The wind whipped around Eribia's face, trying to claw at it only to realize that the Majin didn't feel any sort of pain from her speed as she raced towards the source of necrotic energy. "Dammit... why do I have to be the one saving people..." She muttered as Baltimare quickly came into view, as well as the mass of darker figures slowly making their way through the city. With one quick look around she angled her flight so that she could land near a relatively large group of necromantic spawn.
The Majin shifted her stance nervously as several figures that resembled ponies in plate armor shambled towards her with their swords drawn. There was no question that she would easily overpower them, that much was certain, there was just too many for her to take on in the city as the army of undead monstrosities overran the guards posted in the city. She grit her teeth as she reached into her dimensional pocket to pull out the badge, “I hope you brought an army…” The Majin muttered as she sent a magical charge into the enchanted item and prayed for a miracle.
The badge started flashing, first a red X, then a blue O. It repeated over and over until it finally stopped on the O. It then floated off the shield, enlarging until it was large enough for the princesses to pass through. With a flash, a lighter colored membrane formed within, and out stepped a curious figure.
He was tall, garbed in a black trench coat with a sword at his side. The odd thing was that his head was that of a blue dog, with lizard like scales along his cheeks.
“Hello hello hello, what’s all this then?”
Eribia extended her hand towards one of the shambling armor sets and unleashed a small pink blast of plasma energy to send the set of armor flying. “Undead army, they’re pushovers but there’s too many to handle without risking innocent civs getting hurt.” She explained as she grabbed the blade of another and snapped it between her fingers. “You got an army of your own?”
“Yes, but I don’t need it.” The figure reached into his coat and pulled out a small black box. “I am an army... SPD Emergency!” In a flash of light, he was garbed in dark colored armor, “Power Ranger in the house, sorta.”
He drew his sword, and started attacking the beasts with quick, precise strikes, “I got the civilians, you got my back.”
The Majin nodded as her form seemed to blur. Moving quicker than the naked eye could track, several of the creatures’ armor began to receive large dents that quickly made it more and more difficult to move. “They’re undead, so don’t worry about destroying them…” The pink girl explained as she reappeared near the newcomer. “There should be a single distinct creature controlling them, so if you can find it… try to kill it in one shot.”
“So, hivemind with central boss baddie? One sec…” He walked towards an undead and stabbed his blade through its head. “Let’s see, signal strength, direction, compensate for relay drones, account for ambient magic, got it, thank you.” He removed his blade, cutting its head in two in the process, “‘bout a mile and a half north by northeast, right in the center of this horde, in hindsight rather obvious.”
“Wouldn’t doubt that.” Eribia replied with a sigh. “The quicker we bring the necromantic anchor down the better…” A pink aura began to flare up around her as she vanished once more, crushing several helmets and punching holes through the steel chestplates. “We have to move quickly or else there’s going to be more casualties, we’ll get better acquainted after the fight.”
The Majin reappeared in the air near a mound of corpses that had a grisly-looking minotaur sitting atop it, his eyes and mouth were all sewn shut but it didn’t stop the monstrosity from looking directly at her. Eribia grit her teeth together as she tried to spot some sort of weakness in the beast’s armor, considering it was undead though… she didn’t hold out too much hope of that happening.
The stench of death was enough to make her happy that she could mostly ignore most scents as she rushed the burly undead behemoth. Neither of them shared a word as her fist met a flail made of steel and shattered it, a low growl emanated from its throat as the beast brought its arm up to block the rest of the punch. A sphere of pink plasma charged in Eribia’s free hand as her right fist dented the undead abomination’s armor. “Too slow…” She growled as she let the beam free to sear away the minotaur’s head and shoulder area.
The monster crashed to the ground with the rending sound of metal that forced Eribia to cover her earholes as the negative energy signature in the area slowly began to fade, each of the nearest Dread Guards collapsed to the ground in heaps of armor and weapons while the darkness in the immediate vicinity seemed to fade away like smoke in the wind. Despite the single strike she had to use to put down the monster Eribia felt more than a little drained as she slowly let herself land, keeping her senses aware of any possible dangers in the area.
cxxxxx[==============>
Eriba arrived in the town square, where the stranger was waiting for her, along with over a hundred ponies. “Hope you don’t mind, but I gathered up all the civilians while you were busy.” Suddenly, a mare started screaming, apparently she couldn’t find her daughter. “Oops, missed one.” He snapped his fingers, nothing happened. “Huh, stupid alternate dimension, let’s see, the current background frequency is, ah got it.” Before he could do anything, all of the ponies cried out in terror. Eriba and the stranger turned around to see a monstrous sight, a massive bipedal beast that seemed to be made from a graveyard. In its hand was a young filly, which it then proceeded to devour. While her mother’s screams tripled in volume, the stranger remained calm, “now I know exactly where she is, that makes things much easier.” He snapped his fingers again, conjuring a portal similar to the one he emerged from. Reaching in he pulled out the young filly, a little grimy but otherwise fine, “excuse me ma’am, I believe this is yours?”
The pink Majin gave him a look. “I’ll ask later… we need to take that thing down and we have no idea how many other people it’s consumed,” she said as she slowly began to flare her aura. It flickered a bit before she collapsed to the ground in disbelief. “...Uh… I think I still haven’t quite recovered from the Elements of Harmony last week…”
The stranger looked puzzled, “now why would a sweet little thing like you ever be doing in that thing’s crosshairs? Now just sit back and let Uncle Cruger take care of business. FIRST, I need to make a call.” Cruger pulled out the box he used to transform and flicked it open, holding it to his face like a cellphone, “Sorrow Song, Cruger, initiate Code Blue, yes THAT code blue, just use my morpher’s homing signal, it’s in crawler mode, Delta Gate ready, good, have the boys make sure it’s loaded for zombie, got a walking graveyard that likes eating ponies and I don’t want to just pop it like a grape, thank you bye.” Cruger put the box away, “alright now, 3, 2, 1, BEHOLD!”
A massive portal opened up not far from the monstrosity, discharging a mobile dog-themed fortress covered in flashing lights. With a mighty leap, Cruger leapt on top of it, “time for some zombie hunting, transform, Delta Command Megazord!” With a mighty lurch, it stood up on its back end, panels shifting around transforming into a massive humanoid figure, the walking graveyard barely came up to its waist. “Time for a hostage-ectomy,” one of the metal giant’s hands plunged into its chest as several portals appeared in the midst of the crowd. “1 little, 2 little, 3 little ponies, 4 little, 5 little, 6 little ponies, 7 little, 8 little, 9 little ponies, 10 ponies rescued today.” As Cruger sang, dozens of ponies poured out of the portals, presumably extracted from within the walking graveyard. Unfortunately, not all were as lively as when they had been stolen from the streets, though something to bury was better than nothing at all as the creature let out a roar of anger and began to slam its earthen fists into the arm of the machine that was violating it. “Aw, that’s cute, the little eldritch abomination thinks it can hurt my baby,” the machine removed its hand and backed up a few steps as several panels started to glow, “but, as they say in any good sci-fi story that has zombies, KILL IT WITH PLASMA!” Several intense beams of light burst from the glowing panels and the tips of its fingers, striking the beast and causing it to evaporate. When the beams finally stopped, nothing was left but a large pile of ash, “ashes to ashes, dust to dust, and you my friend, just got wrecked”
Several figures emerged from the ashes, corpses from the graveyard that had spawned the monstrosity. The zombies didn’t wander much before several plate-armored ponies and various other races began to make quick work of them.
Once Cruger landed on the ground a fair distance away from the gathered citizens a white-robed mare quickly approached him. Emblazoned across the left breast of her shirt was a symbol of a sun that had a crescent moon overlaying it. Her hood cast her eyes and most of her muzzle in shadow despite the noon sun that beat down on the surprisingly intact city. She held a hand up to get the newcomer’s attention. “There is much you need to know…” She starts in a rather urgent tone.
Cruger held up a hand, “if you’re going to stand there spouting off that my little pink friend is evil, I have two things to say to you. First, I judge ponies by their actions and her’s impressed me a lot more than a little miss cloak who says bad things. Second, in the words of the great JackSepticEye, FUCKA YOU BILLY!”
As Cruger walked away, the mare had only two thoughts on her mind, one was that this blue furred interloper was a potential complication, second, who was Jack Septic Eye? The woman pulled a pale-blue sapphire from her robe and spoke to it. “...the destroyer has more allies…” she said quietly before going to join the warriors already handling the zombies.
cxxxxx[==============>
Once Cruger had returned to the group of rescued ponies a wayward glance revealed the pink creature that had summoned him to be standing quite a ways off underneath the shade of a semi-standing tree that had miraculously stayed standing despite the attack.
“Good work out there, name’s Anubis Cruger by the way, but you can just call me Cruger.”
The pink being nodded. “My name is Eribia… you did some pretty good work out there yourself…” She complimented with a small smile before going back to a slight frown as she looked at the gathered ponies. “As if there wasn’t enough already that showed I’m not part of this world…” She sighed.
Cruger frowned slightly, “guess I’m the first other Displaced you’ve met huh? Looks like I need to educate ya on the subject.”
Before either one of them could continue, they were interrupted by a Royal Guard, “her highness requests your presence at Canterlot Castle as soon as possible.” Behind him was a royal chariot, presumably to ferry them on there way.
Cruger sighed, “mind if we discuss this later? Keeping Celestia waiting isn’t a good idea, and I get a bit sleepy when traveling.”
“No problem, although I can get us there faster than that ridiculous cart can.” Eribia replied as she put her index and middle finger to her head. “Grab on…” She requested.
Cruger sighed, “I hate porting when I’m not the one doing it.”
“Oh don’t be such a baby… I’m not teleporting, I’m using instant transmission.” Eribia explained.
“I never said I wouldn’t, I just meant I find it extremely disorienting,” Cruger grabbed onto Eriba’s shoulder, “and just because you call it something else doesn’t mean it ain't teleporting.”
No sooner had Cruger finished his sentence than a cursory look around him revealed that they had been standing in the middle of the main hall of Canterlot Castle. “It’s not just called something else Cruger…” Eriba started.
“Do you disappear in one location and appear instantly in another?”
Eribia let out a sigh. “Finally! Someone who gets it, it’s not teleportation because I’m not bouncing off another plane of existence, I’m just appearing… instantly.” She replied with a smile before she started making her way over to the massive doors. “Sunbutt couldn’t wrap her mind around it the first time I did it either.”
“Well in my dictionary, the definition of teleporting is the act of disappearing in one location then reappearing in another, no matter what method you use.”
“And that’s why mine is different… I don’t just disappear and reappear, I just move.” She replies as her path is blocked by a pair of spears crossing the door.
Cruger looked impressed, “interesting technique, I fold space-time so that two different locations are touching. I believe we are expected gentlemen, the Princess requested our presence.”
The first guard, dressed in a helmet that had a red mohawk instead of the normal blue, gave a partially bored look to the both of them while the other guard in a plain gold helmet openly glared at the Majin. The first spoke with a tone that mirrored his face. “There’s an audience already in progress as well as several cases already waiting… the Princess doesn’t have time at the moment for a diamond dog and the spirit of chaos.” He explained. “You can take a position at the back of the line with the chance of being able to attend the night court once her royal Majesty retires the day court until the morrow.”
Cruger frowned, “alright, look bub, there are two things you should know. First, if someone says that they were summoned by the Princess, you should ask if they were expecting someone instead of assuming they’re not, which if they were, they wouldn’t be happy if their guests were cooling their heels. Second of all,” his voice, while not changing at all, caused a cold feeling of dread to wash over the guard, “I am not a Diamond Dog, savvy?”
The guard gulped, “yes sir.”
Cruger’s grin returned, “good lad, now why don’t you run along and confirm our reservation, party of two from Baltimare.”
The guard saluted, then passed through the door as fast as he could without appearing to flee, even though it was obvious to everypony present that he was. The second guard though, didn’t flinch from the gaze he continued to direct at Eribia. “The princesses sent no missives regarding a special audience for this Monster, you might as well take a seat anyway because the…” His face seemed to contort into a slightly deeper scowl. “great lord Ankhman is currently disputing a case with her majesty.”
