Imbalanced: Legacy of Light

by Nameless Narrator

27-2: A big mistake

Magpie looked around at the mostly silent city of small tents lit by the occasional oil lamp. It was night three of his stay in Stern’s army, and several things had become clear to the griffon over yesterday.

First, none of the zebras he’d talked to during the day’s forced march north wanted to be here, not even the long-time soldiers with privileges, and neither had they known anyone who served voluntarily. That meant to his mercenary mind that there had to be only a comparatively small group of zebras in charge who actually wanted this army to keep going. Said group, however, was powerful enough to keep the rest in line. That, in itself, would be impossible with only firepower. A thousand or even ten thousand loyalists with chainguns would run out of ammo in case of a widespread uprising.

Second, fear and exhaustion were rulers of this place, and made being here a strangely peaceful experience for a city-sized army camp. By now, it seemed that most zebras were asleep or enjoying the few ways to fight off boredom in tents or around the scattered firepits. Even through the forced march of the day, the Corrupted brought in more and more newcomers with supplies, the vast majority of whom had been killed immediately to avoid being a drain on resources. That’s how the army was managing to keep going while wiping out that population of Zebrica which hadn’t managed to flee to the Northern Coalition territory in time.

And third, this army wasn’t powerful, just numerous due to the ‘forced draft’ if one could call it that. Heck, a contingent of Imperial soldiers in a decent defensive position with some Black Ops gear would probably end the whole shindig if they had enough ammo. Most of the soldiers were meat shields for anyone in charge, which also explained the overall lack of rules, drills, and anything else associated with a real army. Other than few basics of not killing others or stealing rations, not running away, and a morning exercise Magpie could barely call a warm-up, there wasn’t much to do but walk, talk, bang, or trade valuables looted from the draft victims deemed useless. Oh, and that was the big part that didn’t make sense to Magpie - there were zero rules regarding giving up gold and jewels to higher ranks. If you could beat someone up without killing or crippling them, you could take their stuff as long as it wasn’t their tent or sleeping bag, food, or gear.

A zebra soldier, wearing a white robe like pretty much everyone else, passing by in the darkness saluted Magpie.

“Anything?” the griffon returned the salute.

“Nah,” the zebra shook his head, “All quiet like usual. Hey, I don’t recall seeing you before. You new here, catbird?” he asked, examining Magpie.

“Yes, I am,” he nodded, “Still, how can you recognize anyone here anyway? This place is massive.”

“Glad you survived the ‘entrance exam’,” the zebra chuckled, “And don’t worry, you’ll get used to the life. In a lot of aspects it’s safer here than a real city.”

“Because everyone who is out of line gets shot outright?” Magpie raised an eyebrow.

“Exactly,” the zebra nodded without a pause, “Don’t give me that look, I’ve been here for about a month, newbie, and I feel like I aged thirty years. No one but those nutjobs around Stern likes the killing, but what can they do with-” he lowers his voice to a whisper, “-the unicorn around?”

“Unicorn?”

“Oh yeah, a stallion wearing a grey robe. I saw him few times just before he razed a city or a fortress with his magic. It’s crazy how powerful he is. Without him, this army would rip Stern and his guys to pieces.”

“So if someone-” the zebra jumped at Magpie with his hoof outstretched, which the griffon used to trip him up and lead his drop on the ground.

“Be quiet, you idiot!” the zebra hissed, “Don’t even think about it. I was there the last time a smartass tried to organize some resistance, and I was really happy I was stationed on the other side of the camp.”

“What happened?” Magpie offered his foreleg to help the zebra up as a gesture of peace, which the soldier took after a second of thought.

“What do you think? They grouped up everyone from that segment of the camp, several hundred soldiers, and executed them for show. One of the shamans told me later that she felt souls being ripped out from the cycle of life and tortured by the unicorn to fuel his power. I don’t want to go like that. If I have to die, and hopefully I won’t, then at least I want to rest in peace.”

“A necromancer then,” commented Magpie.

“Look, enough,” the zebra shook his head, “I was happy to have a chat with someone who isn’t asleep or fucking right now, but I see you’re more trouble than it’s worth, catbird. Good luck in your segment of the camp, I’m going back to mine so no one can connect me to you.”

