, and mostly consisted of images, emotions and short scenes. She fought against it, but her mind replayed that final one in the castle yet again.
Her body tensed, as the torrent of magic hit her. It flew down through her horn, into her head and body. The powerful alicorn magic suppressed her physical senses. She felt like she was floating in air. She could feel the new kind of power integrating with her own. She saw a flash of light. The nature of the flowing magic changed slightly, and she felt pain coming. The fear started rising in her, but she fought it. It was no use: the agony quickly overwhelmed her conscious mind. She screamed, and then only darkness remained as she slipped into emptiness.
She shut her eyes as the memory of the pain and confusion, and listened to the sound of footsteps coming from the corridor. They weren’t a pony's. She hasn't heard hoofsteps apart from her own for months, maybe years. It must have been a long time, considering her current physical state, which mostly consisted of haphazard memories, hunger, pain and her own bones almost poking out her thin skin and rare, purple coat.
The footsteps came closer, then stopped. She heard a deep, male voice saying, “Eat up, pony!” There was a metallic clang that her mind immediately associated with food and water. She waited until the steps faded, then took a deep breath, opened her eyes and stood up. She slowly walked towards the food beside the bars on weak legs and slumped down on her stomach before the bowl. After consuming the old grass, apples, flowers and a chewy, brown and reddish thing which didn't resemble anything she had ever eaten, she made her way back to her place in the corner with ancient hay on the ground. She wondered when she will get water again. Her throat was like the cave she was in: dry and dusty. The little humidity in the food wasn't enough to make her feel better.
A tall, white figure came into her mind. Sorrow filled her, then unconsciousness brought her relief as she drifted into sleep.
* * *
Coal was sitting in the main room in the afternoon sunlight. He lifted the box in his hooves and examined the edges for any sign of gap, but there was none none. The box appeared to be one piece of glass, probably unicorn made, which meant only magic could open it without any damage. Coal knew that unicorns couldn't bear the magical radiation for long, and he wouldn't able to carry the fairly big box to the nearby chariot station or next town. He certainly didn’t want to leave it in the tree either.
That left breaking the box as his only option. He didn't see anything that would suggest that it held any kind of importance or significance, so it probably wouldn't be a problem. He took a deep breath, raised a forelimb, and stroke the top panel with his hoof.
He couldn't stop himself from crying out in pain, as the box resisted the force. He held the aching limb to his chest, and looked for a rock. He grabbed a big one from next to the concrete block in the doorway and walked back to the box. He held the concrete piece in his forelimbs, and stroke again with all of his strength.
The rock bounced away with a loud clang and the glass remained unharmed. Coal grumpily decided to leave the obviously enchanted box to a unicorn. He would have to carry it to the edge of the town though, where the magic was less disturbed. He decided by hiding it in one of the buildings until he gets back with a unicorn. He hoped that he could find someone in the nearby chariot station who is willing to help him.
Maybe he will also get some answers about the necklace itself. He has seen similar ones on mares, though they weren’t this simple in design, and that gem looked bigger and more expensive than those. His talent didn’t give him any clue either. It was only finding objects and living beings that were historically relevant to his past, or sometimes to his future, but without any explanation. Sometimes he found things relevant to his work at the libraries he occasionally worked in, in a form of books or the right pony to ask.