Bone Marrow noticed a few things after he'd recovered from his traumatic ordeal of being eaten alive over a dozen times. The first was that Toothpick was once again a pile of ash. He'd probably been re-absorbed the first time Bone Marrow died. The second was that Bone didn't need to breathe anymore. He didn't feel fatigue or hunger, his eyes were glowing more now than they ever had before, and that he felt like he had an unlimited amount of magic to draw on.
What concerned him was what he'd overlooked. In his hurry to die with a purpose and to kill the three hydras that he'd seen earlier in the Everfree, he didn't consider what would happen on the outside of the hydra's stomach while he was being digested. The hydra hadn't remained in one place to curl up with a bad tummy ache like he'd thought. It had gone on an agony-induced rampage through the Everfree, spreading death and corruption with every bite and stomp.
The desolate wasteland wasn't just the local swamp that he had been expecting to wake up at. It stretched for miles like a scar on the world. The skeletons that he'd sensed earlier were critters and monsters that had all perished in the hydra's wake. The beating hearts of the surviving wildlife were running away as fast as they could, and to top it all off, the place was completely silent.
Aside from the beating hearts, of course. If Bone Marrow was going to return to Ponyville, he would need to find some way to lessen the unending cacophony of noise that didn't involve feeding the void any more than he had already. Killing wasn't his goal, no matter how much the void begged him to make it his priority.
Already he could imagine the look on Celestia's face when she stepped out onto her balcony in the early morning to see that half her kingdom's forests had turned ashen and black. Bone already knew that Celestia and Princess Luna were aware he was back. Princess Luna had seen him 'in person' during one of his dreams and sent him a gift, after all. Would he have to deal with Princess Twilight Sparkle as well? Maybe Celestia would come after him with an army this time, and now with two other alicorns in tow to blast him with the Elements again. Or, more likely, they'd just toss him into a volcano and be done with it.
In any case, after what had happened, Bone Marrow knew he couldn't take the risk of explaining everything and hoping it would all turn out okay. He'd tried that once before and that's what got him into this mess. Celestia couldn't be trusted no matter what she did or what words came from her mouth. If Princess Luna was back, then that probably meant they were seeing eye-to-eye again. As for Princess Twilight, well, he never really trusted her to begin with. She was too friendly and too accommodating for what he was used to.
Still, Bone decided that he'd need someplace to get a hold of his powers. He'd need to figure out how to control the void if he was going to have any hope of leading a normal life and resurrecting his friend, and that meant that he couldn't be anywhere near Equestria or the countries that bordered it.
Though... Bone Marrow realized he'd never actually been to another country. Where would he even go?
The first thing he would need to do if he wanted to leave would be to get his cloak and Scenic's soul jar back. That was the top priority, but that meant he'd need to go back to Sweet Apple Acres.
That meant Heartbeats. That meant Alicorns. That also meant that he'd have to explain to everypony why so much of the Everfree was an ashen wasteland now. He'd have to do the thing that he really didn't want to do.
Bone shook his head. He was not looking forward to explaining all of this. What would he tell them? 'Oh hey everypony. Yeah, I thought it would be a swell idea to walk out into the Everfree to find a hydra to eat me. Silly me!'
The necromancer let out a sigh. He needed to get better at planning ahead, that was for sure.
Grass swished underneath his hooves for the first time in a while, bringing him out of his melancholy state. Well, at least not all of the forest had died, right? Looking around, Bone noted that there weren't any birds or other animals around. There were no chimeras or manticores or timber wolves and everything else he'd been warned about. Wasn't the Everfree supposed to be more dangerous than this?
His eyes widened. He'd seen this before but it slipped his mind. When Galloping Glades had been set on fire by bandits, all of the animals had run away from the area. They'd invaded the other areas of Equestria that weren't normally where they'd nest and ponies didn't have any idea how to handle the change in monsters for their area.
If he'd just caused half of the Everfree to be reduced to rot and ash, then that meant the monsters of the Everfree would be going for anywhere but this place.
Bone Marrow dipped into his magic reserves to speed himself along. He wasn't about to have another Galloping Glades. Not another town burned to ash. Not if he had anything to say about it. No messing around, no sparing anything that meant to harm ponies. No chances. If the monster wasn't supposed to be there, it was as good as dead.
