//------------------------------// // Creeping Shadows // Story: Tales of Harmonia // by Ise no Kami //------------------------------// The Everfree Forest was far more threatening now than ever. It had always been a dark and dangerous place, but the path through it used to grant visitors a sense of peace and safety. Now the air was over-saturated with magic energy, and the creatures within had become restless. Shining Blade pulled out his sword once more, preparing for the onslaught of enemies ahead. As he made his way through the forest, a timberwolf leapt at him through the trees, only to be cut to shreds as he turned and sliced the beast. More enraged monsters began to approach the pony who had stepped into their home. Blade dealt with the monsters at the front of the horde with Azure Edge, then sliced down the rest when they got too close. As he finished, he noticed a black and white streak heading toward him. "Zecora?" he called out. "The forest has grown too dangerous for me," Zecora warned as she ran past. "Heed my advice, and flee, pony, flee!" "Thanks, but no," Blade replied when the zebra was out of earshot. "My destination's further in." Blade proceeded deeper into the forest, cutting down every monster that attacked him. Eventually, he made his way to a large chasm. Across the gorge was the ruined Castle of the Two Sisters, and down below was his destination, the Tree of Harmony. Except...reaching the Tree wouldn't be possible. Magic energy poured out of the gorge like blood from a wound, saturating the air within the chasm far beyond lethal levels. Something had happened to the Tree all right, and whatever it was couldn't be treated directly. "Blade? What are you doing here?" The stallion turned to see Twilight right behind him, and behind her her five friends. "Same thing as you, checking on the tree," Blade replied. "By the way, you're welcome for all the monsters I took out on the way here." "Are you crazy!?" Twilight chastised him. "This place is more dangerous now than ever!" "I think I've proven I can handle myself," Blade retorted. "And I'm certainly not stupid enough to trot headfirst into that." He gestured toward the glowing stream of death. "The Tree of Harmony..." Twilight said absently, realizing their predicament. "Now what do we do?" "Uh, maybe there's a way to the tree that isn't full of magic energy?" Fluttershy whispered from the back of the group. "Yeah, you might be right!" Rainbow Dash agreed. "That old castle was built right on top of the tree. Maybe one of its secret passages can get us to the tree safely." Brimming with hope, the mane six crossed the bridge over to the castle, which just barely hung above the lethal magic stream. Shining Blade followed behind them, still curious about the Tree of Harmony and whatever problem it might be having. Besides, with all the monsters going crazy, these girls could use all the fighters they could have. Once they had all crossed, however, another tremor shook the world. As everypony was forced to their knees, they noticed the bridge supports snap, dropping the wooden planks into the magic stream. The non-pegasi were all stranded on the far side of the ravine. "Looks like we have more than just monsters to deal with," Blade noted. "Let's all be on our guard." As he passed by Twilight, he whispered, "I guess you're stuck with me now." The quake had hit the castle just as hard as the bridge. Rarity was appalled to see that all the work she and her friends had done fixing the place up had been ruined. Pillars had fallen over, and large chunks of the ceiling had dropped to the ground in massive piles of debris. Clearly it was going to be hard to maneuver in this place, especially if another quake hit. "We need to hurry if we're going to fix this problem before our path to the tree is destroyed," Twilight noted. "We should split up and search every corner of the castle." "Good idea," Blade interjected. "Rainbow and Fluttershy, you take the rooms to the west. Applejack and Rarity, you two take the rooms to the east. Twilight and I will go straight south. And Pinkie...do whatever you're gonna do." The mane six were confused that this outsider to their circle was giving out orders, but they ultimately decided their wasn't a problem with his decision and went their separate ways. Twilight, however, wasn't exactly happy with Blade. "Why did you do that? We could search this place faster if we ALL split up!" "In case you forgot, the magic surge is driving the local monsters crazy," Blade reminded her. "With this setup, each group has somepony who can fight them off if they decide to show their faces." The two ponies headed off into the depths of the castle. As Blade slew monster after monster and searched the ruins, he couldn't help but feel depressed. The place was falling apart at the seams, whatever love it had recently been given undone by the quake. Orbs of magic danced in the air, somehow amplifying the castle's atmosphere of emptiness and solitude. He wanted to find that path to the Tree of Harmony and be done with this place, but the secret passages he found all proved fruitless, taking him and his ensemble in circles around the back of the castle. Eventually, the two came to rest in the library, all but defeated. Suddenly, Blade's ears perked up as he noticed a presence behind a bookcase. He got up, drew his