Chapter 5: The Asylum and The God
The walk up into the foothills of the temple mountains was a long and quiet endeavor, none of the three mares talking. Wiser individuals would have used that walk to devise a plan, but these three were too focused on the task to think ahead. They had a nihilistic, self-hating, and possibly suicidal prince to save after all!
The further they got into the mountains, and the closer they got to the Asylum, the more... disturbing the ground around them got, and not in the way one would think. The grass closer to the mountains slowly and progressively got greener, and the woods gradually got less overgrown and calmer. Dead yellow shrubbery was replaced by well-trimmed hedges and gardens, and ill kept gravel paths turned to cobblestone roads.
The feeling of unnaturalness compounded when they finally laid eyes on the Asylum itself. It was a large building, surrounded in the middle of a large compound with flagstone paths leading through a clearing surrounded by stone brick walls. The building looked somewhat like a hacienda, with barred windows and castle-like towers at its four corners. An arched roof sat on the top of the building, with a statue of a deer with a hoof slightly raised and head held high at the top of the arch. The only sign of life inside the compound they saw were a pair of pure white birds perched on top of the antlers of the statue, and a couple of neatly trimmed trees along the central walkway into the building.
Twilight grimaced when she saw the only entrance to the compound was a metal gate that loosely hung open, swinging this way and that in the wind.
"W... why isn't any of it run down?" Applejack asked after a moment, a notable tone of discomfort in her voice. The two ponies turned to her in quiet agreement.
"Look at that..." Rainbow mumbled, pointing at the front entrance of the asylum. Twilight and Applejack both followed the tip of her hoof toward the set of double doors, both of which loosely hung open like the gate before it. That however wasn't what Rainbow was pointing at. It was the cyrillic-like letters that formed into scripts carved into the walls, floors, and roof of the inside of the building.
From this distance, it was completely impossible to make out what they read, or even what the letters looked like. The only reason they could see them at all was because of the pure density of it all. The words formed into spiral-like patterns that snaked across the walls, floors and ceilings of the inside of the entry hallway of the building, some of it even spilling out to cover the exterior of the building and the flagstones of the fenced-off clearing outside.
Twilight grimaced slightly, reaching into her backpack to pull out her binoculars. Sure enough, when she looked through the barred windows, the walls, floors, and ceilings of those rooms were similarly covered in the writing. She shivered slightly. In some way, she was glad she couldn't understand the cervine language because she had no doubt in her mind that what was written on those walls would be disturbing, to say the least.
Her scan with her binoculars also revealed something else beyond the writing. There wasn't a single deer inside that compound. And even then, everything was perfectly unnaturally clean.
Twilight gulped, handing her binoculars over to Rainbow before turning over to Applejack.
"I'm going to be honest girls," she started, gritting her teeth. "I'm usually a realist about these kinds of things, but I think Buckley wasn't lying. This place might really be cursed."
"How do you figure?" Rainbow said, a very distinct frown coming to her face as she looked the building over this way and that. "There's definitely going to be a lot of ghosts in there."
Twilight merely shook her head, dropping her backpack as she marched toward the front gate. "Come on girls, we have a prince to save."
Rainbow and Applejack both nodded doing the same as they followed after their friend.
A part of Twilight wished that, when they reached the front desk of the Asylum's entrance, they would've found a deer sitting on the other side, who happily explained that really the Asylum was just where a small commune of deer who hadn't embraced the philosophy of the rest were living. A small group of productive and happy cervines among a sea of misery. Instead, all they found was an empty room, covered top to bottom in that same writing. Not even the furniture and paintings lining the walls were spared.
Rainbow shivered as she looked around the room, she almost felt like she was being watched. "Yep, definitely ghosts."
"Shush," Applejack said, frowning deeply. "We're trying to be productive here."
The cowpony turned toward Twilight as Rainbow let out a huff. The alicorn was in the middle of the room, looking over the writing. "Any idea what all this means sugarcube?"
