The hunter and his charges walked through the forest slowly. The light-hearted swapping of stories from before had faded into a silent apprehension of the world around them. The hunter never relaxed his grip on the weighty crossbow in his hands, his gleaming eyes constantly flicking between trees, aiming to catch movement within his peripherals, anything that could prove to be a threat. He hoped to, at the very least, detect some meaningful form of progress; either another strange pony creature, or, at the very least, something horrifying to fight, to break the monotony.
The hunter became increasingly aware of his own bloodlust. It was never this calm in the worlds that he fought in- nay, there was always something going on, something always in need of a warrior with his talents. Be it a civil war or a vampire in its castle, the hunter would always have something to earn his meals with.
There was a light jingling noise. "Hey, champ! What's that?" Came the voice of the brash pegasus pony the hunter had rescued. "Sounds like yer' medallion!" Responded the cowgirl by her side.
Indeed, it was the hunter's medallion, aggressively shaking on its heavy, silver chain. The hunter stopped, tightening his grip on his weapon, bringing it up all the more, in case he needed to quickly sink a bolt into an encroaching beast. The hunter scanned around the forest, nothing in particular catching his eyes.
"Psst! Hey, cowpoke! C'mere a sec!" whispered Applejack. The hunter crouched down to match her height, shifting his aim in order to match the pony's line of sight. He followed her gaze, and became aware of what she had noticed; a bright light, flickering on and off behind a tree, far into the distance. The hunter would have passed it entirely, had the pony not spoken up. "Now, what do ya' reckon that is?"
The hunter's eyes widened. His ears perked up. He picked up the sight of yellow light moving quickly towards the flashing, a heavy set of footsteps making vibrations through the woods. "No clue, but I sure as hell know what that big bastard charging at it is."
The pearlescent unicorn had given up hope of finding her friends. How could a simple walk in the woods have gone wrong, and even so, where was the flair? The action? It was almost cruel how subtly her life had changed for the worst. She wanted to be a star, to be someone of great influence, and her friends were bringing her to that point. Now, all she could do was sit and sob behind a tree.
She didn't give up her search on a whim. As fragile as she seemed, the girl had heart. However, she was no athlete, nor was she used to roughhousing- that was more of Rainbow Dash or Applejack's kind of game. She ran through that forest for hours, screaming and hollering. Perhaps she could have kept up her search if not for her noise drawing in some sort of hideous beast from the very confines of the forest depths.
The pony was absolutely no match for the horror that had come for her, despite her light propensity for the fighting arts, and she knew that well enough to turn tail the moment she saw it. It was like some form of corrupted minotaur; matted, gristly, greasy hair covering its back, chest and arms, with scaly, grey skin everywhere else. Its three-fingered claws clutched a massive, jagged rock-axe, bones of unknown creatures lashed haphazardly to the shaft. The creature's head was that of a bull, with colossal horns curving outwardly, framing the beast's skull-like face, which arguably the worst part of the whole monster, with two empty, glowing, yellow eyes boring holes into the pony's soul.
The monster, standing a solid fifteen feet in height, practically dwarfing the little unicorn, pushed trees aside with barely a moment's effort, swinging its axe and roaring into the sky. It pursued the pony for a good while, but the pony was crafty, in her fear- she skipped between thin trees, used her magic to swat branches into the beast's eyes, and finally ducked into a fallen log as the monster passed.
When she finally came out of her hiding spot, fairly certain that she was safe, she looked down at herself and was disgusted. Her purple, once-curly mane and tail were an absolute mess, and her pristine white coat was covered in mud and dirt. She was lost in a world that was so different than her own, a horrible beast was out for her blood, she couldn't find her friends, and now she was in ruins.
The pony slumped against a tree trunk, and she cried. She cried for a long time. She cried while she combed her mane, doing what she could with her magic alone. She was certain that her sobbing would attract the beast to her, again- and she didn't care. She was practically broken. She continued to sob and comb her mane while the thunderous steps got closer. She ignored the beast when it lifted its axe.
