Thief of Redemption

by One Tin Soldier

Chapter 5- Rest and Quest

A gentle breeze blew around him as he got up from where he had been lying down. He looked around. Sky. White clouds on a blue sky stretched out around him. Looking up, he saw a little spire, supported by four small pillars, rising up above him. Looking down, he saw tan stone, set ablaze with white flame, as if it held a million tiny candles.

He took a step forward, out of the middle of the square. The flames died down, but there was still a trace of lingering dark magic upon the stones. He bent down. These stones had been used as catalysts for countless dark magic endeavors before.

He straightened once more and lifted one hoof in front of his face. Grey. Soft. He put his hoof down and walked to the edge of the sacred stones. Peering down at the ground, he noticed that he was 356 meters above the ground below. Ivory stone stretched down before him to the ground, little neon lights dotting its side. A gust of wind should be able to blow this tower down, unless one third of its true length was actually underground.

Looking back at the tiny sanctuary he was in, he wondered how he might get down to the ground. At the mere thought, he felt wings unsheath themselves from his back. Shiny grey feathers stretched out, ready to propel him onward. Then, he hesitated.

Where would he go? He felt something in his mind, a presence that told him he needed to find something. What was it? Something that no one in this world should have seen before. No, someone. But who?

And who was he to find someone this world had never seen before? The answer existed, but only within his own mind until he said it aloud. "Root." His voice was rough and scratchy, as if it had been a long time since it was used, if ever. "I am Root."

And with that, Root launched himself off the edge of the spire, not noticing the tower vanishing behind him.

<:---.'.---:>

I woke up, dawn light casting its fingers though the windows of the train. We were still moving, and nothing in the room had changed since when I had arrived.

I sat up, feeling my back disagree in pain. Looking behind me, I saw blood smeared all over the wall and cushion from where I had been sitting. I felt the little hole in my back with my hand. It was all crusted, but when I pulled my hand away, it still had new wetness on it. Man, I needed to find a mirror. I was guessing that earth shard was helping me out a little, because I felt strangely calm as I got to my feet.

I stretched, wincing in more than a few places. I glanced out the window my eyes found first. Rolling hills. A few trees. I wondered where I exactly I was, or how close to Canterlot I was now. Hopefully this train even went towards Canterlot. The sun was rising towards me through the window, which meant that we were indeed going North.

Huzzah.

I really felt weary. But instead of just lying down again, I decided to try and find out if Stormy was on this train. I couldn't afford to lose him now, and I had sent him to the train station before. Might as well find out so I could plan properly.

Just as I was about to open the door that led to the next car, the train started slowing. I retracted my hand from the knob and looked around. It appeared we would be stopping in a little village for some time.

I grabbed my stuff (nothing), and opened the door to the caboose. I walked out onto it and jumped down onto the ground when the train stopped. A little filly at the station saw me and gaped in horror. "Mommy! What's that horrible monster doing here?" she poked her mom with one hoof and pointed at me with the other. I was too tired to really care. I just gazed dumbly back at her with a dull expression upon my face.

I looked over at the passengers emptying the train. No Stormy. Ah wait, there he was. I walked towards him slowly, ponies around me giving me a wide berth. Stormy seemed not to notice me, and hurried away into the village on some uncommunicated task. Huh.

I looked back at the village before me. I shrugged.

It was a nice place, just big enough to hold people you don't know, but small enough to feel comfortable and cozy. I meandered through the marketplace stalls, just enjoying the feeling of being alone, with the breeze and cool air and sunshine.

"Can I help you there?"

I must have stopped at one of the stalls on accident. "Oh, uh, not really, I don't think." What was this guy selling? Oh. Carrots.

"You look pretty messed up. What are you, anyway?"

"A human. Spread the knowledge so I don't have to say it everywhere I go."

"Huh. So what are you doing here, human?"

"I have a name. As for what I'm doing, I sure don't know. This sucks, man."

"Oh," he seemed somewhat confused by my terminology. "What's your name then?"

"Time."

"Neat. Do you think you could get me an autograph?"

"Sure! Do you think you could get me a thousand-year-old hidden relic that's actually a shard of a ridiculously powerful weapon located in Canterlot that'll grant me some mystical power while I hold on to it?"

His expression almost made me smile. I gave a short cough. "Why are you so talkative, anyway?"

"Well, I really haven't had very much business all day."

