[Blazing's Entry]
My memories are getting clearer and clearer. Of course, I recalled most of the stuff surrounding the last vibrant years of my life in the first week or so. What's coming back to me now are the things before I ran away from home. There is no reason to write those down. I wasn't a good son, and neither any of my family members could be considered good at their "job". It is important to remember, though, just to avoid history repeating itself, and me making the same mistakes. After all, I can always find new and original ways to fail somepony rather than repeating the old ones.
I just have to keep fixing what I break along the way. First, Cromach. Next, Guiding. Maybe I should have returned to Ponyville and let somepony know the truth. Twilight would have understood for sure and likely would have tried to help in case my search for Cromach went down the drain. Oh well, chalk it up to yet another poor decision on my side.
Speaking of memories, I'm slowly sorting through the fractured shadows and feeling which are not mine. I had a vivid dream about Scream tonight, about a date happening in some ancient city who knows where. The details were nothing like any normal dream. Everything was accurate as if I was there. At first, I thought Scream was strangely small, but when I passed by a window I saw a reflection of a black unicorn with long, dark purple mane and yellow eyes. I was inside Void's disguised form, realized that and woke up. Why? I don't know.
Divine power is a strange thing. Take alicorns, for example. Their... our bodies are made of it, but it takes characteristics our mind wants it to. Even if divinity answers to a wish, I couldn't, let's say, transform into a dragon. My unconscious mind wouldn't let me, so I transformed from unicorn into an alicorn. We die, but unless we are purified or killed in some special manner preventing our return, the divine power forming us, containing our memories, characteristics, and personality will restore us eventually. A valid philosophical question arises concerning whether or not I am a different personality restored by scattered divinity, or a direct continuation of my past existence who just had a long, not too restful sleep. I really, really couldn't care less, but it's still a valid point.
So, memories... I can't let my mind drift too much or I won't make any sense. My ability to absorb divine power came with a perk. Since it forms all we and the gods are, stealing it means stealing memories, personality... everything I've just mentioned. At some point or other, I attracted the attention of all three gods and stole a little bit of what they had, thus gaining their knowledge. Garbled and faded it may have been, it dated back to the beginning of time, the formation of Equus, and everything that happened from then onward. Sadly, no mortal or even alicorn mind was ever meant to bear such burden, and I was nearly overwhelmed by personalities of the gods imprinted in what I stole.
Thankfully, I wasn't right in the head in the first place. You know that little voice that keeps telling you to stop drinking, smoking, get out of the basement, and make something of your life? Yeah, I never liked that guy, but I listened. Nothing I did was ever good enough, and when Sombra's soul took place inside my head, the voice was erased by the shadow king. After I finally got rid of Sombra forever -an event resulting in the destruction of my family's manor in Manehattan, death of my mother and all our servants, and eventual insanity of my father- an empty space inside my head remained, and a different voice returned. Calmer, more grown up, guiding, not deriding. However, having a different personality inside you when divine power is involved makes strange things happen, and the voice turned into a semi-real pony who took a name I used at one point for myself as his own, and started helping me. He was called Mistake.
He locked away the surfacing sea of memories that didn't belong to me, and became the steward of what little shred remained of my sanity. Unfortunately, it seems he didn't return from beyond the grave with me. With there being two of us in one physical body, I was able to take stronger hold of my overwhlemind divinity, and he focused on using unicorn magic. I was the only alicorn able to simultaneously use high-grade, reality-bending divine effects and "common" unicorn magic. Those two things are otherwise completely mutually exclusive.
Well, now I'm back to just using my smarts and hooves. I'm soooo doomed.
[End Entry]
It's been a week since I left Pine Hills and, according to my map, I should be reaching the main caravan route to Manehattan today.
Something drips on my shoulder. I just shake it off.
I'm sitting underneath a tree, studying my map and realizing my trip is going to take a little longer than expected, maybe a day or two. It took me two weeks to get from Vanhoover to Ponyville, but that was on at least partially maintained road. The week I spent travelling directly north was not even close to fast. So, eight or nine days left.
Drip. Drip. Drip.
No sound of rising wind that could shake the canopy and make water trickle from the sky. No sound of rain either. I turn my head, spot black slime on my shoulder, and roll to the side without thinking while throwing the map towards my bags lying in the grass.
Splat.
A clump of black goo drops from a low-hanging branch and splatters where I was standing. It wobbles and forms a pony shape even faster than I get up. A slick, shiny, black mare, actually about as big as I am. She's small for a Corrupted, there are no tentacles on her back, and instead of a coat her surface is just smooth skin, but as she swings her hoof my way and black droplets form a web in mid-air, I know she's a Corrupted. Definitely a Corruptor then.
