//------------------------------// // Former property // Story: Corrupted Heart // by StarGlare //------------------------------// Sombra was enraged after Shining Armors trick allowed the other ponies to get away, he managed to keep his cool at first but eventually lost it. The shield had only weakened slightly since it was first raised, still that didn't stop the large shadow outside of it throwing everything it had at it, dark burst after dark burst Sombra fired at the shield, but it still wouldn't give. The last he saw of those ponies was after Shining teleported away, when he got to the shield they had been heading towards the castle, most likely to speak to the alicorn. For now he would give the empire some space, he really would prefer to avoid Cadances attacks. ***** "Well he just seemed like a big meanie," Pinkie said in a much more deadpan tone than usual, losing her excitement from earlier, it would seem that seeing Sombra had a bad effect on her, "he probably never let anypony living here have parties!" "I'm sure he wouldn't have, Pinkie" Twilight replied in a tone similar to Pinkies, "but we're here to make sure he doesn't take over again, and that's exactly what we'll do" "Yeah, we'll show him!" Rainbow announced triumphantly as the others nodded in agreement. On their way to the castle, they noticed there were bored looking ponies walking around, their coats also looked drained in a way, making them appear darker, Twilight hypothesised this was simply because they had different genes, or something like that anyway. The castle looked as good up close as it had at a distance, it seemed to reflect Celestias sun perfectly, sending rainbows in all directions. The castle itself was made of pale blue crystal and stood tall, standing on four legs, each with a doorway inside them. Looking up, Twilight observed that there was a small hole in the castle, but what was its purpose... She turned back towards her friends, seeing Rainbow and Applejack snickering and Rarity blushing slightly, Twilight simply smiled and proceeded to lead them into the castle. The interior of the castle was both phenomenally beautiful and painfully blinding. With the whole structure made out of crystal, light was reflected in great amounts in all directions. After stumbling around a lot the small group finally reached the throne room, Shining opened the door with his magic to reveal an extremely extravagant room, with windows and banners along the walls, most of the banners were ripped but some still had the image of King Sombra on them, they hadn't been taken down yet. On the throne sat a pink alicorn, drooped over. Twilights face lit up as she saw her sister in law but instantly faded to a look of worry upon noticing how weak Cadance looked, she had bags under her eyes and her eyes were currently closed. Twilight and her friends waited at the door as Shining went to wake Cadance, she was casting a spell in her sleep which was something only alicorns and rather skilled unicorns could do, even so the caster gained very little benefit from sleeping and could only do it for about two hours at a time. Shining trotted up to her and whispered in her ear, Cadance opened her eyes and a look of joy appeared on her face as she saw Twilight, she tried to get up but just collapsed back into the throne. "Sorry if I don't do our usual dance, Twilight. I'm not at my best right now." Cadance sighed, "It's taking almost all of my energy to keep this shield up." "If you're so tired why doesn't Shining use his own shield spell?" Twilight asked "I've tried kiddo, Sombra managed to get through it as if it was made of butter," Shining spoke with a dreary look, he was obviously sad he could not assist Cadance. "But if your shield was countered why is Cadances still working?" "My shield is different to Shinings, instead of projecting reinforced energy, I'm projecting love around the empire, Sombra has been unable to pass it, only problem is..." Cadance suddenly slumped down in her throne before jerking back up, "...as you can see it takes a lot out of me to keep it up, I won't be able to hold it up much longer now." "Twilight," Shining began. "The reason you were sent here was to find some way to protect the empire?" Twilight nodded. "Ok good, I'm going to stay here and make sure Cadance is alright, you and your friends have to go and question the Crystal Ponies" "Will do Shining." Twilight spoke as she turned to her friends, "Ok we all need to split up and see if the Crystal Ponies know anything, alright?" Pinkie begins waving her hoof in the air, "Yes Pinkie?" "Will there be a bakery here?" "I don't know, why do you ask?" "Just wondering, thanks." "Right... anyway lets get going." Everyone else then nods in agreement. When everyone had left apart from Twilight, Shining called out to her, "Twi, I think there's an old library not far from here, you should check it out." Upon hearing this Twilights eyes light up. "Really? I have got to look there first, thanks." She then leaves, closing the throne room door behind her. After she left Cadance noticed the black crystals embedded in Shinings horn. "Hey, what are those?" Cadance asked gesturing to his horn with her hoof "Oh it's just something Sombra did to me out there, it'll be fine..." Shining just sighed and went back to looking at the door until suddenly he felt the crystals being blasted away from his horn. "There," Cadance started, "much better." "You didn't have to do that, you shouldn't waste your energy." "I don't mind... I just hope they're back soon." "Me too," was all Shining replied as he went back to staring at the door. ***** Outside