//------------------------------// // Chapter 6 // Story: Dark Rites // by Sporkbacon //------------------------------// Chapter 6 "Yimo ar!" a voice boomed in my head. I knew I was still asleep, but this disembodied voice reverberated through my entire body. "Upuy'nopr dtiv! Yimo ar!" "I don't understand!" I shouted in my head. It paused and sighed, audibly. "I thought you could understand the demon tongue. I guess I'll have to use this," it seemed to audibly frown, in disgust. "This absolute abomination of a language." The voice sighed again, but continued the verbal torture. "So, this is the "great" Andro Darkheart's daughter, eh?" the strange voice thundered in my head. "You look so impressive." the voice ended the sentence with a hearty chuckle. "Who are you?" I thought at the voice. "Me? You are really clueless aren't you, stupid filly?" the voice said, sounding like poisonous honey. Offended, I shot back, "You're calling me clueless, yet you're too cowardly to show yourself." "Ah, feisty," he said. "Since it makes that much difference to you, I shall reveal myself." It cleared it's throat and introduced himself, "I am the Primary Demon of Truth, Truth-Bearer." "Right," I said, hardly believing that "truth" is a demonic aspect. I played along anyway. "So, 'Truth-Bearer', what are you invading my dreams for?" I asked. "I am merely here to tell you that your beloved uncle has been a traitor since the very beginning." the Primary Demon casually explained as though it was an obvious fact. "There was no way Joel had been on the demon's side this entire time, or has he?" I thought to myself. "Ah, doubt. My favorite." Truth-Bearer happily growled. "Anyways, your Uncle Joel has been helping us demons this entire time. He even told Curse-Bearer that your father had killed his son, for starters. Oh! Also, he sent his apparently beloved wife to go to the Nether-Plane on purpose, as bait, to lure you there, so we could all jump in and devour your soul. Which, I might add, looks extremely tasty." He followed that up with sliding his tongue over his lips, in a gesture of hunger, impatience, and greed. I couldn't help the shiver that shot through my body. "There I go off topic again. Sorry about that. Where was I? Ah yes, your betrayer. So, he gathers up all you "Hunters" and for the fight against my kin. However, his plans were set back a bit because Salem, the bastard, wants to save Joel's wife. What a waste of time. Everypony just had to go, completely ruining that plan. Could have just been you, so we could have ended this stupid charade." he sighed impatiently. As I listened, emotion welled up within me. Anger, regret, surprise, confusion, doubt, and a host of other emotions surged. "Ah, I see you are doubting your favorite uncle. Don't be so quick to judge, little Spellflash. It's worse than that, for you. You see, Joel used the spell you messed up to his advantage. He sought out our generals to help kill you and your friends. Even going as far as involving the royal guard. Then shows up in your cave with those twins and his wife, conveniently after the squad arrived." I couldn't believe this. His name was "Truth-Bearer", how could I not agree with him? Sensing something awry, I turned on my Second Sight. I caught him before he spoke next. "As you know, Joel is an Earth Pony. He lived in his brother's shadow for so long, he had Andro killed in exchange for ultimate power. However, we would only honor the deal if you, the twins, and any other hunters you may have gathered, were dead at our feet. Not wanting to blow his cover, he had to make it look like he was being all friendly with you, so we could do the job ourselves." I knew he was lying to me now. As he spoke, I saw the magic hanging off his words. Being honest was obviously not a characteristic trait of demons. I supposed being the "Primary Demon of Dishonesty gave you some increased persuasion abilities. "Reveal your true self, liar!" I shouted at the voice. "You're more clever than I thought. You may be as great as your father one day, but I doubt it. Oh, by the way, Curse-Bearer is pissed off that you sealed him back into our world. I thought it was funny though. I mean, seriously? He was sealed by a filly into the floor. It was awesome. Oh well, gotta go. Deceit-Spreader out!" he finished. Then he was gone from my mind. I still felt uneasy about Joel. I was going to have to watch him more carefully now, even if I knew the demon was lying. I finally woke up after the conversation with Deceit-Spreader, feeling a little nervous. When I woke up, I found myself in a bed, the same one from before that I guess was mine, for the time being as long as I was staying there. Seeing familiar surroundings and not demonic structures made me feel a little bit better. After enjoying the comfort a bit, I flopped out of bed onto my hooves, stretched, and