Jumping aside in time, the web misses me, turns into a black pool, and a smaller version of the mare forms from it. It lunges, I punch her in panic, and my hoof runs clean through the black body as if it was made of jelly, which it likely is. The original Corruptor leaps at me while I'm wiping the gunk away from my eyes. A quick dodge to the side is enough to avoid her and reach my pile of bags. There are no claws on her legs, although that can change instantly, and as she opens her mouth to spit at me again, I see no teeth, only a pit of countless small, soft, wiggling tentacles.
Spits like a camel crossed with an artillery cannon, though. Thankfully, it takes her several seconds inbetween each shot.
"...three, four, five, down!" I mumble to myself, dropping flat on my belly and feeling droplets splatter my ear. She isn't too smart, but I'm not complaining. As they say - don't look a gift Corrupted in the mouth, the last thing you'll see will be tentacles.
I look up to check her next move, only to see her wiggling her jiggling liquid buttocks at me, several long tails wrapped together into one flicking around to give me an eyeful of her pulsating privates with more tentacles inside, grasping for anything coming closer.
Hey, I must be getting used to these sights. This time I only reach out towards her before I get it back together and only pretend to stand up, take a wobbling step forward before quickly levitating my bags on my back and charging straight at her. Unfortunately, that leaves me open for the next wad of goo landing straight in my eyes.
Joke's on you, I don't need those.
I swat her head away with my hoof and realize this one is much, much firmer than the smaller one before. Still, her pudding-like form stumbles aside and I leg it as fast as my hooves can carry me. The mentality of Corruptors is largely unknown, so I have no clue if she'll just let me go after a short chase, or if she'll hunt me down to the ends of the earth.
She grows claws on her forelegs, her hind legs bulge with new muscle, and her form grows leaner. The claws dig into the ground to get a good grip, and she pounces at much greater speed I'll ever muster.
The hunting till death do us part then.
Okay okay, invulnerable to physical damage. I don't have fire or anything, the name Blazing Light being only for show.
Height! They can't handle heights. Well, neither can I.
Fleeing from the rapidly approaching Corruptor, I scan the area for a suitable tree without slowing down to clean my eyes that I just keep tightly shut. I have no clue what the goo the Corruptor kept flinging and spitting at me is supposed to do, but I'm not willing to find out. The three-sixty vision of my tracing spell shows one I could climb in a hurry, so I turn left, drop the saddlebags, pull myself up a low branch, and climb upwards further and further. Thankfully, my crippling vertigo doesn't seem to manifest when I'm not looking with my real eyes, so there's a new experience. Or it's the adrenaline, who knows?
I did, sort of, forget she jumped at me from a tree first.
Crap.
As her claws dig deep grooves into the ancient tree's bark and her hind legs grow some sort of tentacle-y suction cups, I realize I may have made a fatal mistake. Was Des wrong about Corruptors?
Or is it...?
She's climbing like a spider, with no slowing down or any signs of worry.
Okay, now or never.
Hanging down with my hind legs clamped around a thick branch, I reach down with my hooves towards her. She immediately lunges upwards, grabbing my outstretched forelegs that grasp back only to push her away from the tree. Mid-air, she could easily just crawl upwards using me, or grow tentacles to swing her small weight back towards the tree, but she freezes, letting go of me. Her form grows wings which chaotically flap without getting any drag, then too many shapes shift in less than a second, then she inflates like a balloon and bursts in the manner of a soap bubble.
And silence. The good kind of silence. The silence of rustling trees, grass, and nothing else. Just now I realize that during both the fight and hunt the Corruptor didn't make a noise.
My abdominal muscles protest as I pull myself up enough to grab the branch I'm hanging from with my forelegs, and my locked hind legs refuse to let go until I calm down. Unfortunately, in the same way that my magical vision doesn't trigger my fear of heights, it is really bad for judging how far down the other branches are. Finally cleaning out my eyes and looking down, I inch my way down at a snail's pace, fighting against my shaking limbs threatening to let go.
Back on the ground, I wipe my forehead.
Squelch.
I step on something wet.
Black goo shoots from the ground and wraps all around me in one fell swoop. I paw at it, but it clings to me like glue, rising up my neck, into my mouth through my gritted teeth, ears, and nose. It attempts to ineffectively cover my eyes again while I smack against it everywhere I can reach. As I gasp while the thing finds my back entrance and immediately pushes inside, I only open my muzzle to allow the thing to choke me. My silent begging for air only lasts a second or two of me feeling my lungs fill with the lukewarm slime.