When the young necromancer was on the hills overlooking Sweet Apple Acres, he overheard animalistic screaming coming from the farm itself. He had to be sure that the Apples were safe. That he didn't end up killing Granny Smith or her descendants from not thinking ahead.
Granny Smith.
His view changed, switching from his own sight to that of the ancient grandmother. She was with Applebloom in their family's barn. Big Mac and Applejack were bracing the barn door with everything they could find while something tried to batter its way through.
Bone Marrow.
No time to wait. He had to act now before anypony got hurt. He was responsible for this and he wasn't going to have more dead ponies on his mind.
The necromancer sped down the hill, his hooves leaving icy prints in the grass beneath his galloping tread. When he rounded the main home of the Apple Family, he saw a dozen wolves made of wood and grass that were gnawing and clawing their way through the barn door of the Apple's farm.
Die!
Twelve wisps of blue magic shot out from Bone Marrow's horn, striking each of the wolves in their chests. The grass and moss of their bodies blackened and withered, their timber limbs splintered and rotted, and they collapsed in a heap of decayed lumber.
Bone let out a sigh of relief and checked the rest of the area to make sure nothing else was lurking around. He found four more groups of timber wolves and dealt with them in similar fashion. He wasn't going to give the monsters a chance to fight or to harm him.
When he returned to the barn, he knocked on the large doors with his hoof. "Granny Smith? Applejack, Applebloom, Big Mac, are you alright?"
There were sounds of things being tossed around and shoved to the side for a minute before the door opened to Applejack's surprised expression. "Bone Marrow? Well I'll be, I didn't think I'd be seein' you again!"
"He's a necromancer, dearie." Granny Smith cheerfully called out from further in the barn. "Nothin' can kill that colt that I know of."
'Yeah, well there aren't any volcanoes around to huck me into, are there?' Bone mentally quipped.
"Did you get a little shorter, Bone Marrow?" Applebloom asked. "You look like you lost an inch or two..."
"I'm fine, Applebloom." Bone replied with a smirk. "What about my necklace and my cloak?"
Big Mac looked away for a moment before offering the items with a hoof and a nod. Bone Marrow used his magic to slip the pocket watch over his neck and fix the cloak and to finally have his hood over his head again.
Applebloom shivered. "You know, you look a lot scarier with that hood on. Your eyes are all glowy, too."
"Do you know if there's anything in Ponyville happening?" Bone asked Granny Smith. He didn't really have time for talking about the changes that death had given him at the moment.
"I heard some awful critter yellin' a few minutes before them timberwolves showed up. Maybe you could go over an' kill it?"
"Granny!" Applejack was aghast. "Don't you think we could just run the critters off instead of killing them?"
"Thanks, Granny Smith." Bone dipped his head before sprinting off, leaving ice in his wake once again.
Scenic was safe. That was what mattered to Bone Marrow the most right now. Well if he was being truly honest with himself he really didn't want anypony to be hurt or killed by his mistake. At least he wouldn't have to be eaten again, right? He had all the power he needed.
Bone Marrow slowed down a bit when he saw a pillar of smoke in the distance. Memories of Galloping Glades burning to the ground flooded his mind, along with screams of terror being cut short by a bandit's sword.
'Nope, that's not happening again if I have anything to say about it! Bone picked up his pace, pushing himself faster than before.
When he arrived to Ponyville, there was an explosion of lavender magic that originated from the town's square. A manticore was sent flying off to some distant land from the blast, having been catapulted by a pony's magic. Bone Marrow had a pretty good idea of which pony in this town was capable of doing something like that.
'This is going to end badly if I run into Twilight. She's probably going to think I did this on purpose!' Bone scowled, his distrust of others flaring up once again.
The scream of a filly brought him back to reality as a nearby door splintered out onto the streets nearby. The little pony came running out of her home with tears in her eyes and galloped right past Bone Marrow, too filled with fear to explain what was going on.
From the doorway of the filly's home stood a manticore that looked starved. Blood was on its claws and dripping from its mouth, probably from having just eaten somepony. The necromancer hissed through his teeth. "Die!"
The beast's eyes widened as a wisp of blue magic struck its chest, and a moment later a glob of blood came from its mouth and it fell forward onto the street, stone dead.
Bone Marrow rushed into the house and past the manticore's corpse. There was a colt, a stallion and a mare inside, each of them with a limb or two missing and with bite and claw marks all over their bodies. Bone was frozen for a moment as his mind brought back similarities between this and Galloping Glades.
He shut his eyes with a grimace. Now wasn't the time to panic, he'd seen worse during the assault on Canterlot, after all. "Please be alive," Bone asked the bodies. "At least one of you be alive!"
Heal!
The colt with a missing front leg gasped as magic glowed around his entire body. His eyes widened in panic when he saw that his limb was missing, but that quickly became confusion as he saw it grow back right in front of him. The two parents, however, weren't so lucky.
Bone Marrow didn't have time to sooth the colt's fears. If this had already happened to one home, then more were just as likely to be as dead as this colt's parents.
"Good luck." Bone wished to the orphan. He was willfully deaf to the colt's pleas for help when he sprinted out of the destroyed home, leaving the young pony with nothing but his life.
Beast after beast, Bone Marrow kept killing. One after the other, the Void grew stronger yet again. It was like the void fed off of misery and destruction, and although Bone Marrow was doing his best to help, bit by bit he felt himself becoming more detached from what was going on. He saved who he could, he killed everything causing destruction, and then he went to the next street or house to do it all over again.
In was like he was back in Canterlot, but without skeletons to back him up. With Twilight around, he didn't want to give any hint that he was in Ponyville. Turning the things he'd killed into his minions would tip her off and cause her to come searching for him. Not to mention the fact that he didn't know if this was a large enough emergency for Celestia and Princess Luna to be called down, or at least the Royal Guard.
"Hey!" Bone Marrow heard the familiar voice of Rainbow Dash yell at him. "Where do you think you're going?!"
She was keeping pace alongside him fairly easily with her wings despite how fast he was travelling.
"I'm helping ponies here, and then I'm leaving." Bone coldly explained. He needed to save Ponyville and leave as soon as possible. He needed to get away if he was going to have any chance of being in control of the Void inside of him.
"You're leaving!?" Rainbow Dash seemed offended. "You're the one who caused all of this mess in the first place!"
"I know that!" Bone shouted at the pegasus. The one who looked eerily similar to Scenic Sights. "I'm fixing it, then I'm leaving!"
"You need to speak with Twilight first! She's in the town center." Rainbow Dash flipped around to speak with Bone Marrow on his other side. "If you try running, then I'll just follow you, got it?"
Bone vented cold fog in a huff. "Fine. When I'm done killing all these monsters, I'll be there."
He didn't want another pony getting dragged into his mess. If Rainbow Dash was just going to follow him, then he wouldn't be able to work things out on his own. Even worse, Rainbow Dash's stubbornness was reminding him of Scenic.
Rainbow gave the hoof motion that signaled that she'd be watching Bone with a close eye before veering off into the sky to rejoin her friends at the town's center.
It was another thirty minutes before the creatures attacking Ponyville had either been catapulted by magic, beaten into submission, or killed by Bone Marrow. Rainbow Dash had watched him like a hawk, reappearing every few minutes to check on where he was before she rejoined her friends.
Now was coming the part that Bone was dreading the most. Speaking with a Princess about his necromancy. Worse yet were the casualties. Could he explain what had happened? Yes. Should he lie about the cause of everything? Well... he might just have to. He wasn't going to spend another thousand years in stone or die again, that was for certain.
Bone Marrow had managed to save around twenty ponies from death, but a quarter of the village had been killed. He passed by weeping ponies as they mourned the losses of their loved ones. Overall, Bone had to admit that the outcome was better than Galloping Glades.
He healed who he could, and he consumed the corpses of the monsters that were left out rather than let them rot or be buried pointlessly. Bone thought of it as sparing the survivors any more work than they'd already have. The ponies of Ponyville would need to rebuild and continue on with their lives after everything that had happened.
When Bone arrived at the town's center, he bore witness to a sleeping giant. It had collapsed backwards onto a building and reduced it to splinters, but the giant seemed no worse for the experience. He decided that stepping around the thing and giving it a wide berth would be the best choice at the moment.
The necromancer became nervous when he saw the face of a Princess glaring at him from the town hall. It was Princess Twilight, so not all hope was lost, but she had a magical barrier around herself and her friends. No matter what Bone tried, his magic wouldn't be able to go through a barrier of any kind, nor was crystal affected by it.