“Look, I’m sorr-” Magpie sighed as the zebra paid him no further attention and left, “Well, one more point for fear it is then.”

So, the camp is separated into segments, and soldiers don’t seem to leave theirs. Is it because they aren’t allowed to, or just because it’s not particularly convenient in this huge place? No one warned me about places I wasn’t supposed to walk into.

He opted against experimenting tonight. After all, Gem might have already figured out much more than he had as a changeling. If not, there was always tomorrow, or at least there would be for the next week and a half until they would reach Northern Coalition territory.

***

Gem put a small, green pill into a pot of boiling water with bark and leaves in it set on a portable cooker powered by an energy crystal. Behind her stood a chubby zebra mare in her forties wearing a white patch with a red cross around her foreleg watching her every move.

“I’m not seeing anything other than a minor analgesic,” the mare looked at Gem, “Though I don’t know what that pill of yours was.”

“That is my secret, and I’m not sharing,” Gem smiled at her, “The important thing is that it’ll help.”

The cooker was in the only larger tent in this segment of the camp which could host ten zebras easily, and tightly wound flaps in many places looked as if it could be extended a lot further. Around the cooker lay eight zebras clutching their bellies, rolling their eyes, and groaning in pain.

“Don’t think you can fool me, little girl,” the zebra mare said, “I used to be a surgeon in Wassay central hospital. I know real treatment from simple pain relief.”

“Just wait,” Gem wasn’t bothered at all, “As soon as it turns a little green, then we can administer- aand here we go,” she smirked, grabbed a metal cup, filled it from the pot, and poured its contents into the zebra’s mouth.

The small, mature zebra mare watching her who was as close to an official medic of this segment of the camp as comeone could be walked closer. She didn’t do anything to help, though, which Gem immediately exploited to make the mare feel bad soon.

“You can help me with the others.”

“If I see real progress, I will, little girl,” the mare frowned at Gem, “Until then, you’re just bullcrapping me.”

The groaning stallion’s stomach rumbled and he froze. As seconds passed, his breathing slowed down, and he finally laid his forelegs down on the floor, letting out a sigh of relief.

“Still not persuaded?” Gem winked at the mare.

The medic didn’t answer, instead taking the zebra’s pulse, temperature, and generally poking him all over.

“Well I’ll be a dusty bag of old bones,” she nodded in appreciation, “I’ve never seen a case of this serious food poisoning go away this quickly.”

Gem and the medic joined in administering the cure to every sick zebra inside the tent.

“I travel a lot. Well, I used to before I was dragged here. You can’t believe local foods no matter where that local is. Plus, stuff goes bad often. In an hour at most, they’ll take a good dump and they’ll feel like new zebras.”

“I still don’t understand why you’d want to be a medic here,” the mare winked at Gem with a new, friendly smile, “I mean, with a body like that you could live in comfort even in this place. If you kept out of the way of Stern’s core soldiers, that is. They take whatever they want, but at least they rarely leave the center of the camp, so here on the edge we’re mostly just policing ourselves.”

“Thanks for the warning. Anyway, I’m no prude, but I just like to help, I guess. Whorsing myself...” Gem rubbed her chin, “Maybe if I see something really nice I want around here.”

The medic laughed openly along with Gem as the zebra-disguised changeling stood up to leave the infirmary tent.

“I wish I could do that at my age. But hey, use what you’ve got while you still can. And if you want to help, I can always use a skilled pair of hooves. Having one’s teeth knocked out is a daily occurence here.”

“I believe that, and thank you.”

Several minutes later, Gem found her tent, and slipped inside.

“How did it go?” asked Starry Night, having returned from his patrol earlier. It turned out that with so many soldiers everywhere, the patrols only lasted half an hour before it was someone else’s turn. A strangely convenient and sensible arrangement, as the Nightguard had to note to himself. Military wasn’t usually known for common sense.

“Exactly as planned,” Gem flashed him a confident smirk.

“I wonder why I wasn’t sick when I ate the same stew as those guys,” commented Starry Night with genuine curiosity.