Everything goes dark.
"Haaaaah!" I gasp and sit up, gulping down lungful after lungful of sweet oxygen. I notice my surroundings, "Oh crap..."
I'm lying on the lush, green grass of a wide, rectangular park surrounded by shattered, ripped, and mangled skyscrapers. A crevice left after an earthquake is visible nearby. My bags are nowhere to be found.
This is the inside of my head, my internal landscape or something. It's Manehattan, because it was the place where I was born and raised, and it's completely destroyed just like it has been ever since I first visited here to mirror my broken mind. So, the Corruptor got me and my mind retreated here for the famous last stand.
Alright, do I have some sort of power here?
No amount of wishing and focusing makes pink flames of Hope burst out in a roaring and cleansing inferno.
I sigh.
Alright, now I know how to navigate this place, though. Conjuring up the image of a small campsite in my head... inside my head, weird, I take the first street I can find. Lo and behold, after a short while of walking one of the alleys joining the street I'm walking down opens into a much smaller, circular park with a tent, a campfire, and a folding chair. I don't recall the last one ever being here, but perhaps it has something to do with my marginally better mental state.
Wait...
Waaaait a minute...
I look upwards. Thin, faint rays of sunlight are streaming down from behind the steel grey clouds, making the entire park greener, air fresher, and this place warmer.
"That's new," I raise an eyebrow.
"A pleasing sight indeed," comments a familiar voice from no visible source.
"I know I asked already, but I don't suppose you are just Mistake playing tricks on me, right?"
"My answer's still the same, Blazing."
"Just making sure."
"It is good to see you're finding some stability in the new world, but I suppose we should tend to the matter at hoof."
"Yeah, a Corruptor ate me. What now?"
"If you are asking me for a solution, I'm afraid I have none. Only you can dig deep enough inside yourself to win. Until we meet for real, I can only... suggest."
"Look, the only thing I can do is shove a hoof down my throat and hope I throw up everything the damn thing put inside me, but that's not going to work. It is inside me, in my skin, my organs, my ass, last time I noticed. Alright, I can't do this alone. Do you at least know where Mistake is? If I can somehow find him here, revive him, and create a new body for him we might confuse the Corruptor or something."
"Mistake is gone, Blazing. Your mind is whole. You are only you. You do not need him anymore, you can believe in yourself," he chuckles, "albeit only a little."
"Believing in myself does nothing. I need to be able to DO things, not just blindly hope stuff will work. But how come when Mistake is gone I still feel something inside me that is not me? I know, I've absorbed enough energies and divine power to get a feel for different 'tastes'. What is it?"
"That is you, the real new you. And also me."
"So you are me? A different version or something?"
"Oh, no no no. It'll make sense when we meet, as I said."
"Welp, that's great. Only... we won't meet ever if I get turned to goo here and now. Fuck, and right after I found out Guiding is still alive," I sit down by the smoldering campfire, "See how useless believing in oneself is? You either can do something or you can't, and right now things feel like the latter. Damn it!" I punch the ground.
"Still beating yourself up for not being better than everypony else, I see."
"I'm beating myself up for not being at least as good as the most worthless pony being in history."
"Oh come on. Hurting yourself for not being able to save your daughter? NOPONY can do what you want to be able to do. NOPONY even tried to get to Pine Hill after the first time they failed. You heard the stories and you still went, believing BLINDLY that you might fare better than anypony else. You beat yourself up because you aren't perfect, not because you aren't good enough. You want to shoulder the burden for all those you love, and when you can't do the obviously impossible you tell yourself you aren't worth them. It is foolish, but also something we all loved about you."
"We all?"
"Heh heh heh. All in due time. Trust me, I'm not breaking my promise to Void. He gave me a gift he gave nopony else in all his time. A small gift, in the grand scheme of things, but priceless to me."
"Once again - dead if I don't somehow get rid of the thing. Got any mental version of sodium phosphate?"
"No, and I doubt dragon-strength laxatives are the answer."
"Any better ideas?"
"I do, but... it will require some 'stupid blind hope', as you call it, from you."
The campfire bursts with sparks, and black, purple-tipped flames erupt from the circle of rocks.
"True death, here? What the hell?"
"Use it."
"Look, true death is the end. The complete and utter end. That is Void's power, only his. Granted, I stole it before but I had my power of Hope to keep me alive while I used it. I don't have anything of that sort now. It will kill me. Inevitably, and completely. No return, nothing."
"A leap of faith, that is what I ask of you. It is power, and since it is here it already is inside you. You are still alive and breathing. Well, not currently, at least in the real world."