Cruger chuckled, “that won’t be necessary, judging by how much of a blowhard this Ankhman sounds like, I believe we will have our audience in 5, 4, 3, 2…”
The door opened to reveal the first guard, “I’m sorry sir.. The princess sent no message to Baltimare regarding a reservation for anypony…” He stumbled a little.
Cruger sighed, “Tia, do you drill the ability to detect sarcasm right out of these yahoos? Just tell her that the saviors of Baltimare are here in response to her royal summons. If she asks how we got here so fast just tell her we teleported here.”
A voice called out from their left. “Ah! thither ye are, i wasn't expecting thou until thou couldst attend mine night court, since thou happen to be hither already then we can find some way to keep busy while we wait f'r mine sister's day court to end.” A dark blue alicorn mare stated with an obviously-hesitant smile as her eyes continued to flit from noble to noble.
“Well, I was all ready to take the carriage you provided, teleporting was technically her idea.” Cruger turned to the guards, “sorry, got my princesses mixed up. Don’t you just hate it when one of them summons you with a member of the other’s guard, no offence Luna.”
“It matters not, we will hast a good time until mine sister is ready.” She replied as she indicated one of the halls off to the side she had come from.
“Sounds good to me, by the way, if you’re serving tea, I’ll have Zebrifican Red, if you have it of course.”
“We hast Zebrican Red, though I can only assume that 'tis similar.” The lunar alicorn replied as she led them away from the main hall. “Prithee, betoken me how thou came to be in the service of miss Eribia?” Luna prompted as they made their way out of earshot of the gossipy nobles.
Cruger chuckled, “betoken, not sure if coincidence, or if multiverse has sense of humor. Anyway,” Cruger pulled a badge out of his coat, “I believe that this is familiar to you miss Eriba?”
The Majin nodded. “Yeah… that’s the thing that disappeared when the portal was made around it.”
Cruger nodded, “after you used it to summon me I assume. This is my Token, now you can see why I chuckled at Luna’s phrasing. Anyway, mind if we continue this discussion in a more comfortable environment, it’s a bit of a long one.”
Luna nodded as she waved a gentle hand. “certainly, we're heading to mine private quarters as we speak, I beliv'd that it would be best to partake in the 'small talk' while we travel'd.” she explained.
Cruger nodded, “quite understandable. How about we brag about our victories, I once bested the dragon king in a hoof wrestling match that lasted three days and three nights, sustaining myself on nothing but will, focus, and peanut butter chocolate chip wraps.”
Luna smiled and managed to look a bit pleased with herself. “Hah! we once best'd the great spirit of chaos her-. . .” She hesitated as she looked over to Eribia. “er. . . I cullionly. . . we fought the great dragon Frontyr, who had forc'd an entire kingdom of saddle arabia to bow to his will.” she continued.
Cruger glanced at Eriba, “the spirit of chaos huh? Top this, less than an hour ago, Eriba and I saved the city of Baltimare from a horde of bloodthirsty zombies, one of which was the size of a small castle.”
Eribia frowned as Cruger looked at her. “I wouldn’t say chaos… but…. I’m not exactly a perfect hero either…”
Luna suddenly stopped and flared her wings to indicate a dark blue door. “look! we're hither, come, into mine cubiculos so that we may speak privately!" She practically threw open the doors, which were mysteriously lacking guards, to reveal a room that matched her… almost to a T. Aside from several pictures of her with a coal-black alicorn stallion most of the room was set in fairly sparse night-sky-themed room.
Cruger sat down in a chair, “now, before we get into the present, let’s talk about the past.” He turned to Eriba, “now, let me paint you a picture. You’re at a convention, you’re wearing a costume of one of your favorite fictional characters but it’s missing something. You run into a mysterious merchant who just so happens to have the missing piece at a ridiculously low price. You buy it, and five seconds later you’re in Equestria. Does that sound familiar?”
“...No… it doesn’t.” She replied with a shrug. “I don’t remember a merchant of any kind.”