“It could be you being a batpony, or the fact that I bit an antidote into you this morning,” Gem chuckled.

Starry Night rubbed his neck, feeling nothing there.

“Alright, I kissed an antidote into you while you were asleep,” Gem whistled innocently, “I mean, you are a looker.”

Starry narrowed his eyes. Gem had to admit he was pretty good at conveying meanings through facial expressions.

“I was meaning to explain things anyway once Magpie and Packy were done. Now, are you up for feeding one hungry buggo?”

***

Prominence was meditating in front ot hers and Harriet’s tent. It helped her clear her thoughts as well as bring some modicum of peace to Harriet unconsciously connected with her.

Several sets of steel greaves stopped in front of her, making her open her eyes. She didn’t have to look up, because even as she was sitting she was eye to eye with a group of zebras. It took only one look to know these soldiers weren’t the ‘drafted’ kind. Strong, scarred, with a hollow look in the eyes belonging to someone who would do anything for their own profit.

“Out of the way,” said the leader.

“What do you want?” asked Prominence. The suppressor on her horn was mostly for show. It was the weak kind through which she could burn in an instant.

“We’re here for the Corrupted.”

“Why?” asked Prominence. If she had to start trouble to protect barely stable Harriet, things could go to Tartarus really quickly.

“Examination,” he put his foreleg on Prominence’s shoulder and unceremoniously shoved her away. He was strong, too strong for his build.

Magical enhancements? He’s a zebra, so likely potions administered over long time. Gem would have a field day with him.

The soldier didn’t do anything else like kick her when she was down. He just poked his head into the tent, and Prominence said a small prayer to the sun that Harriet wouldn’t do anything violent out of sheer surprise.

“Girl, come out,” said the soldier, backed off, and joined the others spread in a half-circle around the tent. Prominence used the moment to gather herself, because the last thing she wanted was for Harriet to see her being on the ground.

Short while later, Harriet’s poked her head out, and her ears splayed back when she saw the stern-looking group.

“Come with us,” the leader ordered. When Harriet looked questioningly at Prominence, he added, “It’ll be a lot easier for all of us if you don’t resist. Though I wouldn’t mind a turn with that plot later.”

“Ahm khominngh,” Harriet shuffled through the seriously insufficient tent flaps. When she raised herself to her full height outside, Prominence snickered.

“What?” asked the leading zebra.

“Might need a stepladder for a ride on that,” Prominence couldn’t help herself. She knew it wouldn’t do no good, she just had to repay him for the shove.

To her mild surprise, the stallion didn’t pursue retribution, at least right now. She should be careful to avoid a potential ‘accident’ later, though.

Harriet grumbled, lowering her head, and obediently stepped into the group of zebras, which was enough of a sign for them that she wasn’t about to cause trouble even though they didn’t understand her. Forming a circle around her, they took the scared young mare away.

It took close to an hour before the guards led Harriet through the camp into a house-sized tent surrounded by sets of short, mobile barricades all around. Harriet was in no state of mind to make any proper observations, but even she noticed that during the whole trip the soldiers had barely spoken to each other.

The leader of the group entered the big tent, and a moment later walked out again, gesturing Harriet to go inside. She didn’t have any better idea, so she nodded and did so.

It was immediately clear that this place was special. After all, the tent house had wooden floor which someone presumably had to dismantle every morning before the daily march, and reassemble in the evening. There even was real furniture around covered by articles of clothing that weren’t the usual white robes or cloaks for long trips in direct sunlight. Three mares gorgeous by Harriet’s standards no matter how much she tried to avoid thinking of them like that, two zebras and one pegasus, were lying around an ornate armchair in the center of the tent in see-though skirts while a fourth female - a chubby, well-endowed griffoness was massaging the hooves of a zebra stallion in the armchair.

Correction, throne.

As soon as Harriet entered, the zebra flicked his hoof, making the griffoness walk off, and he stood up himself. He was tall, aside from his black stripes so light grey as to be almost white, extremely well-built, with scar and eyepatch over one eye. Giving Harriet a once-over, he approached and circled around her, running his hoof over her coat and, as expected, her backside. Even as big as he was, she was still a head taller and somewhat broader, which didn’t seem to faze him at all. In short, he wasn’t dripping or even oozing confidence, he was confidence.