Then again, Twilight wouldn't be able to kill Bone Marrow without risking the void spreading out to consume the nearby ponies to revive him, so they were at a draw.
"What happened?" Twilight asked, her tone sharp and bitter. "I noticed you were gone one day without telling anypony, then Rainbow saw that the Everfree was dying, and now this?" She gestured to the scorched and ruined buildings around the town hall. "What did you do?"
This was bad. Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Spike and Starlight were all in a line facing him. From Bone's perspective, they all looked ready to tear him apart if he said the wrong word.
'What should I say?' Bone bit his tongue and looked down at the cobblestone street beneath him. His eyes caused the stone to faintly glow with blue light while he thought. 'I'm terrible at lying and I can only imagine what will happen if they find out that I wasn't telling the truth.'
"I killed myself."
Anger was replaced with shock almost in an instant. Ears folded back and confusion set in, so Bone Marrow spoke up before the group could claim that he was lying. He was standing right in front of them, after all.
"I went to the Everfree forest to find the Hydra that we had run from earlier, and I let it eat me." Bone remained where he was and stood as still as possible, not wanting his movements to cause a fight if they interpreted him wrong. "I died, I came back, and I died again and again until the Hydra couldn't regenerate. I don't know how long it took, but I woke up in a wasteland of ash and rotten wood."
"Y-you... came back?" Fluttershy asked in confusion.
"He's a Necromancer," Starlight explained. "From what I've read, the only way they stay dead is if you use Lava."
Bone sighed. 'Thank you for giving everypony the idea, Starlight. You're ever so helpful.'
"Listen," The necromancer colt spoke up,"I didn't mean for any of this to happen. If I had known it would cause this much destruction, then I would've found some other way to die."
"Why kill yourself to begin with?" Spike questioned. "You could've talked with us if it was that bad!"
Bone shook his head. "That wasn't why I killed myself, Spike. I need to bring my friend back from the dead, and the only way to do that is if I had enough power. I get more powerful each time I die, so..."
Twilight put a hoof to her face. "Why didn't I see something like this coming?" She then pointed to Bone Marrow. "That Pocket watch around your neck. That's a Soul Jar, isn't it?"
Bone couldn't remember if he'd already told Twilight about the soul jar, but she'd guessed correctly. He nodded in reply.
"Look, all this is great and everything, but that doesn't get rid of the fact that ponies died today!" Rainbow Dash was livid. "The flower ponies, The Cakes, Bon Bon--"
The mention of the cakes dying brought Pinkie Pie to tears and she fell to the floor, sobbing.
Rainbow growled. "This isn't some small mess up! This guy is worse than Tirek!"
The other ponies shied away at that remark. She was right. While Tirek had sucked out the souls of nearly every pony in Equestria, when he was sealed away again, all their souls were returned. Nopony died because of Tirek, but because of Bone Marrow?
"So what do we do, Rainbow?" Twilight asked her friend. "Do we throw him in a volcano for it? Do we seal him away in stone?"
Rainbow's ears flattened. She didn't really know what the best thing to do would be. She also didn't want to stoop down to Bone Marrow's level and kill him either. Rainbow didn't know if she was capable of even doing something like that.
"I'm leaving." Bone Marrow spoke up. "I'm never coming back to Equestria."
"Then won't stuff like this happen in other places?" Spike countered. "Just because you want to leave doesn't mean that you won't cause all of this to happen to somepony else!"
"I'm not going to anyplace with a pony. No people of any kind." Bone explained. He was feeling very cold inside at the moment and he chalked it up to past experiences making him numb to death in general. "I need to get control of myself and I can't do that around anything that has a heartbeat. I can't kill the sand or rocks, Spike."
"So where are you going to go?" Rarity asked. Bone noted that she didn't call him 'dear' this time, but that was understandable.
"Do you have any suggestions, or maybe a map?" The necromancer questioned.
"I think I know of a place..." Starlight ominously replied.
Wicked.
Great work and happy to hear you are doing well! Pity about the lives lost though.
GOT DAMMIT! MARROW YOU FOOL!
Not like story wasn't tagged but still going to be uncomfortable for me to read this story after seeing the names of those who died.
Oh damn, shit just hit the fan.
Wait. why only lava? Wouldn't surrounding the Necromancer in an Anti-magic stone/ward be easier?