"Well, it's still pretty early in the morning. Actually," I noticed the guy was a unicorn, "do you think you could get rid of some sort of magical enchantment on me?"

He leaned forward, eyes squinting. "Here, let me try." His horn started glowing softly. He scrunched up his eyes in frustration. After about a minute, he stopped. "Listen, I can't really help you. There's a veil of strong magic that just seems to shroud even your most outside parts. I've never really seen anything like it, but if I had to say, you'd need a real powerful magic user to break that enchantment."

"Oh. Hmm, that's actually not what I was talking about. I was referring to a death link someone put inside of me."

"A death link!?! Wow! You'd have to be a class four magic user to cast magic so powerful! This fellow most likely put this shroud of darkness on you, too, to protect his enchantment."

"Right. How do I level up?"

"Excuse me?"

"Yah, nothing. Where can I find a powerful magic guy to bust open this vault inside of me."

"Actually, one lives in a cave a little ways North of here, or, so the legend says."

I rubbed my ears. "Seriously?"

"Yeah, he might be able to break your curse. But be careful, his lair is supposed to be extremely well-guarded, and even then he might just kill you if you make it to him."

"Wow. Thanks." Never thought I'd be so lucky. Now I just need to find Stormy.

I walked away from the stall and thought about where Stormy might go. What kinds of things does he even do, anyway? When I'm not around?

Hmm.

He's probably off buying new shoes or something.

If what that guy had said about a dark wizard living right over there was true, taking Stormy might be a good idea. Man, if only we had walkie-talkies. That would be really fantastic.

I was strolling through town, looking for Stormy, when I finally found him. Or rather, he found me.

I was minding my own business, just contemplating what pony flesh might taste like, when BOOM, he collided right into my side, completely knocking me over.

I got up, spluttering, and glared at him. "What was that for?"

He looked up at me. "Uh... Time? Look behind me."

"You mean: 'look behind you.' It's not said: 'Look behind me,' cause that's just silly."

"No, I mean look behind ME."

I looked behind him. A ten foot tall red minotaur was looking at me with unconcealed rage. "Oh. Right."

I took a step backwards. The minotaur took a step toward me. Stormy Whisper scrambled out of the way.

"So what's your deal?" I asked.

"DIE!" was his logical answer.

He dove at me and I leaped out of the way. Sadly, he was quick on his hooves and launched at me again. I didn't have time to recover, which ended with me sprawling in the dirt with the hideous beast right on top of me. He didn't seem to have a weapon, so he just decked me over and over.

I'm sure it would've really hurt, but because of that green shard, it didn't.

I slipped out from under the minotaur and unsheathed my sword slowly, letting the ring of it loudly pronounce itself. A small crowd had gathered, and their breaths seemed to quicken.

I saw the minotaur size up my blade, as if comparing its sharpness with his own brute strength. Then, he charged.

I dodged to the right again and brought my blade in a quick arc down into his neck. The blade bit in, but it was more like a hide than skin, and the minotaur leaped and grappled me again. This time I kicked him in the jaw, then stabbed the sword upwards into his chest. It probably would've killed him if it had been a stronger blow, but my positioning was awkward and swords don't really work the best in ground combat.

I slipped out from the ground underneath the guy, hoping to maximize my sword's potential, but instead a massive kick from the minotaur slammed me backwards into someone's market stall, scattering fruits and vegetable everywhere. The minotaur was coming at me again, so I turned and ran between two buildings.

I went down little alleys and spaces between buildings, hoping to lose the red thing. Then, when I was sure I had time, I found a stack of crates and used them to climb on to the roof of the building next to it. I steadily creeped around the top, hearing the minotaur's voice loudly tear at the ambience of the village. It was coming closer, closer...

There. It was charging down the path I had just taken. I poised myself to jump. Just a moment closer, and... BAM I landed straight on the minotaurs shoulders, slamming my sword down into his skull. He crumpled beneath me and I extracated myself from him before his face hit the dirt. Blood shone dark on my blade and I absent-mindedly stared at it.

Weren't you supposed to clean the blood off with something? I looked around. Nothing but my tunic and pants, since the minotaurs rags were blood-soaked already. I didn't really feel like getting my clothes blunked up, so I resolved to let the blood stay there on the sword. You know, because why not?

I looked through the minotaur's coin purse. Nothing but three bits, two nuts and bolts, and a tiny little bone. Nothing special there.

