Twilight trotted happily down the library steps with a huge grin plastered onto her face. A happy tune resonated from her lips as she finally reached the bottom of the steps, on the second floor of the library. She took a short moment to gaze out of the balcony, taking in the morning sun which had just freshly risen, bathing the whole of Ponyville in a warm and calming light.
“Oh Spike!” She sang out in a harmonious tone. Usually, the dragon would be immediately present in front of the unicorn, ready to attend to her every whim. However, this time there was only silence. No streak of purple rushing out from the kitchen, no loud answer of his familiar voice. “Spike?” She called out yet again but as expected, no response was received.
“Hmm. He’s probably out in the market again. No worries, I’ll just find him!” Twilight cheerfully spoke to herself, trotting with a spring in each step down the stairs and out the library.
“Ah it’s such a beautiful day today!” The unicorn said with a smile across her face. The sun continued its climb to the peak of the sky but the light it sent onto Ponyville was warm and not scorching hot. The colors that surrounded the unicorn seemed brighter than usual and she could not see a cloud in the sky.
However, upon reaching the marketplace of Ponyville, she started to notice something odd. The area which was normally filled with buzzing ponies getting the freshest produce was deathly quiet. Not a single pony was in her sight, not even the shopkeepers. In fact, the shops had their blinds down, signaling that the shops had not even opened.
“That’s odd...” Twilight continued her exploration, this time heading towards Sugercube Corner to pick up her usual slice of cake when Spike was unable to make breakfast.
On her way to the familiar bakery, nopony crossed her. Usually the bakery would be swarmed with ponies trying to get the freshest pastries but as the large building finally came into view, she could see it was devoid of life.
“Huh? What’s going on? Come to think of it, I haven’t even seen anypony since I left the library…” Galloping up to the door, she saw that it had been closed shut with a wooden sign hung on it. ‘DO NOT DISTURB. SAVING THE WORLD’ was crudely scribbled in a pink marker.
“S-Saving the world!? Oh no!” Twilight started to panic, slamming her hoof against the door frantically. “Pinkie! Pinkie open up! What’s going on!? Is Discord back!? I can help! Pinkie!” Fear started filling her heart when nopony arrived to open the door.
“R-Rarity! She can help!” Twilight wasted no time, rushing over to Carousel Boutique in record time. Again she repeated her quickened knocking. “Rarity! Rarity open up! Pinkie’s saving the world without us!” Her screams went unheard as she stood outside the purple door, her heart racing. “Rarity!” She screamed once more but realized she was just wasting time.
“Oh no. This is bad, this is bad, this is bad!” Twilight’s mind scanned the possibilities. “What if they’re out fighting Discord without me? No, they wouldn’t do that! But who could still be home? Fluttershy lives too far away and going to Applejack’s might take too much time…Ah ha!” Her mind rested on the only other possible friend who lived nearby, albeit upwards into the sky.
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“Argh, who in Equestria could be knocking on the door on this day!?” Rainbow angrily shouted to herself, standing up from her chain and moving away from her computer which sat on a large cloud table. Grumpily walking towards her main door, her face displaced her unhappiness.
Flinging open the door, she was immediately greeted by Twilight, who jumped and hugged her on sight.
“What the!? Hey!” Rainbow responded in shock.
“Oh Rainbow I’m so glad you’re home and you’re okay.”
“Of course I am! What do you think happened to me!?”
“Oh Rainbow the towns completely empty and we could be in a lot of danger! We need to find Pinkie! She’s out ‘saving the world’ without us! She could be in a lot of trouble!” Twilight tried to pull Rainbow’s hoof but the pegasus stood firmly on the cloud ground, one eyebrow raised and a smile on her face.
“Why aren’t you coming Rainbow!? Pinkie could be in a lot of trouble!”
“Pinkie is saving the world. We all are!”
“What!? Then why are you standing here!? And why didn’t you invite me!? Oh no this is bad, this is bad…” Rainbow had to force her laughter from coming out upon seeing the mare’s panicking expression.
