Despite what appeared to be isolation, he was never truly alone. There were no other ponies, of course, not like there were in the small images of a desert land that found their way into the mind of them all from time to time. Though, none was sure to whom such echoes of memory belonged, since neither had anything like that to call their own beyond woe. All these half-creatures lived under one name, and one body. They shared the same magic. Individual thoughts hardly occurred in the blood sport of their eternity, and they knew only how to inflict the utmost agony upon one another, or to suffer.
They were voices, or most were. Some had been reduced to communicating only by impressions of their own despair inserted into the thoughts of those around them, begging for any torment to cease with only sensations and images in a desperate attempt to tell of all they endured.
Many had no distinctive traits other than a tone of voice and place within the primordial entropy that was their shared conscious as a broken instrument in a frantic symphony. Few had personalities, or they had all been ground into an exhausted submission to pain and the knowledge that they were broken. None had developed a true sense of self that was anything but a fragment of anything past knowing that they existed, and that each was within this awful union of many. There was no reflection, especially by the numerous lessers, the weak who still cried out from the few that rose to the top through might and cruelty. They all blurred into an indistinguishable mess after all these years. The few that had anything close to a sense of self were always incomplete and their 'self' could not be called completed.
There were echoes of things: deserts, sisters, gods, citadels, and a great world and the ashes it came to be. More flashed into thought, and more faded, creating hollows of being that could never be filled, and these old, harvested ripples of a being left to be dissected.
He that was part of them. They were part of him. There was no distinction any more, if there had ever been any before, it went unrecalled or was merely the illusion of a few. And perhaps the sands and sisters were too, yet there were vivid things: all that had been broken by this being had all their moments of torment etched in him for infinite hungry remembrances.
He was a demon. A Shadow, being the terrible unity of a summoner and all his dark creations.
But he did have a name, however unimportant it was. He was Umbra, they were Umbra, for he branded them under his own name. Even the caster, who had such a thing plastered over him so long ago was Umbra now. Throughout the course of time after even the last stages of his First Raze were gone, he had tried to fade away. There wouldn't be any history left, and if any creatures survived at all, those who were not demons would not even have basic magic mastered in time for the Second that was to come. He had left no Alicorns, he was certain of it. And the only thing really needed to break a world was to break its gods. No tragedy was worse than the world without Alicorns.
The cycle would continue again for as long as Umbra felt compelled to, just as he had done to the Alicorns so long ago. He faded physically, since mentally they were hardly whole. Few distinct fragments could be found after all these millennia. All were connected in the unbreakable web of strife that was their existence sealed by the spell.
After all, what remained? Who remained? There were no Alicorns.
There should be no Alicorns.
This nagged at him, eating away at him like the tides ate away at the shores of land he had greatly distanced himself from.
He was one with the voices, and they whispered and raged as endlessly as he did. There was no sleep. None of them knew such a thing, not that they needed it, or if they ever had it.
What if one had survived? What if not all was as empty as the interior of the Isle? What if you, Umbra, failed?
So it was many months ago that he sent a sentry, a simple sliver of shadow to view what had become of some land to the north. Nothing interesting was expected, for that was a barren, frozen land that had not even needed to be torn by his First Raze. In the time when culture and gods still lived, and the world was teeming with life, there had not even been kingdoms the caster had known of there. Thus, he was so, so certain that the sentry would slither back with nothing.
But it did find something: a demigod with vague, darker pulses about her.
How?! For there to be magic organized enough to get demigods instead of explosions, an Alicorn ought to be present, or at least be in the world to cultivate a true culture, for no sophistications sprang from the meager efforts of mortals, and certainly none that ever ended well. Nothing would last. So how could one such immortal escape him?
How long was it that he waited and pondered this in the realm where time has no meaning? He let such information stew within him and sear his thoughts. Then, he decided what better way to introduce himself than with a message.
For this he obtained a shark. Such creatures lived in the sea realms, which he never bothered to touch during the First Raze, since they co-existed with the land. Such a place had been dubbed 'the Overworld' by the creatures below. The underwater realms would only fall if the Overworld did, and he had rather intimate knowledge to confirm he had lured both of the ocean Alicorns to their doom ages ago. Both were outside of the Isle, and it had required that he go through the trouble of fetching a shark.
It was a large shark whose blood was currently pooling on the black floor, as it lay cold and dead, its glassy eyes and almost as hollow as Umbra was.
Hollow voices. Evil voices. His voices.
With a quick gesture the crimson drenched äerint crystal sank back into darkness. The äerint he created, the äerint he named before so many voices. Such a foggy, terrible time that was, and perhaps it was where the echoes came from: a time that begged to be crushed.
"You will make an excellent messenger," he hissed.
The corpse did not speak and Umbra felt rage boiling inside all the voices, the magic burning parts of his form, although he did not care about the pain that rippled through his own flesh.
"You do not feel like talking?" he snarled at the cold creature.
His demonic laughter echoed through the crudely sculpted chamber.
"It is time to warn the survivors that they are not alone!"
He thought of his bait, which would be irresistible to the Alicorns he sought, since one of them must had escaped and would know his magic, for the corpse would reek of it and be preserved by it simultaneously, pulling the slain creature to the shore.
But who could the Alicorn be? It couldn't have been one of the three strange youths who fought, the two sisters and their brother. The three had been old enough for war, as judged by who, he had not known. They had all tagged along with their parents, two aunts and uncles. Each had been from a key family of the Alicorns, supported by others. Sky Alicorns and mountain Alicorns had been both slain by him and hunted down after the wars. But those youths? He had his way with them all - in the case of one, literally so - and had brought about their ends. The only Alicorns left had to be the ones of the dead world, and yet they had hidden away both their nigh-impenetrable realms and themselves. He hadn't quite dared to upset that tricky balance, but perhaps they had actually left their havens to collect all the ghosts he had left.
If it was a youth, it might have been one of those who were bonded to the mountains and stone. Those Alicorns had been busy when it came to family, and for all their numbers, they were horribly good at sealing themselves away and hiding. Although, he would be almost surprised - if he could feel such a thing - were it not one. They were always a ferocious bunch until he had dealt with them. The last one he could think of would have to be a an adult whose mind was warped by what they had seen, for they would not be able to find much for a mate.
And so it was that a message was written, blood pooling from the scratches carved in flesh, and sliced in bone as he sought whoever got away, enchantments finding their way onto the shark's skin to combat the effects of nature and the tides so everything might be read clearly before the departure of his testimony.
Time too, would find itself as his unwilling ally once more, since not enough time had passed for the Second Raze to begin, and he personally wished to test this escapee just like all the others. He was not above the thrill of luring somepony back for pre-apocalypse encounters.
And first blood was never something to waste.