yawned. Levitating a brush, I went over to the mirror, and combed through my mane. In the mirror, I noticed that my gear wasn't on me anymore. Somepony had put them next to the door. I trotted over to it and re-equipped them after I finished brushing out the tangles in my mane. Feeling a little more confident, I walked down the hallway and down the stairs to the living room. The "living" room doesn't describe what I saw there. There were demon corpses sprawled out all over the place. One hanging off the couch, one impaled through with a lamp, and several just on the floor, leaking vital fluids. "I must have missed one great party." I thought, chuckling to myself. After wading through corpses, I decided to go to the kitchen, for breakfast. I went to the fridge and opened it, found a jar of jelly and some carrots and put them on the, thankfully clean, kitchen counte. My stomach growled, craving another of Joel's great PB & J sandwiches. I looked to the cupboard and found the peanut butter. Gathering all my food, I turned to set them onto the dinner table. Though, once I turned, I dropped everything I was holding. There, on the table was a note, in pony blood that read, Spellflash Darkheart. While you were busy sleeping, I gathered up all of your so-called friends and sent them into the prison in our palace to be tortured. Good luck finding us. Yours truly, Malice-Bringer, Primary Demon of Cruelty. Several things were revealed at this point. First, that my friends were kidnapped, again, they are in the Nether-Plane in a prison somewhere in a demonic palace, and I had the names of three of however many Primary Demons there were. I figured now was a good time to brush up on my opponent. Remembering that I had dog-eared the page of my father's journal, I quickly went up to my room to retrieve the book. I levitated the book out of my satchel and flipped to the dog-eared page. The first entry was about Malice-Bringer. At the top of the page it read, "Malice-Bringer, Primary Demon of Cruelty." then continued further down, "Description: Malice-Bringer is the weakest of the seven total Primary Demons." "Well," I thought, "There are four more that I haven't even heard of yet. I continued reading, but not before looking at the winged centaur sketch on the other side of the page. "Malice-Bringer should not be taken on alone. He gets his power from inflicting pain on his opponents. The best option for defeating him is to kill him quickly, before he has time to react. Defeating him requires stealth, distraction, and cunning. His main weak spot is the vertebrae below his neck, in between his wings. He is heavily armored at all times. Some of the weapons he will use are bone saws, serrated blades, and his favorite meat cleaver. He is a brutal, tortuous, and insane, but he isn't the smartest. Use this to your advantage. Good luck." "It looks like I have some work cut out for me." I thought. I went down to Joel's basement to gather some supplies. Since killing Malice-Bringer required stealth I grabbed some potions off the shelf. A convenient satchel was nearby so I started loading it up with necessary equipment. After grabbing an invisibility potion, sneak potion, and a hoof full smoke bombs, I flipped the flap of the satchel and snapped it closed. Slowly, I scanned the area one last time to see if there were any other tools I could use. My gaze fell upon a small pouch on a shelf. It was labeled, "Experimental Flash Bulbs". Peering inside, I found that the bag contained flower bulbs, which had a small amount of smoke coming off them. Deeming them useful, I unsealed my satchel and tossed them in. Venturing back upstairs to the bookshelf, I grabbed a few sheets of rune-paper that would transport me to the Nether-Plane. After I rolled them up and set them in my satchel, I decided to survey the damage outside. There was a flash of light as I crossed the threshold of the door. "Spellflash!", Sabrina's voice said, "If you are listening to this, we are being hauled away to the demon's palace. We did not expect to be ambushed by a Primary, we could have used your help. I'm so..sorry." the recording stopped. At my hooves I saw a smoldering chunk of obsidian colored flesh. Taking it in my hooves I realized that it was a spike from Malice-Bringer himself. "Thanks Sabrina," I thought solemnly. I continued outside to see that Joel's fields were ablaze, slaughtered demons slumped throughout the yard, their wounds gushing with bright green ichor. Trotting over to the circle inlaid within Joel's garden, I prepared a circle spell charged with summoning magic. First, I set the runed paper onto the middle of the circle, along with the spike from Malice-Bringer. Like before, I made a portal to the Nether-Plane, this time giving an exact location of where to put the exit portal. When the portal was finished forming, I stepped through. After exiting