//------------------------------// // Chapter 3: All The Heresy! // Story: Faust'ish // by Sanguine Eyes //------------------------------// "You will not get away with this you fiend!" A tiny dark blue alicorn filly growled from her place in what looked like a large playpen for fillies and colts. A light blue Alicorn lay in the shadow of Celestia's statue prison, chains holding an iron stud pushed through her wings. Though she lay on the ground mostly due to the heavy welts across her legs and flank that refused to heal. "Get away with it?...oh silly widdle Woona... I don't mean to sound so predictable but how am I not going to get away with it?...I mean seriously...think about it... wait... you know what... no don't... I think its adorable... I just can't take you seriously when you are an adorable little filly like this" Nis rocked back laughing before he began to calm down. Luna gave an angered look at the unicorn, though it was a pathetic display with how young her body now was and it only made him giggle more. "Do you even know what you are doing to this kingdom?... to this WORLD?... Please you HAVE to stop..." His smile softened and he leaned in. "No... I really don't and you of all ponies know exactly why... I am still surprised you are still trying talk me out of this... I just got this new home... a new apprentice... and a new pet" His hoof shot up panning across his vision at the friendship castle he had just made his new slave labor force paint black, the same slave labor force that showed up in an angry mob challenging his power, those who did't attack lost to his games. His gaze settled back on Trixie. "Yo! Princess Trixie... have you learned your lesson yet?" The Alicorn sobbed trying hard to stand despite the metal tearing at her wings and the raised welts over her legs. Finally up she choked back her tears. "Y...Yes Master.... I will not be weak anymore..." "Damned skippy... I gave you all that power and you still get batted around like a toy. Holy balls you think you would at least have the decency to last more than 20 seconds against another alicorn..." His horn sparked and the chains vanished, her magic was allowed to flow again and her wounds began to very slowly heal. "Now go and be useful... do something... maybe stop all the ponies outside from whining... its damned annoying." Trixie using her magic to tame the massive levels of pain hobbled out of the room and made her way into new Ponyville. Not much in the town had changed unless they directly attempted to interact with the black unicorn. ".... Twilight... please... PLEASE come and save us..." ---------------------------------------------- "Oh thank Celestia... you made it too!" Twilight had just found Rarity asleep in the nonfiction section. Luna's magic was so quick and so effective it appeared to have transferred all six of them while they were doing their own thing. "Mneh...mya....T...Twilight?..." Rarity's hoof pushed her eye cover up and to her shock she jumped up noticing she was not in her bed. "Twilight! what did you do?... This is not a funny prank!" Twilight pushed a hoof against her friend's lips before she went into full whining mode. "Rarity, this is an emergency. The princesses are in danger they might even be dead..." All of her friends were here. Pinkie was a little upset that her baking was interrupted, Applejack was in the middle of cooking as well, and Rainbow Dash was just heading home to sleep and was promptly knocked out when she was teleported with the same momentum two inches from the wall. "Listen... Something is attacking Equestria... whatever it is, its obscenely powerful, it took on Princess Celestia and Luna with ease and seemed unphased by anything they threw at him..." "Him?..." Applejack gave a quizzical glance. "Yes, Celestia said something that had me worried about the subject but yes. The new threat is what looks like a pitch black Unicorn stallion with gray mane and tail named Nis. But I don't think hes actually a pony... Celestia said the same, but he has a massive level of magic radiating off of him and well... if I am right there is a way to beat him we just have to be very careful... we can find out exactly what we are dealing with in a second... but first we have to do as Celestia said and go find Discord..." She crouched next to the still shivering and fear filled Fluttershy trying to coax her into calming down. Though it was not going well. The small yellow pegasus would not stop shaking and shivering. Twilight did not blame her, Nis had literally ripped pieces of her life out of her with his strange magic. Whatever he was it was cruel and heartless. "Come on... help me get her up... Pinkie you get Rainbow Dash, we are heading to the throne room. We will summon Discord there and either get our answers or at the very least we will get some help against Nis. It had taken