From: Twilight Sparkle
To: Princess CelestiaDear Princess Celestia, I'm sending you this letter separately from my friendship report because of:
A) While the letter is related to the events that spawned this week's Friendship report, it's content is unrelated to it.
B) This letter contains gruesome information, to the point that I'm writing you this letter directly instead of asking Spike to write it, I had to wait until he departed from Ponyville to Canterlot for I do not desire for him to hear the information I'm about to tell you.
C) This letter is more related to the Ursa Minor incident, in which I asked you to send an investigation team so they could make a proper research since I lacked both the time and equipment to make a proper investigation on the battle zone.
With that said, I'll start to write you all the information I managed to gather from the dead dragon which my friends and I found a few days ago:
The first thing I managed to notice was the way the Dragon was found: he was trapped under tons of rock, this can be explained by the fact that. before we arrive there, we felt a tremor on the top of the mountain. The problem with this is that it's impossible for a mountain to tremble on its peak, because tremors and earthquakes starts on the bottom of the earth and not from the top of a mountain. I can deduce from this that, whatever fought with the dragon, had enough strength to start the rockfall that entombed the dragon. I find this concerning because the amount of strength needed for this is inmensurable, only dragons have the strength needed to cause tremors.
I also noticed that the dragon was frozen from the inside, not only that, but it looked like the freezing started in the lungs and expanded from there. The only conclusion I can get from this is that the dragon was going to throw his fire when a freezing spell entered into his mouth, a freezing spell strong enough to end his life almost immediately. As you can see, there are some problems from this possibility when taking in consideration the fact that the rocks were collapsed on the dragon, but I'll go over it later.
The third thing I managed to notice was that the gold was completely melted while the ground and walls were completely marked black because of the heat, for a moment I thought that the gold was melted by whatever it was that engaged the dragon but, after some analysis, I saw that the source of the heat was the dragon himself. But this also enters in conflict with the idea that dragons wants to protect their horde and will always make sure that nothing happens to it, perhaps you could enlighten me in that regard? Why would a dragon endanger its own horde?
Here also comes he mystery of the assailant. As I said, the dragon was trapped by all those rocks, it wasn't capable of fighting but it still tried to fight back and, whatever was fighting it, decided to finish it by freezing it to dead. This implies that the attacker has intelligence, strength and is capable of using magic but I cannot be certain of how far does it's magic goes without a closer analysis to it, which is something I find hard to achieve until we find the culprit for the dragon's death.
And, lastly, the one thing that I detected in the dragon (which also was the one detail that scared me the most) was its lack of magic. I don't mean magic like the one we use for spells or the weather, I mean the magic that keep us alive, that inner magic that makes all the species in Equestria the same, but also different: the soul. I know it sounds weird to say that, but I never thought something like the lack of something could be detected until I saw both the ursa minor and the dragon. I could try to give you an explanation of how I detected that, but this letter would be too long and I would be sidetracking and, as much as I would desire to explain it to you, I'm trying with the best of my efforts to not sidetrack right now.
I have a theory around this, but I require a few things first:
1.- More time to research: since I'm already researching friendship, which I still hold into priority one, I don't have enough time to make a proper investigation on this, once I have enough time I'll try to make a better analysis on the situation and send you an update on this.
2.- The results of the team sent by you around both the ursa minor and the dragon (which I also kindly ask you to research, please) for those results would give me a good amount of details to further understand what I'm dealing with.
That is all for now, thank you very much for allowing me to make this research and I won't disappoint you on this either. Your faithful student:
Twilight Sparkle
Canterlot Castle
Princess Celestia was on her room reading, with great concern, on the second letter sent by Twilight. She already had the results of the team that researched the ursa minor and she was going to prepare a second team to research the dragon that Twilight mentioned on her report. But both her report and the team's results were bothering, with what they described, Celestia wasn't sure if she should allow Twilight to keep on researching this mystery, she wasn't sure of what it was neither how it could affect her student. Twilight may be trying to fake it, but she wasn't capable of cover her problems with whatever happened with Nightmare Moon and, while Celestia tried to ask her sister what happened, Luna's face just showed that something happened but that she wasn't willing to speak about it. Luna promised that Twilight wasn't harmed but they both prefer to not speak about it (unbeknownst to Luna and Twilight, Celestia detected a faint difference, while Twilight showed signs of disturbance for seeing something that she shouldn't had seen, Luna showed signs of disturbance for seeing something that terrified her to her very soul) so Celestia would try to not pressure them for now, but if things got too out of control, then she would step in. For now, Celestia would send the new team with all the information they needed and, once Spike was returned to Ponyville, she would send the first results to Twilight.