Cruger nodded, “what about the rest of it? Anything about that scenario ring a bell?”
Eribia scratched her head. “S-sorta… some of my memories are about a convention… but… they’re not all clear.”
“Well, we can skip the specifics about how it happened for now, what matters right now is what happened next.” Cruger took a sip of his tea, “liquid Nirvana, anyway. You my dear girl, are what is known as a Displaced, one who was displaced from their world, into an Equestria. There are several of us, though counting you I’ve only met two so far. By the way, do you know of a show call My Little Pony?”
The pink girl shook her head with a slight frown. “Never heard of it.”
Cruger took another sip, “well, it’s not too important, if you don’t want to know why I asked, you don’t have to know. Anyway, in addition to the whole reality jumping thing, all Displaced have another thing in common,” he pulled a necklace off of his neck, “the ability to create a Token. Just before I arrived, you found a silver police badge, am I right?”
Eribia nodded. “Yeah… Twilight found out it was a Class Seven Magical artifact… whatever that meant…”
Cruger whistled, “assuming we both use the same Clover artifact scale, that’s impressive. An individual Element of Harmony is an 8. Well anyway, this is the Token of Umbra, the Overlady. Tokens are basically calling cards for the Displaced, using one summons the appropriate Displaced to your Dimension. So, care to make your own?”
She gives him a small look before she slumps back in her seat. “I… I don’t actually have the magic to create something like that… if I hadn’t been hit with the Elements of Harmony a week ago I might be able to,” she muttered.
Cruger smiled, “that’s quite alright, it’s easy. Step 1, choose an item that represents you.” The Majin pursed her lips as she looked down at the belt buckle attached to her poofy combat pants.
“This buckle is really one of the only things I actually own…” she explained as she put a hand on the gold-colored buckle.
Cruger smiled, “that should do nicely. Mind giving us a duplication spell Luna?”
The dark mare nodded, “Of course, one moment while I prepare it.” She replied as her horn lit up and encased the buckle in a dark blue glow. A few seconds passed before an exact duplicate landed in Eribia’s lap.
“Thank you, now we can move to step two. Put some of your energy into it, you don’t need to do a whole lot, and give it a… let’s call it a Phrase. Just speak a few words that say who you are and what you stand for. Do you remember hearing something like that when you picked up my Token?”
Eribia slowly stood and shook her head before she looked down at the belt buckle. “...Cruger… I am Eribia, a warrior with mixed memories, the resident spirit of disharmony and chaos… I give you my token.” She said quietly before holding out the buckle to him.
Cruger frowned, “you didn’t hear my phrase, need to do some error checking when I get back.” He looked over the buckle, “looks good, now we can move on to the last step,” he opened a small portal, “throw it into the void. It’ll automatically multiply and go to any Displaced they gravitate to, if you want to of course.”
The short Majin shook her head and pulled the token away. “This one is specifically for you… I… Considering how I used to be, I don’t want to take any chances for what might pick up my token and use it for… less than good reasons.” She explained.
Cruger closed the portal, “a reasonable precaution, I rigged mine to explode if used with ill intent for the same reason, of course it required several additional spells, but your way works to.” He snapped his fingers and a second buckle appeared in his hand, “this one stays with me, and that one is rigged to automatically create a copy whenever you want, no sense having to do this every time, is there.”
She nods. “So… I saw that one of the guards approached you earlier… did she thank you?” Eribia asked slightly curiously as she sat back down.
Cruger leaned back in his chair, “to be perfectly honest, I don’t remember. Assuming you’re talking about that business in Baltimare, the highlight was seeing that mother reunited with her daughter, although beating the tar out of that walking graveyard was fun.” He pulled out his black box, “I am a cop, both because I was Displaced as one, and because I chose to. Now, something tells me you need to make a similar choice. Do you want to be a hero, or the villain you were Displaced as?”
“Walking graveyard?” Luna asked curiously. “A… a corpse gatherer attacked Baltimare?”
“Twenty or so stories tall, made of soil with a bunch of tombstones mixed in, eats ponies and spits out zombies?”