“Umm…Twilight. Do you know what day it is today?”
“Of course! It’s May 15th!”
“Yeap! You know what’s so special about this day don’t you?”
Twilight replied Rainbow’s question with a blank stare.
“Wait, you really don’t know what day it is today do you?”
“N-No…?” Twilight stuttered out in fear, giving a nervous smile towards her friend.
“It’s the release of Diablo 3 Twilight!”
“Diablo…3?”
Silence enveloped the two mares as Rainbow stared on with her mouth wide open.
“You don’t know what Diablo 3 is!?” Rainbow asked in disbelief, her mouth still hanging agape.
“Should I know?”
Rainbow’s mouth dropped even bigger, something Twilight thought was impossible.
“That’s it. You’re coming with me.” As soon as Rainbow finished her phrase, she flew behind Twilight, pushing the unicorn into her house. Twilight was too confused to resist the push, in fact her curiosity only piqued as to what this ‘Diablo’ might be and where her friends might be. Rainbow stopped the push without warning a small distance away from her desk, her face twisted in confusion as she looked at the unicorn she had
“Hey I just realized, how are you even standing here? And how in Equestria did you get up here?”
“Cloud-walking spell and my hot air balloon.” Twilight responded nonchalantly.
Rainbow responded with an “Oh…” before finally pushing Twilight in front of her computer and sitting her down on the cloud chair.
Twilight was perplexed at the screen of the computer, which displayed a screen of an empty clearing. The clearing had a small teal-shade to it and at the top of the screen hung the words ‘Diablo III’. In the middle sat a large square box requesting an ‘Battle.net Account Name’ and a ‘password’. Various buttons adorned the rest of the screen explained with words she didn’t understand such as ‘Manage Account’ and ‘Options’. She did have to admit that the screen looked amazing, even though she did not understand it.
“So… this is Diablo?” Twilight asked.
“Well… yes but no. Hold on.” Rainbow flew just above Twilight, giving herself room to type various letters and numbers into the ‘Battle.net Account Name’ and ‘Password’ boxes before hitting the enter key. Immediately she was brought to a screen showing off a odd bald man standing at the center of the screen.
“What’s going on?”
“Hold on just a minute.” Rainbow plugged some wires into the computer and brought out a small, standing microphone which she placed in between Twilight and her. “Girls can you hear me?”
“Yuppy Duppy, Dashie!”
“You sound quite clear, darling.”
“I can hear you fine, Rainbow.”
“O-Oh yes. You sound fine…Rainbow…”
“Wait. All of you are here? Even you Pinkie?” Twilight asked.
“Yeaaaaaaap!” She replied. Her cheerfulness could be felt even though they couldn’t see each other.
“Then why didn’t you answer the door when I was knocking!?” Twilight yelled to Pinkie.
“Oh, I had my new headphones on!” Pinkie sang. “I couldn’t hear anything besides what was going on on my computer!”
“Wait, you bought this Diablo 3 too?”
“Yeap! I don’t know what it is but after Dashie bugged me to get it so I’m giving it a try!”
“What about the rest of you?” Twilight asked the other ponys in the conversation.
“Well, I personally bought it as Rainbow told me it is a work of art. And you do know how much I love a good piece of fine art.” Rarity explained.
“Well, I reckon I got this game cause Rainbow told me it’d be hard work and she said that there ain’t no way I’d be up for it. I’m here to prove that pegasus wrong.” Applejack elaborated.
“I got it because all my friends were getting it… I thought you were too Twilight?” Fluttershy asked meekly over her microphone.
“I didn’t even know about the game till 5 minutes ago!” Twilight yelled back. Rainbow immediately snatched the mic, giving a small laugh before talking.
“Okay. So now that we have gotten the formalities out of the way let’s start. Okay, we have five classes and there are five of us. We need to decide who’s going to be which class.”