For now, she would have to think around all the variables that she has seen so far: her sister's fear, Twilight's perturbation, the mystery in the Everfree and now this dragon. Celestia couldn't stop to speculate how all of this could have been related to that thing that appeared in Canterlot the very same night that her sister returned. But she couldn't jump to conclusions, she would have to wait.
But now thinking on more healthier things, Celestia was glad to see Twilight being so eager to learn about friendship (perhaps now Twilight wouldn't make the same mistakes she did when she was young), her friendship reports were always something beautiful to read and always lifted up her mood (granted, the last report was a bit sad, considering that they witnessed a murder scene, just like the ursa minor, but at least Twilight managed to find a lesson there) and now Celestia was wondering what kind of lesson she would be sending to her soon.
Ponyville a few hours ago
Twilight has just sent her letter to Princess Celestia through the special mail (advantages of being friend with The Princess, you can send her the mail and she will receive it in one day or less) and was now pondering on what she just saw a few days ago. She never expected to see a dead dragon, not that death itself troubled her as much now but still, Equestria wasn't a land known for murders (unless speaking of the Everfree, where animals hunt each other out for survival) so anything like that was unexpected. On the other hoof, this case was too similar to the ursa minor incident, including the lack of a soul. Trixie's reaction to whatever she saw only strengthen the idea that there was something else in the Everfree, but what? The only suspect she had was gone and before she could venture into the Everfree to investigate she would need Celestia's report on the ursa minor.
All of this was troubling, especially because she would have to wait until Spike arrived, but it would do. For now, she would have to figure out for ways to spend some time with her friends, both to make sure that her friends were fine and to just relax. She didn't had a specific idea, but she has always wanted to make a sleepover, those always sounded like fun. The only problem Twilight had was that nopony has ever wanted to pass the night with her, either because she was too enthralled in books or because she was Celestia's pupil. Perhaps if she could ask one of her friends, who could she ask to spend the night with her?
Twilight looked at the sky and noticed that the coming storm was going to be very strong, she was glad for having her tree protected, and she hoped that nopony get trapped in it. In that moment she saw her friends Applejack and Rarity trying to find a place to hide from the storm.
"Applejack! Rarity! Over here!"
Both mares saw Twilight and decided to go to her house for shelter, as they went, Twilight realized that she now had the perfect excuse and reason to spend the night with her friends and get out of her bad mood for at least a night, she was now hoping things could work as intended.
Everfree Forest
Feeding is a very important thing for every living being. Food brings energy so the individual can maintain itself for a day, that is a fact that doesn't change in any way whatsoever, but what can change is the type of food the individual need. For the plants, they need sunlight (which they transform into food through photosynthesis), for the bunnies, they need carrots, for the bugs, they need plants, for the herbivores (like ponies) they eat things like hay or eggs, for the carnivores (like a manticore or a griffon) they eat meat which is the synthesis of the sunlight through a plant and through a herbivore. All of this living beings uses the sun to get the energy they need to survive and stay alive, for Raziel though, he feeds through the last part of the way of life (death) by taking the souls of the deceased and using it to keep his physical form. For him, a soul is the most precious part of an individual, it represents his life and everything they did, their efforts, their adventures, their struggles, their most precious memories are embodied in that soul and (again) for him, the fact that he must feed on that to stay among the living felt like the most horrible curse any creature could have ever gotten and he felt disgust over anyone who could have ever felt good on that way of life.
That was why Raziel never tried to go after innocent lives or conscious beings, unless they were an obstacle or Raziel completely hated said creature, so, during his stay on Equestria, he would try to feed on the creatures of the Everfree (for they lacked a conscience and he didn't felt bad in any way whatsoever for eating animals) and the only exception for this rule so far was the dragon and that was because he had no other choice. And now, in this rainy day on the Everfree, Raziel was going to eat his daily creature (a Chimera this time) or at least he would have if it weren't for the mysterious fact that the chimera's soul disappeared.