Luna frowned. “There is only one who knows how to create such an abomination…” The mare let out a sigh. “But he was cast into the prison plane of Carceri by my father…”
Eribia looked at her with a puzzled frown. “Who would that be, exactly?”
“The DemiLich Razul…” Luna replied with her own frown. “...If he is back then it is certainly cause for more haste than my sister believes.”
Cruger nodded, “looks like swapping stories about first coming to Equestria will have to wait. I may not have the authority in this world than I have in my own, but I highly recommend a full council, the princesses, the elements, everypony. You can save briefing Eriba and myself until then.” Cruger stood up, “if you want me to fetch the elements, just say the word.”
The dark mare seemed to consider his offer for several tense moments before she slowly shook her head. “nay, Razul hath proven himself to be a powerful wizard as well as warri'r beyond many a mortal hero on this plane. To gather the elements and more than just mine sister would be folly. . .” she looked to Cruger with a slightly pained expression. “It would doth nay good to send the six of them up against him. Our only chance rests with Eribia herself.”
Eribia let out a loud sigh. “Well… I would, in a way, consider myself more than mortal…” She replied. “But I’m nowhere near my full strength, how strong is this guy?”
Cruger frowned, “given the fact that he summoned a literal army of the undead, without being present himself, I’d say pretty strong.”
Luna nodded. “Shouldst Razul succeed, this entire world will be lost to the undead. Nary place shall be safe and yea his allies, if they art not undead already, will be the first to fall 'ere he conquers this world. He was a powerful wizard in life, death hath only made him stronger.”
The door to the room opened once more, permitting the only remaining princess in the castle to enter. Upon her face was a graceful smile, one that seemed more at home in front of nobles than in a quieter setting like this, as she elegantly took a seat among the gathered beings. “I decided to end the court a little early today Luna… When word reached me of Baltimare I had only one guess as to where our unexpected guests had gone to.” The alabaster mare looked over to Eribia curiously. “I would have thought that you were supposed to be in school at this time of day though…”
“A test I had done for the school turned out that it was literally only history that I had to learn and I’ve been studying up on that privately with Twilight the past couple days.” The Majin replied with a shrug.
Cruger returned to his seat, “well, now that all the princesses are here, I suppose we can begin the briefing. Though I still say the Elements should be brought in. They should still be effective against the hordes of the undead, even if they’ll do diddly squat against their master, Razal was it?”
Celestia took a small breath. “I was hoping it hadn’t been Razul… this does make the situation quite a bit worse.” She replied. “The Bearers have never taken up arms against anything of this sort… even the dragon I had… um… mistakenly sent them up against, was still not immediately out for blood.”
Cruger grinned, “mistakenly sent them up against? Whatever you say.” He coughed, though it suspiciously sounded like ‘Princess training’.
Luna gave her sister a flat look. “Mine sister had gotten into a precarious rum and tea card that day. . . believ'd it would be funny to request six untrain'd civilians to 'ask' the dragon to leave.” She sighed as she leaned back in her seat. “this is what we art suppos'd to hast guards f'r”
Celestia at least had the dignity to look like she knew she had been in the wrong on that call. “Either way… because of this turn of events we’ll be having the bearers train among our guards, that way they can at least know how to swing a sword and not chop their own hoof off…”
Eribia rolled her eyes. “Sunbutt… trust me, those guards will be the reason this place falls, if you want those six to get stronger, you gotta have them train with me.”
Cruger steepled his fingers, apparently in thought, “while I agree that guard training might not be the best option, I don’t think you have the necessary experience to train them, especially considering the rush job you’ll have to make it. We need a third option.”
Celestia looked at Cruger with a slightly… less worried look. “Since our enemy is a Lich he has formulated all of his plans around time, it’s likely that his fastest plan will be to wait until the Elements are dead and gone before he enacts them unless we push him to think faster. Since we currently have no idea where he is or what he’s up to aside from collecting a very specific set of magical artifacts… All I can say is that we know we have the time to train them.”
“Besides… I’d be following the Roshi school of training, no techniques needed and results in less than eight months.” Eribia replied with a slight smirk.