Her attention was immediately restored when the beast growled in a different emotion- not rage, but pain. The unicorn looked up to see the creature scratching at some sort of shining, metallic rod buried into its left eye. The metal rod seemed to glow for half a second, some kind of hourglass shape carved into it catching alight- before a massive electrical storm erupted from the rod, stunning the beast and causing it to take a knee to hold its smoldering face. The pony simply looked on, in surprise and confusion.
A voice erupted from the foggy forest around her. "LEROOOOOOOY-"
"JENKIIIIIIIINS!" Shouted the hunter, leaping into the bolt-stunned beast with a small sword in his hand, sinking the steel underneath the monster's chin and roughly pistoning his arm back and forth, creating a colossal gash in the beast's throat. The creature moved a giant, scaly arm up to grab at the hunter, but the warrior was much faster, placing a muddied boot to the monster's face and forcing himself off, blade in hand.
He landed, performing a back-roll, and quickly swatted a strange device off his left thigh. Black and streamlined, seemingly designed specifically for a human hand, the hunter pointed it at the beast, gazing down small iron indentations atop the device. The beast raised its axe, blood gushing from its wounds-
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!
Colossal amounts of bone and matter sprayed off from the beast's skull with each loud blast, the strange device the hunter clutched smoking from an exit port at its tip. The monster, finally succumbing to its wounds, tried to balance itself on its great axe like some kind of crutch- but it failed, unable to keep its balance, and fell to the side, convulsing and twitching in its death.
Despite his slaying of a colossal beast, the hunter reacted with a degree of nonchalance that seemed vastly disproportionate to the feat. He merely holstered the weapon he was using, and tucked his shortsword into a sheath on his right calf, the ice-blue rune still glowing through the sheathing.
"Heard enough out of you." The hunter rumbled. Getting down on one knee to check on the pony that was slumped against the tree, her head buried in her hooves, her entire body trembling, the hunter tried his honest best to soothe her nerves. "Hey, little horsie, its over now. I got it."
The unicorn mare didn't reply to the hunter, keeping her head tucked low and refusing to look up at him, her ears forced against her skull. The hunter could understand- with the whole situation that had unfolded in the last thirty seconds, it was understandable for an innocent little cartoon horse to be terrified.
"Holy cow, Al! Ya' sure tanned his hide! Applejack exclaimed, running up to the hunter. A moment's breath passed before she quickly realized what the hunter was doing. "Rarity?!"
The unicorn's attention immediately shot up. "APPLEJACK!" She squealed, immediately leaping from her pathetic wallowing and all but swallowing the cowgirl pony in a desperate hug. "Oh my goodness, you have no idea how happy I am to hear your voice!"
"Rarity!" Came the voice of Rainbow Dash, flying over and tackling the two reconciling mares, rolling them into a big heap. The three girls all clung to one-another, sniffling and nuzzling into each-other's coats. The hunter smiled to himself, letting them keep that moment, while he pulled the crossbow from his shoulder. Stepping into the foot-pedal that arched out from the bow, the hunter grabbed the bowstring with both hands and cocked it back, before loading in another bolt, again marked with an hourglass shape at the end of it, between the fletchings. As he clicked the safety on, he turned to regard the ponies once more, who had finished with their reconciliations.
"Excuse me, Mr. Human?" Came the unicorn's voice, some manner of class restored from the pathetic sniveling that it was before. The hunter knelt down, shouldering his crossbow, indicating that he was listening. "May I know the name of my savior?"
The hunter straightened his back, his medallion loosing an idle shake. "The name is Almir of Astora, miss. Surprised you're not freaking out about how weird I look." The hunter rumbled, with a smile. "Of course not, darling! Why would I be so rude as to insult someone who risked his life to save mine simply by manner of appearances?"
"Uh, Al?" Rainbow Dash butt in, "I can get that proper introductions and whatever are in order, but can you two walk and talk? Three missing friends left to go, ya'know."
"Aye, she's right." The hunter conceded, "I've gotta keep an eye out, miss. I'm sure your friends could tell you anything you need to know- at least, what we've gathered so far. Just make sure you stick close."
The unicorn nodded, and the trio of ponies- along with their human companion- set off once more.
Another silent walk through the forest came to an end when the hunter took note of the forest's ever-constant darkness. It hit him, then- it was the middle of the night when he arrived in this world, and everything had only gotten darker. He checked his wristwatch- nearly nine hours had passed! Surely, dawn should have come, by now?