"Not much," Twilight sighed. "Cervus uses a completely different alphabet to Equestria, making translation much more difficult than it should be, especially because there was never really an ancient Equestrian-Cervine Rosetta Stone translation thanks to their isolation, I'm kind of in the dark. If we didn't have a time limit here, I'd go back to grab Buckley to translate for us."
That's when Rainbow suddenly pipped in. "Well, I have read about some of this kind of thing in Daring Doo books. You know, the whole ancient translation thing. She always figures it out in the end by looking for patterns and stuff like that."
Applejack and Twilight both stared blankly at the pegasus for a second.
"What?" Rainbow grumbled, a frown coming to her face. "Daring Doo's an archeologist remember?"
Twilight shook her head, turning towards the walls. "Well, I suppose that narrows it down slightly. But... Hmmm... That's odd." Twilight closed the distance to the surface, running a hoof along the stonework. "See here. It looks like a period, but it's at the start of this sentence. And again over here."
"Same over here," Applejack said as she looked over another wall. She pursed her lips slightly. "This doesn't seem too helpful."
Twilight nodded slightly, as she mumbled to herself. "We are definitely missing something."
Rainbow Dash let out a groan, looking up at the ceiling. "So, on top of being annoying debby downers, Deer also read everything backward. Great."
Twilight's eyes instantly widened.
"That's it!" Twilight cried, straightening up.
Rainbow and Applejack instantly both turned to look at her as she started tracing one of the spiraling lines of text on the wall. "The Deer must write and read from right to left, rather than left to write as we Equestrians do. That means that, if Forester actually wanted to read what these walls said, he'd probably follow them all the way to where they started. That's where we should start our search."
The three ponies nodded before they took off deeper into the asylum, following the writing on the wall.
"Sweet Celestia..." Twilight whimpered. They had found the origin of the writing, a small padded cell at the very back of the asylum. All of the writing originated from a single circular spiral of words in the center of the cell, and laying just outside of the circle, with a withered away unicorn horn in clasped in one of his hooves, was the truly ancient skeleton of Prince Weald, a silver circle wrapped around his head.
But he wasn't the only skeleton in the room. There were others along the walls, dozens of them. Maybe even hundreds. Deer of all shapes and sizes were all huddled together against the walls of the room, all of them staring at the circle. The three ponies' mouths were all hanging open in shock. Twilight's shock only grew when she noticed something horrifying. Not all of the skeletons were the same age.
All of them were younger than Weald's skeleton, but the youngest one only looked to be a couple of decades old! The wrongness of the asylum all suddenly started coming down on their heads. This place was definitely haunted! Haunted by ghosts who had killed all the deer in this room and were probably going to come for them next!
Just then they heard a sound that made all of them sequel in horror. Breathing. Very light breathing. Twilight quickly turned her head this way and that. Her eyes locked then on Forester, huddled against the wall amongst the skeletons, staring blankly into the middle of the circle.
Rainbow and Applejack noticed him too, quickly rushing towards him. "Prince Forester! We need to get you out now! Before whatever did this comes for you too!" Rainbow Dash cried in a panic as she tried to pick the deer up. He was light, easy to throw around, but there was something off.
Rainbow Dash and Applejack locked as the cowpony came to her aid in carrying the small prince. He was completely limp. Just mumbling over and over to himself. Sure he didn't move to stop either of them, but that was because he wasn't moving. Period.
Rainbow and Applejack came to a stop, looking between Forester and Twilight several times. Twilight frowned as she turned to the circle, then the unicorn horn, then back to Forester.
"Forester. What is this place." She asked, gesturing for Rainbow and Applejack to put the Prince down. Just being in this room made her horn hurt, and it didn't take a genius to know it was because of magic of some kind. Magic that deer shouldn't have. She had to know why, and something told her Forester had some kind of idea.
The two ponies acquiesced, setting him in a sitting position, though they both had to intervene to prevent him from just plopping over onto the ground.