Wait.

Two nuts and bolts? I fished them out again. Huh. These were human inventions and I hadn't seen anything involving nuts and bolts around here. What on earth? Hmm.

Well, they'd probably explain themselves eventually. For now, I dropped them into one of my little pockets and headed back towards the town square.

I found Stormy coming towards me before I got there. He stopped and looked at me in horror.

I felt like I should know why, but I was light-headed and couldn't really think straight. "What?" I asked him.

He rushed over to me. "Dude, how are you even standing!? You look horrible."

I stared at him dumbly. Oh yeah. Hmm. "Stormy?" He looked up. "Hey, are my eyes glowing green?"

He raised his eyebrows, then stopped and looked me square in the eye. "I have no idea."

I smiled briefly. "Cool." I looked down at my hand and summoned the earth shard. Immediately I felt blackness drag me backwards toward the ground and was unconscious before I hit.

<:---.'.---:>

It had been a day since the princess had left to go back to Canterlot. Even though Twilight knew that her mentor would have the situation under control, she still wanted to investigate things on her accord. In fact, if she studied hard enough, she might even figure out something that the princess hadn't!

So naturally, the first thing she did was cast the pathfinder spell her teacher had taught her not too long ago. Twilight knew that the human was in the hospital in Room 214 precisely four days ago, and so that's where she cast it. Then she followed the human's afterimage to the center of Whitetail Woods, one of her favorite places to go during the fall, when the leaves were all lovely shades of red and yellow and brown.

Apparently the human had simply morphed into existence. The magic in the air and ground around the clearing were all perfectly normal, suggesting that the creature defied all laws of physics and magic completely.

Twilight moved in and around the clearing for some time, studying every plant and tree for some sort of hint. She was missing something here, she knew it!

As time went on, she found herself drawn to the center of the clearing once more, this time just staring at the afterimage of the human.

Wait. Afterimage.

!!! Her mind jumped erratically. That was it! How could the human leave an afterimage in the magical field of Equestria? The only way he could do so would be if he himself was a part of the magical field.

The human was connected to Equestria's magic! She had to tell Princess Celestia her revelation right away. She teleported in two short bursts back to the library. Spike was already there, lounging on his little basket bed. "Spike!!"

Spike jumped and fell out of his bed. "Huh? Wuh?"

"Spike, quickly, this is important! Take a letter!"

Spike (who, of course, was used to random stuff like this all the time) immediately got up and ran over to a little shelf. He snatched some ink with a quill and a parchment. "Ready!"

"Good. Dear Princess Celestia, As you know, the discovering of a new species in Equestrian has caused both of us to leap into action, you, diplomatically, and I, investigatively. Therefore, I think that it is important that you know what I have learned thus far, that being the fact that the human is definitely a part of the magical field of Equestria. This is good news, and also bad news. The good news is that we can definitely track him magically and the like, as well as manipulate him magically and the like. The bad news is that he, being connected to the magical field, may have access to magic and, if not, may be able to learn to use magic. Also, since he apparently ran away from the hospital, he must have been well enough after being crushed by a stinking house to be able to do so. This signifies that the magical healing salves being applied to him must have worked at least double time, or he already has significant regenerative powers. My guess is that he responds well to magic, and it seems to amplify around him. After all, his afterimages seemed brighter than I remember the afterimages of other creatures being. Perhaps this is the case, or maybe a combination of the two?Either way, this is what I have learned so far. I will continue to update you as I find out more information. Your Faithful Student, Twilight Sparkle. Oh – and P.S. Since the human is part of the magical field, couldn't you send Princess Luna into his dreams to try and talk to him or get his location somehow? Let me know how that works!"

Spike collapsed on the ground in exhaustion, held the parchment up to his mouth, and blew it away to Princess Celestia. Twilight leaned back onto her bed, wondering what Princess Celestia would think of her discoveries.

Either way, she could definitely still continue her own research. She put both her hooves to her cheeks gleefully, thinking of all the exciting things she would learn.

~/\^/\~
Rules of my Descention
.IV.

I will be like any other mortal, except that my mind cannot be altered by supernatural experiences.
~\/v\/~

I was having a dream. Yes, I was aware of it. Because of my screwed up existence, I knew that some people thought that if you were aware of the fact that you were dreaming, you could change the dream. I knew this was a dream, and I kind of felt like I could control it, but I decided to just let it play out. More interesting that way, you know?