the shield Sombra had a huge grin on his face, still in his shadow form. Well at least it's obvious they aren't strategic masterminds, they've left me out here too long. In the time he had been outside the shield he had regained enough power to use his communication spells again, after doing a short sweep of the Empire he saw that Avalite was there and his runes were still intact. I'll destroy them from the inside! Sombra began to laugh as he readied his spell... ***** Avalite Seeker wasn't too sure where he was right now, the area was familiar but he couldn't put a name to it as he glanced around. After a second he saw a table under an umbrella and just decided to take a seat and wait. After a few minutes he began to feel faint and nauseous, for no obvious reason. "Avalite... upon hearing this he just glanced behind him to see a deserted street, "Avalite Seeker... Avalite began feeling nervous now as there was no one else with him. "Hello?" Avalite called out, trying to sound intimidating. "Ah, so you can still hear me," the voice replied. "Erm... yeah but I can't see you, where are you?" "I'm outside the city, and I need your help Avalite" the voice continued, sounding confident in itself. "Why should I help you? How do I know you're even real?" At this point he waited for a reply, but received none. After a few seconds Avalite collapsed to the ground, it felt as if a lightning bolt had shot through his skull. Suddenly images started flashing through his head, he saw himself in some kind of crystal armour but through someone elses eyes, amidst the images he saw someone looking into a mirror, the reflection was tall, wearing steel-looking armour and had glowing green eyes. Eventually Avalite was able to get to his feet again, still shaking slightly and overall feeling somehow different "I remember now, you're King Sombra and I'm your..." Avalite paused as he thought, "Second in command?" "So you remember now, and are you ready to follow my orders once again?" Upon hearing this Avalite took a moment to think. "Of course m'lord," he then bowed to no one in particular, "what would you have of me?" "I'm presuming you remember the purple flowers that grow in the Empire?" "The ones that we used to silence captives?" "Exactly... I need you to make a brew of them and give it to a pink Alicorn, currently residing inside my citadel" "An... Alicorn?" Avalite asked with a sound of disbelief in his voice. "Yes, it seems there are more now, I don't know how many as I've only seen this one, hopefully there are no more." Avalite began to grin, "Ok Sir, I'll make the brew and I'll make it look like an act of kindness." "Ah, I see you're beginning to act like yourself again. Go now and do not fail" "It will be done." He then saluted, again to no one in particular before leaving to find what he needed. ***** "What do you mean you don't know where they are?" Twilight said with her voice raised slightly. "I've told you all I can remember," the librarian replied, "I'm certain history is over there," she raised her hoof towards the left of the library, "Somewhere." "Urgh nevermind, I'll find them myself. Come on Spike lets get looking." Twilight looked around at Spike who had just sighed slightly before walking towards where the librarian pointed, Twilight quickly followed. "Well Spike," Twilight began to the small dragon, "You've found books for me plenty of times at home, lets see if you're as good here, huh?" "Yeah, we'll see," he replied, "Don't you think you might have been a little harsh back there?" Twilight looked at Spike, slightly annoyed. "I might have gotten a little angry I suppose..." "A little?" he replied as he raised an eyebrow. "Oh sshhh, It's just that these ponies haven't been even a little helpful since we arrived is all." "I suppose but shouting at them won't help," Spike said as they arrived at the first bookcase, "anyway lets start looking," he finished as he began looking. Twilight sighed before joining him. About 30 minutes later they were both still looking when suddenly a crystal pony with a cyan coat and a bright green mane ran into the library, grabbed a book, and left before Twilight or Spike could get a word out. "Ok that was different," Twilight stated, "I wish we were having as much luck as him," Twilight chuckled slightly as she went back to looking. "Hey Twilight, I think I found something," Spike called from just down the row, "it's just called 'History of the Crystal Empire', straight to the point I guess." "Well done Spike," Twilight said as she seized the book in her telekinetic grip, "now we just need to see how they protected themselves." Twilight and spike had been sitting in the library for a few minutes, Spike was sitting down twiddling his thumbs and waiting while Twilight was lost in the book. "Oh no," Twilight spoke suddenly. "What is it?" "We need to get to Shining and Cadance now. "But Twi-" "No, I mean now," she cut in as she hurried outside, dragon following behind. "Twilight will you please tell me what's going on?" "Ok," Twilight slowed down a little to explain, "it says in the book that traditionally the crystal ponies had some kind of faire to charge an ancient relic, 'The Crystal Heart' it says here." "Ok, so we need to set up a faire and find a relic?" "Yes but it won't be as easy as that, Cadance was already weak when we left and I doubt Sombra would leave the Heart out in the open for anyone to find." "So this could be more of a problem then?" Spike asked, sounding a little worried now. "Yes, we need to get this to Shining and Cadance to explain." "We should try and go faster then," Spike said as