only a few moments to get everypony together and then into the throne room. Twilight stirred her magic summoning up the power. Slowly she weaved the spell. Rainbow had just started to wake up, Fluttershy just stayed in her huddled up pained state. There was a flash and the silly figure of the mismatched beast appeared with a couch and TV flipping through channels. "Celesti... oh?.... hrmm... Twilight I thought for certain it was Celestia... what can I possibly do for..." His eyes widened and all the joy and silliness left his face, replaced with anger, which if Twilight had to be honest with herself put a knot in her stomach. He looked utterly enraged. Quickly he teleported past the others and ended up by Fluttershy. "Who did this?...." He touched her gently shooting his magics through her to see what was wrong, It did not take long for him to see what happened, but he looked back as if to still demand to know the who. "...It was a Unicorn.... Celestia and Luna might still be fighting him... they just sent us to tell you moments ago." "This is EXTREMELY high level magic... and dark... VERY dark....I have only seen magic on this level four times before in my entire life...This was not just 'some unicorn'..." He clenched his eyes shut harshly and plunged his taloned hand into his leg. To everpony's surprise he actually bled, wrenching out a small shred of white mist he pressed it against Fluttershy's skin and it melted into it. "This should remedy the damage... Whole entire pieces of her remaining life was taken... I gave her back more than enough... I will live for a whole bloody lot longer than anypony you know... so I have plenty of life to spare...." He snapped his lions paw and his leg healed instantly without a trace of damage. "Now... as I was asking before.... WHO did this to fluttershy?" There was anger in his voice as he demanded an answer. "Celestia called him... Nis... She told us to find you and tell you that specifically Nis had returned, I take it that you could help us?" Discord's face suddenly lost all its apparent rage, it was replaced with a pale mask of fear and pain. "Nis?...you... HOW IS FLUTTERSHY STILL ALIVE THEN? WHAT HAPPENED?...." "He showed up with Trixie... he... turned her into an alicorn. After starting some trouble he challenged me to a game... and..." "AND YOU AGREED?....." Discored's voice raised to a low roar as he glared angrily at Twilight. "Look... this is more dangerous than anything you will have ever faced... but you can do it... I will help but I will NOT face him right off the bat. I may be crazy but I do not have a death wish...." "Wait... can you at least start with an explanation, what is going on... who is Nis... and WHAT is he?" "What is IT... you mean... You ever notice that I am called Discord?.... Chaos... Discord... I am the spirit of Chaos... and I am named Discord... now, I am a literal embodiment of chaos, of the lack of order... the lack of harmony... Nis... is very VERY similar, though what he represents is taken from a far older and more... well outdated ideal..." He cleared his throat and gently pet Fluttershy who had since stopped shaking, she just looked to be calmly resting. "Nopony knows where he came from... or even what he technically is... but we just know hes some sort of magical entity that is bound to a physical body... or at least something INSIDE a physical body. The only things that are certain here is that he for some reason is not allowed to strike first, his body may be able to be ripped apart but it always repairs itself, to a point he is indestructible, and finally he MUST follow magical laws that are numerous and very specific. He has a bunch of pre set up laws that dictate his actions, and if something is agreed upon he CAN'T go back on his word." He paused and looked calmly at everpony present. "Now look... I know you will want me to be out there and helping you, but the laws that keep him from harming you do not apply to me. Most likely because I am too similar to him in the fact that we are both physical representations of an aspect. He can and WILL attack me if he sees me. And Twilight, he is EASILY twenty times as powerful as even me. He WILL kill me." Discord took in a deep breath and stood tall as he looked down at Twilight. "Here is what you need to know, whatever it is... DON'T say yes, I don't care if he says the sky is blue, just say its pink. Never agree with him, never allow him to set the terms of a deal and NEVER put anything on the line you are not willing to see ripped from your hooves and destroyed utterly..." "Wait.. what is this thing he represents?...." Applejack gave a concerned look at Discord who looked back. "... isn't it obvious?....Its in his name....Nis...." They gave him an odd look and he sighed. "Its spelled backwards.... He is literally the physical manifestation of Sin.... Every