Anyway, I was in a dark room. Because of the lighting, I was pretty sure the room was completely white, but it had just a tiny bit of light, making it a really weird dark. Stark dark. Yeah, that was it.

In any case, I wasn't alone in the room. There was this guy standing right before me. All cloaked and stuff so that he took on the appearance of just pure darkness. I don't know, maybe he was trying to hide a bad haircut.

He extended a gloved hand and looked up at me. First, the hand wasn't withered and old; it was pretty normal looking, besides the black glove. Second, his eye (only the right one was showing) was just a pure green. That's the only way I can think of to describe it. Pure.

Hmm.

It almost looked like he wanted me to take his hand. I kind of wanted to, but then I realized it would be a sucky idea.

Well...

Who cares if it's a sucky idea? Sucky ideas make things more interesting.

I reached my hand forward to grasp the other guy's when it bumped into a hard surface just before the other guy's hand. The other guys hand was also touching a hard surface, but just on the other side it seemed. Then I looked up again and noticed something.

I was looking at a mirror.

The moment I realized that, it vanished into dust, leaving me in the dark room once again. I looked down at my black robes and chuckled to myself.

Then the serenity almost seemed to shatter. I felt a niggling anxiety and looked behind me. Ah crap.

There was a freaking pony behind me. A really big one, kind of like that Princess Celestia, but dark blue instead. The crown and resemblance meant that this was almost certainly Princess Luna, the other ruler of Equestria.

The very same Equestria that had just assaulted him with twenty guards. The very same Equestria that he had completed disobeyed the ruler of. And the same Equestria in which he had killed some of its forces.

Yep, this wasn't gonna pretty.

Oh, even worse was that the princess was wearing a casual smile. Oh man, how do you deal with that?

Well, I'll let her talk first. Like in a game, I can respond to her first move intelligently, instead of me playing the first move.

She regarded me cooly before speaking. "Hello, human."

Hardly a beginning. "Hi," I said back.

"My sister tells me that you maimed several of her guards, and murdered a few as well."

I knew it! "Well, looking back on it, I'm pretty sure I didn't injure any of them. Anyone I caused damage to is dead. Well, except for crap-face."

"Crap-face?"

"Nevermind. Whatever the case, they were the ones attacking me and assaulting an innocent home. How do you justify that?"

She seemed undeterred. I decided that I really didn't like her. "Well, my sister received a tip that added quite a bit of weight to a certain side of the scale. She is quite convinced that you are a threat to Equestria."

"Oh yeah? Who told her that?" Even though whatever the reasons they might have for thinking I'm a threat to Equestria are probably loose and unreasonable, the truth is, I'm literally working on creating the most powerful weapon in the world for some guy who's literally named Doom to use on Equestria. Now that's funny.

"To be honest, she didn't tell me. Her captain gave her the mission report and Celestia was just seething. She told me what happened on the mission, her general disposition about you, the obscure 'tip' she received, and Twilight's idea."

"Twilight's idea?" That one purple unicorn back in Ponyville? Memory of her should deem her unworthy of remembering, but she seemed important, somehow. Almost... familiar.

Man, that's weird.

Oh crap, she's talking!

"...thought it'd be a good idea for me to visit your dream and talk to you."

"Yes. Great."

"Celestia's actually just incredibly busy these past few days. Things are pretty hectic in Canterlot right now. I'm all tied up, too. Celestia insisted that I talk to you before I take my shift at the watch, so that's why I'm not really in the mood for pleasantries."

"Okay..." Perfect, that means I just need to stall! "So what did you want to talk to me about?"

"Whether or not you're a threat to Equestria," she said bluntly.

"Oh, okay."

"So.... are you a threat to Equestria?"

"I don't know. What do you think?"

She thought for a moment before replying, "No, I don't think so. Your general posture and mood seem to be that of a friend. You do not appear to care about things such as political power or ruthless slaughter, but instead seem to be uncaring about everything in general as of now. A position such as your own is in no way a threat of any kind."

"I'm glad you can see that, unlike your sister."

"She has not gotten the pleasure of a conversation with you, as I have. Plus, she's a little paranoid at times," she added.

"Well, being the ruler of a nation does that to you."

"Indeed. I suppose I shall be going now. It was fun." She started backing up into the wall. "Friend."

She disappeared completely and I let out a sigh of relief. In general, it seemed like the pony race was pretty stupid. Stupid people with lots of power = a real mess and pointless complications.