“Vostoy,” said the zebra loudly, and one of the guards who had led her here entered, “How was she?”

“She made no trouble, warlord,” said Vostoy, “Although it seems that she can’t speak.”

“Oh, really?” the warlord faced Harrier again, looking her directly in the eyes, “Say, girl, can you speak?”

“Ah khn,” Harriet nodded.

“Open your mouth,” he ordered, and Harriet did so, her tentacle tongues lolling out, “Ah, I see. We’re not getting anywhere by questioning then. Vostoy?”

“From what little I know, warlord, Corrupted can regenerate from wounds fatal to any other creature. I believe that if I can get a sample from her, I can do some research even in these conditions. The Corrupted will be a threat once we enter Equestria, and it would be wise to gain some knowledge about-”

The tent flap opened and closed behind Harriet, making her slightly raised back tentacles wiggle as she felt the air move.

“No,” said a new, cold and flat voice.

“Warlord-” Vostoy objected but shut up instantly as the warlord raised his hoof.

Harriet looked at the newcomer. He was a unicorn, fit but of softer build. His mane was light blue and cut short, complimenting his much darker blue coat with long hair around his fetlocks. What captivated her, though, were his pink eyes that looked as if they glowed from the inside. Come to think of it, the effect was quite similar to Prominence’s eyes.

The unicorn’s horn flashed as he grabbed Harriet’s back tentacle with his hoof, then quickly examined her eyes and teeth after gesturing her to open her mouth.

“You won’t get any useful information from her, Stern,” he said, “No matter how big a hard-on it gives that vivisection fetishist,” he nodded to Vostoy who growled at him but didn’t dare say anything.

“Why?” warlord Stern asked calmly, “He is a trained biologist.”

“Which would be great if natural biology was how Corrupted were created. Unfortunately for you, unless you can measure the effects of divinity on cells, you won’t figure out more than I can tell you in few words. All he would do would be to make the poor girl scream and lose whatever little control she still retains.”

“Warlord!” was all Vostoy could say.

“Go cut up a pregnant soldier or something,” Stern rolled his eyes in annoyance, ignoring the objection. Vostoy stormed out of the tent, “Fine then, is the girl a threat?”

“Not unless your soldiers start having sex with her indiscriminately and get infected,” replied the unicorn, “In her case I would go with the live and let live approach. If she goes wild on her own, we will have to mob her, though.”

“Oh, can’t you deal with her?” Stern raised an eyebrow.

“Corrupted have an instinctive method of defense against magic which is… problematic for unicorns and even alicorns. I’d rather throw a bunch of soldiers at her if I had to. Saves energy.”

“So, do we treat her like a common soldier?”

The unicorn shrugged.

“Pretty much. Let her go all out in battle, and don’t overdo it with the wild sex. Tainted aren’t as infectious as everyone thinks.”

“Can you do some research on her?”

“Not in these conditions. If I had months and a proper lab, then yes. Anything invasive that might be helpful would just be torture.”

“You’ve never been averse to that before.”

“This time it would serve no purpose. I don’t mind publicly displaying mutilated and still alive dissenters, and neither do I care about wringing someone’s brain for information, but this would provide us with absolutely no benefit.”

“Still, if Corrupted are so tough, why not give Vostoy his tentacle?”

Harriet’s back tentacles fully retracted in fear.

“I’ll show you something then,” the unicorn sighed, “Girl, raise those tentacles. It’ll be quicker and much less painful than if we let that idiot experiment on you for no reason.”

Harriet whimpered, but there was something in the wizard’s voice that reassured her that he was her way out of this if not unharmed, than at least not too hurt. It was the feeling that all this was just a waste of time to him. In light of that, she focused, and willingly let the tip one back tentacle flop out.

“Knife,” said the wizard, and Stern tossed him a combat dagger from his belt.

To Harriet, it felt only like a numb prick as the floating dagger cut the tip of her tentacle off. The unicorn took it and offered it to Stern while counting down:

“-three… two… one...”

