Sunburst and the Shadow Pony 2

by Miner

A missing pony

It’s the next day. I got an idea of what the artifacts we found do. According to one of the books, I equip the Cloak of Moonlight Shadow. It says that the seen will be like shadows. I think it means that I can change into a shadow. But I have no idea how to do that. Maybe it only works at night? But if that was the case, why was it brown? With the name Moonlight Shadows, I was hoping for something shiny or silver light for its namesake. Maybe somepony forgot to clean it before I got it.

As for Melody, she found Luna’s eye. It says that the shadows will become like the day. Wasn’t sure what it meant until we got out of the cave. On our way back, Melody asked why it was day already. To which I told her it was still night. It turns out that Luna’s eye allowed her to see in the dark as if it were day.

The other book was a surprise. It has a detailed list of other vaults with artifacts and their location. It will take some time to find them, but the question is should we find them? After all, our original goal is to find King Sombra’s resting place and release him from his prison. I can look for the other artifacts later.

My train of thought was cut short when a hyperactive filly jumped next to me, “Hi, Sunburst!”

“AH!” I jump and land next to my bed and… and… what happened? I felt like I teleported, but I couldn’t cast that spell. Sure, I know the rules and principles behind it, but I was never able to do one before. I feel fine, but what happened? Looking around, I can see something is very wrong. Everything looks distorted like the world has lost its color, and I can hear a constant wind blowing in my ears. I can see Melody looking around for me and calling out to me. But she sounds so far away; however, she is only two feet away from me.

Remembering my cloak, I look at my back to see that my cloak is covered in dark shadows and starlight like the night sky. “And the seen will be like shadows. It must be the cloak of Moonlight Shadow doing.” Taking this moment to test its abilities, I moved around Melody and touched her shoulder a few times. She could feel me, but she could not see or hear me. “What a fantastic artifact. It must have activated when I panic earlier. If that is the case, it must react to the user’s state of mind, or certain conditions were meant.” Focusing, I thought of being able to be seen again, and then the blowing wind stopped.

The moment the wind stopped, I got the wind knocked out of me, courtesy of Melody tackling me, “Sunburst!”

“Melody, ow.” I rub the top of her head as she looks up at me,

“I thought something terrible happened to you.”

“It’s ok. Your little jump scare inadvertently activated mine, turning me invisible.”

She breaks the hug taking in what I said, “Oh, so that is why I could see you?” I nodded,

“Melody, could you tell me exactly what happened when I disappeared?”

She touches her chin, looking up in thought, “Well. You screamed like a filly,”

“No, I didn’t,” I grumble to myself,

“And jumped next to the bed,” She demonstrated by jumping next to the bed and then hiding under it, calling out, “And then you weren’t there.”

“I want to run a few tests with my artifact to find its limitation. It might come in handy later.”

After some trial and error, I found that my cloak lets me go invisible indefinitely. However, I can only hide when no pony is looking at me. And I had to touch another shadow that was not mine for it to work. Any sound I would typically make is muffled to a whisper, and only I can make myself visible again. I know because I had Melody blast me with some magic to see if it disengages the invisibility. I can painfully say that it can’t. In hindsight having a filly with the power of a powerful unicorn blasting me with magic wasn’t the best idea I ever had.

It took me an hour to calm down Melody when I didn’t say anything for a few minutes after getting knocked into next week. Why does dealing with a filly have to be so complicated? I may have a more muscular body now, but muscles can’t fix everything. I am going to need to find a book or something to help with how to take care of foals.

Moving on, I still can’t believe how powerful these artifacts are. I can see why the ponies of old didn’t want just any pony to get their hooves on them. Makes me wonder how they made this, to begin with. But enough of that. With the moonlight shadows with me, I can now enter the Crystal Empire, and no pony will know I was there. Only one problem. I can’t take Melody with me. The cloak only works for the one that is wearing it. And I have no idea how to get it off. And trust me, I tried. After looking through the book again, I found something that I believe should have been a warning label for these things. To many sure that Umbras couldn’t steal the artifacts from the users. They gave them the ability to soul bond to the pony using it. Only when the current user ceases to exist can there be a new user.

In other words, the moment that I put on Moonlight Shadow, it became mine until I die. Also, I found out that current users of an artifact can not have two artifacts simultaneously. I guess they did this as a safety measure to ensure that no one could have them all. It makes me wonder if any other ponies found some of these artifacts themselves. Hard to tell since the only way to find out is to ask them. That is what you get when you make such powerful artifacts look like everyday objects. Ah, who am I kidding. It is not like I will have to watch out for any pony coming after me with artifacts from the Crystal Empire coming after mine, right? Why did I shiver just now?