I mean, it's easier to trick them, but that's about it. Now I had one princess kind of on my side, and another somewhat against me. Hmm.

Crappy.

Well, whatever. Could be worse.

A lot worse.

Then the dream seemed to shut down, almost like an old tv screen.

<:---.'.---:>

I woke up in some grass.

The sky stretched out blue in front of me. A few traces of clouds lingered near the sun. A bird passed by.

I sat up. The village was near, to my left. I was sitting on a gentle hill.

I felt the grass. It felt good. I saw a little beetle near my hand, too.

I smiled gently. How peaceful.

I saw Stormy coming at me from the village. I waited for him.

He arrived and looked down at me. "You seem to be in a good mood."

"Oh. Yes, I suppose so..."

He held out his hoof and a small, pulsating green stone morphed out into his cup. "I brought this for you."

I reached out and took the shard, savoring the feeling of it coursing through my body once again. I felt a little bit more alive. "Thanks."

He sat down next to me. "So how are you feeling?"

"Pretty good, considering what that minotaur did to me."

Stormy sighed. "You were out for about a day."

I arched my eyebrows at no one. That long?

"Why'd you ask me if your eyes were green?"

"I... don't know. I must have forgotten you can't see color."

"Regardless, why did you want to know?"

I thought for a moment. "I don't know, whenever I'm relying on that thing, I kind of feel this burning sensation in my eyes. I wanted to know if it was physical, or just mental."

"Interesting." He laid back. "You'll have to ask someone else, I guess."

I laid back once again, and we just sat there for a few moments, looking at the sky.

"You ever wonder if there's anything up there?" I asked.

"Up where?"

"The... oh."

"What?"

I sighed. "Nothing."

A few more moments before he said, "So where are we going now? The only train that comes here leaves sometime soon, I think."

I got up and brushed myself off. "Actually, we're going to go visit an evil wizard."

He scrambled up. "What?! Wh-"

"He might be able to break that death link Untergang has on us."

"He- really?"

"Yeah, let's go."

He practically bounced on his hooves, then stopped suddenly. "But what about if what you said before is true. That he might be watching us right now, somehow?"

"Hmm, you're right. But you're also wrong."

"How so?"

"Untergang needs me alive to get him the shards. He needs you alive so I can find them. What part of him killing us would help his plan along?"

"I guess it doesn't. But it does mean he could just kill us if we go rogue on him, which means-"

"That he did indeed put the death link on us to ensure our compliance," I finished. "So he really did think this through. Crap. Either we can take our chances and go for the dark wizard, relying on luck, or we can hurry on to Canterlot."

Stormy and I glanced sullenly at each other. Chances or not, I felt like the wizard was the worth the risk.
Slightly irrational, yes, but it just felt right.

"Well, let's go for the wizard."

Stormy just nodded in submission.

So we started heading North, Stormy on the lookout for a cave.

As we walked, he asked, "So we're going to visit this evil wizard who lives in a heavily guarded death cave, counting on the hope that Untergang won't just kill us for trying to escape his death link? Why, exactly, are we taking such a dangerous detour?"

"Intuition," I answered.

Stormy stopped and turned his head toward me and I could almost imagine his eye twitching inside of that mask. "Intuition? Seriously?"

I kept moving.

He caught up with me, saying, "You're crazy!"

I turned back and faced him. "Well, we could just avoid this and lose your chance to possibly be free of Untergang. That sound better to you?"

"Uh... no," he said sheepishly.

"Then let's go." And we did.

It wasn't long before we found a cave on a hillside. We had come to marshier ground, and there was plantlife everywhere. What would have been invisible to the naked eye could not hide from Stormy, and we found the opening behind some draping stuff. I didn't even know what it was, it was just green and hanging over the entrance.

On the other side of the entrance, a tunnel stretched out in front of us, with a slightly downward shift. Sunlight shone eerily through the stuff at the entrance and cast moving tongues of light on the tunnel floor. It was a big tunnel, too. Tall enough for me to walk quite comfortably and wide enough for two or three ponies two walk comfortably.

The air inside of the tunnel was cold and smelled of stone and mildew. I actually really liked the smell of mildew, so I felt a little more at ease. Stormy, on the other hand, was almost trembling in place.

I gripped one of his mask's winged horns and said, "Well, here we go."

And on we went.