The reflections of the crystalline cave matched the color of Rainbow's eyes. Her vision darted left and right, and as the light grew darker in her descent, she brought a hoof up to her pendant and rubbed it with a few light circles. The Element of Loyalty lit up, casting a glittering red haze across the claustrophobic environment floating past all sides of her. It was a tighter squeeze than most caves that she had been familiar with, and yet its path did not wind like so many labyrinthine passages she had navigated in the past. It was almost as if some bizarre phenomenon had perfectly carved a tunnel forty-five degrees down from the earth's surface, and at some point in the past innumerable rubies had formed along the cylindrical walls of the cavern.
The gems were jagged, long, and gathered in thick clusters. They all reflected the light from Rainbow Dash's pendant evenly, but she was at a lostt to figure out which of them where innately enchanted. After all, she was after a stone capable of harnessing magic, not simply reflecting luminescence.
With an epiphanous plan, Rainbow Dash beat her wings faster and sped down the throat of the cave. She flew until the sunlit mouth of the cave was a distant speck. Once she was satisfied that she had flown deep enough, she paused in a gentle hover and covered the lightning bolt of her element with two forelimbs. Shutting out the light, she cast herself into inky-black darkness. Squinting, she pivoted about, looking around the body of the claustrophobic interior.
Finally, something sparked in her peripheral vision. She spun to the side, squinting, and focused on a tiny shred of light just in front of her. Floating over—she bumped her head on a cluster of rocks. