Dear Diary,
I have decided to recall the advance camp as they have recently reported more activity from Canterlot and believe the Princesses are mobilizing. I hope this is simply a false alarm and they haven't been able to penetrate my masking field, but just incase, I am now advancing the heart engraving at a faster rate so if they do make the Crystal Empire their destination I'll be prepared for the worst.
-Diary of King Sombra around 1000 years ago.
Sombra closed the old leather bound book and placed it back in it's drawer where it belonged, he made sure the drawer was locked securely with both his magic and runes, so his slaves who then cleaned the area wouldn't go 'exploring' too much.
After a few moments of going over his plan again, Sombra rose from his chair, no... throne was more fitting. He still had his crystal throne in the throne room but that throne was incredibly uncomfortable. The study throne was made out of leather that came from one of his less obedient slaves, when he sat on this throne it felt like he was sinking into a rather comfortable cloud.
In the corner of his study which also counted as a small library, was what his slaves, those of which had actually seen it referred to it as the 'nightmare door', while this was partly true as it gave intruders visions of their worst fears it was actually a sort of transportation system that led to many rooms, each having their own unique spell to open the door. At this moment in time Sombra was going to the crystal charging room which is where the Crystal Heart was stored, charged and engraved these days.
Upon approaching the door Sombra conjured up the spell that was required and directed it at the focusing crystal, which glowed brightly before the door swung open with a creak. Sombra left behind the warm atmosphere of his study and stepped in the cold and unforgiving one of the charging room. In the centre of the room the crystal heart sat inside a specially designed apparatus which had five pony sized pods surrounding it, since there wasn't a lot of love in his empire now so he had to forcefully drain what residual love the Crystal ponies still possessed. In the pods were five ponies who now looked like dried husks more than anything living, Sombra observed this was similar to the effect a changeling had if it fed too much but this was far more crippling.
To the side of this was a desk moulded out of the dark crystal Sombra was famous for loving, which held a small pot of ground soul essence, a crystal engraving Auger that looked similar to a basic drill but had a small chamber and was made of pure crystal and there was a large saddlebag leaning against a table leg. Sombra picked both of the engraving items up, loaded the essence into the Augers small chamber then turned to the Crystal Heart and continued with the complicated set of runes he had been working on.
These runes were designed originally to reverse the power of the heart turning it to dark magic but in the end the heart was too pure for such a procedure, instead of letting months of research go to waste he repurposed it as a fail safe device. The King of Shadows knew enough about Celestia to know that she wouldn't downright murder him but would instead imprison him somehow, Sombra knew there was a chance he could lose to Celestia and Luna's exceptional power so he would place the heart at the empires focal point which was at the top of his castle, if he was captured the heart would instantly activate and send the entire empire and all its residents into a phased stasis bubble, essentially it would be a empire frozen in time where no one could leave or enter and would remain this way until Sombra's return.
Unfortunately this took a lot longer than expected coming in at about 13 hours continuous work but it was finally ready. Sombra put on the saddlebag and levitated the engraved heart into it, the engravings vanishing into the heart as he did so. He then walked over to the pods with the ponies in them and proceeded to scrape off the life sigils keeping them alive, then he turned to the door behind him and left the bleak room for what may be the last time for many years.
Sombra stepped out of the door to see many shiny, crystalline stairs that went up for around 1200 steps. The purpose behind this was that if an intruder got past his other defences they would hopefully collapse from fatigue before reaching the top, the secret to getting up was rather simple, all it required was a reverse gravity spell that only the Princesses and himself were capable of at the time. The spell was performed and off Sombra went, the difficult part was reversing the spell at the correct time to avoid flying into the Stratosphere.
At the top Sombra pulled the manoeuvre off almost flawlessly, he only landed on his forehooves this time instead of his face. Sombra rose from the ground, careful to keep weight off his forehooves for a few minutes, then hobbled over to the focal point in the centre of the peak, the light up here was almost dazzling as Sombra's dark magic infused eyes adjusted to Celestias oh so glorious sunlight.
"Soon Celestia, Soon" Sombra muttered thinking of how he would destroy her when the time came. Or perhaps he could cause her some pain first? He knew she greatly cared for her sister...
Coming back from his thoughts Sombra paused, taking a minute to look out over his empire through the large holes that were needed to project the hearts power properly. Just a measly two years ago he had been like them, a peasant whose only purpose was to serve those higher than themselves. Now he was the king, he was the one being served and he was much more worthy of it than those before him, the fact his subjects obeyed him without question was a testament to that claim; even if it was purely out of fear, they obeyed all the same.
After daydreaming Sombra snapped back to reality then used a levitation spell to carefully pull out the heart; to his knowledge it couldn't be broken but rather safe than sorry. The heart was levitated above the core of the castle that ran down far into the ground through the legs of the castle. Sombra knew placing the heart now would draw power from the masking field and possibly collapse it, so instead of seeing the crystal empire in peace the real empire would be revealed; if anyone had walked into the field they would pass out only to awake hours later thinking they had accomplished whatever they were on their way to do.
Due to the power the heart would be using, the runes would all burn on use which means it would only have a one time use unless it was engraved and charged again. Sombra activated the binding seal on the ground that would connect the heart to his castle and empire; a dark crystal shot upwards and secured the heart in it's vice-like grip; ensuring nothing could remove it... hopefully. Sombra waited by the crystal to ensure it wouldn't explode or cause a magic surge; after about seven minutes he decided it was safe to leave and wouldn't explode in the meantime.
Everything had seemed to be going great until Sombra conjured the spell to remotely check his defences, upon checking the masking field he saw that the entire thing had collapsed when the heart had been integrated, if the princesses weren't curious before they sure would be now. Sombra turned and was about to begin the long walk down the stairs just as he received a telepathic message from one of the sentry towers outside the empire, well the princesses were swift he had to commend them there.
My Lord, it has been reported that two ponies matching the description of the princesses have been spotted heading towards you, followed by a small army of only pegasi. With your permission we would like to order a full retreat and attempt to prepare for the oncoming attack.
The message had been sent by Avalite Seeker who was his present captain of the guard and is one of the only crystal ponies to offer his services without 'persuasion'. Captain Seeker was stationed in the main barracks but he had access to a comm totem so that he had almost instant communication with all the empires camps. To make his job more efficient Sombra gave Avalite rune tattoos that allowed him to send a message directly when it was required. With Avalite informing him this news could be no more than five minutes old at the most. Sombra hastily used his telepathy spell to order Avalite to immediately recall all personnel that were out of the empire and prepare for the attack, they could handle the army, Celestia was his to take care of.
*****
The time had come, most of the camps had been successfully recalled and his army stood ready. Sombra had hidden explosive crystals in the ground that would fly up and take out pegasi, from the reports only the two sisters and some battalions of pegasi were on their way, most likely because of Celestia panicking that her precious little ponies were in danger.
The entire crystal army minus a few camps that were late back stood ready in front of the castle. Sombra stood on the balcony marvelling at how powerful he looked but back to the matter at hoof, his army looked like they could do with a motivational speech and their king would deliver. Before joining them he took note of Avalite standing in front of them all, he really did suit the part with his cyan coat and peridot mane that could be seen sticking out of his helmet, just like the rest the crystal armour that left almost no areas of the body exposed.
To save time Sombra teleported down to the side of where his army was standing so he was just out of view; this was done purely for time convenience as teleportation is taxing at more than a few metres at best and Sombra had a high balcony. As he walked out in front of them and he was recognized as their ruler, Avalite gave the order to salute, which they did of course. With those niceties out of the way Sombra stood in front of them all and attempted to look intimidating and motivational.
"Ponies of the crystal army," Sombra began with a voice almost as loud as the Royal Canterlot Voice. "As you know the raisers of the sun and moon are heading here to strike me down, but, will we let them?"
"No!" His magnificent army shouted back.
"Will we let them break past our defences and destroy all that we have accomplished?"
"No!"
"Will we show them the best fight they have ever seen?"
"Yes!" they shouted back loudly, this speech thing seemed to be working, the excitement in their voices was apparent.
"Well then, prepare yourselves, they will be here in less than five minutes. For those of you who haven't been told, the mines I have planted will be able to take out a limited number of them and with any luck force the rest to the ground; with most of you being earth ponies you will have the advantage, use it well"
After this Sombra waited for a moment for these words to fully sink in before leaving them to their excited muttering and final preparations. Within two minutes Sombra had sprinted back up to the balcony, an ecstatic and out of breath Sombra rose to his full height and looked over his army, at least he had before ducking down to get his breath back, he wanted to look his best for when his royal guests arrived. Speaking of the princesses where were they?