"It will kill me. I know more about divine power in general than almost anypony else."
"And Void knew more about himself than anypony else. And he sent me here. You were completely purified by Harmony. There was nothing left of you, no divinity, anything. And yet you are still here, bearing a spark of Void's power despite using up all your own. I am asking you to blindly trust me, but I know you are intelligent enough to work out some of the circumstances."
"I'm gonna hate myself for this."
I must have stolen some of Void's power before my death when he visited the Order mansion and kept it. Perhaps even Harmony can't touch true death or something... I don't know. I don't have enough information. If I have to risk losing a leg or two, possibly more to have a shot at getting to Manehattan and at least beg Cromach to help Guiding before he cuts my head off, then so be it.
Putting my hooves closer to the fire, I take a deep breath...
...and once again touch the energy no one should use other than its rightful owner.
"IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAATEEEEEEEEEEEEEYYYOOOOOOOOOOOOUUUUUUUUUU!" I scream as waves of wrecking agony pulsate through my entire body. I become a living, burning spasm. I feel nothing other than crippling pain pulsing through my insides. I don't see anything but blurs. Whether I'm standing, sitting, or lying on the ground, I have no clue.
My screaming turns to gurgling as I throw up thick globs of black goo. Pushing my stomach, neck, and mouth as far as they can go, I keep vomiting as long as I feel the Corruptor's presence inside my head. The short moment of me choking must have been enough for her to taint me even more and make it easier to sense her hidden presence.
She's still there, but not matter how I try there's nothing coming out of me anymore. I don't dare search inside me for more true death, because while I still exist, I can feel the chilling touch of the other side grasping for me.
The Corruptor is around somewhere.
The thought makes my legs twitch, and I wake up from the freezing stupor of body out of life force shutting down completely. On the third attempt, I manage to stand up. My tracing spell fails to start, and I don't see her anywhere, but I know she's still close.
As I collect myself, I realize the fear I feel isn't all mine.
The Corruptor is terrified of what I did to it, but it's still watching from somewhere. Come to think of it, this is the first time I'm sensing a Corrupted feeling utter existential dread...
...and it's afraid of me.
Go Blaze, go Blaze, it's your birthday, it's your birthday! Score one for the alicorn wannabe.
I'm done with internal celebrating. Now, where is the damn creature?
Taking a step towards my stained saddlebags, I squeak in surprise as something presses tightly into my buttcrack. As I shoot forward to dodge a blow or anything going my way from behind, I finally see my forelegs wrapped in completely black, tight, shiny... goo.
I stick my tongue out. It's still pink. Good.
Few more somewhat uncomfortable steps verify my suspicion. I am wearing a living Corruptor as a fitting suit.
Spreading my wings covered in black without any problem, I grudgingly admit the Corruptor's body is extremely malleable. Strange new skinsuit aside, how do I get rid of it... her... whatever?
A chill running up my spine, weakness of my legs, and cold breath still crystallizing in the air coming from my mouth tell me I can't use true death to burn it off. Even if I could, I would likely kill myself outright.
Trying to shake some life into my limbs, a stab of pleasant, stretching pain from my foreleg makes me moan and shiver. While I ponder what the heck just happened, the feeling of my sore muscles being slowly massaged works its way to my head.
"That's you, isn't it?" I focus my mind on the fear I'm feeling that certainly isn't mine anymore. It's just an echo of the Corruptor's mind experiencing shattering horror.
I remember the black and purple flames of true death on purpose, and my new 'skin' starts slowly massaging my privates.
"Stop!" I bark out.
Whether it's the tone of voice, the word itself, or the stab of panic that the Corruptor is trying to make me give in to my base desires, the kneading of my nethers stops instantly. When I just stand there, more confused than angry, the pleasant pressure on my legs in spots where I was hanging from the tree returns.
I shrug. Didn't minotaurs use to wear the skulls of their enemies as signs of status? This sort of counts, right?
And to be honest, the slimy but not sticky and dirty touch warming me all over feels pretty relaxing. Still, no matter if there is a hidden threat somewhere, which there surely is, I have no way of getting rid of her.
"Should I call you Sutie McSuitface?" I mumble as I gather my things and get ready to head further north.
No reaction.
So yeah, words mean nothing.
I wonder if anyone else since the corruption first spread managed to wear a defeated Corrupted. Am I a real badass now?
My living suit starts massaging my bruised plot.
"Sto-" I shut up.
Ah forget it.
My map is completely ruined, covered in vomit and Corruptor goo. Sighing, I pull out my compass, hoping that I'm where I think I am, and that some time today I should really reach the road.
"If you try something, I'm setting both of us on fire."