Cruger sighed, “while I admit that technique did create Goku, you seem to have failed to take something into account. If Razul learns that the bearers are learning combat, he will move up his timetable, assuming he hasn’t already because of our little encounter. Assuming he knows about it, and I’m going to err on the side of caution and say he does, he’s going to be keeping a close eye on you.”
Eribia rolled her eyes. “They’d just be doing weight training. The Roshi style of training specifically emphasizes it not looking like combat training. If anything it would look more like they want to get in shape instead of learning combat. It would also provide the bonus of not needing to teach them how to use a sword.”
“Alright, but if they attack one of your training sessions, I reserve all right to say I told you so. However, I’d recommend that you do two things to help camouflage it. First, exempt Twilight. If we put her to work on research duty as well as learning combat magic from the Princesses, yes that means you too Luna, we can make it seem less like the bearers are being prepared specifically to combat his return.”
Celestia shook her head. “Twilight already knows combat magic, she refuses to learn offensive combat magic.” She explained. “Besides, if Twilight is exempted from the training it would show unfair favor towards her.”
Cruger grinned, “as for the first part, show her the aftermath of the Baltimare incident, that should change her mind. And the second, Eriba could give you some notes so you can do it yourself. I never said exempt her from training period, just from training with Eriba. Anyway, for my second suggestion, get some additional students. If it looks like it’s not just for the bearers, Razul might underestimate it.”
Celestia let out a sigh as she pinched the bridge of her muzzle. “I hate to do this to them… but there’s no other choice right now…”
Cruger frowned, “there is another choice, sit on our butts eating cake until he comes to destroy us all.”
Celestia gave him a glare. “Are you insinuating something about me?” She asked as the room seemed to slowly begin heating up.
“I believe he was not being specific sister…” Luna replied as she quickly placed a hand on her sister’s shoulder. “It is probably a custom where he’s from to call one of the hosts fat.”
Cruger grinned, “nope, in my dimension I helped raise you two, so I know that Tia here has a bit of a weakness for cake. By the way Luna, I don’t recall saying your sister was fat, what made you say I did?”
“It was assumed due to the last noble that had a passing mention of simply sitting in one place gorging herself on sweets instead of the actual work that she does.” Luna replied. “It wasn’t long before that noble found himself homeless and without home protection.”
“Huh… I would’ve thought you would be the one with the explosive temper…” Eribia stated as she put her hands behind her head.
“Explosive being the operative word, Eribia…” Celestia replied. “Dealing with petty nobles day in and day out does wear thin on the nerves after a thousand years.”
“Well, I have a method that works for my Celestia,” Cruger replied, “set aside some time each day to go to town on a punching bag. If you are especially mad at a specific somepony, put a picture of their face on it.”
“Tried it… nearly burnt a hole in the old castle… I tend to visit my father when I need to calm down if my tea doesn’t work.” Celestia replied as she levitated one of the cups over to herself before taking a sip. “Ugh… Zebrican red…” She sighed. “I don’t understand how you can like such a bitter mixture Luna.”
“It grows on you after a while…” Luna replied.
“Not that this hasn’t been an entertaining tangent, but we should get back to the matter at hand,” Cruger said, taking a sip of his own tea, “so, the solution we’ve come up with so far is to subject the bearers to the Roshi method, along with a few civilians to try to hide the intent. Now, about what I said earlier about assigning Twilight to research, we should put together a team of Equestria’s best and brightest, I don’t care which race, and put them to work on learning everything that they can about the Necromancy Razul uses. If we can learn enough about it, we might be able to figure out how to better combat, maybe even how to neutralize it. Best case scenario, we can track Razul so we can hit him hard at a time of our choosing, instead of waiting for him to reveal himself on his own terms.”
Luna actually rolled her eyes this time. “The necromancy he uses is the same that anyone who studies that school of magic uses, he simply knows more about it than we could reasonably expect any of our wizards to learn in a short time. Even I learned the necromancy school from one of my father’s acquaintances.” Luna explained. “This isn’t the first time we’ve had to fight him, this is simply the first time he’s been collecting artifacts to form the Regalia of Evil Might.”