The thing is that Raziel was the only creature that could feed on souls, and souls can take a while before they pass from the physical realm to the spectral realm, so the fact that a soul disappeared almost immediately was beyond Raziel's comprehension. Or at least, it would, if it weren't for the fact that there was only two ways he knew for this to happen, and since one of them was downright impossible that left the other choice.
Fearing for the worst, Raziel phased through realms. With the twisting of the trees, the disappearance of the bodies, the lack of air and how everything looked like shadows, Raziel quickly remembered why he always preferred to live in the physical realm, even if there was no concept of time in the spectral realm. Raziel looked around the new but, at the same time, old environment and he could not detect the soul. But then he heard a sound that creeped him out, not because he feared the sound itself, but for what it implied to listen to it.
The sound wasn't natural in any way (even for the spectral realm), it sounded like if somebody was making his last attempts to ask for help while being sucked into a compressor that didn't murdered it's victims, a sound that it belonged to a creature that Raziel hoped to never see again but considering his own objective in Equestria, he knew that he would meet it eventually. It had crab-like claws, no legs (although it could travel through the streams of the spectral realm as if it were flying), purple robes, blue eyes (just like Raziel) and the mouth of a shark. Raziel knew what they were:
Archons, the servants of the Elder God, creatures that lacked will and mentality but still managed to retain intelligence. Whenever they fed, they fed the Elder God at the same time and, unlike me, they never hold back in how much they eat. The more they eat, the more they give to the infernal divinity that has them tied down to this world. But as much as I dreaded to meet this creature, I was actually happy, for I now had something to feed on that wasn't a living creature and I didn't minded how many I would have to eat of them, for I didn't cared how many of them were in existence. Life can be a very fickle thing some times.
Raziel aimed his Spectral Reaver towards the archon and shot a volley of reaver blasts to it. The Archon felt the attack and, after quickly realizing who it was, attacked Raziel with all the voracity you could expect of a skilled hunter, but said hunter was going after a being of a higher hierarchy and was quickly brought down by a strike from the reaver. After eating it with gusto, Raziel decided to find one (of the many) bodies he left rotting in the Everfree so he could respawn.
With the Archon filling my spectral bowels, I could no longer waste my time. Those creatures could only be created by The Elder God, and if he could create them, then his powers were increasing. Who knows how long it would be before he started to have an influence over this world's timeline, it wasn't time to prepare my grounds, I no longer had time to wait, it was time to move.
Meanwhile, in the Physical realm of the Everfree, a Zebra was going on her duties when she was suddenly surrounded by a pack of Timberwolves. The Zebra was ready to fight back when, suddenly (and after feeling a temporary chill), the Timberwolves moved their heads to their left. The Zebra was wondering what they were doing but, in the moment the Timberwolves started to squeal and run scared, she knew what they were sensing. She quickly hid in one of the bushes and in that moment she saw what she feared so much: a chimera came out of the ground and (in a very revolting way) started to transform into the nightmare that was living in the forest. The Zebra was aware by this point of what the Beast did to the bodies and why it needed them, she also tried to figure out how she could get rid of it, but she then preferred to do nothing at the moment considering that she could not fight that thing any way whatsoever. The best she could do was to try to create a new potion, but that would take a while.
The Beast looked at its surroundings and started to move towards Ponyville, The Zebra hoped that nothing bad could happen to whoever met it.
Ponyville's Library
This has been a very disappointing night so far for Twilight Sparkle. Her friends were fighting during the whole night and it didn't looked like if they were going to improve on anything, by this point she only wanted to sleep to forget this night even happened. For trying to have a better moment with her friends, this was being a failure so far. Perhaps the reason this night was being such a disappointment was because of Applejack and Rarity's clashing personalities; Applejack was raised on a place known for keeping the hard work and that didn't have a problem with getting dirty while Rarity grew up with the idea of staying clean and doing anything with the least amount of work as possible. Applejack never liked to do anything related with "frilly" stuff while Rarity loved those things, this and many more differences made Twilight put in doubt if it was a good idea to have such different friends in one place and that doubt brought a wave of anxiety and worry to her mind. anxiety because Twilight always thought that friends shouldn't have secrets from each other, but she now wasn't sure if it was a good idea to tell them to her friends under this circumstances, or if she could tell them in any moment whatsoever.
"Um, Twilight, sugar cube. Are you awake?"
