"I cannot believe that we did that," Midnight moaned, shaking her head, "Darkstar is sure to have felt the death of her champion and she'll either send another Shadow to look into it or she'll come herself."
"Glimmer had it coming," Crimson said, glad that his enemy had finally been eliminated, "Now we must focus on building up our strength before we challenge Darkstar; which means that we'll need to find the remains of Nova and Order, so we can bring them back from the Void. We'll also need to recover the Elements of Chaos themselves, because without them the Tree of Chaos is likely dying and that means that this world is slowly being chocked. Once we have the Elements back we'll need to save the Tree, which will, unfortunately, tell Darkstar that we're doing something to disrupt her plans.
We'll also need allies, which means that we'll need to, somehow, convince Princess Rhythm and her husband that Darkstar is trying to destroy their world. Talking to Nightmare Moon is out of the question, as she listens to her sister and does whatever is commanded of her, but we shouldn't rule out the possibility that she might turn on her if she senses that Darkstar is going to lose the war. Queen Meta is also out of the question, as you told me that she was executed when she failed to take down Shadowlot. King Nova and Order should be able to lend us their powers, provided we give them enough time to recover from what Darkstar did to each of them. Though if we are to challenge and defeat Darkstar, which seems impossible at the moment, we'll need to find out what her source of power is and then either use it ourselves or destroy it completely.
Now, if Ebon is as smart as I am, he would have constructed a vault somewhere in the castle, someplace where only he, and by some extent myself, could open."
"Why would Ebon make a vault that only he and his counterpart could open?" Pinkamena asked, sheathing her blade while curiosity got the better of her, "Why wouldn't he tell any of us, his closest friends and allies, that he had such a vault?"
"For the same reason I didn't tell my own mother," Crimson said, a smile appearing on his face, "we both hid the vault's existence so our mother wouldn't find out about it. Inside my vault are some of the most dangerous magical artifacts that existed in a time before my mother and aunt ruled over Equestria, all found by searching the world over. Many of them should have been forgotten completely, but I managed to move the majority of them so deep below the Everfree Forest that not even their magical essence could escape."
"How...how big is the vault?" Midnight asked, almost scared of asking at this point, "How many magical items are there overall? Is there anything we might be able to use to combat Darkstar?"
"My vault is only two floors worth of items," Crimson replied, "that's because our Equestria doesn't go to war with other worlds and conquer them. Because of this single fact there many be twice as many items as mine, or there could be anywhere between five to ten times as many artifacts. Ebon likely buried the worst of the worst in the deepest reaches of his vault, so don't expect me to go down that far to see what he found. We'll also need to check the Logbook, where each and every artifact that is in the vault is listed, just to see what Ebon found and if they can aid us."
"Excuse me? Princess Midnight?" a voice behind them said, causing the entire group to turn around and find the Ponyville Mayor standing there, with a small group behind her, "We saw the fight from the town and came running as fast as we could. Is everything alright?"
"Glimmer Scale is dead," Midnight replied, causing the group to cheer just a bit, "are these the ponies you told Cinder to tell me about?"
"Ah yes, they are indeed," the Mayor answered, beckoning for the ponies to approach them, "how soon will the rest of our allies be coming to the castle?"
"They should be here within the next three hours," Midnight said, sighing just a bit, "but that's if they hold true to what their letters said. With Glimmer's appearance they might be waiting until the coast is clear, though I'll be seeing them soon. You had best get back to the town and make sure those that are ready to move are the first to leave, because I'm not sure how long the forest will remain as quiet as it is now."
The Mayor bowed her head and headed back the way she came, disappearing into the Evergleam Forest, which was as quiet as Midnight had claimed it was. Crimson cast a glance at the ponies that had come to Midnight to aid her, but as he watched them he cast their eyes shifting colors until they were all light blue. He recalled the last time he had seen eyes change that quickly was when he had met the Changeling Queen Chrysalis, though he knew several glamour spells that could produce the same result. If he was right about who these ponies were, and he was almost a hundred percent sure he was right, than he may have found their way to recover what he had told Midnight that they needed.
Before he had a chance to ask them who and what they were azure flames wrapped around the seven ponies, telling him that they were indeed changelings. He and his allies watched as the flames slowly disappeared, but when they did Crimson noticed that five of them happened to be the lightly armored scouts he had met the one time. The sixth changeling wore more armor than his companions, which told Crimson that he was either a fighter class changeling or a high ranking commander. When the seventh changeling was revealed Crimson noted that the mare was about the same size as Darkstar, had both a pair of wings and a jagged horn, and a small hidden crown on the back of her head.