"Halt." The hunter rumbled. "Night works different here, it looks like. I think we need to stop, for now."
"Al's right." Backed Applejack, "We've been walkin' practically all day, and there ain't been a lick of sunshine."
"Celestia should have raised the sun, by now..." Rarity whispered to nobody in particular.
"That how it works in your world, ponies?" The hunter replied, "Because, everywhere I've been, the sun is part of a natural process. Either this world has no sun, or it's much bigger than any of the other worlds I've been on."
"What?" All three ponies said in unison. The hunter proceeded to explain to them the concept of a solar system, and the way days and nights worked. He explained the twenty-four-hour clock that he was used to on most worlds he had been on, and that only one world had anything different, settling in at a brutal twelve hours for a single day. That planet, however, was a tiny, icy ball of rock that was practically hell without the brimstone. The ponies seemed confused, but the hunter waved them off, simply telling them that there were no magical princesses in other worlds to handle the celestial cycles.
"I think we should settle in for the night, girls. At least, until daybreak, then we need to count how long a day lasts on this rock."
"But what about the rest of our friends? Twilight might stand a chance, but Pinkie Pie? I'm not even going to pretend that Fluttershy has a chance, out here..." Rainbow Dash argued.
"We'll last longer if we sleep. Look, I'll keep watch all night. I'm built like that. You three, you need to sleep, or you're going to end up passing out at the absolute worst possible time. Just... trust me on this, okay?"
The ponies looked to one another, and sternly nodded. "Alright. We trust you, sugarcube." Applejack confirmed. The hunter nodded to the ponies in turn, and began to snap dry branches off the neighboring trees. "I'm going to build a very small campfire and shred some grass for you girls to sleep in."
And so he did. The unicorn used her magic to assist the hunter with collection of materials, and Rainbow Dash worked with Applejack to collect standing deadwood in a nearby radius. The hunter noticed that the unicorn was working diligently to make the small grass bed seem more... homey. His inner survivalist wanted to scold her for wasting energy prettying-up a temporary resting position, but he resisted the urge. The little pony was clearly under a lot of stress. Best not add more to her load.
In a short time, the hunter had a fire roaring, and was on his knees in front of it. The ponies chatted among each other, trying to ease the tension that was ever-so-thick in the air. The hunter pushed a small grinding stone against the shortblade he used to slay the beast some time ago. The metal was engraved in glowing runes and glyphs, with black, jagged inscriptions running along the blade in a twisting pattern.
"Almir? What are you doing?" Miss Rarity began, sidling up to the flames. "Ah, simply honing my sword." The hunter replied, twirling his shortblade. "Her name is Angraen- meaning 'iron rain' in an old language. She was a gift from a friend in another world."
"Another world? So, I assume you're saying that you've experienced this before?"
"Somewhat."
Before the hunter could continue, a flash of pink caught his eye. With a swift twist of his head, his glowing eyes met with a blue gaze. The sheer suddenness of the sight caused the hunter to let out a yelp and fall backwards from his seated position, falling onto the unicorn he was speaking to in the same motion. "Oi! What the fuck!"
"Ooooops! Sorry, mister!" Responded an enormously bubbly voice, ludicrously out of place in a situation such as the one the hunter and his companions found themselves in. The hunter looked up to a pink pony, jabbing his shortblade into the ground. The pony was entirely pink, with her puffy mane and tail only being a slightly darker shade. There were three balloons on her flank, one yellow, two blue, which matched the shade of her eyes. "I didn't mean to spook you! I just noticed the fire in the woods and I figured that these weird things didn't like light because they were trying to avoid the torch I made and I thought that a bright light might keep them away until the sun comes up but the sun hasn't come up for a long time which had me worried but that's okay because I'm a patient little pony and then I noticed my friends but they were asleep except for you and Rarity so I figured that you must have been friendly because Rarity doesn't normally talk to-"
The pony's breathless rambling was cut off by a loud shriek in the woods. The hunter rolled off the unicorn, taking his shortblade with him, and looked beyond the new addition to the camp. The hunter's breath caught in his throat as he realized the sheer amount of eyes glaring at him from the edge of the fire's light. He focused his vision, taking in the sight of dozens of small, hunched creatures with massive fangs and glowing eyes.
