Fated

by dragenfire68

reeling (chp. revisited)

Everyone got settled around the cutie map, with the jester sitting on a seat and after the little stunt rainbow dash pulled, the jester simply kept drinking gold liquid from his goblet, which until now no one noticed that the mask somehow was part of his face, that let him drink from the goblet unrestricted.

"I Apologize for rainbow's actions again," Twilight said.

"not the worst thing I've ever felt, hell where I'm from that would have been a low-level dungeon," the jester said, waving hand while putting his feet on the cutie mark map.

"Low-level dungeon?" twilight questioned.

"Look at this medal, notice that it has a ruby in the center, cast in gold, it's a medal that I got from completing certain difficulties of dungeons, this is the highest I could earn, also known as a champion medal," The jester said, pulling the medal from a hidden pocket, causing all the mares to look at it.

"Oh it's so pretty, where did you get it," Rarity cooed.

"I can't tell you that," the jester said, causing everyone to groan.

"Why won't you tell us anything," Twilight asked.

"Because where I'm from, knowledge is a dangerous thing," the jester said.

"It can't be all that dangerous if you're here with us," Applejack said, the constant dodging of questions grating on her nerves.

"You could never handle what I saw, it would cripple your minds," the jester said.

"you're pretty sane for seeing what you saw, so show us."

"Fine, you want to see what my world is like, then get a load of this," the jester said turning and pulling off the mask, revealing his ghastly visage, one that would burn its image into their minds for a long time, one bloodshot eye peering out from his ruined face, the other side scarred by heavy acid damage, its eye completely gone, and finally a huge chunk of his lower jaw is missing, causing the entire room screaming, except blueblood, until the mask was fastened back around his face.

"WH-WH-WHAT," Twilight gasped, trying to push the image out of her mind.

"Heh, thought you would get a kick out of it, do you still want to know more, what stitched my face back together, what fused my broken bones back together," the jester asked.

"I think that we need a respite, we meet back here in an hour," Twilight shakily said, not wanting to look at the jester's masked face, meanwhile Fluttershy and Rarity had fainted while The rest simply looked horrified, Twilight collected them while the jester simply looked at the ceiling, while blueblood studied the jester.

"That was a mean thing you did," Blueblood said.

"acting like what I've gone through is nothing, especially since I've lost good friends, down in the dark," the jester growled.

"I lost good friends too, but that will scar them for a long time."

"ah yes, I can see it, that is just an illusion, you're a lot older then you let on."

"how?"

"I may have only one eye, but even I can see an illusion."

Unbeknownst to them, Twilight had sunken back from the door, eavesdropping on their conversation, she waited with bated breath as Blueblood asked another question.

"What did you see to be able to catch an illusion this complex?"

The jester waited, before answering, "Our little eavesdropper will have to come out from behind the shadows, isn't that right Twilight?"

Twilight gasped, before coming out from behind the doorway, with Blueblood raising an eyebrow.

"you want to see it too, your curiosity is insatiable, even after witnessing my visage."

"I... Yes, I do, please show me," Twilight stammered.

The jester simply sighed and brought out the cup, before pressing the cup to his mask and whispering something to it, then pulling a knife from another hidden pocket, he cuts a finger, spilling blood into the cup.

"What did you say," Twilight asked.

"Shh, just watch," the jester said as he then spilled the cup onto the cutie map, which caused Twilight to almost start hissing at him, but she stopped when the map flickered, then a squalor hamlet appeared before zooming in, and then a first-person view.

"Are you ready for this, because if your not, then stay behind," A large grisled man said, his one good eye looking down at the past jester.

"I've fought this battle before, I know what we're getting into, besides you need me if we're bringing Dante," The younger sounding jester quipped.

"I can't believe you talked me into letting him come with, that thing has no place near a hand of God," a soft-spoken woman complained.

"Last I checked vestal vyan, I come with because I can deal with the beasts down below, none have yet stood against me and won," Dante, the chain wrapped man said.