... Yikes. I don't really know what other words to say. I mean, I figured that there would be some fatalities, but the Flower Trio, the whole Cake Family, and Bon Bon...?
Gotta love how he's worse than Tirek yet the worst he's intentionally done was protect and save lives and even that was forced on him. It's not like he meant for the town to be attacked by everything the Everfree had to offer and all he was trying to do was resurrect his only friend. Tirek may not have killed anyone, but everyone would have died anyway had he not been stopped in his selfish desire for power, Bone accidentally gets a bunch of ponies killed and he's worse even though he stayed to try to fix things? He's worse the would be destoyer of the world yet every bad thing that's happened was mostly if not entirely out of his control? I doubt many of the readers could predict this in either position and this is all his fault?
Did Tirek heal or save anyone after leaving them defenseless and in positions they could have died? No! It was their choice to free THE NECROMANCER and take no precautions against a guy who in damn near every story necromancers is evil. This is as much on them and the princesses who should have seen this within the reasonable realm of possibility if not more than Bone who mentally speaking is still a kid.
I know how I can be the most spiteful person you will ever meet and only thing I would have said is "The next time you or the traitor Celestia decide you need a necromancer look elsewhere. I could have just left you for dead and revived my only friend while you were all being eaten, but I chose to try to prevent a repeat of Galloping Glades and make her wait even longer. I may not be 'good', but I at least try not to be evil unlike every necromancer to make their mark in history."
i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/447/822/80a.png
well that escalated quickly. wonder where starlight is thinking of.
The Flower ponies, the Cakes, Bon Bon, 1/4 of the rest of Ponyville, much of the Everfree, Zecora MIA.
That hit hard. You've never been shy of a heavy body count even from Chapter One, but these are canon characters. Don't see where it's going from here, Bone just hanging out in the desert dosn't sound like a fun story, but I'll be keen to find out. Glad to see you didn't bleed out on the table, and I hope you like the 'new you'.
I feel like the ponies are a bit too judgmental towards Bone Marrow.
He did just save them. He could have left them to deal with his actions that he didn't mean to cause, but he didn't.
Hmm... I half expected Flutters to die from the carnage.
Wow. That went down hill fast.
Damn you killed so many. Glad to know your safe from surgery though
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9549431
You should take into account that this literally after an attack on the town leaving many dead and highly emotional. That and the girls in all their heroism haven't had to deal with a villain killing anyone.
How much do you that starlight will send him after the changelings
9549393
Ignorance does not excuse a crime. He killed a lot individuals even if it was not his intention, he is still guilty
9549482
That's fair. I guess after a thousand or how many years of peace would soften anyone right up. Granny understands, though.
9549482
Yet they've dealt with villains who enslave (so unless they're a lot more innocent than I would expect in this story they have dealt with implied murderers and rapists like Sombra), Nightmare Moon who in this story has killed I'm pretty sure, and Tirek who is likely responsible for a lot of ponies dying like all the airborne pegasi or Cloudsdale. I understand they're emotional, but it's still hardly fair to blame a child for getting ponies killed when he was miles away when he died and his only intention was to die to he wouldn't be alone in a world he is reasonably paranoid in.
I'm sorry if it seems like I'm trying to argue so I'm just going to stop.
9549507
Those girls did not deal with those type of actions in canon. The Mane 6 has never had to deal with villains killing. (And some of that is headcanon).
And it's not about being fair. It's that the girls are in a clear high emotional state for very good reason. Logic is not going to dictate their actions. He's the ground zero of the animals of the Everfree attacking and killing many of the people they saw on a regular basis. Therefore they are obviously going to be upset at him.
At a minimum he should be imprisoned for accidental manslaughter. That's several years for every person dead.
Either Bad Land or Frozen North I'm sure.
He shouldn't just get to walk away after causing so many deaths. He saved lives ..... no ....he prevented more deaths he'd be accountable for. They wouldn't of needed saving if not for his actions. Why celestia and luna aren't their allready is mindbogling ... half a forest is probably visibly gone even from canterlot and when the attacks started twilight i hope wouldve been smart enough to have spike send a scroll asking for help itd takes less then 10 seconds for her to port scroll ink and quill then spike does his thing not even needing her. Also who needs a volcano when she can banish him to the sun.
Welp, that sucked. Why is it that people view the mistakes of those who try to be good end up being worse than the those who intentionally harm others?
