//------------------------------// // Act I, scene ii - Through The Forest // Story: A World Rent Asunder // by NeverEatTheLemonsAlone //------------------------------// As soon as morning comes—well, at least I assume it's roughly 'morning', given that Marks and I both wake up at the same time—we ready ourselves with grim stolidity. I'm really begin to feel the presence of the forest. Something about just...exudes an aura of unhealthiness. It feels wrong, in a profound sense of the word. It's like a sickness, a leafy green canker sore in the mouth of the world. Now I'm starting the day disgusted. Great. Regardless, we spend quite a while simply filling various containers with what little food could be scrounged up. There is, of course, stipula, but just like most every medium-to-large plant around, there's a faint haze over it. It's maddening. It lingers right at the edges of my senses, filling all of them at once and yet none of them at the same time. Even my magic can't pick anything up past a faint flicker that could simply be the environment's natural magic. However, Marks notices it too, and that's enough reason for me to subsist off of grass. [1] Finally, we can't put it off any longer, as much as we want to. Walking to the edge of the forest, where a small, overgrown trail leads into the undergrowth, we share a quick glance before plodding off into the shadows beneath the trees. The first thing I notice upon entering is just how damned dark it is. I expected it to be, given that it's a forest at night, but I was expecting at least a measure of moonlight. No luck. It's utterly black, so dark that I can't see my own snout in front of my face. No choice, then, but to create my own light. A pale, ghostly violet light emerges from the air above us, flickering and writhing as though it's alive. Odd, it's never done that before. It's disconcerting and I would rather banish it, but the sad truth is that ponies are mostly based around eyesight, and without any kind of light, we're as likely to run into a tree as we are to stay on the path. At least the light provides enough illumination to see clearly. I swear to Celestia, that tree just moved. Shaking my head in frustration, I berate myself. You're letting the atmosphere get to you, Twilight. Buck up, girl. It's just a forest. As long as you stay away from the Circle of Bones, you'll be fine. Inhaling and exhaling once or twice, I continue moving, catching up to Marks, who's moving quite quickly. I guess she dislikes this place just as much as I do. The second noticeable thing I realize about this forest is that, unlike any other forest, it's dead silent. Completely. Even the trees don't make a sound. Without even noticing, I've been stomping my hooves nearly as hard I can, just to hear something. Turning to the unicorn next to me, I open my mouth to speak, until she glares at me with such intensity that I think better of it. I tread more lightly from then on. Just then, I realize that it's getting darker. Maybe the magic is leaking from my light. I reach out my ethereal sense to refill it, and then stop short as I realize something. It's not my light that's getting dimmer. The shadows are actually encroaching upon us. Moving closer to Marks, I whisper into her ears as quietly as possible, "close your eyes." Her gaze flicks up to the orb above us and she nods sharply, screwing her eyes tightly closed. I follow suit. My sense reconnects to the light and I push a vast amount of magic into it, enough to light up the woods for hundreds of feet around us. Grinning triumphantly, I open my eyes. My grin fades away. Nothing's happened. In fact, I think the darkness is getting even closer. It's moving faster, too. I can actually see it slithering towards us now. Just barely, only an inch every few minutes, but it's definitely happening. And then, I make the greatest mistake possible. I panic. [2] Tearing Marks off of the ground in a powerful magical grip, I sprint off, my hooves flying along the winding, steadily narrowing trail. Marks says nothing, or I don't hear her. I don't even know why I'm panicking. Some deep, primal fear has awakened within me, and it refuses to take no for an answer. The more I run, the closer the shadows come until, my breath spent, I stop. I can barely see my hooves past the gloom. Looking above me for the pale spark of my magic, I see nothing. I can still feel the poor unicorn up there, kicking in my grip. Lowering her in front of me, I apologize. Then I frown. Something wasn't right there. Then it clicks. My voice is gone. I can barely see Marks to watch her chest swell mightily, and I reflexively wince as she screams at the top of her lungs. I can only hear the barest of whispers, however. "You idiot, idiot mare! I thought you were smart! Why did you do that? I told you that there's something supernatural about this forest, but not only do you ignore my warnings, you summon a magical fire, completely ignore it when it begins to act erratically, and when you realize that the farther we go, the greater the shadows are becoming, you sprint farther! You're mad! I should never have come with you!" I scream back, feeling the rush of air claw at my throat but hearing just a tiny sound. "Why didn't you say anything? You could have warned me!" "I did! You didn't respond! I even punched you and you didn't do anything!" At this point, I'm just...intensely confused. "But...you were in front of me the entire time! I even tried to speak to you, and you glared at me!" We both realize what's happening at precisely the same time and stare at each other in horror. Then the darkness begins to move again. We aren't moving this time. Are we? I'm not even sure this forest is real anymore. All I can see a whirling maelstrom of utter darkness. The light is gone. Marks is gone. I'm alone. I feel something pressing down on me, and my brain cries