time any of you ponies or anypony else in this entire world is envious, greedy, gluttonous, lazy, filled with hate, too much pride, or lust... He becomes more and more powerful. Hes been sealed away for over a thousand years. During that time Celestia made it a point to craft Equestrian culture to discourage these behaviors and create a nation that for lack of a better word has less faith in things they can't see. This lead to ponies straying from the idea of things being 'sinful' In turn this lessened his power through denying him faith in his existence." Discord snapped his talons and the room changed. They were all in some dusty old tomb, everything was crumbling and cracking apart. The only thing that looked new was a single pure golden statue of a unicorn. Though the girls felt it was in terrible taste. Sure it was extremely well made but it was haunting, the face was one of pure terror and pain. "He was here, but now obviously some dumb pony let him out... Probably somepony who doesn't care enough about history to learn to read the five hundred something warnings all over these walls saying 'DONT LET THIS BASTARD OUT EVEN IF HE PROMISES TO GRANT YOU EVERY LAST DESIRE OF YOUR SOUL!' Seriously..." Discord let out a long sigh, but Twilight spoke up quickly. "How did he get trapped in here?" "....oh... a trick he most certainly wont fall for again... I put him in there." He rubbed his eyes with a pained expression. " It took me a very VERY long time, but I researched the laws of magic enough to formulate a winning hand. I then challenge him to a game and he didn't say no. Then I won by a technicality and he partook in his ONLY weakness. I then proceeded to drop him in this tomb and rig up a magical seal that would never let him out ever again. But according to magical law I had to give him a chance to someday escape once more, otherwise this tomb would have never held him. So, I had to make his tomb like this. I compensated by writing warnings over five hundred times in this tomb and all other areas in this old place complete with all known languages in Equestria and beyond." "Wait?... weakness?..." "Yes, weakness... I'll let you in on what his weakness actually is, but its very VERY important you follow all the rules and just don't ask why it works. It will be very confusing... just roll with it." He sighed and snapped his talons again letting them all appear in Celestia's bedroom. "I CAN'T fight this battle for you... but I can do at least SOMETHING to make sure you know how to fight him... But as of right now, my loyalties leave me here.. I will take care of Fluttershy... I owe her at the very least that much." Twilight nibbled at the tip of her hoof nervously. Everything she had learned so far was utterly terrifying. Discord did not even give a reaction like this when he was betrayed by Tirek. She counted herself and her friends incredibly lucky, as well she now understood why he goaded her so much and why Celestia had told her to run. He could not attack unless attacked, this meant that at the very least they could survive by ignoring him. Twilight glanced about everypony present and took in a deep breath. "Ok.... Lets get a plan together..." ---------------------------------------------------------------------- "I said NO YOU STUPID CREATURE!!!" The little dark blue alicorn shouted at the top of her lungs. She stood defiant her tiny wings spread as she glared up at Nis. The display would have been rather intimidating had she not been so small and as he put it, utterly adorable. "Oh come on... you will look adorable in the bunny outfit!" He laughed going through a box of various children's outfits leftover from nightmare night. "You do know, I don't have to ask right?....You made a deal with me...you are literally, not figuratively but LITERALLY my possession... I could slit your throat for shits and giggles, I still would not be in violation of the contract...." He grinned menacingly before leaning firmly on Celestia's statue. "Or... I could just cancel the contract..." Luna flinched, visibly gritting her teeth she nodded. "FINE!... give me the damned costume!" Trixie stepped in avoiding direct eye contact. "..M...Master?....there are three ponies here to see you... they... they are challenging you..." "Oh?....is this a last ditch effort of getting rid of me by that other princess?... or some brave knight trio to slay the monster?" "...W.. well its ... um closer to the latter." Trixie gave a very concerned look, had she not been bound to his will she would have done everything she could to stop this. Nis arched an eyebrow at the hesitation in her voice but then all was made clear as three fillies jumped out glaring at him, in complete tuned unison they yelled out with confidence. "Evil unicorn guy! The Cutie Mark Crusaders challenge you!" Nis grinned wide and took one step forward.