he jumped onto Twilights back. "Urgh, you aren't light you know," Twilight said as she was almost winded. "Sorry but you're faster than me." Twilight just nodded and sped up to a gallop. ***** Avalite had done as he had been asked, he'd gone to the library to get the book, which had been exactly where he remembered luckily, and he's used the instructions in it to brew a sedative potion, stronger than the book said to make it though, it was strong enough to knock out a stallion. As he approached the throne room door in the castle he stopped to think about how to go about doing this, he eventually decided he would tell them it was a Crystal Empire delicacy and acted as a stimulant. Avalite took a deep breath and pushed open the throne room door. "Um... excuse me?" Avalite started inquisitively. "And you are?" a tall, white stallion asked him. "My name is Avalite Seeker, I heard that the princess was tired?" "How did you know that?" Shining asked, sounding annoyed "Most of us know now, hard not to," he explained as he pointed outside to the flickering sky, "I brought something that can help." "What? How?" Shining asked, sounding invested now. "Well, here we have a special drink which also acts as a stimulant, I thought it could help," Avalite continued, a few beads of sweat forming above his brow. "I don't know, may not be a good idea." "Shining..." Cadance had woken up sometime during the conversation, "we need to show we can trust them, I'll drink it," upon hearing this Shining raised an eyebrow but took the drink from Avalite anyway. "Are you sure?" Shining asked Cadance as he handed it to her. "Yes I'm sure," she said as she started drinking it. "I'm sorry but there's something I have to attend to," Avalite bowed as he began walking out the door, "good luck." "Thanks," Shining replied. ***** Twilight and Spike had finally made it to the castle and had slowed to a quick trot as they approached the throne room. "Hey," Twilight said as she nudged Spike, "there's the crystal pony who ran into the library." "Maybe we should ask him why he's here?" Spike then suggested. "I suppose we could, we're short on time, but it may be for the best, I'll talk to him, you wait near the throne room door." Twilight then politely walked up to him and went to introduce herself. "Hello? My name is Twilight Sparkle and I was wondering if I could ask you a few things?" After hearing this Avalite looked like he been interrupted as he turned to her. "Yes?" He asked her. "Well I was just wondering why you were standing outside the throne room?" "You'll find out in a moment," Twilight was confused at this, "look," Avalite just pointed outside at the sky. "Yeah, what about the sky," after a few seconds the sky flickered again before fading to orange completely, "Oh no," she looked back at Avalite, "What did you do!" "I just let my lord into his land," he grinned, "he'll be here soon, just wait." A look of dread washed over her face as she turned to the throne room door where Spike was standing, she then galloped over to the door and pushed it open, narrowly missing Spike in the process. Twilight burst into the throne room and saw Shining next to Cadance, who seemed to have passed out. "What happened?" Twilight asked with urgency. "Some crystal pony came in here, offered Cadance a drink and after she drank it she fell asleep!" "Yeah I just saw him outside, he said he had let 'his lord' in, do you think he did it to let Sombra in?" "Well it seems likely doesn't it? Why else would he do it!" "Why else indeed, my unicorn friend," A voice stated. Shining and Twilight both looked behind them to see the entire door had been engulfed by shadow. "Hey, where's Spike?" "The dragon? He's quite alright, I just knocked him out." "You did what!" "He is fine I assure you." "Why are you here, monster?" Shining asked sternly. "Is it not obvious? I'm here to take back what is rightfully mine." "It's not yours, the empire doesn't belong to you." "No, but that's about to change." "I'm sorry but you're only a shadow, what do you hope to do?" Sombra simply began to laugh at this. "How naive of you, to think I'd come so unprepared," after saying this Sombras shadow form began to writhe as it formed back into a pony, one with purple smoke pouring out his eyes and red cloak at his back, "Better?" "Either way I won't let you harm anyone here." "Don't worry, I won't harm them, simply enslave them again." After hearing this something in Shining snapped as he quickly launched a beam of pure energy at Sombra, who stepped aside to avoid the attack. "How pathetic, I really expected more of a challenge," Sombra said as he began to grin. The now angered Shining Armor continued firing off stronger and stronger magic bolts. "Shining!" Twilight interceded, "he's just trying to make you angry." "Well it's working!" he yelled back as he fired off another beam. "This is pitiful, let me put you out of your misery," Sombra then caught one of Shinings bolts in his magical grip and redirected it back at him, throwing him back a few feet. "Shining!" Twilight yelled as she ran over to him, "are you ok?" "Please... stop him," Shinings eyes then rolled into the back of his head as he passed out. After this Twilight turned and faced Sombra, anger visible on her face, "I'll make you pay for that!" she yelled. "I'm afraid I won't give you the chance to my dear." Twilight prepared to respond to him but found herself unable to as a cold feeling gripped her. "What... is this?" Twilight stammered. "It's just something to help you sleep." The last thing Twilight heard was Sombra laughing as the world around her faded to black.