---

Meanwhile, at the school of friendship,

Fluttershy walks to her class and notices a rather long line by Starlight’s office door. “Oh, my did something happen?” She says to herself but some of the students heard her.

“Miss Fluttershy!” They cried as they circled her causing her wings to flare out above her in alarm. She looks to and fro between the children as they bombard her with questions she couldn’t keep up with; her eyes start spinning as she tries to keep up.

“I have a question about the friendship lesson from Applejack regarding fruits!”

“I-,”

“How do we know if we are cool enough?”

“I am not sure-,”

“Why did a giant bubble of magic send changelings flying after a kiss?”

“Well that’s-,”

“What is going to happen with this week’s snack time?”

“ENOUGH!” Fluttershy shouts, quieting everyone, but it was no better than somepony talking a little bit louder. But nopony wants Miss Fluttershy of all ponies to shout at them, “One pony at a time, please.”

“Is class canceled today?” Ocellus calls from behind everypony,

“Whatever gave you that idea?”

“Miss Trixie didn’t show up today.”

“Oh, that’s because Trixie is taking a little vacation. Starlight should be covering her class today.”

“But that the thing. She didn’t show up either,” Gallus added,

“Really? Oh, dear. That is a bit concerning.”

“That’s why we came here to her office to see what could be keeping her. And found everypony else waiting in line.”

“I have been waiting here since lunchtime,” Somepony added, which everypony looked at, “I wanted to know if she wanted some cookies, but she hadn’t shown up.”

“Okay, then everypony had back to class. And those who are in Miss Starlight, please join Miss Pinkie Pie’s class.” They all mumble an agreement before leaving Fluttershy alone in the hallway. Fluttershy opens the door to Starlight’s office and finds it empty.

She knows that Starlight isn’t the kind of Pony who would leave somewhere without telling somepony. It is not like her to up and leave everything behind when so many ponies are counting on her. However, the longer she searches the office, the more concerned she becomes. Nothing. She has found nothing. No letter, no scroll, no sticky notes, no nothing. It’s like she did come in today.

“Maybe she is sick today and could make it today?” Fluttershy says to herself. She closes the door and starts making a mental list of ingredients for soup. “The poor thing much be so sick that she couldn’t leave the castle this morning. I better drop by to make sure that she is doing all right.”

Unbeknownst to her, Spike had returned to the castle to reclaim some of his old comic books and found the front doors to the castle were left open. As if somepony left in a hurry. He didn’t think much about it and went inside all the way to his room. “Now, where did I put them?” He searched all over the place and couldn’t find them. “That odd. I thought that I left them right here.” He rubs that back of his head for a bit before he snaps his claws, “I saw Starlight reading them that one time before Twilight started dating Thorax.”

Quickly, he goes to Starlight’s room to find that her door was left open much like the castle's front doors, and her bed wasn’t made. “Sheesh, didn’t any pony tell Starlight to make her bed before getting up?” Spike goes through Starlight stuff, tossing a long stick over his shoulder, finding the other half of Starlight’s staff, and looking back at the stick on the floor. He shrugs his shoulders, puts it with its other half, and continues his search. He found a picture of her and Sunburst, a light purple book with a lock on it. Spike quickly makes sure no pony is looking and sticks a claw in the lock, only for him to receive an unpleasant shock. He coughs a small smoke cloud before putting the book down and started looking elsewhere.

He eventually finds his comics and checks to ensure they are okay before making his way out the door. On his way out. He found Fluttershy coming to the castle with a saddle bag full of goods.

“Hi, Fluttershy,” He greets her at the base of the stairs,

“Oh, Hi Spike. You didn’t happen to see Starlight by any chance?”

“No, actually. The castle was empty when I got here. Why?”

“Wait, she is not here?”

“Oh, course not. She should be at the school right now,”

“But Spike, she was not there either. I came here because I thought that she was sick and couldn’t make it today.”

“What?” Spike says, dropping his comic books. Fear crossed both as they ran through the possibilities of what could have happened.

“Spike, could you make sure that she is not in the castle and if anything is missing? I will ask the rest of the girls to see if anypony has seen her.”

“Got it. Where do you want to meet up?”

“Back here in about an hour. I am getting a bad feeling about this.” She says as they split in different directions leaving a small cloud of dirt behind them as Mailpony land where they were earlier with a letter in her mouth. Confused not seeing them, she puts the letter back in her bags and takes to the skies to find them again.

Author's Note:

Now, what do you think happened to Starlight?

Comments

[Thyrrnatf]

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Hope that you pick up the story again 😁