“I pick this here ‘Barbarian’ class. She seems mighty strong.”
“Oh the Barbarian is so awesome.” Rainbow followed her statement with her signature squeal. “She has high health and a wide array of abilities that deals AOE damage. She works as the muscle of the group, growing aggression away from nearby enemies so that she takes all the damage.”
“She has what now?” Applejack was lost in Rainbow’s words.
Rainbow gave a sigh and moving her hoof to her face. “She helps the rest of us survive.” She re-explained in a slow, monotonous tone.
“Then why’d didn’t you just say so Rainbow?”
“I did…” There was a slight pause as Rainbow placed her hoof back down on the mic, turning to Twilight who had her eyes fixated on the bald man still moving around on the screen.
“Okay so now on the Witch Doctor. The Witch Doctor focuses on conjuring-”
“Oo! Oo! Pick me Dashie! Pick me!” Pinkie’s enthusiastic voice echoed through the microphone.
“Pinkie? Are you sure? I haven’t even-”
“Pick me! I love conjuring because conjuring means making, and making means baking, and you know how much I love baking!”
The room fell silent, Rainbow’s mind tried to comprehend Pinkie’s logic. After a few seconds, Rainbow accepted as she knew arguing with Pinkie Pie’s way of thought was useless.
“Okay so now the Monk. The Monk is-“
“Umm…Rainbow?” Fluttershy’s soft voice was barely audible.
“What’s up Fluttershy?”
“Do you think I could take the Monk? Monks are kind and gentle people from what I’ve read. They always find ways to solve the issue away from violence.”
Rainbow was officially lost for words. She didn’t know how to respond to Fluttershy’s innocent deduction. After a few seconds of thinking, Rainbow finally gave an answer.
“Umm… Fluttershy. Everypony in this game uses v-”
“Oh please Rainbow! I promise to do good!”
Rainbow did not want to argue any longer, realizing she was wasting precious time talking when she could be using the same amount of time killing demons.
“Rarity, what about your class?”
“I’d like the Demon Hunter please Rainbow. Her clothes are absolutely striking! Why her sleek yet stylish armor presenting a whole new style in which I’ve never thought of! Her hood gives a threatening yet elegent look and her yellow eyes tells the story of one broken and torn. She’s, without a doubt, the most faboulous class in this-”
“Okay! Demon Hunter! Fine!” Rainbow grumbled, pushing away the microphone and turning to Twilight. “Well, that means that we get the Wizard, is that okay with you, Twi?”
“Wizard? Like ‘Starswirl-the-Bearded’ Wizard!?” Her eyes finally showed the first signs of interest in the game, sparkling like gems at the mention of the word ‘wizard’.
“Yeah sure, whatever you say Twi.” With a click of the button on the left which read ‘Wizard’ the bald man disappeared and a beautiful girl took his place. Dressed from head to toe in a long, flowing robe, she gripped a small orb in her right hand, floating it around herself like a dance. Twilight stared on in amazement, a stark contrast to Rainbow’s eye rolling and sigh.
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“Okay girls, here we are.” They were finally given control of their characters as they were placed at the top of a small hill. “So clicking the left mouse button moves your character to that location and clicking on, say an enemy, will cause your character to attack it.”
A synchronized “Okay!” rang out through Dash’s speakers. Dash turned to the purple mare beside her, who had a mouse gripped in her left hoof, clumsily moving it around the screen.
“You don’t use the computer a lot, do you Twi?”
“I have no time for stuff like these most days! I have organization to do, planning needs to be done. I have-”
“Uh-huh. Yeap. Sure.” Rainbow repeated the wordss, feigning attention to Twilight’s explanation as she started to move her character down the hill, following the torches which marked the path very clearly. The others followed suit.
“Girls! Girls come quick!” Pinkie’s panicked voice caught the attention of the mares. Only then did they notice that Pinkie had strayed from the rest of them. Fluttershy was the most frantic, immediately shouting back.