"Sir," yelled up a soldier. "Enemies approaching from the south"
"Ah speak of the devil" Sombra remarked before once again rising to his full height
On the horizon small specks started to appear and were getting bigger by the second, leading this small army of specks were two more noticeable blue and white specks. After perhaps a minute, Sombra's guess was that they were around 600 metres out and could easily be identified by now. The soldiers appeared to be wearing some kind of crystal armour... how quaint of them. By now Celestia and Luna's army had almost reached the minefield, Sombra waited for something to happen, and waited, and waited.
Finally a pointed formation of crystal shot out of the ground at alarming speed and hit Luna directly in the chest, detonating on impact. She plummeted to the ground with Celestia in tow, good, that would delay them for a while. Their soldiers carried on unfazed by the display that had just occurred. More and more mines started flying up and by the time the army got past them they had already lost a quarter of their battleforce.
The pegasi took to the ground in fear of there being more air mines that could appear out of thin air. Without command, which was slightly annoying, Sombras own army rushed them brandishing weapons from maces to battleaxes. The two armies met head on with equal determination to pummel each other into pieces, steel clashed against crystal as combat commenced. Off in the distance Luna was getting shakily to her hooves, seemingly recovered and turning towards him; as Celestia and Luna's wings spread for take-off Sombra diverted his attention back to the battle. Rather embarrassingly he had now lost more ponies than Celestia, although none of them had been killed, it was pathetic how soft Celestia was, not even willing to take a few lives to save thousands.
Suddenly a sunbeam slammed into Sombra's castle above him, causing crystal to rain down on him, actually leaving a dent in his armour on the left foreleg where he raised it to protect his eyes, the royal sisters were at the edge of the battlefield and were closing in fast.
They really expect to defeat me this easily, how humorous.
Even though he was certain his victory was assured Sombra retreated to his castles main atrium where he would wait for their arrival. Soon he heard a landing impact behind him and he saw Celestia and Luna's regal forms, towering over his own,
"Why Celestia how nice of you to joi-" Sombra cut off as he saw the multicoloured gems they were both levitating. "No how can you have those? You can't just-" He was once again cut off as the two sisters touched horns and the gems began to glow.
Sombras flight or fight response kicked in as he instinctively raised a dark crystal barrier to protect himself, the barrier lasted all of two seconds before it evaporated like water under the elements onslaught. When the beam hit him it was like being hit by the sun itself, pure agony ravaged the dark lords body as it was broken. Sombra tried to bargain for his life but all he could manage was a tortured scream before the pain reached its limit. Then all the pain melted into darkness and freezing cold. Sombra did not know where he was or exactly how he got there, but for now he was content knowing the empire would vanish without his presence.
Back in the empire there was just a scorch mark where Sombra had been standing before he was cast below the ice.
"It is done sister." Luna spoke, breaking the silence. "The dark lord has gone." The happiness could easily be heard in her voice until she saw the grim look on Celestias face, "What is wrong sister? Surely thee must be pleased?"
"I am Luna, I just feel like this was too easy," Celestia explained. "Think about it for a moment, King Sombra, the lord of shadows and even he didn't have any extra precautions in place?"
"I see your point sister, but we should be rejoicing about what good has happened, not upset about what did not happen."
"I suppose your right, lets go, I'm sure the crystal ponies will want to celebrate after this."
"Wait a moment sister, what of the crystal heart?"
"Hmm, Sombra must have hidden it somewhere, worry not we will find it but first we must check on the local population," and with that they turned to leave.
"Sister," Luna started in a panicked tone, "did the floor always look like that?" They both glanced down at the fading floor, looks of concern flashing across their faces.
"We must evacuate the empires citizens, hurry," Celestia demanded
As the stepped outside they saw that the crystal ponies were vanishing along with their empire, looks of horror and dread on their faces, it would seem Sombra had not informed them of this plan. Celestia finally realised what was happening and simply gave the order to leave.
"But sister-" Luna began to protest.
"No buts, we were too late to stop this, we failed them all." and with a heavy heart Celestia gave the order to retreat.
*****
Unknown to Luna and Celestia, when Sombra was imprisoned the heart had sprung into life, it took longer than had been intended but it worked all the same. It would not be known what had truly caused the disappearance of the entire empire for almost a millennium. Over this time, out of shame Celestia hid all records of the empire and fell into a great depression at failing to save an entire empire, the loss of her sister was what finally pushed her over the edge and her subjects saw very little of the solar princess over the next 100 years.