//------------------------------//
// Epilogue: The Game of Life 
// Story: Tomb of Magic 
// by Ice Star 
//------------------------------//


Celestia:


I stared at the ebony and ivory pieces positioned before me, the board that was their world a perfect balance of black and white spaces. In times of stress, I often found myself pulling out the game and setting it up on the floor of my study. I had done a multitude of things here in the past years, namely reading the scrolls that had been sent to me by Twilight Sparkle up until recent times.

To me chess was always more then just a pastime, it was a metaphor for life: the many squares of black and white, as well as its various roles moving through a perplexing yet rewarding series of movements, while still being part of a larger balance: good and evil.

I just wonder where I might have went wrong.

I was the king piece. Luna was the queen, I think, while Twilight and Cadance were the mages. Shining Armor and the Royal Guard the rooks. It continued on with the Elements of Harmony being the knights, and the citizens of Equestria as the pawns, despite their diversity united by the sense of loyalty and magic they all had within them.

I moved one of my lucky ebony knights and captured a white pawn.

Just what had happened to create such a wild string of events? I had selected Onyx - or as he was called now, 'Sombra' -  to accompany Twilight Sparkle because I knew that Onyx, despite his brutal nature, was not a serious threat, and would be kept in check by Twilight easily. She was a capable young mare, and would help guide Onyx to me, and he would unknowingly be one step closer to his death at my hooves. His crimes against Twilight, Cadance, and the crystal ponies will not go unpunished.

I knew his behaviour inside and out from the moment we met in the Magicspire so long ago. So how could something with such coordinated, neat movements, surprise me? Such a cruel surprise that had led to Twilight getting hurt.

Onyx was a literal pawn: dependent on something other than himself to accomplish things and could be easily controlled and ordered around by those above him, thus he was a prime candidate to go on this quest, especially since he knew the Magicspire.

So what had gone wrong? I mused as one of the imaginary opponents created by mere enchantment moved a mage a little too close to my rook.

This 'player' didn't move like Onyx at all. They didn't play by any conventional rules and had my believing that I wasn't even playing the game I loved anymore.

Whoever this was, they were directly challenging me, I can feel it.

Even Discord fit somewhere into this pattern.

Black and white.

Harmony and Chaos. 

Good and Evil.

Yet here I was facing off against somepony I didn't know, with moves I couldn't foresee, who was neither a shade of black nor a shade of white, but rather somepony who thought that a single shade of gray could survive in a world that is, has been, and will always be nothing but proper absolutes.



...




Sombra:


This is over. That's what she thought. The look on Purple Eyesore's face clearly read 'I may be an unintelligent excuse of ponyflesh who has a higher chance of asphyxiating in a closet compared to most of the utterly worthless, expendable, and anonymous faces clogging Sombra's world, but at least this whole ordeal is over.'

Heck, I even stole the 'Harmony Theory' papers from her and she hasn't seemed to notice. After all, who hires a mercenary and doesn't pay them? Somepony who wants to die. I just had to secure payment for myself this time, and what better payment than something I enjoyed: knowledge. Material things hold little interest or me, but there's so much in knowledge that I find so very rewarding and enjoyable.

I suppose it doesn't matter, since I take whatever payment I want and Twilight Sparkle will most likely be dead before I finish this spell. Well, it said something like that, I was in her head and knew that 'ordeal' was too complicated a word for the God-Queen of Idiocy, Mother of all Simpletons, to even begin to comprehend.

In reality, all this madness never had much to do with her at all, it was all about me of course. After all, who else has been particularly worthy of words in my life? No pony, really. In fact I bet somepony could write an entire odyssey about everything I do. I'm worth it.

I digress in regards to the books though, the madness that I bring is only beginning and since I naturally have a say in everything, it will never end. I'll make sure of it.

My motivations may be as shady as a good bar, but what can anypony expect?

If life were a game, it'd be cards: strategy-filled, luck based, and everypony for themselves, with very few exceptions. Oh, and of course about as black-and-white as a good thundercloud.

And it seems I already have two 'aces', although as nice as that is, it isn't too impressive. The pink ace and the purple ace aren't that noteworthy, it's the other two that are harder and the last one that wins the game, and I've been waiting so long to work towards that one: the one that mattered, the one that I cared for.

But who says I play fair or even legally? Forget the four aces, I've never played by any rules but my own, because if I had I would have ended up dead, or worse off then, a living weapon. I'm throwing in the fifth ace, hard and almost impossible to even get close to, but the only thing I'm playing for, because I am the fifth ace.

After all, life is like a card game: I win.