“Pinkie!? Are you okay!? What’s wrong!? Where are you!?” Her voice sounded as if she was on the edge of tears. After a short search, they finally saw Pinkie’s character standing in front of a tree, unmoving.
“It’s a….tree!” Pinkie’s loud laughter blew through Rainbow’s house, causing the cyan pegasus to land another hoof onto her face.
“Okay girls, let’s go.” Twilight commanded, bringing the party back on track.
At the bottom of the hill stood a commander, fighting of hordes of undead. Applejack rushed in without a second though as Pinkie Pie and Twilight followed. However, Rarity and Fluttershy stayed behind which Rainbow immediately noticed.
“Rarity, Fluttershy, why aren’t you helping the others attack?” Rainbow inquired through the microphone.
“I don’t want to go near those things! They’re so…icky!” Rarity whined, piercing each pony’s ear with her high pitched complaining.
“Oh Rainbow where’s the button to calmly talk them down so that we don’t have to fight?” Fluttershy asked.
Rainbow sat there in confusion and anger. She took a deep breath in before responding. “Rarity, those things are going to kill your friends if you don’t get down there and help them! Same for you Fluttershy!”
“K-Kill our friends? B-But I…” Fluttershy remained quiet before speaking again. “O-O-Okay…”
“Good, go on Fluttershy. I’ll wait here where its nice and dry so that none of that icky blood gets on my beautiful clothes.”
Fluttershy’s character descended down the hill, just in time to walk up to the remaining enemy and deliver a devastating punch, showing a yellow shockwave effect erupting from the end of her character’s palm. The odd undead-looking monstrosity erupted into many pieces, spraying blood around.
“Eeeep!” Fluttershy’s squeak was followed with a loud crashing sound.
“Fluttershy are you okay?” Twilight shouted, concerned.
“I-I-I killed someone!” The yellow pegasus’s broken voice said through her sobs.
“You did great Flutters!” Pinkie assured the crying mare.
“R-Really?”
“Yeah! You were all ka-pow! And then he went all ka-boom and it was amazing!!” Her energy seemed to spread through the call, allowing Fluttershy to regain some of her composure.
“Thank you, Pinkie.”
“No no! Thank you Flutters!”
“Okay girls can we get on with the game now?” Rainbow impatiently requested.
“Oki Doki Loki!” Pinkie was the first to enter the burning wreck of a town they had just saved. The others followed closely behind.
Upon entering the town, the sight of death, decay and darkness was clearly present. Fluttershy was the first to walk up to one of the dead non-playable characters.
“Oh no! Rainbow, what’s going on!? How can I heal him!?”
“You can’t Flutters. He’s a non-playable character or NPC for short. You can’t-”
“Maybe if I right click? Or press buttons!?” Fluttershy frantically started going through all the keys on her keyboard.
“Umm Flutters. Maybe I should wait outside of the town with you.” Pinkie Pie suggested and Fluttershy agreed, walking with Pinkie till they were out of sight, her sobs clearly heard through each pony’s speakers.
“This is going to be a long journey…”
----------
“Oh this simply will not do!”
“Oh this is armor is absolutely dreadful!”
“Brown slacks with silver armor? What was I thinking…”
“Rarity!” Rainbow snapped. “The armor in this game is meant to be used for stats, not as a fashion show!!”
“Oh please Rainbow, a good fashion sense always pays off!”
Rainbow was ready to retort when Pinkie’s panicked shouting resonated through her home.
“Girls! Girls come here quick!” The ponies raced through the dungeon, finally locating Pinkie’s character, who was standing in front of a grey stone. “It’s a… rock!” Again her signature laughter would have annoyed anypony but her five friends had already gotten used to the fact that she was just being herself.
----------
“Hey Twilight, mind if I take over for a while?” Rainbow asked.
“Sure!” Twilight stood up, letting Rainbow onto her chair as she positioned her left hoof over the mouse and the right hoof over the keyboard. Immediately, Rainbow started smashing the left mouse button on one single enemy, leaving Twilight perplexed.