They say he is worse than Tirek. Had Tirek not been stopped, every single pony in the nation would have eventually ended up dead without their magic. Then the rest of the world if Tirek didn't move the sun and moon, ironically killing himself in the process. We're talking freaking extinction. So Bone accidentally causes the deaths of a 1/4 of the village, a few hundred deaths if that, and he is worse than a genocidal monster?
Big point the girls are missing here is that they have not, and never have, thought about the consequences had they failed in the past. They have never thought 'what if.' Sure they did the 'What if the rainboom never happened,' but that's not the same thing here, though Twilight did see some hints in it. This particular incident just happened to have greater consequences sooner. I know they are emotional right now, and it will be difficult to see it because of their anger and now established bias, but hopefully someone will be able to point that out to them that Tirek intended genocide with no remorse. Hopefully after 1000 years, Celestia has gained a little wisdom to point that tip out. Or Luna, with an older perspective.
Though I do have to wonder there Bone; why did you think it was a good idea to feed yourself to a hydra when there are far simpler, and probably less painful, ways to (repeatedly) kill yourself? Boneheaded kid (not sorry).
Happy to hear that your surgery went well for you I wish you the best of recovery.
9549431
I agree with that, though that they might lash just a bit. The Cakes, Bon-Bon... heavy losses. It's an eyebrow raiser but not too OOC. Let's see where it goes.
Hmm... over the past three chapters, I think I've really lost any desire to root for Bone Marrow.
Perhaps it was much easier to sympathize with a character like this in a time that was also more vicious and the stakes were much different, but Bone also had a much smoother progression down the slope, one where his decisions were very easy to understand. Here... just a short ways off his fresh start, he made a chain of exceptionally bad decisions which led to an exceptionally bad outcome even considering how bad those decisions were.
And I do mean exceptionally bad. The Hydra worked out much worse than I ever thought it could - I thought the real tragedy here was that Bone didn't just die but instead died several times back to back, sending the Void spiraling out of control immediately. But nope, Everfree torched and surrounding villages freshly murderized.
But I can't see the rationale for Bone choosing to kill himself in such an unpredictable, painful, and potentially dangerous way as a Hydra to begin with. It is not very hard for Bone to break his neck or slit his throat. Why he chases down the most daunting predator of the Everfree for something as simple as suicide is beyond me, but I suppose he is a kid and he's allowed to make some silly, dramatic decisions.
But also... while I accept his need to see Scenic and also his fear at being left near-powerless in a world he does not at all trust, his decision to die is also a terrible idea. He knows exactly what the Void can do to him and how it gets worse. Every death he died made him lose his equinity, and every life he takes chips at it further. He was in a very, very bad place before he was stoned. He's freed of its corruption for the first time in years, he's alive, and not only does he dive back it - which is understandable given he needs that power to restore Scenic - but instead of dipping a hoof into the water, he dives face first. Not only does he decide not to study, search for other ways to tap his power, use his one-in-a-lifetime chance to find an outcome which won't end as badly as his first walk with death did, but he goes and gets himself killed in one of the ways which will assuredly kill him more than once. He picks one of the only creatures that could possibly eat him whole, so he's going to regenerate in a stomach instead of on the ground with a confused predator that just lost what it was eating. There are precious few deaths he could have sought that could have chain-killed him like this, and Bone's not a novice in the art of dying.
And not only does the Hydra kill him a bunch of times, but it goes on a rampage, causing the rest of the Everfree to go on a rampage. Alright. The lack of communication that allowed everything to be this bad, I understand that - there was no way at this stage that Bone would be able to trust the ponies overtly trying to be friends with him. It was already clear Twilight wasn't going to get through to him and that he wasn't looking for friends, but his own agenda wasn't actually harmful and I figured some new ponies in a new location could have gotten to know him naturally, and he'd be in a better position to reciprocate with Scenic around and some characters who didn't have obvious ulterior motives.
Might still happen, but man... Bone didn't just squander his second chance, he fed it to a Hydra.
Like, Bone didn't intend for all this death and destruction to happen and he intervened as soon as he could. He isn't a bad pony. But here on out, everypony's lives have been made much worse for his existence, and I don't believe that trend is going to change. Ponyville got massacred on accident, and while Bone is still the main character - here I'm too attached to the characters who've suffered to not care more for the pointless upheaval of their worlds than the exploration of his. Since Bone's from a time where he can't even find this unusual - I actually think Twilight is reacting better to this than she could be. Rainbow's acting how I'd expect. If somebody was playing with fireworks and accidentally blew up your entire neighborhood, some friends and family unit included, you would not really be looking for reasons to exonerate them, even if they tried to help evacuate and give medical attention to the survivors.
