The Adventures of Arcane

by Blaze Mane

Queen takes Bishop (part 2)

The pegasus behind the Sorcerer gave him a shove and told him to hurry up, the two guards where behind him and continuously pushed him to a faster pace. As they neared the center of Ponyville the Sorcerer saw a large crowd had formed. The unicorn guard walked ahead and moved ponies to the side on account of "Royal" business. As they reached the center the pegasus gave him a shove, the Sorcerer landed sprawling in the dirt. Shaking himself off the Sorcerer stood up and was face to face with golden shoes and white fluffy trunks. Confused the Sorcerer looked up and staggered back.

Standing in front of him was the tallest pony yet, the pony was pearly white with a tinge of pink, upon its flank was a sun. It had large graceful wings and a long spiraled horn. On top its crown was well, a gold crown, as well as other gold accessories elsewhere on its body. Its mane was an array of colors lazily drifting in a nonexistent wind.The pony had a slim smile but its magenta eyes where not amused.
"So this would be the new pony you spoke of?" A majestic feminine voice chimed nearby.
Shifting his gaze the Sorcerer saw another pony similar to the other, this one was slightly shorter and was darken colors, her coat was a dark sapphire and had a crescent moon upon her flank, while her mane was a dizzying display of stars and the night sky, on her body was silver and black accessories.
"This is my new friend Arcane," Twilight cheerfully stepped around the two tall ponies. "Arcane these are the Princesses, Luna and Celestia."
The darker was Luna and the lighter Celestia, but while Twilight was happy to see the Sorcerer, the princesses where not.
"Twilight," Celestia began with a silken voice,"Do you not need to organize the contest?"
Twilight levitated a scroll thicker than her neck and began to unroll it,"Everything is ready but if you want we can triple check the list." She smiled happily at the Princess.

Celestia's eyes stopped glaring at the Sorcerer as she tried to find a way out of this new predicament. "I trust in your skills, I'm sure everything is ready, and well prepared"
Twilight clearly pleased hugged the Princess then left saying "Good luck!" to the Sorcerer.

Princess Celestia smiled as her student left but leaned over to the Sorcerer and spoken in a chilled tone."If you try anything on her you will never see the light again."
If it was not for the fact the Sorcerer recently obliterated legion after legion of horrendous shadow demons he would be terrified. Well he was a bit, but mustering his courage he shot back. "How would she react if she knew her Princess was throwing empty threats to her new friend."

They locked eyes for but a moment, the Sorcerer knew he was outnumbered but could hold his own, the Princess knew what ever this creature was she could hold it at bay but its lack of fear unsettled her.
"I rather not start a commotion, I tire of fighting." The Sorcerer whispered.

Princess Celestia stood to her full height and spoke to the crowd, "Shortly we will begin our contest, the winner will receive a selection of prizes, ranging from a trip to Manehattan, Las Pegasus, or to the newest show of the Wonderbolts..."
The Sorcerer perked his ears, wasn't this the group Rainbow Dash was a fan of?
"...As well as a large sum of bits."

The crowd stopped their hooves and cheered, guards began ushering contestants to elsewhere in town, before the Sorcerer was herded both Princesses grinned and mouthed "Good luck," but the Sorcerer didn't feel lucky at all.

---

In the Ponyville park the contestants gathered, Twilight and few other unicorns in fancy attire sat at a bench labeled "Judges", the Sorcerer gave himself a satisfied smile for having no trouble reading now, his self praise was cut short by the same guards from earlier jostling him.

The Sorcerer lined up next to a dozen unicorn who shifted excitedly. A sea foam green mare beside him bounded excitedly, she turned to Sorcerer saying, "I can't wait, I really think I have a chance to win!"
The Sorcerer cocked an eyebrow. "Oh? Do you know these other unicorns?"
The mare nodded excitedly, "I'm Lyra Heartstrings by the way, now the other ponies are..."

Lyra briefly described each one down the line, most where average citizens and at most levitated household objects, most of the local more powerful unicorns weren't in the competition, such as Rarity and Twilight Sparkle. Lyra described that most of these competitions got unicorns to levitate a couple of varying objects and to manipulate them, which she believe she was quite good at, or sometimes to perform spells in a time trial against others ponies.