Hearing Applejack brought a certain feeling of unrest, after the fighting made between her and Rarity, all Twilight wanted was to rest, but Applejack was her friend and she was indeed awake.
"Yes Applejack, I'm awake, what is it?"
Applejack saw this as an opportunity to apologize. She debated for a while on her way of acting and she was feeling a bit guilty for ruining Twilight's sleepover (granted, it was mostly Rarity's fault, but she still felt bad nonetheless) and after remembering that Twilight has always been on a bad mood ever since the Nightmare Moon incident, Applejack felt even worse because she wasn't helping on the situation, so she now wanted to apologize.
"Look Twilight, I was thinking a bit about my attitude tonight". - She said on a sad tone. But this didn't affected Twilight so far.
"So?"
"After thinking for a moment, I realize that I didn't help on the situation here and I wanted to apologize."
This brought Twilight's attention, and after thinking for a brief moment, she responded - "Well, apologize accepted Applejack, is that all?"
Applejack didn't saw this as a good sign, but she decided to keep going.
"Its not that simple, is just that Ah know Ah haven't helped much on this night and Ah feel Ah made things worse for you, especially considering what you must be going through"
And here Twilight's attention raised to curiosity.
"What I must be going through? What are you talking about?"
This question made Rarity raise from her bed and join into the conversation, - "Twilight, dear, its no secret to anypony that something affected you during your encounter with Nightmare Moon" -. After seeing Twilight's shocked face, Rarity continued, - "the only reason we haven't said anything is because we didn't wanted to invade your privacy. But there are times when it becomes too obvious that something affected you."
Before Twilight could deny it, Applejack decided to continue Rarity's speech.
"Yeah, like when we saw the Ursa Minor. We were all disgusted and it was impossible for us to see that corpse, but you had no problem whatsoever as far as we could see."
And then Rarity decided to give the final part in their questioning, - "and if it was just our imagination, that possibility was shattered when you got close to the dead dragon and saw his-" - before continuing, Rarity was interrupted by her own stomach trying to puke, but she quickly controlled it and continued - "-dead body and lifeless eyes. We couldn't see the Ursa or the Dragon, dear, but you managed to see them with no problem. So we would like to know, what did you saw or what happened when you faced Nightmare Moon? We cannot help you unless you don't speak to us".
At this offering, Twilight felt happy. The fact that her friends were putting their own problems and differences aside to help her so she decided to accept their offering:
"Thank you very much, it makes me glad to know that you worry so much about me. In fact, I've always wanted to talk to you about it but I never got the courage to do it fearing that you wouldn't care. But hearing you makes me glad because now I can say that I got nothing to fear. And to inform you, yes, something did happened when I faced Nightmare Moon" -. At this, both Rarity and Applejack got more interested and moved their heads closer to Twilight. - "Its not that I want to talk about because its already too incredible to hear but if you want to hear about it, then I will talk to you. Its just that I don't feel ready for it yet and I would prefer to tell you all together about it, ok?"
Both Applejack and Rarity listened to this and, while glad that Twilight opened to them a little bit, they would have liked for her to open up more, so instead of giving her time to open up, they would play truth or dare and take out the information out of her (since somepony like Twilight would always respect the rules of a game like Truth or Dare).
Border between the Everfree and Ponyville, Fluttershy's cottage
Fluttershy was feeling down, after the incident with the dragon she was wondering how things could have changed if she had been a bit more valiant. Perhaps the Dragon would have stayed alive? She wasn't sure, but she knew something would have been different. Her animals were trying to cheer her up but to no avail, her animals just couldn't help if the reason for her sadness was beyond their control.
She went outside of her cottage to feel the rain, the water drops touched her butter coat and sympathized with her feelings, she wanted to stay like that for a while, but life wouldn't be so easy on her, the rain started to diminish (albeit slowly) until it was gone. Fluttershy was wondering why life could be so hard sometimes (you cannot live in fear, but you don't want to get out of your comfort. Why the dragon had to die?) and she was going to keep on mourning on this things when her animals went outside and started to hug her. Fluttershy saw her animal friends and, while they weren't' her equestrian friends, she was glad to have them. Sadly, this wouldn't take out her questions, questions like: why did the dragon had to die?, why she was so easy to scare?, why she couldn't take the initiative all the time?, just why? When would life give her a moment to be something that she could feel proud about?