If Celestia set out to stone him again, I'd think she was justified. It's not that Bone Marrow is a bad pony. He's just horrifically dangerous, and in this world he's more dangerous than ever. The current Equestria cannot defend against him at all. There isn't a reason for anyone to want him roaming around, not when he does this kind of thing on accident and now has a screaming drive to cause it intentionally.
And I feel like there was almost no point to returning him to life/his base state if he was going to jump back to the power he had at the end of the first story before he had a chance to do anything with said life and new perspective.
So yeah. This isn't the most useful review, but it's why I'm not feeling much enthusiasm with present events. I wasn't expecting this hard a turn into grim territory this fast and I don't think the setup segued that smoothly from 'everything is nice' to 'everything is terrible.' I might have had an easier time accepting Bone's actions if the ponies of Ponyville had been wary, Twilight intentionally controlling, Celestia getting involved, etc. The secrecy and need for power gain would have felt more like a consequence rather than Bone just screwing up horribly. The person Bone became in the first book was a result of how he was treated and what he faced; here you've just taken that character and turned him loose on a world full of helpless marshmallows. If the goal of this is destruction and suffering, and not character development, I'm just not interested.
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The goal is character development, but that can't happen in a story that isn't finished yet.
9549563
They say he's worse than Tirek because no one died with Tirek. They're within hours of dealing with the immediate aftermath of Bone Marrow's actions in which people they see every day are dead.
What if doesn't matter compared to what did happen. Especially when people they know are dead.
You're trying to talk logic about people dealing with an incredibly heavy emotional loss in the immediate aftermath.
I... ok as this chapter is written he needs to end up in lava now. If it had ended with a few being attacked that would be one thing but the rampant death his actions caused....
There’s no oops on this. He’s directly responsible for to many dead for not thinking his actions threw.
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I understand that. I don't expect them to make any rational or logical decisions, or even remotely think rationally anytime soon. I'm looking at it rationally, giving my analysis on it. What I ultimately meant is what I hope they eventually have to realize or be told and face what they said about him; that while they think he is worse than Tirek because no one died immediately, they didn't think about how many would have eventually died if Tirek hadn't been stopped.
So he massively screwed up in a way that wasn't actively malicious but was entirely within his control to prevent from happening in the first place, and rather than confronting the consequences of his actions or trying to learn from them and become a better pony, he decides to isolate himself. Sounds familiar.
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While this is true and I didn't think you were going to neglect that considering I thoroughly enjoyed the last story, I hope you can understand why I'm a little concerned at this point.
Characterization is a slow, complicated game and I'm not expecting a rapid pace, but we're ten chapters in and Bone has shown only a stolid refusal to engage with anyone. His reasons for being so make sense to me, but now he's done something which has in turn alienated him from 1.) every pony he's met since waking up, 2.) the Powers That Be of the setting, and 3.) dialed him back to the same kind of self-destructive crazy that makes existing with other ponies a crippling struggle. He cannot presently relate with anyone and you've yet to present anyone who would want to relate with him, with the possible exception of Granny. But he's leaving Ponyville, so none of these factors point towards a shift in Bone's perspective any time soon. About the only thing he could do here is feel guilty over uprooting Ponyville and vow to make amends, and it didn't feel like he intended to do that.
It's not that this setup isn't interesting, but right now it feels more interesting from anyone's perspective but Bone's. Bone Marrow turned a 1000-year jump into the future into same-old-same-old for him while upheaving everyone's lives. I did expect both of these things to happen, but not before he'd gotten some new friends on his side.
I liked Bone Marrow throughout the events of the last story; I did not find him likable at all here. Many of the things he just did, I can't understand why he didn't know better.
Actually, I think his death plan would have made miles more sense if he went into the Everfree to die quietly and away from prying eyes, and running into the Hydra again was an accident.
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Yeah, that's fair. Maybe its from my distant chapter updates or maybe its because I'm only writing this sequel due to popular demand rather than passion. I'm not sure, to be honest.