"Forester!" Twilight asked again. She spread her wings and straightened her back, her eyes narrowing as she did. Forester slowly raised his head, locking eyes with her. Instantly her bravado died as the two stared at one another. Forester's eyes weren't sad. They weren't angry. They weren't ringed with tired bags. They were just... broken.
"After the palace, I came to the asylum. Stupid, yeah. Just wanted to see Weald," His voice was quiet. "Thought I knew how he felt being upstaged by ponies. Wanted to think about what to do."
"Yeah, you abandoned your subjects, and we messed everything up in the palace," Rainbow said, her frown deepening. "We all made mistakes. Let's just get you back to the palace and talk things over and figure out a way to fix this together, alright?"
Twilight nodded in agreement with Rainbow, even as her eyes were drawn to Weald's skeleton again. She grimaced when her eyes locked on the horn again. Then a dry chuckle emanated from Forester's throat. All three of the ponies' visions shot to Forester. A hollow, slightly mad smile on his face even as tears started building up in his eyes.
"Why? It's too late for that. It's been too late for a thousand years," Forester said, his voice shaky and empty.
"Forester," Twilight said in a gentle but firm voice. "What is this room?"
"I told you, it's Weald's room," Forester said, tears started pouring down his cheeks now. "After he m-met your princesses, Weald went insane and was locked in this room."
"Yes we know that Sugarcube but-" Applejack said, a frown deepening on her face. She was interrupted.
"He burned all the books and destroyed our r-religion and culture. B-but he wanted to know the truth. He wanted to know why we deer existed. Why we, a pathetic and inferior race with nothing to our names, were even created in the first place. So he used the magic in a unicorn's horn to create a ritual circle to tell him the truth. It took him years until he d-d-did..."
Forester trailed off before he suddenly let out a sudden whimper, bringing his hooves to cover his eyes with a sob. "It's true! It was all true! But in the worst way possible!"
Rainbow and Applejack's eyes widened as Forester suddenly fell onto his side, letting out a primal scream as he did. Twilight merely growled walking towards the deer.
Both of the other ponies opened their mouths to tell her to stop, but before they could, she merely walked past the deer to the edge of the circle. Without a second of reservation, she slammed a hoof down in the center of the spiral.
There was a pause before a sudden flash of light blue and white energy shot out of the center of the room, the unmistakable glow of magic filled the air around them. There was a massive hiss as the all-black silhouette of a deer started to form in the circle, pulling himself out of the ground as if he was trapped in the very stone bricks that made the floor. There was a growl that made all three of the ponies flinch as the silhouette slowly turned towards them, staring them down with a pair of all-white eyes.
"I already told you what you wanted to know! Now leave me to my WORK!" The silhouette roared in an unmistakenly masculine voice, causing the room to shake and the skeletons to rattle. Then the silhouette and Twilight locked eyes. The two all-white pools of energy widened for a moment before there was a boom and a flash, which made all three of the ponies look away for a moment. When they looked back, the silhouette was gone, and standing in it's place was the unmistakable form of a simple deer.
"Oh! My mistake! I didn't realize an alicorn of all ponies summoned me instead of one of my normal petitioners!" the deer cried, giving a slight bow. "Curanos, antlered god at your service! A pleasure to make your acquaintance!"
The three ponies were completely speechless.
"Y... you're the deer's god," Rainbow said, her mouth agape. "And you're real!"
"Yep, real as can be!" Curanos said with a nod. "What, do you think those losers outside just suddenly popped into existence one day?"
Twilight grit her teeth. "Losers?"
"And you never once told your creatures that? They've gone the past thousand years thinking they were inferior to us ponies, when they've had a god this entire time!" Applejack suddenly cried a sneer forming on her lips. Curanos stared at her with a raised eyebrow.
"Uh yeah, that seems about right," he said with a shrug. "Though to be honest, I think it's been more like a thousand and five years or something like that. Honestly, I've lost track of time, I've had some really important business I've been dealing with in the meantime."