out in frustration as something constricts around my neck. Pangs of colour spark and crash in front of my mind, and my eyes flicker and finally slide shut. --- My eyes crash open, and I'm surprised to see that it's no longer entirely black. A sickly green light hovers over me, and as my optic nerves come online properly, I look around. What I see is most definitely not good. I'm on a stone tablet in the center of a ring of stones. All around me is a sea of bones in various stages of decomposition. Kneeling next to me, not yet awake, is Marks. Wait...kneeling? While unconscious? And that's when I discover that I can't get up. Now I realize where I am. The Circle of Bones. --- [1]: Upon doing further research, I discovered that those that ate from trees and bushes around Cullwood suffered from horrendous symptoms of magical overload and died soon after. Huh. [2]: Take it from me: never panic. It just doesn't end well. No idea why we do, biologically, in the first place. --- It's true what the book said. I can't move from my kneeling position, no matter what I do. I can't use my magic, either. For all intents and purposes, I'm a thinking, talking statue. So, first thing's first. Let's see if there are any obvious flaws here. Searching around, my eyes find nothing of notice until I look straight down. Underneath me is an incredibly detailed engraving in a language that I'm unfamiliar with. It takes me a moment to realize that it's a version of proto-Equid [1], but...different. Everything is jagged. All of the smooth lines and curves that I should be seeing are replaced with jagged, rough lines and hard, sharp corners. I can make out the words blood and magic, and nothing else. Still, that alone causes me to break out in cold sweat. Blood magic was banned long before the Princesses split, though. How could the Sovereignty have been sanctioned to use it by Luna? In any event, academic interest is the last of my worries. [2] I have no intentions of becoming one of the prostrated skeletons that surround me. But how am I going to escape without my magic? Actually, what even brought me here? I call out to the forest in curiosity, surprised that I actually make noise. "Hey, who took me here?" There's a threatening creak as a full-grown tree swings lower, slapping me in the face with vines as they wrap around my torso and lift me bodily into the air, tightening until I can't even breathe. Just as the world begins to darken, it releases me and I fall down hard on the stone, immediately resuming the kneel once more. Well, that answered my question and told me not to ask any more. As far as I can imagine, the trees passed me from vine to vine until I arrived here. Again, not something I should be thinking about right now. If the book told me right, they should just let me waste away here, so I have at least a few days before I become delirious from dehydration. Comforting. "Alright, Twilight," I muttered, "you need to think this out. Think. Think." I close my eyes, breathing deeply and attempting to concentrate, clearing the last of last night's panic from my mind. Flicking my eyes open again, I look around once more. It's then that I notice that Marks and I are the only ones that are on the stone platform. All of the skeletons are surrounding it in that same kneel, facing towards us. Something about it is unsettling, and potentially useful. I attempt to move my head and find that it works. As long as I don't try to stop kneeling, I'm allowed to move some body parts. Neat. Anyway, I look back down at the proto-Equid, now that I can see more of it. It takes some time to translate, but as far as I can tell, the part in front of me roughly equates to ...blood magic fills the space and leaves the bound unbound when... I growl in frustration. So I have a lead, but I don't have the conditions of the spell. Just bucking wonderful. I can't turn to see what the rest of it says. All I know, in this scenario, is that it needs blood for the activation matrices, and that its overall function is to set us free. At least, I assume that it'll set us free. That's a good thing, right? [3] So first thing's first: to even get anywhere near puzzling this out I'll need... "Ughhhh..." Right on cue. "Hey, Marks. You awake?" Her head turns to me balefully, and in the process, she notices where we are and catches on instantly. Her reaction? "Oh buck." Trust me, I couldn't agree more. --- A little while later, I've filled her in on everything that's happened. As for the blood magic, she's as shocked as I am. Regrettably, she can't translate proto-Equid, so there goes that plan. However, she knows about magic somewhat. She might be a help. "So, Marks, any idea what the conditions of a spell like this are?" She shakes her head. "First thing's first, though: we need some blood to get out of this mess." I think for a moment about how to get some without being able to move, and after a few seconds, an idea blossoms in my brain. I bite down hard on my lip, ignoring the pain until I can taste blood. The red liquid begins to pool in my mouth, and I spit, letting it spatter on the stone. What I'm not expecting, however, is for it to begin glowing pale blue. After a moment, it sinks into the stones, and the ancient script lights up. A feeling of numbness that I didn't know was there flees from me, and I find myself able to move. So does Marks. I grin at her. She doesn't respond with a smile at all. Instead, her eyes go wide with terror. "Sparkle, you left the bound unbound." There's a clattering sound, and the skeletons that swarm around us begin to move. Their eyes are suffused with the same pale blue lights, and they begin to advance on us, drawing rusted swords and daggers from long-decayed remnants of wooden sheaths. Marks and I back up on the platform until we're back to back. I'm still unable to use magic. I should've taken that inscription