to the other side, I found myself in what looked like a storage room. "Perfect," I thought as I drank all my potions. First I drank the invisibility potion. It tasted terrible, it was like drinking moldy hay cider, complete with chunks. Shortly after I downed the bottle, I noticed my body start to sparkle, then slowly fade into the background. After the transformation was complete, I popped the cork off of the other bottle and knocked it back. This potion tasted completely different. It was a sticky concoction and felt strange going down my throat, but it tasted like honey, cinnamon, and flower petals. The sneak potion enabled me to not make any noise whatsoever, which made it a handy potion to have when infiltrating enemy territory. Unfortunately, the potion did not make my armor invisible. However, there was a small amount left in the invisibility potion, which I poured on myself, causing my clothes to disguise myself further. Now stealthy, I trotted silently passed the stacks of boxes, containing Celestia-Knows-What, to the door and pushed it open with my telekinesis. "Y'jiv yiu v'jiv?" clicked a demon with basic armor and a curved sword. He was probably a prison guard. I ducked behind a stack of boxes and focused. Focusing, I summoned the power from inside me, guided it to my bracelets and softly called out "Fain" for my newest toy, my crossbows. Swirls of red energy flowed around my hooves as the crossbows manifested themselves. As I glanced at the door, the demon looked out from it and stepped inside. Carefully, I cocked the bolts on my crossbows and took aim. I flicked my hooves down and a pair of bolts shot into the unprotected throat of the security demon, first stepping back, then slipping in his own blood, then falling forward to the ground, which shoved my bolts further into his throat, silencing him, at least. As soon as I was sure he was dead, I carefully walked towards him and looked at his belt for some tools I could scavenge. He only had one thing that was of any use, a keyring. I levitated the keys into my pack and stepped through the door, then shut it, making sure that none of the demons would notice the dead one. "Stealth is key here," I thought, slightly chuckling at my own pun. It turns out that the demon was guarding a gate. I trotted over and looked inside. I saw Sophie there, huddled and shuddering in a corner, turned away from the entrance of her cell. It seems like she was sleeping. Deciding to leave her there, I turned and saw another few cell doors lining the right side of the rectangular room. Assuming that the other ponies that I had befriended would be those cells, I braced myself for the worst. Cautiously, I looked past the bars. There was Salem, his mane drooped and pale, looking no longer like living flame, but more like a washed out curtain of dull green. He was also turned away from the bars, shuddering. If Malice-Bringer was really this messed up, I needed to put a stop to him as soon as possible. After looking through the two cells and looking at my friends in this state, I decided not to look into the next one, but to take the fight to the Primary Demon of Cruelty myself. A large gilded door sat at the other short end of the rectangular room. Assuming this was the torture chamber, I put my ear up to it to find out if I could sense the location of the demon, since activating my Second Sight might've tipped off the demon to my presence. I glanced at my hooves to see if I was still invisible, I was, but I regretted only bringing one potion of each kind. Suddenly, I heard a tortured scream coming from the room. It had to be Sabrina. That explained why Salem looked so depressed and powerless. I felt sorry for him, but I would have revenge for the fallen. With Celestia as my witness, I shall bring Malice-Bringer's reign of terror to an end. Not being able to tell if the demon was in the room and still being invisible, I quickly pushed the door open and slipped through, being careful to soundlessly click the door back into it's lock, without alerting any demons that may be lurking around. I turned to face a small group of armored demons which were facing the other direction, their gaze focused on a torture device, which had the outline of a pony strapped to it. Their armor was fancier than the guard's from before, theirs having a lot more polish and more attachments, such as chains, small spikes, and swirling emblems. I assumed they were Malice-Bringer's own guardsmen. I was out in the open, so I moved behind a torture device, out of their view, not that they could see me anyways. Slowly, a plan to take out all at once came into my mind. While I levitated five throwing knives from my bandolier, I set a demon circle sideways, so that it faced them, inscribing the words, "Eu'teno", "Ir'oof", and "Hu'to"". As I slowly released the spell, I threw the knives through the circle