sword, and slowly approached the bookcase, ready to slice through whatever monster was stalking them. Finally, he chose to get the drop on his adversary. He turned the corner, prepared to strike... ...and stopped dead in his tracks as he saw Nyx cowering before him. "Nyx? What the hay are you doing here!?" He chastised the young alicorn, sheathing his sword. "I-I was worried about the tree, and about mother," she replied. "I couldn't reach the tree, so I flew over here..." "Nyx!" Twilight yelled from across the room. "You could've been hurt! Do you have any idea how worried I would have been if I'd come home to find you gone!?" She got up and approached her daughter. "I'm taking you back home right now, and you're gonna stay there!" However, as she approached, another tremor shook the foundations of the castle. As the three were brought to their knees, a huge chunk of the ceiling came crumbling down, forming a wall of debris between Twilight and her child. The force of the collision weakened the floor where Blade and Nyx stood, causing it to crumble rapidly. Thinking fast, Blade grabbed Nyx and braced himself as the floor gave way beneath them. Worst. Day. Ever. Blade woke up a short time later, rubbing his head to assuage the headache he incurred in the fall. Once his senses fully returned to him, he looked around the room, and noticed Nyx just regaining consciousness a short distance away from him. She appeared to be fine, thank Celestia. Twilight would have killed him if anything had happened to her daughter. "You alright?" he asked. Had to make sure. "I...I think so," she replied. Having confirmed her safety, Blade then looked around the room. Looking up where they had come, he saw that the quake had knocked over all of the bookcases into a pile over the hole they had fallen through, leaving only holes far too small for even Nyx to pass through, through which what light was in the room came in. There was no chance of Nyx just flying back to her mother; Blade was going to have to be her guardian for now. The room itself was small and narrow, apparently one of the castle's dark hallways. The floor that had crumbled beneath them had formed the pile of debris where Blade lay, blocking their progress in that direction. There was only one way out. "Hey Nyx," Blade called out to the filly gently. "Looks like we'll be stuck together for a while, so stick close to me, okay? I'm gonna find us a way out of here." Nyx simply nodded in agreement, and the two made their way down the hall. As the two made their way down the hall, they passed a couple of suits of dark armor. Nyx cowered away from them as they towered over her. As Blade noticed this, he remembered why he had come to the castle to begin with: to seek a secret passage to the Tree of Harmony. Perhaps these suits of armor hid that passage, or at least a route back to Twilight. He examined the statues, and noticed that one of them had a device planted inside the helmet for absorbing magic. A trigger, perhaps? He asked Nyx to use her magic on the armor...but the device didn't activate. Was is broken? Or did it only respond to a certain magical signature? Disappointed, Blade made his way to the end of the hall with Nyx. There, they say what seemed to be a magic laboratory. Or at least, the remains of one. Almost all of the equipment was broken and decaying, and the dust was far thicker here than anywhere else in the castle. Clearly nopony'd been here since well before Princess Luna had become Nightmare Moon. Perhaps this untouched corner of the castle had the path to the tree. Blade began investigating, checking out each piece of broken equipment. As he brushed one busted machine aside, a manticore leapt from the shadows behind it and slashed his shoulder. "Buck!" he yelled in shock and pain, before turning around to chop off the monster's tail. It howled in pain, then fell silent as Blade finished the job. "Are you okay!?" Nyx called out, rushing to Blade's side. "Rrgh. I was careless," Blade replied, silently cursing to himself. Suddenly, a blue glow enveloped him, and the gash on his shoulder rapidly healed. He turned to Nyx just as her horn stopped glowing, and gave her a grateful smile. "Thanks, kid." Just then, something caught his eye. He made his way to a table in the back, and brushed off papers so old that they crumbled into dust upon contact with his hooves. At the bottom of the pile was a gold bracelet with a red jewel inlaid in it. Blade noticed one final document next to the ring that seemed to be about the artifact. "...Sorcerer's Ring?" he mused, reading the bracelet's name aloud. As he read, he put the ring on his forehoof and pushed it up his leg. As he did so, a wayward thought activated the ring, sending forth a fireball from the jewel and scorching the document. Not that it mattered. By that point, Blade had read all he needed to know what the Sorcerer's Ring was and what it did. "I'm keeping you," he said, a sly smile creeping along his face. Suddenly he had an idea. "Hey, think that device back there would react to this thing?" Nyx could only shrug in reply. They made their way back to the suits of armor, where Blade shot one of the suits with a fireball. It reacted and receded into the wall, sending the two ponies plummeting down a secret chute. When they finally reached the end, they were in the very depths of