He knew that she had to be the new Changeling Queen, because Midnight had told him that Meta had been executed in Shadowlot around the time of her brother's wedding.
"Queen Meta, what a surprise!" Midnight exclaimed, bowing slightly to the supposed to be dead monarch, "I wasn't sure that you were going to come to the meeting today."
"I wouldn't dare miss out on one of these meetings, my dear Princess Midnight." Queen Meta replied, respectfully bowing her head to Midnight in return, "I had heard rumors of a failed attack on the Prime Equestria, which had been lead by Darkstar herself, and how she had been stopped by a stallion that was nearly identical to our own Ebon. When I arrived in Ponyville I heard that Glimmer was coming here, so we followed in the shadows and watched you all stand up to her, fighting her above the forest until you destroyed her. With her champion gone and the Elements' betrayal still hidden from her, Darkstar will no doubt step up her timetable on her latest plan to destroy the Prime Equestria.
Ah, Lord Crimson Flare, forgive me for not speaking to you immediately after answering Midnight."
"Its a pleasure to meet you as well," Crimson said, not sure what to make of the day he was having anymore, "Truth be told, I had been informed that you had been executed soon after the wedding between Princess Rhythm and Lord Gloomy Armor, but now I see that what I had been told was not true."
"We tell that story so nopony knows she survived," Midnight replied, "if Darkstar knew that Meta had escaped the prisons of Shadowlot, with one of her scouts staying back to take her place, we never would have gotten her out of the city. Darkstar would have decimated the entire city to kill one of her enemies, so we used a glamour that persisted until the following week on the scout that stayed behind. Once we were sure the coast was clear a few scouts went back in, recovered the body by acting as 'allies' to the master, and got out before Darkstar found out. Unfortunately, Meta is the only other enemy of Darkstar that survived her initial fight, as Nova and Order are, truly, lingering in a different place."
"Enough about this doom and gloom," Meta said, shaking her head before glancing over at Crimson, "I also heard some of the Shadowlot guards mention that Darkstar has called on her most talented mages, so that they can begin constructing a 'gateway' for her. Crimson, I suspect that you know what's going on, but we seriously need you to find out what Ebon was researching and if he might have found something to help us beat Darkstar."
Crimson nodded and made his way back into the castle, recounting his steps that would lead him to the door that held the lab Midnight had mentioned. There he found stacks and stacks of books, notes, reference materials that he suspected were copied from Darkstar's library, and even a map with at least two dozen locations circled with a few words near them. He knew what he was looking at, Ebon had constructed a map of magical artifacts that he hadn't gotten his hooves on, while also searching for the source of his mother's power. Crimson grinned and flared his horn to bring a book over to him, he had the best starting point to find out what he needed on every magical source that rested in this strange world.
One of them was definitely the source that Darkstar was using, he just needed to figure out which it was and make sure that was either brought back to Ebon's vault or destroyed.
------------------------------------------------------
Darkstar watched from her balcony, glaring down at the workers who were building the gateway that they had the blueprints for, provided by the mages she had assigned to the project. They, the thirty brightest mages across her entire realm, had been assembled and begun work on the gateway that she desired, despite their protests that the use of such a gateway would likely destroy their world. She would have liked to add her student Midnight to the list of mages, but she had been assigned to help Glimmer search the Evergleam Forest for her enemy.
Crimson Flare had followed her to her own world, but now he was on her home territory and that meant that she could destroy him the moment she found him.
"Mistress, I have an update for you," one of her servants said, bowing as she approached her.
"Speak then," Darkstar growled, letting the servant know that she didn't have time to waste.
"The gateway is about a fifth of the way completed," the servant replied, fear dripping from her voice, "The mages say that the moment it awakens that the entire world, if not those around us, will feel it. They're afraid of the backlash of such a gate, but your overseers have kept them in line and they're working as hard and as fast as they can. They say that it should take them a week to complete, at minimum."
"Good, good," Darkstar said, staring down again at the giant construct that the mages were working on, the giant ring that would wrap around Shadowlot until it was ready.
Soon she'd have her way into the Prime Equestria, but once she was there once more there would be nothing and nopony to stop her from destroying everything. She's love to see the look on Crimson's face when he watched his world burn around him and realized that there was nothing he could have done to stop her.