Twilight Sparkle, Rainbow Dash, and Purple Heart had been walking for several hours in amiable silence down the path the clearing’s opening had revealed. A great deal was weighing on each of their minds. Twilight was theorizing on the consequences and reasons that revolved around Purple Heart’s presence. The Princess of Friendship had seldom seen a pony with a coat as dark as his except for Princess Luna’s. His strange blue tattoos were a mystery as well. Since the earth pony had avoided Rainbow’s question about them by saying they were part of his ‘costume’, Twilight had remained suspicious of the purple stallion’s motives. And his lack of cutie mark was equally mysterious.
Why had Discord chosen him to be part of his game? Were there other ponies like Purple Heart with the rest of the Mane Six? Why was he dodging her questions? Twilight couldn’t find logical answers to these inquiries without asking Purple Heart himself, but the earth pony had made his position quite clear. He wasn’t in the mood for answering questions and certainly wasn’t going to offer up an explanation voluntarily. The magenta alicorn sighed and watched Rainbow Dash dart in blissful ignorance above them.
Unbeknownst to Twilight, Rainbow Dash’s thoughts were racing about her mind. She found the strange purple earth pony to be rather intriguing, despite his reserved demeanor. He seemed pretty smart and gutsy for an earth pony and he had been surprisingly calm during the encounter with the Wandering Pine. The sky blue pegasus thought of herself as an experienced fighter. During many of the adventures she had experienced with her friends, it was she who had been the first to jump to their defense whenever danger reared its ugly head. But Rainbow Dash felt that Purple Heart had a significant edge when it came to combat. She didn’t know how or why, she just knew. And now she was curious. So she did the most logical thing she could think of.
“Purple Heart?”
“Hm?”
“How many fights have you been in?” the sky blue pegasus asked. Twilight froze mid-trot and nearly tripped over her own legs. Righting herself, she sucked air through her teeth in surprise. Purple Heart slowed to leisurely walk, but kept moving down the path.
“What do you mean?” he asked, not looking at Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash shrugged, flipping over to float on her back.
“Like, do you get into fights with ponies that rile you up?” she clarified. “Or do you do large scale fights?” Twilight realized she was being left behind and hopped into the air, flapping her wings several times to catch up to the other two ponies. Purple Heart mulled the question over in silence as he sped up to a trot again.
“I’ve seen my fair share of fights,” he replied finally. “Been in a group activity a few times as well.” He didn’t elaborate on the nature of the conflicts. Rainbow Dash may not have noticed while she nodded silently as her question had been answered, but Twilight did. Purple Heart remained an enigma that the Princess of Friendship desperately wanted to solve. For more reasons than one.
Meanwhile, Purple Heart’s heart was racing. He had just nearly dodged a bullet that would’ve revealed his true identity to his new companions. It was thanks to his quick thinking and newly found sense of caution that he had told the half-truth at all. Purple Heart had indeed seen his fair share of fights and had indeed participated in group activities several times. But they weren’t the kind of fights Rainbow Dash had been referring to. Playing sports was about the closest thing the purple earth pony had participated that was even close to a conflict.
And that wasn’t including the video games he had played over the course of his life. Truthfully, the only reason why Purple Heart hadn’t been pissing himself in terror when he stood before the Wandering Pine was because he knew that Discord wouldn’t kill off a player this early. Well… He had been 80% certain Discord wouldn’t. Having a party wipe at the very start of a scenario wasn’t the best of ideas for a Dungeon Master.
Purple Heart had told another half-truth when he had answered Twilight’s question about how he had survived the Wandering Pine’s attack. While he had dodged to avoid the massive club, he had moved a little slower than he had realized and, as a result, got winged by the wooden weapon. The force of the attack alone had been enough to stun Purple Heart for a few seconds. It was a miracle that Twilight hadn’t checked his health bar. For all she knew, he had escaped unscathed.
I’ll have to be quicker next time, the purple earth pony thought to himself. I won’t be able to get away with getting winged if the enemy is stronger than that tree was. I’m almost happy that it wasn’t an Ent.
The previous silence had changed from its amiable nature to one of tense discomfort. Seeking to banish the cloud of tension, Purple Heart cleared his throat.
“So,” he grunted. “Does Discord do things like this often?” Twilight shook her head.
“Most of the time, he just commits small, irritating acts that are merely a pain to deal with,” the magenta alicorn replied. “I’m surprised you even know who he is.” Purple Heart chuckled.
“Where I come from, a great deal of people know who he is,” the purple stallion chortled. “But most are grown ponies. Ponies my age aren’t too familiar with Discord’s antics in the past.”
Twilight frowned, understanding where Purple Heart was coming from. Discord was indeed an old being that not many ponies in this age knew of. It was only because Discord had escaped his stone prison that day that Twilight actually knew of his existence. It wasn’t a great stretch to believe what Purple Heart said about the younger inhabitants of his home town not knowing who Discord was.
“I’m rather curious about how Discord wants this to play out,” Purple Heart chimed. “I haven’t seen any of the noticeable signs of a particular scenario yet.” Both Twilight and Rainbow Dash frowned at the stallion’s words.
“Scenario?” Rainbow Dash asked. Purple Heart nodded.
“Basically the plot course this fiasco will take,” he elaborated. “Personally, I’ve developed three stereotypes.” Purple Heart stopped as the path diverged into an intersection and faced the flying ponies.
“One: the populace of a town is cursed by a slighted witch bent on revenge,” he said, lifting his hoof as if to count off the stereotypes before realizing he had a severe lack of phalanges to accomplish the task. His muzzle flushing red in embarrassment, he put his hoof down before continuing. “Two: a community in the middle of nowhere is plagued by undead, goblins, or orcs. And three-” The appearance of three ponies wearing bent and rusted armor from the far path of the intersection cut Purple Heart’s explanation off.
“And then she says, ‘I will knock you into the middle of next week!’ To which I reply with, ‘Please do, cuz I’m having a rough time this week,’” one of the armored ponies said shrilly as the trio burst into laughter that quickly died when they saw Rainbow Dash, Twilight, and Purple Heart at the other end of the intersection. The ponies stood and stared at each other for several seconds in an impasse.
“Huh,” Purple Heart grunted. “Guess its the third stereotype.”
“What’s the third stereotype?” Rainbow Dash asked, a little worried at the current situation. Twilight turned her head to look at Purple Heart, expectantly awaiting his response.
“The third stereotype,” the earth pony explained. “Is ‘Bandits running around, making trouble and doing shenanigans.’”
“Huh,” Rainbow Dash grunted as a strange voice that bore shocking similarities to Discord’s boomed across the sky.
“You have encountered a Bandit Patrol,” the voice declared. “Combat is joined.” Purple Heart sighed as the grid and list appeared.
“This is going to get very interesting very fast,” he grumbled, preparing himself for the coming conflict. “I wasn’t expecting another encounter again right of the bat. Grumble mumble.”