In that moment (although an extremely fast one), Fluttershy felt a chill that went from the Everfree to the rest of Equestria. Her animals felt the same chill and were shivering, nobody knew what that meant but they feared it anyway for everybody fears the unknown. Fluttershy was going to try to help her animals to feel better when they immediately started to run inside the cottage, Angel Bunny was trying to push her into the safety of the cottage when he was paralyzed; the paralysis wasn't one caused by electricity or magic, it was caused by fear. Fear of something that was so dangerous that just by being there it destroyed his capabilities of moving, he couldn't help or warn her master and friend and he would have been frustrated by that if he weren't so scared right now.
Fluttershy looked to the forest (the source of the chill) and saw nothing at that moment, not too long after that, two blue eyes starting to appear in the distance (she knew who they belonged to) and she was wondering what was Raziel doing at this [relatively] late hour. She waited until he was close enough to meet her face to face but Raziel stopped once it got right at the border of the Everfree. She thought for a moment that he was shy like herself but before she could say anything, Raziel greeted her:
"Hello dear Fluttershy, tell me, what are you doing so late on this hour?"
Fluttershy pondered on this and answered with as much honesty as she could muster.
"Hello mister Raziel, I was just... trying to think in nice things."
She saw the pair of eyes closing on, as if scrutinizing her, and Raziel quickly responded:
"That's something nice, but very easy to conceal. Tell me, what is troubling you for you need happy thoughts to fill your mind?" - Fluttershy felt amazed, how could he read her so easily when only her animals could do that by instinct? - "My apologies," - quickly said Raziel, - "I'm quite used to have conversations where you have to read your talking partner to know what it's up to and I forgot for a moment how rude it could be to someone you met a few days ago."
In that moment Fluttershy reacted faster than lightning and tried to disuade Raziel from his worries.
"No, there's no problem with that, it's just that I was surprised. Only my animal friends notice those things, not that I called you an animal, and I've been trying to hide that from my friends, although I don't know if you want me to call you a friend. But, answering to your question, my problem is that I found a dead dragon" - The single mention made Raziel to widen his eyes, Fluttershy noticed this - "hum, is there something the matter mister Raziel?"
Raziel was in a crossroad, should he tell her? Considering that friendship works with honesty, then he would have to:
"Yes, I do."
Fluttershy was surprised at this recent development, she decided to pressure Raziel for a bit more of information.
"You do? How so?"
Raziel was feeling dread, he knew where this was going and what could possibly be the consequences of it, but the long time reward would be significantly better than the short time price so he kept on.
"Indeed I do, for I killed the dragon."
There was a silence in the air, nobody and nothing made a sound for what felt like an eternity. Raziel didn't said anything, it was better to wait until Fluttershy could react. Fluttershy didn't made a sound, for she was in shock. After 5 minutes, that felt like 5 hours, Fluttershy regain her composure (and felt something weird inside of her) and asked.
"Hum, sorry mister Raziel, I think I misheard you. What do you mean by 'killed the dragon'?"
She innocently asked, hoping to have heard the wrong sentence or that he meant something else entirely but Raziel only confirmed her fears.
"After you went to your townville to warn your friends from the looming danger formed by the dragon's snores, I went onto the mountain to investigate what was creating the smokestack and I found the dragon. I attempted to ask him politely to leave but he refused to listen so I decided to force him out, hoping that a show of strength would scare it away.
The battle went sour, which the dragon trying to burn me with his fire, so I collapsed the mountain on him so he could calm down. Sadly, he still didn't want to listen and I had to finish him off."
Fluttershy was at a loss of words, she hadn't expected to hear something like that in her entire life so this felt alien to her.
"My apologies for following such brash and terrible behavior, I did not wanted to do such a thing, but I was forced to take out the dragon or else he would have caused a problem to your village."
Fluttershy then made the question [whose answer] would affect the relationship between her a Raziel for a long time.
"So, you feel bad for killing the dragon?"
There was a deafening silence in that moment, Raziel knew that this was going to be the moment that he didn't wanted to happen, but he would stick to his goal. Even if the price was so high right now.
"No."
Fluttershy felt something inside of her break.
"What? Why not?"
Everything was getting blurry surrounding those eyes.