When he got to zero, the separated tip jiggled, and quickly liquified, dripping on the wooden floor, through it, and disappearing completely within seconds.

“And tell that to Vostoy so that idiot doesn’t try anything on his own. He doesn’t have a stasis generator or magic, so he has no way of storing any samples. Anything else?” asked the unicorn.

“I suppose not. Dismissed,” said Stern casually, and the wizard simply left the tent. Harriet looked at the zebra warlord who smiled at her and patted her head, “I suppose that even I have to wait until someone figures a way of protection against corruption, although that plot of yours is definitely tempting beyond all reason.”

“Fnk hoo,” Harriet assumed being polite never hurt anyone.

“Now get out, you’ve riled me up enough, and I have four girls here to take care of that,” he nodded to the tent flaps. Harriet didn’t wait for anything, and quickly shuffled out. The heavily armored guards outside didn’t pay her any attention anymore, which allowed her a peek at where the solitary unicorn wizard was walking off into the camp.

Strange, she would have expected him to live near warlord Stern’s tent.

***

Pack Rat’s job as a menial laborer was bad, no way around it. The newbies kept coming and coming with supplies, dragged here by the Corrupted, but the army wasn’t growing at the same rate, no. The majority of the newcomers were shot on the spot after the supplies they brought were taken away from them. In the evening, when the army stopped to camp for the night, the laborers had to clear away the corpses and carry the supplies to be sorted - gas, food, gear, and many more.

Pack Rat let out a sigh of relief as he finally shuffled into the tent and collapsed on a strangely soft floor. The mystery was quickly solved when the floor said:

“Phrry!”

“Oh, sorry,” Pack Rat slid off of Harriet and onto another soft something which slowly guided him to what felt like a bedroll with someone already in it, “The tent really isn’t big enough for all of us.”

“Ah chn goh aht.”

“No one’s going anywhere. It’s too late and I’d prefer not drawing attention to ourselves with a campfire,” said Gem quietly, the owner of the legs currently wrapped around Pack Rat, “How are you on the old sanity, Packy, Harriet?”

“I really need a fix to go to sleep. I can carry stuff, but moving mountains of corpses of the newcomers who don’t make the cut away from the camp isn’t something I can learn to sleep with in two days. Makes me wish the spiders from my withrawal syndrom came back,” Pack Rat chuckled, and immediately felt Gem’s mouth close around his neck. After so many days of the treatment, he didn’t mind the two pricks of her fangs at all. Of course, the kiss was always better, but he wasn’t going to complain, “I wish they at least shot everyone further away from the camp...” he muttered, feeling the usual daze set over him.

“Ahm okeh,” muttered Harriet, upon which Prominence lying next to her patted her head, “Eyh, Jhehm.”

“Yes?” Gem’s breath tickled Pack Rat’s ear when she let him go to answer Harriet.

“Ah soh d hed zhbrah ahn d uhnkhorh.”

Everyone waited for Gem’s translation.

“The head zebra and the unicorn?” asked Gem, “Warlord Stern and… the wizard.”

“So that’s where the soldiers took you? I was worried when you didn’t come back before dark, so I went to find Gem,” said Prominence.

“Duh khemp ith hoooooogh.”

“The camp is huuuuuge,” translated Gem automatically.

“They let you get close?” asked Starry Night, “A Corrupted?”

Harriet shared her experience which was translated in full by Gem again.

“Oh, a dark blue unicorn with lighter mane?” Packy said in the end, “I saw a pony like that. He was walking around the corpses with something like blue mist around him. We were told not to go near him.”

“So that’s how he’s so powerful...” Starry facehoofed, “We really would have figured it out if we had any information about how the army worked on the inside.”

“Yeah, a necromancer, but one who doesn’t waste energy on undead or on killing,” Prominence scowled into the darkness of the tent, “He just drains the souls and uses those for those insane feats of magic we heard about.”

“So he’s just some unicorn with access to massive amount of raw power from the dead the soldiers shoot? That doesn’t seem like something Celestia and Luna would have to worry about,” commented Magpie, “I don’t know anything about magic other than to punch spellcasters as quickly as I can before they turn me into a frog, though.”