“Umm Rainbow?”
“Yeah?” Rainbow answered in a heart’s beat, her eyes glued to the monitor as her hoof smashed continuously on the left mouse button.
“Why do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“That!” Twilight pointed to Rainbow’s left hoof, which was still gunning on the mouse’s left button. “Does pressing the left mouse button so many times increase your attack speed?”
“Well…No but-”
“Damage?”
“N-No… but you see-”
“Then why do you do it? It’s a complete waste of energy if it gives you no advantage whatsoever.”
Rainbow didn’t respond, only staring at Twilight with an angered gaze, the only sounds was the clashing of metal onto flesh coming from the computer in front of Rainbow.
“I don’t wanna play anymore.” The pegasus stood up, forcing Twilight back down onto the chair. All the while she made soft grumbling noises.
----------
“Oh… umm… excuse me Mr Leoric sir. If you wouldn’t mind…”
“For Celestia’s sake, would you please just click on him Fluttershy!?” Twilight yelled at the top of her voice as her and the rest of her friends tried their best to hold off the gigantic skeleton slashing them.
“B-But what if he doesn’t agree to me ending his life?”
“Fluttershy I’m dying here! I need you to heal me!” Pinkie shouted into the microphone.
“B-But you’re so close to him! If I go near I might-”
Pinkie released a ear-piercing scream over the call, causing everypony who was wearing headphones, which was Rarity and Applejack, to slam them down onto the floor.
“F-Fluttershy…” Pinkie dramatically voiced over. “F-Fluttershy. A-Avenge me…”
“P-Pinkie!?” Fluttershy watched in horror as she saw Pinkie’s character drop dead onto the floor. “P-Pinkie?” Her voice trailed off into a silent weep.
“Fluttershy, darling, are you quite all right?”
“Yeah, sugercube. It’s just a game, you don’t need to get-”
“You hurt my friends…” Fluttershy interrupted Applejack’s attempt to console her.
“…You’ll meet your end!!” Her booming voice frightened the other ponies. With a click of her button, Fluttershy sent her character towards the boss and punched the towering skeleton once.
The red life bar of the boss present at the top of the screen had originally only been reduced by barely a quarter after the constant barrage of attacks thrown at him by the four characters. However, with one punch, Fluttershy had depleted all of the red bar, changing it to a dark grey as the skeleton imploded, sending bones scattering all throughout the dungeon, a death animation that hadn’t even been animated into the game.
Rainbow’s jaw extended so low that Twilight felt pain just by looking at it.
“That wasn’t supposed to happen… was it?” Twilight asked Rainbow but the only answer she received was the light shaking of Rainbow’s head.
----------
“Girls! Come here quick!” Pinkie’s familiar call echoed out.
“Not now Pinkie! I don’t want to see another rock!” Twilight quipped.
“No I’m serious it’s really cool it’s-”
“Umm no offence, sugercube but we’re kinda busy right now.” Applejack was right, skeletons had surrounded the party and Pinkie was nowhere to be found.
“Fine,” Pinkie sighed.
“We have no chance of survival if this keeps up!” Rarity warned, launching a row of arrows at several approaching skeletons.
“Gosh darn it there has to be a way out of th-” Before Applejack could finish her sentence, a huge shockwave appeared, cruising through all the skeletons and reducing them to nothing more than a pile of dust.
“What in Equestria…”
“Hey girls! Look what I found!” Pinkie harmoniously sung as her character gleamed with a bright aura, in her hand gripped a huge sword the likes of which nopony had seen. “Told you there was a huge-shining-terrific-blasting-sword-of-death a few steps away from you girls!”
Twilight swore that the other ponies could feel her cheeks, which were now flushed bright red as she desperately tried to hide it from Rainbow.
----------
“Girls! Stop! Don’t go there!” The whole party stood at the entrance to a corridor which appeared completely harmless.
