//------------------------------// // Chapter one // Story: From Warrior of Rome to Warden of Equestria // by Randomrusina //------------------------------// When I came to my senses I was laying down on top of my shield with the mother of all headaches hammering into my brain. I rolled to my stomach only to groan in pain, everything hurts, heck I’m feeling pain in places I didn’t even know I have. I did a quick check to see if I still got all my bodyparts attached and in right places. Let’s see, two eyes, two ears, mouth is fine, face is good. I got both of my arms and legs, all toes and ten fingers are… Wait, I only have nine fingers after I lost one in a battle against the parthians in the east. How is this possible? “We see thou hath awoken Roman.” Wait, who said that? Was I really so distracted I didn’t hear someone approach. I stood up in alarm and looked around only to gasp in wonder. I was standing in the middle of a great white hall with gigantic pillars made from stars on its edges. I looked closer to one of the pillars and saw that there was thousands of floating mirrors between the pillars and when I gazed on one of them, I saw the beginning and the end of universe, the birth and death of all gods, What I saw was amazingly beautiful in its simplicity and humbling and terrifying in its complexity. “Thou would be wise to avert thine eyes from it mortal, for the knowledge they held is not meant for mortal eyes. Even some gods who hath gazed upon them for too long were driven mad. We would be saddened to see the life we hath spared to wither away before us, driven mad from things beyond comprehension.” I looked away from what I was seeing trying to locate the one who’s been speaking to me only to see nothing, I looked up, right and left but I only saw the never ending hall no matter the way I looked at. I heard someone clearing their throat right behind me. “We art behind thee mortal.” Of course they are always on the direction you didn’t look, how typical. I turned around expecting to see the woman based on the voice I been hearing, only to be surprised as it was not a woman behind me but the creature that attacked the pompous prick I was supposed to look after, if that was not enough of a shock she was now huge! By the gods that thing is bigger than anything I’ve ever seen before! “Do not be frightened Roman, we mean no harm to thee.” Her voice was kind and gentle, a far cry from the booming voice she used before in the ruins, but all I could concentrate on was how each and every one of her teeth was big enough to crush me, armor and all, not to mention the rest of her. She’s so enormous she could just swallow me whole. “What, what are you!” Was all I could only ask it with my legs shaking in terror, I have fought barbarians who feast on the flesh of their enemies and wear their skin as a trophy, but I have never felt this much fear in my long life. “We art Faust, the Goddess of Creation, Keeper of the Secrets of Immortality, Guardian of All Knowledge, the Warden Supreme of Equestria, and the baker of the tastiest cupcakes in the multiverse.” She told me while spreading her wings in proud display, all six of them. My jaw fell to the floor after hearing just who I’m standing before only for a sudden realisation making me close my mouth and ask her. “What’s a cupcake?” I watched as the goddess before me looked at me in bewilderment. “Thou dost not know what a cupcake is?” Faust said in utter confusion. “Is it some kind of a pastry?” Seriously I have no idea what it is, sounds like a small cake of some kind. “Dost thou care for a taste?” She said and floated what apparently is a cupcake in front of me. “Sure?” Hey, it’s a goddess who offered and it’s free food so why not? As I took a bite I was amazed by the texture and the flavor of it, not to mention the delicious frosting on top! Imagine me, a veteran warrior of Rome, the best of the best, moaning in utter bliss over a simple pastry! If my fellow Praetorians ever found out I’ll die out of sheer shame and humiliation. “‘Tis good is it not mortal?” I looked over to the goddess only to watch as she eats a cupcake the size of the alps as it was nothing, though in her current form it is no wondrous feat really. “I have never eaten something this good in my eighty two years of life, oh great goddess, I thank you for gifting me one of your cakes of cup.” I bowed in reverence while removing my helmet, after all I am standing before a goddess. I heard only a titter of laughter and then I feel a great power take a hold of me straightening me up and making me look her to the eyes. “While we art a goddess, thou needst not to bow before us mortal. Any being brave enough to do what thou did is most verily worthy of standing in our presence.” Her tone once more shifted to a kind, motherly one and her smile could outshine the sun itself. I could only scratch my head in confusion “Eh, what exactly did I do?” “Thou dost not even know the extend of thy sacrifice, what hath been lost?” And I saw how her beautiful smile wavered a little and sadness entered her eyes. “What sacrifice?” I asked her while looking myself over in order to see if my initial survey missed something, nope still got everything right where they should be. “We see thou looked over thine body in a search for answers but thou wilt not find any by doing so.” And what does she mean by that? “What do you mean, my body looks just fine!” I’m starting to panic again here! “Little one, we need for thee to understand that no mortal can enter the void eternal without losing what makes them mortal in the first place.” Faust said to me while shrinking to the form she appeared as in the ruins and holding me consolingly to her chest. “Thy body is no more, it was torn apart by the powers of the in between, or the void eternal as most call it. What thou sees as thine body is naught but a projection thy soul created to protect what little mind thou still have left.” She told me while gently nuzzling the top of my head with her muzzle. “W-what does that mean, m-my body is gone… Am I dead?” I stammered while looking at her only to finish with a quiet whisper as the reality of the situation and the cost of my actions finally hit me. “I’m not a larvae am I!” I asked her in panic, to become a restless spirit bent on bringing misfortune upon the living is not a existence I want to live in. “No, thou art still among the ranks of the living whoever barely that is, we anchored thine soul to our own after thy body disintegrated upon entering the void.” Faust said and stood up, trotting towards one of those weird floating mirrors I saw earlier and touched it with a tip of one of her wings causing the image it held to change from a great variety of rapidly shifting colors holding, what I gathered from the small peek I got before Faust warned me of it's dangers, the secrets of all creation. To an image of the similar temple complex that we found in the swamp.  Except this one was fully intact and it was bigger and was build to a base of a mountain instead in the middle of a swamp and full of what seemed even smaller versions of Faust’s current form, but with either the horn, wings or neither of those and never all of them at once. These must be her creations if that smile is anything to go by. “This is the Memorial Temple of Valiant Heroes in the Isle of Unshed Tears that is located in alternate version of Equestria, realm of our personal design, that we require thou to travel and complete a task of great importance.” Faust explained to me while beckoning me closer with her hoof. Once I was standing right next to her she touched the surface of the mirror with her wingtip once more, this time the image shifted to the back of the temple, but instead of arc of stone, like in the ruins, the courtyard carved to the mountain held a coffin made from the purest marble I’ve ever seen, held in a pedestal of darkest stone, in a beautiful contrast to the whiteness of the coffin, giving it almost divine air while not taking the attention away from the natural beauty on the coffins engravings, displaying what seemed the life story of some noble. Wait, the horse on the engravings looks just like... I turned to Faust only to see a sad smile on her face. “If thou remembers, one of our titles is; The Warden Supreme of Equestria, this is the grave of Warden number 63,” She turned to look me in the eyes, “all wardens are our creations. We used a shard of our own divinity to forge them a souls of their own, similar to how you mortals use your own flesh and blood to reproduce. We gods use our divinity to do the same. While they look like us and sound the same, they are naught but children when compared to us and what we have experienced in our long, long existence. Many of them even use our name, others chose a new one for themselves, a selected few went as far as to change how they look in minor ways to make themselves more unique” “So, how did she die? I can’t imagine anything that could kill an immortal.” “All we know is that she fell to an enchanted blade, blade forged by the local god of death, but we know not what it did beyond the fact that it separated her soul from her body, thus making it impossible for us to enter the realm and punish those who thought to harm one of our own.” Faust said while she looked like she wanted to rain death and destruction on the fools who harmed her daughter. “Why can’t you just go there now? I mean if they had time to build a temple, she must have been dead for a while, right?” I looked at the image in the mirror, besides the disturbing similarity the temple held with the ruins where this all started, it looked fairly old even though well kept, so why can’t she just go there and bring her daughter back? “Because only one goddess of creation can exist in one realm at a time, otherwise the paradox would rip the fabric of reality apart. And because her soul and body both still exist in the realm, I cannot enter it without dooming all whom doth dwell within. We have waited for nearly one and a half thousand years for an opportunity to send someone worthy of the task to find the shard of our divinity, allowing us to enter this realm and bring our daughter back to life,” Faust stopped to wipe tears from her eyes and looked at me before continuing, “while she is naught but one of the many thousands of wardens we created, she is still one of our own and the thought of how much she must suffer, being trapped in between of life and death, is causing us such pain we cannot even put in words.” “Wait, she is trapped in