"While I feel remorse for the way our interaction proceeded. I do not feel remorseful for taking the dragon's life, dear Fluttershy. He was a menace and he didn't want to listen the heeds and warnings, he did not care for this town neither its inhabitants. He decided to engage me for he preferred brutality and bloodshed to civility and prudence. I tried the nice way and he didn't accept it. I don't feel bad for taking the life of such a barbaric creature".
In that moment, something inside of Fluttershy embraced her. In the middle of her turmoil, a passionate flame raged and was directed towards the creature that thought of itself higher than any other, high enough to determine who could live and who could die. She would not accept that.
"How dare you to say such a thing!?" - Raziel saw the new Fluttershy talking to him, it was a different pegasus or, at least, that's what mostly would say if they didn't understood that this was only the part of her that always wanted to assert itself in her life but never found the necessity for it. Raziel understood this and he wasn't surprised to have enraged a creature that loved and protected life so much - "No creature deserves to die! No creature deserves to be killed in such a way, you monster, how dare you to say who deserves to live and who doesn't!? Life is the most precious thing somepony could have and nothing has the right to take it away. I don't know what brought you here, but I don't want you near me or any of my friends ever again. Understood!?"
Fluttershy looked at the monster with ferocity and she was prepared to face him if needed to protect her friends. But this drama wouldn't drive in such direction.
"Alright, my apologies for disturb you in this late hour. I wish you a great day" - Fluttershy would keep on pondering during the following days why he accepted so easily and once she understood (in the future), she would be constantly feeling embarrassed and would apologize to Raziel for talking to him in such a way. For now, she would just look at him with anger and wait until he left.
Raziel knew this was going to happen, he have seen mortals acting like that all the time. This wasn't going to stop him though, it would only be a delay. For now he would just guard the forest and make sure that nopony would ever get hurt and try again once somepony entered in the Everfree (or get close to him) on it's own volition. He looked at the sky and when he saw the sunshine clearing the clouds away, he knew he did the right thing.
Ponyville Library, morning
Applejack and Rarity felt sick, not because they were fighting (they already fixed that during the sleepover) but rather, because they never expected to hear the truth (or better said, that type of truth) from Twilight.
Who knew True or Dare could make you have nightmares?
Not only were they scared for the idea of something with the ability to take out your soul (if that title was literal and not just as saying as both mares expected), but to think that Twilight was feeling bad because she saw a murder. Why Luna acted like if nothing happened during the celebration? Was the guilt so heavy that she rather tried to ignore it? That's not fair. Applejack would talk to her once she had the chance and give Luna a piece of her own mind. Rarity meanwhile, felt just as sick as Applejack and wanted to do the same to Luna, but her mind was thinking more on the warrior that Twilight mentioned in her tale. How dashing he must have been to come and save her from Nightmare Moon, why Twilight didn't described him? To call him "indescribable" is no excuse, she would take the truth out of her other day. For now, Rarity just wanted to sleep well and then take care of Sweetie Bell, she must have been worried about her not returning home.
A few days later, Twilight would receive Celestia's response about her report from a very irritated Spike:
From: Princess Celestia
To: Twilight SparkleDear Spike, if you try to read this letter before Twilight I advise you to stop. The contents of this letter aren't to be read by someone so young as you are. Please desist and give the letter to Twilight.
My faithful student, I have received your letter with great concern and, after much pondering, I have decided to send you the results of the research team sent to investigate the ursa minor. I do warn you that it's contents are quite worrisome so I'll send it to you once Spike gets back home. Send me a letter once he comes back so I can send you the results immediately. After you read the result, please read this letter again for I think you'll understand a bit more my orders.
Twilight Sparkle, as much as I would love from you to hear your results on this matter. I think this task could be too dangerous for you alone. Please don't drag your friends as well, I'm not sure if the elements could be the answer to this problem so until the results of the next team I have sent to investigate the dragon finishes it's job, I forbid you from entering into the Everfree for anything related to this problem at hand, but you can enter into the forest if something that requires your attention (like saving a friend trapped in the Everfree Forest). Once enough information is gathered, I'll write you new orders that could help you to take hoofs on this matter in a safer way.
Please be patient and wait for my next response on this. Thank you, your best friend:
Princess Celestia
Twilight read this letter with intention and wondered why would the Princess ask for something like this but she would trust her mentor and would not enter into the Everfree Forest unless she were forced to or the Princess said otherwise.