Vyan merely snorted, after outfitting herself with a book and a bloody bag, next came the grisled man, who had a shiny cerulean shield, and a flag, next came Dante, who was wrapped in skulled locks and spiked chains, with another spiked chain wrapped around him, all covered in a stained and patched cloak, then finally the jester, all he took was a tambourine that had a sort of translucency and the cup, they bought all the necessary stuff, antitoxins, bandages, a lot of food and torches, many many torches.

"Dante, that's the name of your friend," Twilight asked.

"yes, this is us after we had been with each other for at least a few battles against the boss monsters," the jester said.

Finally, they arrived at the fetid and rotten entrance to the warrens, the congealed and bloody mud squelched as they took one final breath, lit the torch and went in, the darkness around them swallowing the light, they made it deep into the passage before the sounds of snorting and squealing got louder and then they were upon them, Twilight thought that the jester's ruined face was nightmare fuel, but these things were nightmares made flesh, the grotesque clothes they wore and malformed faces, the expressions of agony etched on the stretched human skins they wore.

"what are those THINGS," Twilight gasped.

"A sub-race of human/pigs that were spawned by the ancestor's blood rituals, he would summon demons and monsters from beyond the veil into the dead carcass of pigs, and when he ran out of pig flesh, he would put them in the fresh dead humans, and well look at the results," the jester said as the first round of assaults were underway.

The jester went first, a devastating slash from the gleaming sickle causing a deep bleed on an armored pig, meanwhile, a malformed pig at the back vomited with force, a congealed glob of festering flesh and bone, but its aim was off and missed the vestal at the back, which was then responded to with a crushing mace bash, collapsing its head, and then came the growling, a deep guttural sound, all eyes turned onto abomination, which upon transforming broke through the chains and cast off the cloak, before snapping down on the beefier one in the front, killing it instantly, the party now cut down to two from four.

"What is that, why did Dante transform like that," Twilight asked, while blueblood simply kept watching.

"Fed poison in a dungeon-keep, while tortured until he broke, I doubt even he knows for how long, but eventually they managed to create that," The jester answered grimly.

The remaining monsters were slain with brutal efficiency before they kept going and every couple of steps a brutal trap was either disarmed or triggered and took a chunk out of the unfortunate victim, Dante, and the jester seemed to know their traps, but the Vestal, she couldn't seem to handle the finicky triggers, which forced her to continually heal herself every fight, the shock value of the pigman losing its luster the more times until it was no longer fear-inducing, finally they reached the room before the boss, where they lit their final fire.

"You took some nasty hits from the traps, I see God's not in your corner," Dante quipped at the vestal.

"quiet thing, God's always watching me, I stand at his side while beings like you rot in hell," Vyan shot back with venom

this caused the jester to laugh, which got the attention of Twilight and Blueblood, the jester leaned forward and whispered to the cup, the memory stopped while the jester turned his eyes towards Blueblood and Twilight.

"I take it that Hell is the name your people have instead of Tartarus," Twilight asked.

"If its the place where the wicked are locked for all eternity, then you are correct, and the vestal here is a fanatical follower of God, it's advisory, the side of light and purity," The jester said

"Like Celestia, who guides the sun and watches over us during the day, and Luna, who watches over our dreams and protects us from the things in the dark," Twilight said

"They are a diarchy then, ruling together as equals," the jester said.

"How did you come to that conclusion, we said nothing of their nobility," Blueblood piped up.

"This may come as a shock to you, but currently, my God is talking to Celestia, since our minds are connected, anything I know she knows, and vice versa," the jester said.

Twilight's eyes gleamed with more questions, and Blueblood watched him with a more restrained curiosity, but the jester gestured to the frozen memory, another whisper and the memory resumed, and they walked into the blood-soaked room, where there was the shivering, squealing, and squelching mass of flesh and from it a thing so grotesque that it made even the stoic Blueblood looked disturbed while poor Twilight was frozen in both fear and revulsion.