Re-Equestria Online

by MrShmoodlePuffs

Into The Dark

We appear back at Town Square.

“Okay, this is a good time as any to hold a meeting. We have information, and there are probably other players and groups that also want to go back to real life.” Cotton Cloud informs us. “ Let’s meet at our last meeting spot in about twenty minutes. I’m going to go around to see if anypony else wants to join us.” She continues.

Pinkie and I go back to the hotel to change our gear equipment. We enter my room and sit down on my bed. “Okay, I’m going to learn a few more spells. What are you going to do?” I ask her and open my inventory.

“Oh, you know. Just looking over my charms. Maybe I can modify my sword later.” She says in an off-hoof manner.

I look over my spell scrolls, and one catches my attention. Flash spell? Oh! That would have been very useful with the cockatrice, too bad i didn’t learn it… I read the scroll, then focus on casting the spell in a corner of the room. A small flash of white appears there. Well, it’s a start. Ooh, there’s a healing spell! Well, the only way to find out how good it is is when my health is down, so I’ll just wait for now.

“Okay Pinkie, I’m ready. You want to go over early?” I ask her.

“Ya, I’m done already, so there’s no point in waiting around.” She replies.

We leave the room and head out of the hotel. We walk around to the other side of Town Square and find Grey Quintus with a few other ponies already waiting. They wave to us and we walk over.

“ Hey there. We’re waiting on Cotton Cloud with her new ponies, along with the rest of us. We came early as we had nothing better to do.” Grey explains as we walk up to him.

“Ah, that makes sense. For a second there I thought we might have been late.” I reply lightheartedly.

We all turn our heads to the sound of multiple hoofs against the floor. I squint my eyes to see Cotton Cloud with a group of ponies behind her. “Hey Grey! Told you I’d find more of them!” She shouts to Grey affectionately and I turn to see Grey roll his eyes in a mocking manner. More ponies come to join us, and Cotton Cloud walks into a corner with Grey to chat a bit.

More players come and join us, right up until Cotton and Grey return from their talk.

“Hello, everypony, we want to thank you all for coming. I expect you all know why this meeting was called together and what we are planning to do?” Grey calls.

Cheers go up in the crowd.

“That’s right! We’re going to defeat the first Enemy; Nightmare Moon! We’re going to set an example for everypony else, that this is possible! We need to re-instil hope in other ponies, that we can still get out of this crazy game!” Cotton shouts at us with confidence and pride.

“For Equestria!”

“Okay, so far we have you ponies, the most brave and experienced bunch we have here. We’re organizing ourselves into parties. We will have to pass through the Everfree Forest to get to the Castle of The Two Sisters, and that’s part of the battle just as much as fighting Nightmare Moon. We’re going to have two parties take each fight, and then fall back for the next two parties to take the next skirmish. Then, we will stop at the Castle to rest and go over our supplies and choices. Any objections?” Grey asks us as his eyes sweep the crowd of players. No pony speaks up.

“Good. Now, I will explain our battle plan. We will have three groups engaging and distracting Nightmare Moon, while two other groups stay back and observe the fight and Nightmare Moons abilities. A party of unicorns will stay back and aid the engaging group with healing spells and such. When the currently assaulting group needs to bail, they will switch out with the observing group and any other parties currently not engaged in battle. Now, we are not sure if the Nightmare Moon in this game will act as a cunning pony, so the groups not engaging in combat are to stay hidden in any and all ways possible. If anything is to go wrong, don’t hesitate to use your teleportation gems. Any questions?” He finishes.

Everyone nods their head no. “Okay, so it’s all settled. We meet up at the bridge in ten, if you don’t have your ticket yet or you need to get something this is your time. If not, you might as well head on over to the bridge. We will be waiting.” Cotton adds, and the group of players start to disperse.

“Hey, Twilight. We haven’t formed a party yet. I’ll send you an invite.” Pinkie pipes up and a text box appears in front of me.

“Would you like to join Pinkie’s party?” It asks, and I choose Yes.

“This is useful. If we need to we can invite or join somepony else’s party along the way. For now though, it should be fine if at least we’re together in a party. Speaking of which, we should go get our tickets.” I reply, and we start walking to the train station.

We arrive at the ticket booth, a stallion now sitting there. “Hello. What can I do for ya?” He asks us.

“Yes, we would like two tickets to the battle of The Return of Nightmare Moon. By the way, I was wondering, where is the mare that was working this booth before hoof?” I inquire.

“Ah, her? She hasn’t come back since that whole Town Square incident. I had to take her place running this ticket booth, before I was working at the office. Here ya go.” He takes the two golden tickets from the typer-printer device and places them on the counter. I take mine and Pinkie takes hers.

“Oh, that’s weird. Wonder where she went?” Pinkie thinks aloud. “Well, thank you for the tickets!” She says, and we start walking off towards the bridge.

Winding through the streets, we bump into a group also heading for the bridge and notice that they’re already geared up. “Right! We should probably gear up too. You have your healing potions?” I ask and open my inventory.

I put on the second pair of armour I had bought after beating the beginner level, since I’m now on level 17. The journey through the woods had really bumped up my levels, especially the XP raising buff my beginner armour had. My new armour was similar to Pinkie’s, except mine focused more on magic buffs. I equip my sword and weapon grip, along with my hoof-claws which already had a dagger in its pocket.

“Yep. By the way, did you learn that healing spell that you found in the magic shop?” She asks me as we near the bridge, all geared up.

“Well, I think so. I haven’t tried it out yet, but I’ve got it down. It’s practically at the same difficulty level as teleportation, just a bit harder to put into practice.” I reply just as we reach the bridge.

“Okay, is everyone ready?” I hear Cotton shout as the last remaining players trickle onto the bridge.

“Yes!”

“Good! Now, everyone open their inventories. Activate your ticket and as soon as you do you should notice the sky get darker. This means that your ticket is working. As soon as you see the sky darken, I want you to go onto this side of the bridge so we can see if anypony is having trouble.” She orders.

I open my inventory and activate my ticket, and I immediately see the sky darken to a night blue. A giant moon appears in the sky, larger than normal, even for this game. I follow Pinkie as we walk onto the other side of the bridge along with many of the other players, Cotton walking around to the players that are seeming to have trouble with the tickets.

After a few seconds, everything is sorted out and we organize our formation.

“Okay, we need two groups to take on our first obstacle. I am not referring to your parties, just groups. These two groups will be in charge of our battle in the first skirmish. Who would like to take part?” Grey studies us.

“I think we should hold back for now. I want to see what we’re getting ourselves into.” I tell Pinkie before she can speak up.

“Who’s reading minds now, eh Twilight?” She winks at me and giggles. I blush slightly, realizing I did exactly what Pinkie usually did.

Three parties step forward, two made of four ponies and one made of six. Grey splits them into two groups of seven.

“Okay, as soon as we bump into our first problem you are going to take command. If we get into a battle, you are to lead the assault and choose our formation and attack strategy. If we bump into a ditch we need you to find a solution and lead us through. Understood?” Cotton asks them. They nod in apprehension, and we head into the Everfree Forest.

Author's Note:

Hey guys, I'm back on track! I wanted to write it to the end on this chapter, but then again, don't want to maek you wait. Anyways, I have a great chapter name for it so naaw, I'll make it in a seperate chapter. I hope to finish the next one tommorow, but if it ends up longer than expected maybe on Thursday.

I hope you guys are enjoying this, I'm about to get into serious action here.

Comments

[jvmontero]

I will be eagerly waiting

[raven618]

I have this ominous feeling that the ticket mare is Rainbow Dash and that she is going to show up last minute and steal the kill. Naaah.