“It’s a lot more complicated than that,” said Prominence, “Unfortunately, Celestia isn’t that good at magic so I’m not a specialist in any respect, but as far as I know, you can’t just kill someone and then use their soul to multiply your power. Well, you can, but it doesn’t last long, because the souls revolt and want to gain peace. Do it too much and you’ll get ripped apart by your own power. Besides, I’ve never seen a necromancer or a lich with enough power to draw in a meteor to level a fortress. There must be more to it.”

“What’s a lich?” asked Packy, conversation getting away from him.

“An undead bound into a dead body. A skeleton, usually,” explained Starry, “The most powerful version of an undead creature, because they hide their soul away from their body to prevent being hurt. Even if you destroy their bodies, they can recover easily unless the object into which they bound their soul is destroyed too.”

“He woth wahrm,” says Harriet.

“He was warm,” mumbles Gem, “Huh… liches can’t simulate life, can they?”

“You can cast an illusion doing anything, really,” Starry shrugged, “Something like a change of appearance wouldn’t be an issue for someone who can make everyone’s heads explode inside a fortified and shielded fortress.”

“I remember dealing with a lich a long time ago,” mused Gem, “and I think I recall them not being too stable to handle the power we’re talking about.”

“You’re exactly correct!” Starry smiled, “Being souls not particularly bound to a body themselves, liches aren’t great at manipulating those, sacrificing power to lose the weaknesses of a mortal body. That’s why not all necromancers opt to go that way. I think Stern’s unicorn is an extremely powerful and skilled wizard, but not a lich.”

“So we can kill him,” says Gem, “I learned the hard way that most of my skills don’t work on the undead.”

“Yeeeah, poisons of all kinds aren’t usable against those. No digestion,” Starry agreed, “But you’re a good chemist, aren’t you? Acids work great on anyone.”

“I did get the feeling that if some big part of the power structure supporting Stern disappeared, the army would tear him to pieces no matter his bodyguards. Getting rid of the wizard might be just the thing,” nodded Magpie.

“We need to find out where his tent is first, since he doesn’t live around Stern. I’ll get right on it tomorrow. Few bites and kisses here and there and we should be golden. You focus on surviving the next days’ marches as fresh as you can, and as soon as we figure out where to strike, we’ll do it. Promi, any news about Celestia?”

“Still too far, but I know she’s getting closer. She’s not in Zebrica yet, but if she isn’t on the souther coast of Equestria or on a boat, I’ll be damned,” replied Prominence.

***

It had taken three more days before everything was ready, or as ready as an undertaking of this sort could be. Killing someone who seemed like the most powerful necromancer in history wasn’t going to be anywhere near certain no matter how much time they would spend in preparation.

However, eventually they had run out of ideas to improve their position, and with a little less than a week to spare before the presumed army battle, they’d decided to go for it. In theory, the plan was simple. With the lack of information about the wizard it couldn’t contain anything specifically tailored against him. Still, they had found out that the wizard had several slave mares around him, and that soldiers had occasionally heard the noises of sex from the tent. Why was that important? Undead normally didn’t bother with corporal needs, so that was a point for the wizard being a living creature.

Part one of the plan required the most preparation. The wizard’s tent was the size of an apartment in Canterlot and situated on the eastern part of the army camp, without any guards stationed outside, and a little way away from other tents huddling together. Gem had had to figure out the routines of soldiers of that segment of the camp, repeat her trick with with the poisoned supplies to have a reason to snoop around as a medic, and to make sure that whoever was supposed to be on watch the fateful night would be a little dazed by her pheromones, hypnotic commands, and venom. It was a lot of zebras, but for someone with as much experience in non-violent means of controlling a situation, it was nothing impossible. Granted, having to do all this on her own left her with little time to mix a bigger supply of potions which might prove helpful, but encumbrance was a big deal in a battle anyway, so she wasn’t too bothered about it. On the belts crossing her chest, she had acids, smoke bombs, firebombs, hypnotic gasses, anything that could be useful in battle, and in her saddlebag rested several extremely rare potions granting invisibilty, resistance to the elements, strength, speed, and reaction times which she was saving for Starry and Magpie. Prominence, due to her nature, wasn’t overly receptive to chemicals of any sort, but she would get something as well. No metabolism of a semi-Corrupted divine being was going to outshine her alchemy, no sir.