the castle. If there was a route to the Tree of Harmony, it was going to be down here. However, this part of the castle was drowned in darkness, illuminated only by the weak light of Nyx's horn, and just as untouched as the lab. No one had been here in over a millennium...except for the monsters. "Stay close to me," Blade warned. Together, the two navigated the maze of darkness, Nyx lighting the way while Blade cut down everything that attacked them. However, as dark and desolate as the halls were, the pair quickly became lost. Finally, they found a door along the endless walls of stone, and exited the maze...into an empty room. There was nothing here: no objects to check, and even the walls were blank. Even when Blade made the effort, it was clear that the room had no secrets. This was a dead end. "I'm scared," Nyx whimpered. "We're...we're gonna be stuck down here forever, aren't we?" "No, we'll find a way out," Blade reassured her, though he was losing hope too. Suddenly, another quake hit, practically shaking the room apart. In the light of Nyx's horn, they could see the floor crumbling beneath them yet again. "Are you kidding me!?" Blade yelled as the floor gave way and they were swallowed by the abyss below. In a cavern far below the castle, just outside the reach of the magic stream, a unicorn in a brown robe was working her magic on the Tree of Harmony. Or rather, she was struggling to use her magic on the tree. She hadn't expected it to put up this much of a fight over such a simple spell. The magic surge, the tremors, the crazed monsters, none of that was part of the plan. She struggled against the tree's defenses to finish her work her, hoping that it might bring things back to normal once she was done with it. "Is this gonna take much longer?" her rather impatient colleague blurted out. He was a gray thestral, his blood red mane offseting his eerie golden reptilian eyes. His cutie mark, two red lines circling each other in a corkscrew motion, seemed to specifically represent his favorite use of the twin blades mounted on the ends of his leathery bat wings. The unicorn had no problem with the ponies of the night, but this one in particular unnerved her. "Give me a minute, Thatch," the unicorn retorted. "This thing isn't exactly cooperating with me." Then the tremor hit, violently shaking the cavern. "Oh come on! Just work with me and I'll be outta your branches!" Right then, the cavern's ceiling collapsed...dropping Shining Blade and Nyx into the room. "Well well, looks like we have some unwanted guests," the thestral, Thatch, mentioned, licking his lips. "Oh great," the unicorn groaned. "I can't deal with this right now. Take care of them!" "Wait, what?" Blade asked, still recovering from the fall. "What's going on? And what are you doing to the Tree of Harmony?" "Not much point in telling you," Thatch rejected the question. "Sorry, but you can't know we were here." He spread his wings, and his blades extended from their sheaths. "Goodbye." With that, he suddenly took off and pulled into a corkscrew. Blade just barely avoided having a pony-sized drill bore through his body. Thatch pulled out of the corkscrew right by Nyx, who was just recovering herself. Noticing her, he took a swipe at the defenseless filly. She just barely managed to avoid the attack, and Blade immediately drew his own sword and rushed their assailant. Thatch turned his attention back to Blade, and their two blades locked. "Hey! Are you really willing to kill a child!?" Blade scolded angrily through his teeth, keeping them clenched to hold his sword. "She saw us, so she has to die," Thatch replied gleefully. It was obvious he wasn't just killing out of necessity; he was nearly getting high off his bloodlust. "What kind of a pony are you!?" Blade asked in disbelief, pushing Thatch away and slashing at him. The thestral danced away from his strikes...only to take an Azure to the face. Enraged, he went in for another corkscrew drill, only for Blade to sidestep it and slash him while he couldn't pull away. He fell to the ground, but he quickly got back up and lashed out at Blade in rage. Blade managed to block each strike, patiently letting Thatch take out his anger, until he saw his chance. He swiped at the thestral one more time, leaving a serious gash across his barrel and taking him down. "L-lucky shot," Thatch told him in disgust. As the fight drew to a close, the unicorn finished her spell, and somehow managed to calm the Tree of Harmony. The magic surge dissipated, causing the lethal magic stream outside to dissolve into nothing. "There, you happy now!?" she yelled at the tree. "Thatch, hurry it up there! It's time to go!" "Urgh... They got me," he replied weakly. "Oh, for the love of Celestia." She teleported over to her injured comrade. "Looks like you're off the hook for now, but don't you dare think you're getting off scot free. Trust me, your life is over." With that, she teleported herself and Thatch out of the cave. "What just happened?" Blade asked in confusion. "I don't know," Nyx answered, "but at least the Tree of Harmony's back to normal." "And who's to say those two aren't going to screw up some other magical artifact, like the Crystal Heart?" Blade asked. "Come on. I've gotta tell someone about this. And you need to go back home." With that, he escorted the young alicorn out of the cave.