between?” Who could be so cruel as to trap another living being like that? “It is a natural reaction of an alicorn who are in threat of dying to protect themselves by creating a coat of crystal armor around their bodies that gives them time to heal, but because of the separation there was no body to heal and thus she imprisoned herself inside a large pillar made from crystal known to the inhabitants of this realm simply as the Pillar, or to some more zealous individuals as the Pillar of Torment for the when the wind blows through the top of the pillar they claim it carries with it the tormented cries of our daughter.” Faust explained to me and walked over to another mirror, this one showing a gigantic pillar made from blue crystal surrounded by raging storm clouds raining water to the gigantic lake below. “Because she no longer had a physical body to limit the reactions power, it expanded until all of her magic was gone, rendering her conscious mind inert, creating not only the pillar but also what is called the Sea of Divine Tears in the process. The way the water drops to the lake below is seen as mine daughter weeping over her fate by the same individuals that call the Pillar that of Torment.” Faust stepped away from the mirror and turned towards me with a serious expression on her face. “What we require of thee is to travel to this realm, locate the Pillar, free her soul from within and then travel to the Tree of Harmony where our power is allowed to influence the realm.” “And how I’m supposed to do that? If you don’t remember, I have no physical body of my own!” I’m barely even alive if her words are anything to go by and she wants me to go looking for some pillar? “There is a body empty of a soul just ready to be inhabited in that realm mortal, dost thou remember how we spared thee of an untimely death?” Faust said while pointing her wing towards the mirrors once more. “Yes I do, you anchored my soul to your own, but what does it has to do with me going to this Equestria you speak of?” “Because thine soul is anchored to our own, we can send thee to inhabit the body of the fallen warden of this realm.” She told me while changing the image of the mirror to show the white coffin once again. “Wait, you want me to use the body of your dead daughter to save said daughter?” I don’t know what to think or say here. “Yes, for we would have builded her body anew regardless of the fact that her body is still intact for the manner she was separated from it made it impossible to return to it without complications.” Faust looked at me and said. “And thine soul cannot hold itself together without a physical body that much longer, if thou completes this task we can regain our daughter and thou wilt not perish in utter agony.” Huh, so I either save her daughter, or die in agony? … Let me think for a while. ... “So, when can I begin?” Anyone can call me a coward, but when given a choice between doing a task in a realm you have no knowledge of in behalf of a goddess, or die in pain unrivalled. I’ll choose the task, thank you very much. I may be old but I like being alive… Even if it means that I must turn into a horse… I knew this was going to be one of those missions when emperor asked me to watch his son while hunting a druid. “Right now, but before thou depart, is there anything we can grant thee to aid in completing this task?” Faust said while a portal opened behind me after a wave of her wing. I looked myself over and then looked at her. “If you could fit my armor, weapons and clothes to my new form, I would be grateful.” I asked her and finished with a small bow, never hurts to be polite after all. “When thou awakens, thine armor and clothes shall still be upon thee,” Faust says, “if there are no wards to prevent magic in the temple that is.” Faust then adds almost as an afterthought and touches my head with her horn. “The spell we casted should allow thee to walk with thy new body without complications, after all ‘tis a folly to send a warrior there only for thou to stumble around like a helpless newborn,” Faust said while standing tall and proud again, “Now we must fare thee well little one, for the next time we shall meet in person shall be after thou completes the quest.” Faust’s horn and my belongings glowed for a while and then stopped as I stepped towards the portal. I stopped just before entering and turned towards my strange and surprising benefactor. “Is there anyway I can contact you for advice in case something goes wrong?” I asked her still a bit unsure if I can do this on my own in a realm I have little to no knowledge of, not to mention a new body. “The realm of dreams is open to us, merely say our name while thinking of this place and we shall appear before thee and thou may ask whatever thy heart desires to know.” Her words were the last thing I heard before entering the portal, but this time I only felt in peace when the first time was agony beyond comprehension. Unknow to the Praetorian, after he walked through the portal, Faust was looking thoughtful, like she was trying to remember something. “Did we remember to warn him of the Warden 63’s two sons? … Oh well he will find out on his own soon enough.” Faust thinks out loud while looking at the empty space where the portal was just a moments before.