more literally, but for my part, how was I to know that the remains would come to life?! As they move on us, I cringe before noticing something rather important: all of the skeletons stop at the edges of the stone tablet. They simply stare at us, unblinking, unmoving. Now that I can't leave, though, I might as well take a look at the rest of this spell. There may be some unfulfilled conditions. I tell Marks of my intentions and she nods tersely. I continue working nervously, occasionally correcting an error, until I have something that seems like it makes sense: Using the ancients' blood magic fills the space and leaves the bound unbound when supplied with sanguine. All will become free, left to wander for eternity. They will seek the soul that freed them by their blood, searching for something with which to fill their eternal emptiness. I repeat it to Marks and she looks at me meaningfully. I can see what she's thinking: if I'm the one they're seeking, she would be free to go. I give her my most angry glare. It doesn't look like it does much. Without a backwards glance, she leaps off of the stone. The skeletons part around her without even breaking my eye contact, and she marches off into the treeline without looking back. I can't believe she betrayed me like that. What am I supposed to do now? The skeletons begin to advance ever so slowly, coming closer to me one hoofstep at a time. It seems like the stone tablet isn't keeping them away as well as it looked like it did, and it won't be too long before they're close enough to touch me. At that point, I'm done for. Cut to five or so minutes later and I'm dodging flailing, skeletal hooves. Not for long, though, because one of them finally manages to grip my leg, and no matter how hard I try, I can't shake it off. Still no magic, and as it pulls at me, the leg it's touching goes numb and crumples out from under me. I'm left looking at the sky, eyes barely seeing anything. I'm just...so tired... A pulse of pure blue magic streaks out from the treeline, connecting precisely with the green light that hovers above me. There's the intensely painful screeching sound of two magics conflicting, and a marine light explodes above me. That certainly wakes me up, and I avert my eyes from the bright lights. The green is gone when I look again, and the inky blackness of the night is filled with stars and a moon. The skeletons' lights fade and they crumble to the ground, dead once more and no longer kneeling. Warily, I step carefully down, and, when nothing happens other than Marks stepping out of the now-inanimate trees, I dash over and tackle her in a massive hug. "I swear, Marks, if you ever pull something like that again, I'm going to break your horn clean off." She chuckles. "You're welcome, Sparkle." Getting back up, I look up to where the light used to be. "So what was that, anyway?" She stares at me, incredulous. "You don't understand by now? That was the heart of the forest. It's how it trapped ponies. Think about it: when they had nothing but darkness and the trees couldn't catch them, they would eventually see the green light. Any light would be welcome after than, and they would run headlong towards it with no caution. Then they would be caught in the Circle's hold, and it would drain their magic to feed itself. The worst kind of parasite. That's why I left the circle. If I could get out, then I could use my magic again, so I needed to make the forest think that I was abandoning you." Wow. That's...really something. [4] "Now," she looks at the sky and grimaces, "let's get out of here as fast as we can. South is this way." As she walks off into the now-natural gloom, I grin and follow. Turns out that it was a good idea to bring her along after all. --- [1]: For those of you who don't know, proto-Equid is essentially the primordial form of Modern Equus, in common use thousands of years ago, long before the Princesses. [2]: Just saying this hurts my soul. [3]: No. [4]: No shit, Sparkle. --- The darkness is back. Marks was wrong. There's still something out there. Something had to have created the heart of the forest, after all. We were walking along a little while back, when the moon and stars went out. We knew what was happening. So now, we're alone in the darkness. We're not even sure if we're together anymore. It might be an illusion, just like before. It's at this point when I realize something. Fear isn't going to accomplish anything. We're simply going to get dragged back in eventually. I close my eyes, breath deeply, and then open my eyes again, really looking at the darkness. It's not what I thought it was. It's not the true entity. It's a shadow, cast by the thing that now floats in front of me. Picture an orb, covered in pulsating eyes that gaze in every possible direction, with slimy, sickly green skin the same color as the light in the Circle. Mouths periodically open and close all over it, sometimes even opening underneath an eye. Writhing, pulsing tendrils of black flail around it. The shadows. I stare directly at it, and it knows it. It's mouths let out a shrill shriek all at once, and I begin to charge a bolt of magic. The abomination won't be able to move out of the way in time. I let fly, yelling triumphantly. [1] Nothing happens. Well, that's not entirely true. Something definitely happens. It vanishes. It simply disappears, leaving a sickly-sweet smell behind it and a distorted, nearly incomprehensible voice as the shadows vanish for the last time: Wherever there is shadow and forest, so I am. The Watcher is looking for you now. All around us, the trees evaporate, leaving us, disoriented, in a field perhaps a mile or so from the south fringe of the Cullwood. Shuddering, I turn away from it, still mindful of the last thing that creature said: The Watcher is looking for you now. [1]: Honestly, what was I expecting to happen here?