at the demons. Sadly, the demons noticed this sudden use of magic and turned around. Unfortunately for them, my knives were faster. As soon as the knives passed through my circle, they were enchanted with flame and flew through the air, triple the speed I threw them at. One of the knives hit the leftmost demon square in the chest, shattering his armor and painting the wall behind him in a mist of green blood. The middle three demons were hit straight in the head, splattering their brains out all over the walls and ceiling. However, my aim on the right demon was a tad off. It hit him in the arm, but the force was enough to take it off. The demon charged at where he saw the knives come from. Seeing him coming, I charged a few new bolts on my crossbows and let them loose. The twin bolts shot straight through my circle, were enchanted with flame, and flew faster than the crossbows could shoot them, impaling him to the wall with one through the chest and one through the face. He screeched until the fire went out, then slumped limply against the wall. That was sure to alert Malice-Bringer to my presence. Sensing he was close, I took up a hiding spot in one of the corners of the room. While I was looking for a place to hide, I saw a demonic artifact on the ground. It must have fallen out of the pack of one of the demons I'd killed. Excited that I was about to get a new power, I grasped it with my magic and floated it over to me, while I crafted and set an absorption circle. Raw energy filled me as the power from the artifact flowed into my body. I saw the familiar book of the Demon Hunters in my mind as it flipped to the crossbow page. It stopped for a second, then flipped another page. "Stage Two of Demonic Crossbow, Sniper Bow" was the heading of the page. I memorized the word on the page and read the description. "Stage Two transforms your dual wield crossbows into one large crossbow, capable of firing a larger bolt with more force and velocity. Also while the Sniper Bow is equipped, it increases the accuracy of the user's shots. Primarily used to take out targets from a distance, due to a fairly long reload time and recoil. The book closed and I was greeted by the bloodstained walls and cries of terror from the tortured. I would get revenge on them. I focused on my bracelets and chanted "Up'urot" to shift the dual crossbows into their new form. The new crossbow was heavy, but manageable. Slowly, I aimed at the door of where I assumed he would come from. A few moments later, the door swung open violently, and flew off it's hinges crashing into the wall on the other side, shattering into several chunks. "Come out little Spellflash, I know you're in here, you worthless excuse for a Hunter." growled a voice from the new opening. Malice-Bringer stepped through and surveyed the damage. "Well," he started, "You may not be that worthless at all." Seeing that my circle spell was still activated, I stopped feeding power into it and it popped out of existence. "It's too bad really, this room only has so many things to hide behind." he said and he drew a jagged edged knife from a sheath hanging at his side. Suddenly, he threw the knife at where I was, barely missing me by a few inches. I ducked slightly and slowly moved over towards the other corner, keeping my eye focused on the monster. Drawing another knife, he said, "Awww, missed. I thought for sure you were there." I only had one shot to take him out before I was hit by his next attack and revealed. Taking aim for his left wing, I cocked the bolt and fired. The spear-like bolt sailed through the air and struck him straight into the meat of his wing, impaling it to the wall behind him. This bought me some time to change position, while he was trying to take the bolt out. Deciding that the crossbow was too heavy to hold and move quickly, I levitated it slightly in front of me, and moved towards where I had killed some of his guards. "Aggghhh!" He shrieked, taken by surprise and how much power my bolt had. With one swift motion, he pulled his wing through the other side, blood flowed down the bat-like wing, as he searched the side I was on just moments before. The wing fell useless at his side. Luckily, I had hit it in just the right place to make it unusable. He threw the knife at full strength, empowered by anger and struck the wall, shaking it and driving the knife in all the way to the handle. Luckily for me, during this time, I had enough time to line up another shot. I aimed for his other wing this time, trying to psych him out. Just like the last one, it flew through the air at surprising speed and hit it's mark. "Arrrggh! Now you're pissing me off!" he screamed. He drew out a pair of bone saws, dual wielding them. "Aha! There you are!" he said and looked straight at me. Quickly, I looked at my hooves. They weren't invisible anymore. "Crap." I swore simply. Malice-Bringer charged through all of the torture machines at a surprising speed as I searched my bags for something helpful. My grasping hand of magic found the flash bulbs. Shrugging, I took them out and threw them at the rampaging demon. Blinding light blazed across the room as I shielded my eyes. "Upuy'nopr dtiv! U yunn munn eya!" I let my crossbow spell drop so I could move quicker and equipped my blades as I ran for cover. "Fain." I breathed. Ruby colored blades materialized from my fore hooves. As I turned to face him, I chanted, "Uyy'tf." and channeled more energy into my bracelets. A misty healing aura floated around me as I got into an combat stance. I set a circle of power underneath Malice-Bringer with the words "Eu'teno", "Du'pf", and "Rtuu'yp" and fed some power into it. When I deemed the power was sufficient, I released the circle, causing a flash of dark energy and a binding circle to appear under the demon. "Ha! You expect this puny circle to hold me? Preposterous!" he shouted as he swung his twin bone saws down at the barrier. "Yes, actually." I said nonchalantly. His attack barely dented my barrier. Seeing an opening for a counterattack, I raised my hooves and slashed him as hard as I could in a "x" shaped fashion. The blades touched his armor, searing an "x" pattern into it, melting through, and falling apart. Malice-Bringer was now armorless. Angrily, he growled, "You'll pay for that! Just you wait." With that, he sheathed his bone saws and drew out a great meat cleaver. He mumbled something under his breath and it was enchanted with black flames. With one massive blow, he swung the enchanted cleaver with enough force to shatter my barrier. Quickly, I pulled out a smoke bomb, and threw it near him, against the ground. I galloped quickly away, jumping and taking refuge behind an iron maiden. Now that his armor was off, I had a clean shot at his weak spot. "You aren't getting away that easily!" He was at least partially blind and disoriented, because he had been facing the wrong direction, with his back to me. "Perfect," I thought, as I charged a new bolt into my newly materialized Sniper Bow. I set a new circle with the same effects I used on the guard demons in front of my crossbow, and released the spell. I activated my Second Sight in order to get a clean and accurate shot, since he was still fumbling around in the smoke. I aimed carefully at the designated spot and loosed the bolt. It struck his vertebrae cleanly, right between his shredded wings. The bolt had enough force to pierce through his tough hide, bone, and out the front of body, dragging with it a large amount of demon blood and some nasty bits of organ shrapnel. As the bolt passed through his body, it ignited his insides, causing him to scream obscenities known only to demonkind and curse my family. Shortly afterwards, he slumped forwards, slowly breathing his last breath and falling onto his side in a smoldering heap of flesh. A dark shadowy mist came from his corpse, turned towards me and was absorbed by my body. I almost passed out from the power that killing him had granted me, but discovering that had to wait til we got back. After releasing my crossbow spell, I galloped over to where Sabrina was. Her skin was pale, she was dripping blood from various wounds she had received during the torture. Slowly, I tugged at her necklace, put it in my satchel, and swiped my hoof over her eyes. A lonely tear fell from my eye as I did so. Even though I had barely known her, I still felt this bad for losing an ally. Sighing with fear, pain, and sadness, I set to work. After seeing the coast was clear, I cleared an area of the floor that was splattered with demon fluids and set the rune paper to send us home. When the portal materialized, I unhooked Sabrina from the torture device and levitated her through. Then I went back into the previous room and unlocked the cages with brute magical strength, shattering the bars of all the cells simultaneously. Hey, I could have used the keys that the guard demon had, but I was high on adrenaline, and I didn't care. "Time to go home everypony, portal's in the next room." I called, loud enough to wake all of them that had not been woken by either the fight or the bars shattering, yet quiet enough to not alert all the demons in the palace. I didn't wait for all of them to come into the other room. I couldn't face them right now, especially Salem. The power he had now was incomparable to the power he had while he was united with his sister. Losing her would be a grave loss. I had no idea how he would take it, especially since I was the only one who could've saved her. Slowly, I went into where Malice-Bringer had been previously and took some of the important looking jars and statues. Once everypony had gone in, I turned, entered the portal, and awaited my friend's faces on the other side.