"Important business? What could be more important than tending to your own creations?" Twilight hissed, her frown deepening.
"Oh, really important stuff actually!" Curanos said with a smile. "Believe it or not, but I've been working my way into getting into Equestria's pantheon."
Instantly all three of the ponies' jaws dropped. Their eyes widened and their breaths caught in their throats.
"W... what?" Twilight asked, her breathing uneven.
Rainbow Dash blinked twice, turning her gaze towards Forester. The deer was silent, staring away from his god at the wall. No doubt this was his second time hearing this.
"Oh yeah," Curanos sighed, nodding slightly. "It's actually been pretty hard actually, all things considered. You ponies seem really resistant to change, but I think I've done a good job so far. I got a couple of isolated tribes in Equestria's south worshipping me. I think in a couple centuries I might end up going mainstream in the south, then it's smooth sailing from there."
Rainbow Dash bit down, gritting her teeth.
"Why in the hay would you want to be in Equestria's pantheon when you have the deer?!" Applejack cried, narrowing her eyes at the god.
Curanos went silent for a second, then he let out a sigh. "Fine, I'll be honest with you. I did sort of... completely abandon Cervus. But I had good reason."
Rainbow Dash's breathing suddenly became uneven.
"What could possibly be a good reason?" Twilight cried, stomping towards him slightly.
"Did you even see the deer?! They suck! I swear, I messed up every step of the way making them," Curanos cried, throwing his hooves up in the air and turning away from them.
Slight tremors were running up and down Rainbow's legs now.
"I swear, I do all this stuff for them to make them cool. I give them a massive ring of mountains that keeps them safe from all bad guys, I give them, like, the perfect geography to make a cool kingdom, and they ruin everything. I mean, sure, the Temple Mountains I made did end up blocking all magic on the planet from reaching them rendering them magically sterile but is that all my fault? No!"
Rainbow stared down at her hooves, her entire body was shaking.
"I think I just coddled them too much early on. Made them into total wiiiiimps! So one day when I saw those two alicorn sisters pop up, I realized, yeah they were a lost cause at this point so I just moved on from the broken toys to get new ones, ya know? I mean, it's been hard but I'm definitely getting there. It really does suck that Weald made this summoning circle though, cause I can't really do anything to get rid of it. Now every couple of decades some rando deer shows up asking 'why I disappeared' or 'why won't I tell them that I exist' or stuff like that. I always tell them the truth, but man they are so weak-willed that when I do they get all bummed out and just sit against the wall until they-"
"SHUT UP!" Rainbow Dash suddenly screamed, spinning around to stare Curanos dead in the eyes. The god's eyes widened for a minute, and so did Twilight and Applejack's.
Curanos took a step back as Rainbow Dash stomped towards him. "What, you think that just because we have a little magic, we ponies are just the best race in the universe? Did you ever see what happened to us when our magic got taken away? Cause it happened to us twice!"
Twilight's shock at Rainbow Dash's outburst quickly turned to indignation. She joined her pegasus friend's side. "Rainbow's right! Magic is a crutch! All my life I've used magic for everything, to the point that when I had it taken away from me by Starlight, I couldn't do anything! Anything at all! And here these deer managed to create some of the most wonderful architecture I've ever seen in my life, architecture that managed to last untold millennia without any kind of maintenance, all without the slightest hint of magic."
Forester's eyes widened slightly at that. Slowly the Deer sat up, turning to look at the three ponies over his shoulder.
"Architecture? You saw ruins! Plus, have you seen Canterlot? You have gold on the walls!" Curanos snarled, frowning. He was pushed further back by Applejack suddenly prodding him in the chest.
"So what? Just because we accomplished something, through magic mind you-" The cowpony started before Rainbow joined in;
"Which is basically cheating!"
"-doesn't mean that the Deer's own accomplishments are meaningless, no matter what they say!"