"You're shitting." The hunter sighed. He looked over to the unicorn, who had just finished recuperating and shot him a glare, before realizing that the hunter had turned serious. "Is she shitting?" The hunter quizzed, pointing his runeblade at the pink pony, that was now skipping around her two sleeping friends, waking them up. "Everything has got to be shitting."
"Laaaanguaaage!~" Piped the pink mare, her friends rousing and realizing who she was. The hunter knew what he was looking at at the edge of the flames, however- creatures from a realm he barely survived, long before he had become the man he currently was. He sighed, flicking his blade into the dirt, and reaching over his right shoulder.
"You girls, stay here and keep the fire lit. It's going to be a long night."
The ponies were too consumed by happiness due to the sight of their friend to hear the hunter. However, as soon as he cleared the sword from its sheathe, he could tell by their exasperated gasps that their eyes were on him. Three and a half feet of gleaming silver, seemingly caught alight in a blue flame from the alien moon, sang a song of metal as the hunter pointed the blade at the assembly of ghastly beings in the darkness.
With a singular motion, the hunter stepped forward and slashed his way into the dark and out of the fire's safety, exposing himself to the photosensitive beings- taking a few heads with him. He worried not for the innocent eyes of the ponies that likely watched his dance- his eyes were adapted to the dark, so only he could see the carnage he was ready to unleash. All that the ponies would see would be gleaming silver gracefully dancing in the dark.
Though the small beings vastly outnumbered the hunter, his speed and bladecraft were overwhelming. The strange creatures rushed in in packs of two, three, even four at a time, only to have their heads roll, their bodies bisect, their limbs flail into the distance of the forest in the midst of the bloodblath. The hunter span and kicked and jumped and twirled, never letting a single beast get close enough to land a blow.
Finally, the last beast turned and fled, choosing to let out a wail of primal fear rather than face the hunter head-on, alone. The hunter felt a smirk of satisfaction creep across his features- before realizing exactly why the monster fled. He recalled his first encounter with these beasts- barely managing to slay all but one, who proceeded to retreat to its burrow, and return with overwhelming reinforcements. The hunter cursed, but it was too late- the beast was long gone.
"Ooooooh!" Came that same ludicrously bubbly voice from before. "That thing is cool!"
The hunter assumed the pony was referring to the bloodsoaked silver blade the hunter wielded. With a chuckle, he wiped it off on the bandages that wrapped his left forearm, sheathing it in a smooth motion. "Is that a sword? I've always wanted a sword! Granny Pie always said that I was too young and that even if I wasn't that swords were only a fairy tale and that even if I could get a sword she asked me how I would be able to hold it with hooves but I realized that I can hold a lot of other things with hooves but gra-"
Rarity plugged the pony's mouth with both of her hooves. "What she means to say is that her name is Pinkie Pie, and she is pleased to make your acquaintance."
"Bit of a motormouth, eh, kiddo?" The hunter chuckled. "My name's Al. Tell me, little horsie," The hunter got onto a knee, facing the pony at eye level, "Why are you so damn happy?"
"Why shouldn't I be?" The pony replied, sticking a hoof to her chest, seeming insulted by the question. "Well, you nearly got mauled by a metric titload of goulish nightmare monsters after losing your friends in a forest full of things that want to eat you."
"Oh! I learned to laugh at things like that!"
"Oh, no." Rainbow Dash started up, plugging her ears with her wings. Applejack said nothing, merely ducking underneath Rainbow's tail. Rarity cringed.
"When I was a little filly and the sun was going doooooown..." The pink mare began to sing, dancing, while musical instruments seemed to play from nowhere in particular.
"Is she fucking singing?" The hunter rumbled to the unicorn mare, casually leaning his elbow onto her back as if he had known her for ages. The unicorn didn't mind this action.
"The darkness and the shadows, they would always make me froooown..."
"Yes, she is."
"I'd hide under my pillow from what I thought I saw-"
The hunter simply gazed at the pony, sharing the same expression as Rarity. He knew that this night was only going to get longer.