I did have plans going forward to make Bone Marrow more likable, but he has a lot of trauma to work through for a twelve year old. He's a monster in most people eyes right now for getting a few background characters killed and I realize that, but he can't atone for anything if he gets yeeted into a volcano or stoned again.
Amusingly he did to the hydra what he's afraid ponies will do to him. Leave him exposed to something that will just keep burning away energy until they can't regenerate at all. I do realize he's a kid and the vindictive 'Well take that and fuck you while you're at it' decision made him go for the hydra, but what surprises me the most is that the hydra responded to what amounts to super-poison by... running all over the place berserk.
The deaths.... Eh. They'll either get better at some point or they'll be used to justify some interesting conflict down the line. Honestly the modern ponies are starting to do fall into the irksome trap of the last story: Antagonizing the thing that could kill them with no effort whatsoever, and expecting it to not snap them in half. Granted, Bone Marrow didn't, but they wouldn't know that. "Oh super dangerous necromancer, can't be killed, let's yell at it and piss it off."
Really though? I'd love to see Celestia's response to finding out she's the reason that he vehemently distrusts anything with horn and wings, no matter what. So sending Twilight was a hilarious backfire.
Thanks for another solid chapter Sanny, and glad to hear that the surgery went well!
I don’t really think there is a whole lot I can say that hasn’t already been said, so just keep being awesome, and doing things at whatever pace you want to set. Will always be looking forward to updates from you.
So he's a PMD(Pony of Mass Destruction) now.
I would laugh my ass off, if they sent him to the badlands and Chrysalis ended as his neighbour.
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My current theory is that the volcano still doesn't really kill them, they just die too fast to properly regenerate, like bone marrow did with the hydra. Their bodies would just constantly make a bubble in the magma and thus they would sink toward the bottom of the molten chamber.
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I feel like this was badly worded, character development can happen at any point in a story and should happen throughout it otherwise it doesn't make sense.
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I doubt that starlight would send him to the badlands if the changelings are making an entire kingdom there, especially if their wildlife is coming back after so long.
I mean I assume that this is happaning at that point, starlight is there and her only connection to the badlands would be the changlings after there reformation.
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trapped in an pit of lava, always regenerating but always slower than the lava melts away. A true prison for the unkillable. No wonder many necromancers want to kill everything! Just imagine what it would be like for a Necromancer. Just revived after your first death, you start testing out your new magic powers, others come and hunt you just for being able to raise the dead. Next thing you know, you've got Alicorns trying to kill you, your labeled as a threat to society, your every moment is fight a war on two fronts: the call of the Void and the attempts on your life by others.
Kinda feel bad for most of them right now. Necromancers like Bone Marrow at least. Ones who were wrongly killed just for their unique magic powers.
Hey I got a idea, how about a confrontation between Bone and Celestia (possibly scenic) and have the main six hear Bone vent his pain and struggles along the threats she gave him and how she used him as a tool to win the War between her and luna, I feel it would make the real reason he is that way because of Celestia and her ego and fear of failure.
Monsters aren't born there made.
And Celestia made that monster.
Could Bone Marrow give someone cancer by repeatedly healing them? Loving the new chapter.
Quite a bloody twist of event's. Now we wait for the Next-button to rise again... Eventually.
Bloody hell, hello Alternative Universe tag, I get why you're here now. That was quite unexpected. But on the plus side, it prevents the annoying thing people do where the story just has to stay in Ponyville for some reason.
Shit got real
Huh. Listening to a dead bird without considering all of one's options turned out to be a bad call. I am shocked!
And whoa, that was a lot of characters that got axed. You do not hold back, do ya?
Glad to see you're up and at 'em again, Sanny. Keep being an amazing word-beast.
That would be interesting, were not at reformed changelings right? Will the anti-non-changeling-magic throne work on him? We'll have to see what the Badlands holds...
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We believe he chose the Hydra for its regenerative abilities. Essentially, dying alone isn't what increases power, it's the consumption of life that automatically happens when doing so. Because the Hydra regenerates, and immediately eats him again, this results in a net positive transfer of energy into Bone, to the eventual full destruction of the Hydra.
In our opinion, this plan would have worked without a hitch if he could have made some sort of trap (like a pit) big enough to contain a panicked/anguished Hydra while he continually consumed it. Alas, his childish need of instant gratification prevented such a implementation.