There had been one thing Gem decided against doing, and that was transforming into someone and trying to get close to the wizard himself. She knew a decent amount about magical alarms, and while her alchemy was top notch, she was certain that whoever the unicorn was, he’d be able to at least detect some inconsistencies of her not being a pony, if not identifying her species completely. He wouldn’t be able to read her mind, that was pretty much given, but as perfect as changeling shapeshifting was in fooling creatures, it wasn’t that great at fooling magic.

As Gem led the invisible group through the night camp, she was running the situation through her head over and over, but couldn’t find anything she might have overlooked. Of course, there always was the possibility that the wizard was just so absurdly powerful that anything they could do didn’t matter, but considering that he was a mortal with needs and urges, it was unlikely. With Starry sharing all the information from classified files about the wizard’s feats of magic, it was more than possible that his power came from time to prepare complex rituals rather than reactive magic. After all, during the first months the army had always come out of nowhere and attacked first, and later everyone was shaking in their horseshoes and hoping they could hole up and survive a siege.

Repeating that to herself mostly to stop her legs from shaking, she stopped within sight of the wizard’s tent. A patrol passed the invisible group by without any sign of noticing any unusual glints of light of the imperfect invisibility potions’ effect on non-living objects. There was a limit to what she would do with metal mugs, limited amount of vials, and a portable cooker. Gem let out a sigh of relief, and gave everyone the potions she had designed for them.

Everyone had a job to do. This unfortunately wasn’t a situation where they could leave Packy or Harriet behind out of fear for their safety. The stakes were too high, as Prominence had hammered into Gem’s head until the changeling had given in. Packy was there as a meat shield, and he knew it. He was strangely okay with it, to the frown of Gem who was hoping to teach him to value his life a little more. Perhaps having him share tent with Magpie had been a bad idea. Still, she couldn’t sense any depression or suicidal vibes from Packy anymore, it was just the grim determination of someone knowing what his part was and willing to play it. Who was the most surprising was Harriet, whose state of mind shifted drastically for the better ever since they’d started plotting someting concrete. When she had something real to focus on, she was…

...well, still a girl who got caught in things far beyond her, but now one with a body capable of tearing through a vault door, and someone to try it out on.

Taking a deep breath, she looked at invisible Magpie whose love aura she could easily sense just like everyone else’s. The tent flaps were motionless, and she couldn’t hear anything from the inside. The wizard was likely asleep, a state of affairs she knew wouldn’t last long.

“Ladies first,” she whispered and nodded at him.

Magpie pulled out the mace from his belt, and adjusted the kite shield on his other foreleg. He didn’t scream to intimidate any potential opponents, he just entered.

There was a zebra slave mare asleep in front of a lit heater by the left wall, and they had clear view of the unicorn sleeping in a bed on the opposite side of the tent. Tiphoofing, tippawing, tipclawing, and tiptaloning forward, they got halfway through the tent when its walls and floor flew off into the distance, revealing the group standing on black marble inside what could be one of those ancient romane temples, just a square floor and a roof held by numerous pillars along its edge. A quick look outside revealed something along the lines of skyscrapers of any griffon city although shattered, ruined, or sticking from the ground in very unstable angles.

The bed or the slave mare were nowhere to be found, and the dark blue unicorn was standing in front of them, watching them with his pink, glowing eyes.

Gem looked down, quickly realizing she was in her real changeling form and completely visible like all the others. Creating a pocket dimension instantly wasn’t a good sign at all.

“Took you long enough,” said the unicorn, and tens of millions of murdered and enslaved souls swarmed around the edges of the temple like microscopic blue fireflies.

Comments

[Two_Madmans]

“Took you long enough,” said the unicorn, and tens of millions of murdered and enslaved souls swarmed around the edges of the temple like microscopic blue fireflies.

So, he is alicorn of death now? Because... you nkow... it looks familiar. But I can understand his motivation right now.
Heck, I'm saying like I'm getting other's motivations...