The Sorcerer soaked up the information gauging the others in the competition, while he disliked getting thrown in like this he did enjoy a good match against other magic users, something he didn't get to enjoy too often back home.
"Do you think your going to win?"
The Sorcerer realized that Lyra was talking to him again. "I can certainly try."
The mare thought, and held her hoof out. "Say want to make a deal?"
The Sorcerer waited for her explanation.
"If we make it to semi-finals and we are against each other we can let the better one win without any trouble. We then split the prizes, first place gets to pick three things, so say we pick an item we both want and then split the bits?"
Lyra pointed to herself, "Me and Bonbon wanted to head up to Canterlot, so that can be one of them, what do you want?"
The Sorcerer thought of the prizes the Princess had named, he had spaced out so he missed a few but the only one he knew about was the Wonderbolts, besides he could pawn them off to Rainbow Dash for even more money.
"The Wonderblot tickets, I go by Arcane." The Sorcerer shook hooves with Lyra sealing their deal.

---

As the competition began each pony was evaluated one at a time, the Sorcerer being on the end of the line was obviously going last.
"Hey, Arcane." Somepony whispered.
The Sorcerer looked around for the source.
"Blaze Mane!" The pony hissed above.
The Sorcerer looked skyward to see a cloud right above him. Out of the cloud he could see Rainbow Dash's face.
"Can I ask you something?" Rainbow Dash practically begged.
"Shoot."
"Please, please, please, pretty please try to win those Wonderbolt tickets, If you get them I'll pay you back as soon as I can, those are the last two tickets to their latest show and there won't be anymore till next year!"

"Who's in there!" A guard noticed the cloud and thrust the butt of his spear into it, before it made contact Rainbow Dash burst out and landed hidden among the crowd. The guard now annoyed looked at the Sorcerer who shrugged and faced forwards.

---

Lyra was now being judged, she lifted a dozen smooth stones with magic and by the judges instructions rotated them in different series of orders and patterns raising some and lowering others. She then spelled out here name one letter at a time. The judges where pleased by her demonstration and placed her in the competition.

When it was the Sorcerer turn a small commotion happened in the group and a large white unicorn in purple armor stepped out. He walked to the judges and spoke to Twilight, she got up and he replaced her. The new judge spoke to everypony.
"It would be unfair to let this pony have an advantage for him, so as Twilight's brother, and captain of the guard, I Shining Armor, am more suited to judge him."

The Sorcerer ears dropped, what ever horrible being was in charge of his life and well being sure enjoyed making it a living nightmare.

While the other contestants got to play with little rocks he got a half ton block of steel dropped in front of him. When it landed it rocked the nearby area and sunk several inches into the ground.
"We want you to move this, and you can't use direct force from yourself." Shining Armor grinned. The task was virtually impossible.

Enraged by this downfall of luck the Sorcerer threw his saddlebags down, then flung the spellbook to the ground, shattered the clasp with the impact, flipping the pages the Sorcerer found the desired passage and begun to chant, his horn flared dark orange. Beside the steel a circle of power bloomed and the earth began to shudder, the skies began to darken and ponies watch stunned ans they felt the powerful magic bloom.

Before anypony could react a stone appendage burst from the ground, then another and a great beast ripped itself from the ground, the creature was forged in iron and stone, upon its head was the likeness of a great helm which sparked with fiery power in its eye slots and the creature grumbled. The stone and iron being stood on two legs. It had to arms with grasping gauntlets and was bulky. It stood stark still like a statute, waiting for instruction.
"Golem!" the Sorcerer beckoned to the creature. "Move this to the other side of the clearing."

The golem grumbled and followed the command, it grabbed the block and lifted it with ease, with a few thunderous steps the golem placed the block down in the desired location then returned to its origin. With a wave of the Sorcerer's horn the golem changed back into soil and returned seamlessly to the ground.

Silence permeated the air as the ponies took in what had happened, after nearly a minute of awkward silence came a cheer.In the crowd came a small group of cheering, afterwards everypony cheered and stomped amazed at the Sorcerer solution.

Shining Armor's jaw was nearly hitting the table till he shook himself out of shock and quieted the crowd.
"Welcome to the competition."
The cheering resumed and the Sorcerer scanned the crowd, his new friends cheered the loudest, he had a feeling they started the applause, the Sorcerer then found the Princesses glaring at him, standing just behind his friends. The Sorcerer returned the hard look.

They had him, while the other ponies believed he was another pony the princesses knew differently, and after all this they would stop at nothing to find out what he really was.

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