Cruger raised an eyebrow, “why do I get the feeling we’re about to get a history lesson?”
“I don’t know…” Eribia replied. “Do you want a history lesson?”
“Does it look like we have a choice? This Regalia of Evil Might looks like the linchpin of his plans, if can figure out how to counter it, we figure out how to counter him. Go ahead Luna.”
She nodded. “We match him with the Regalia of Good Might, all three pieces of which are located on the outer Plane of Existence, Elysium. All three pieces are gathered from the Regalia of Might sets when that cause needs a champion for a cosmological debate.” Luna explained. “While the Regalia of Neutrality has been lost to time and the Regalia of Evil was spread across the material plane… we simply have to reach Elysium in order to claim our champion’s regalia.”
Cruger grinned, “well it just so happens that I am a master of Dimensional magic. While I sincerly doubt getting the Regalia will be as simple as you claim when we get there, getting there will be cake, no offence Tia. So, when can we get started?”
“Reaching Elysium is not as… simple as it sounds…” Celestia replied. “This plane’s connection to the Path to Elysium has been broken, what we have to do is send Eribia to another Equestria to reach Elysium there and fix the path here so that she may undertake the journey to our Elysium.”
“Aside from that information, our plans can begin immediately…” Luna added. “We shall instruct half the bearers here, likely miss Rarity and miss Pie will be trained among us, while Eribia shall train the Apple Family mare, the weather mare and the veterinarian.”
“AND whoever else wants to, remember we want to keep this as low key as possible.”
Luna scoffed. “Low key… Nay! Our bearers shall be trained among our guard in the old ways of training, so that they may too become, as they say, huge… once more.” The darker mare exclaimed as she rose to her hooves and quickly strode to the walk in closet. She flung the doors open to reveal links upon links of what seemed to be heavy training weights. “While my sister may have been downed in one strike, I shall not be, and neither will the guards that I shall train!”
Cruger put his hand to his chin, “that might just be sufficient camouflage. Anyway, my task will be to chart a course to Elysium. Although, how can we coordinate while in separate… lightbulb!” Cruger pulled out a copy of his token, “now, if I add a communication spell to my token, and set it to use the Void as a carrier wave,” his token glowed, “boom, real-time, interdimensional, communication. That should do the trick. By the way, any documentation on Elysium for reference I could borrow?”
Luna strode over to a large chest in the closet and opened it. With a quick search she pulled out the same top-shaped object that Eribia had recognized from earlier. “That… That’s a Cosmological map, right?”
“Yes, we have multiple for when my sister and I wish to speak with our fathers.” Luna replied as she brought the object over to Cruger. “That is an estimation for how the inner and outer planes of existence are arranged.”
Cruger looked it over, “yes, I recall feeling something like this when I was experimenting with subspace, but I think you got the scale a bit off. Anyway, a visual aid will be a big help with my calculations.” He stood up, taking the map, “anyway Eriba, one last lesson on the Displaced before I go. Normally a Displaced’s visit automatically ends after a time, but you can return them early by saying ‘X, our contract is complete’, replacing X with the Displaced’s name of course.”
“I see… but… would I be able to get you to hook me up with some training weights? I have a feeling that I’m going to need a lot of them.” Eribia asked.
“Tungsten, or depleted uranium?”
“Whichever is flexible and can be set up in twenty kilogram increments for chestpieces and ten kilogram increments for wrist bracers and greaves.”
“I’ll see what I can do, I do have my own R&D department working for me after all. Now, if you don’t mind?”
Eribia took a small breath. “Cruger… our contract is complete.”
A portal opened behind him, “well, guess we have some work to do. Before I go, Luna, identifying his magical signature will let you track him, I’ve done it several times before, so you can have the research team’s public mission be to identify the creatures while they are actually isolating his signature. And Tia, you are looking a bit on the pudgy side, just saying.” Before anyone could respond, he stepped through the portal, closing it behind him.
Eribia’s eyes widened as Luna slowly looked over to her sister. “Dude… you do not say that to a woman… ever…” Eribia said ominously as Luna tried to console her shocked sister.