“What do you mean don’t go there? It’s the only way to go!” Twilight was slightly irritated at Pinkie’s warning.
“I have a combo! Ear-flutter, flank-itch, knee-twitch! That means that there’s a corridor in front of us laced with booby traps!”
“Oh darling, please. It looks absolutely harmless!”
“Now hold up for a minute, girls. I think we should listen to Pinkie about this.” Applejack supported the pink mare.
“Oh AJ, you shouldn’t be so gullible!” Twilight responded before taking the first step into the corridor with Rarity’s character.
“Pinkie’s pinkie sense ain’t never failed us before. I think we should-”
Splat. Twilight and Rarity tripped the trap, sending hundreds of arrows in their direction and opening a pit of lava for them to fall into while a giant anvil dropped from the sky.
“I told you, girls!” Pinkie sang, much to the chagrin of both unicorns.
----------
The sun had long ago set over the horizon, however, all six ponies were too engrossed in their demon-slaying activities to even notice that the sky had turned jet black. All of them sat in their own room, the only source of light being the glow of their monitors.
Only when the first rays of the morning light pierced through the skies and into Rainbow’s room did they notice how much time had passed.
“G-Girls… I think it’s about time we stopped. My animals are all starting to wake up.”
“I have to agree. I think Sweetie Belle-”
“Oh Rarity!!” Sweetie Belle’s high pitched call could be faintly heard through the mare’s speakers.
“I gotta go too. Chicken’s a-crowing and I ain’t started on my chores yet.”
“Yeah and I have to open Sugercube Corner in a few hours!”
“Okay then, bye girls.”
A harmonious “Bye!” echoed throughout each of their houses. Rainbow released a loud yawn, causing Twilight to do the same.
“Well, I better get going now. Thanks for introducing me to this amazing game, Rainbow.”
“Oh hey, no problem. If you ever want to play again just come on over!”
Twilight responded with a smile and a soft nod. As they walked to the end of Rainbow’s cloud, Twilight stared down at the long drop.
“You wouldn’t mind giving me a lift… would you?”
Rainbow’s mouth grew into a friendly smile as she carried the unicorn in her hoof and into the skies.
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Twilight entered her home, her mane frazzled and dark circles obviously present under her eyelids.
“Twilight!” The familiar call of the dragon caught her attention as she witness Spike running up to her. “I’ve been looking for you all day! Celestia-”
Spike’s cheeks inflated and his belly grew and as expected, he gave a large burp and released the familiar green smoke which gathered and materialized into a small package.
“- wanted to send a package to you.” Spike continued, recovering from the sudden and large burp.
Levitating the package in front of her eyes, Twilight undid the strings which held it together. Tearing away at the brown paper, she was greeted with a piece of white paper taped onto a rectangular black box.
“My faithful student, Twilight Sparkle. I have found a new way for you to research friendship in Ponyville. Please invite your five closest friends and complete the video game I sent you. After you complete it, tell me what you lessons you have learned through a report. I look forward to your progress.
P.S. I’m a Wizard too.”
Twilight set the letter aside and brought the black box up to her eyes for closer inspection. To her surprise, the front of the box displayed the outline of a demon’s angered face and the words “Diablo” stylized in front of a ‘III’ made by three red slash marks.
“Spike. Get me the strongest cup of coffee you can find.” Twilight commanded, a evil smile appearing on her face.
“Y-Yes, Twilight.”
“Oh and Spike, where were you yesterday morning?”
“O-Oh me? I was… with Celestia!”
“And what exactly were you doing with Celestia?”
“N-Nothing! Really! Definitely not slaying demons!”
“Uh-huh.” Twilight gave a disbelieving look.
“Oh look are we out of coffee already?” Spike dashed out of the door as quick as he could, making sure Twilight could not interrogate him any longer.
“Looks like I better do what Celestia has instructed me to do.” Twilight smiled slyly as she popped the disc into her computer…
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The End