Curanos merely frowned in response, his eye twitching slightly. "W-well maybe I want to be worshipped by a race with magic instead of the normal losers who can't do anything when a Draconeques shows up! Or an evil king made of shadows comes to enslave them! I deserve that much!"
"Deserve?" Twilight said, eyes narrowing at the god. "If you can't even see the accomplishments of your own deer, then you don't deserve them, let alone anypony else."
Curanos was quiet for a moment before he smirked. He gave a shrug as his body started to turn back to energy. "Yeah sure, keep telling yourself that. I'm sure they'll be so happy about a pony 'fixing' them huh? They're your problem now." And with a roll of his eyes, Curanos disappeared, leaving the ponies back in an empty room, with only skeletons and Forester to keep them company.
Twilight's eye twitched for a second before she huffed. "That jerk had better look for a different 'magical race' to trick into worshipping him. So long as I'm an alicorn I'll make sure no pony even knows his name."
Applejack let out a curt sigh. The pony shook her head. "Even still, it feels like we didn't accomplish anything here."
"D... Did you really mean that?" They heard from behind them suddenly. The three mares quickly spun around. Forester had sat up, and was now staring at them wide-eyed, his jaw open as he quietly breathed from his mouth in slight shock. "About magic being a crutch? And..." He trailed off.
"Yeah, magic is a crutch. Trust us, we've lost it a bunch of times, and every time it just leaves us completely useless. Some of us more than others but, eh what are you gonna do," Rainbow chuckled to herself shrugging in the air."I mean, Applejack here could barely stand up when Tirek took her magic."
"And... and if we can make a society half as good as Equestria without using magic at all..." The deer looked down at his hooves, slowly processing the information.
"I guess..." Twilight started with a smile as she bent down next to the deer. "I guess that'd mean you deer are way better than we could ever be."
Slowly Forester turned his gaze upwards, and the prince and princess locked eyes for a moment. Then, slowly, a smile split across the deer's face.
The walk back down the temple mountains was rather pleasant for the three mares all things considered. Especially because of the noticeable improvement in Forester's mood. The stag was practically prancing down the hills, his head held high and a smile on his face. The three ponies, even with all of their magical strength, teleportation and flight, found it rather difficult to keep track of the deer as long-lost enthusiasm filled him to the brink of bursting.
When they finally crested the last of Temple Mountain's foothills, they locked eyes on an extremely curious sight. Outside of the gates of Bratistag was a large group of deer, who all seemed to be rushing in the direction of the asylum. On closer inspection, Twilight realized that it was the Palace Guards, with Buckley of all stags at their head!
Their pace only quickened when they saw Forester, and it wasn't long until the four of them were swarmed by dozens of cervines. The frantic voices of stags and does alike filled the ears of the three mares as they jostled against one another to get closer to their prince.
"My prince! Are you alright?!" One of them cried.
"Did the ponies hurt you at all sir?" Another said.
Forester stopped all the voices at once when he raised his hoof, and they all went silent as he took a deep inhale.
"I went to the Asylum of Weald," he started his speech as his countenance became grim for a moment. "Curanos, the god Weald claimed was a lie, is real. And he hates us. He thinks we are worse than ponies in every way. In fact, he told me to my face that he was trying to get them to worship him instead."
The eyes of every single deer grew wide at once. They all stared at their prince as if he had two heads. The ponies watched with a growing sense of unease as the faces of the deer around them turned from fear and worry back to their normal nihilistic depression. The sense that they hadn't accomplished anything at all filled them for a moment, but those thoughts were put to rest when Forester straightened his back and raised his head above his people.
"But so what?!" He cried, and instantly the guards straightened up as well, surprise filling their faces. "So he likes ponies better, have you guys seen the ponies behind us? I mean, they are incompetent idiots who thought that they could make us feel better about ourselves by beating us up!"
Rainbow grimaced and Applejack looked down at her hooves sheepishly. Twilight for her part could only manage a very very weak chuckle.
"And so what if they have magic? Just think for a second what happens to them when that magic is taken away? When you base your entire country exclusively on being as magical as possible, what do you think would happen if you can't do it anymore?" Forester asked, staring his guards down. He grew silent, waiting for one of his subjects to answer as dawning looks of realization covered their normally doom-driven faces.
"Everything falls apart!" Buckley cried, pushing through the crowd.
Forester pointed at Buckley with a grin, nodding as he did. "Right!"
Forester took in a deep breath a smile slowly spreading across his lips. "Our ancient ancestors managed to create a society almost as great as the ponies' and they did it without any magic at all. And that means so can we! And we will have done it without cheating like the Equestrians did."
A cheer suddenly broke out from the deer guards as Buckley pushed further through the crowd towards the prince, as Forester looked this way and that, his spirit rising alongside his subject's.
"And I think our first step, sire, is you putting this back on," Buckley said, as he held up the silver circlet. There was still a noticeable crack running through it where Forester had broken it, but the two halves had been reglued together, either by the elder stag or one of his stags.
Forester's eyes widened, and he hesitated for a moment. Then he took a deep breath in, and then grabbed the circlet with two hooves. He stared up at it as he raised it above his head, then slowly started to set it down on his head.
The wonderful instant was ruined when the circlet got caught in his antlers. The happy deers went silent for a moment as all eyes were on the Prince as he struggled to guide the silver circle through his branching horns. Then, after about a minute of struggling, he finally got it on properly.
A sense of pride filled Forester from head to hooves, as for the first time in his life, he felt proud wearing the crown of his ancestors.
"Now then," he said, raising his head with a smile. "I think it's time we spread the news and get this kingdom fixed up."
The deer guards shot up in unison and gave their prince a long salute. Then they turned and began marching in the direction of Bratistag. Buckley turned to the three mares, and gave them a curt smirk and a nod, before he too followed after them.
Rainbow and Applejack both looked down at their cutie marks as they both started to glow, signifying the end of their current mission. Their alicorn friend, however, had a different response.
Twilight raised her head and stepped forwards, approaching the stag. "I would like to offer you help in the reconstruction of your kingdom, Prince Forester. As a potential future ally of Equestria, it seems only right." She said with a regal nod.
"No thanks Princess," Forester said, returning the nod. "I think it'd be best if we did this ourselves."
And with a quick hoof shake, the two monarchs turned and went their separate ways. Forester walked towards Bratistag as Twilight, Rainbow and Applejack turned in the direction of the Gate of Weald.
"You know, all in all, that wasn't so bad of an adventure," Rainbow said with a smile as the sun started to set behind them.
"Well, it didn't start out that way." Applejack chuckled.
"Whoof... that's for sure." Twilight sighed, shaking her head with a grimace. "Still, I think I can safely say, my first ever real friendship mission was a success."
Applejack tipped her hat at Twilight, before she threw a look over her shoulder at Bratistag, the light of the setting sun bathing the white, but dusty, stone buildings in a beautiful light. "Still, do you think that's the last we're ever gonna see of Cervus?"
Twilight shook her head. "Maybe. Depends on Forester I guess. Who knows. One day we open a school or something and invite a deer as a student."
"Hah!" Rainbow Dash laughed. "Yeah, right, like we're ever gonna open a school."
And with that, the three ponies settled into small talk as they started their long journey home to Ponyville.
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Quite a good end overall. F that a-hole gOd. And yeah, the magic does seem to be a major crutch (,sometimes even a 'console-command' level cheat depending on the story,) for Equestria when one really thinks it over.
Kinda wish to see how things go in this verse? But a good tale nonetheless. Keep it up.
And so, after 2 years it has finally concluded, was pretty decent though.
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media.discordapp.net/attachments/788898533951406109/791037749931147334/Crying_Deer.png
Great fic. Best fic ever. 10/10. Literally perfect. You're the best, deer. <3
It was a good one to read. That Higher power guy eminded me of a teenager. I hope to see more from you to read.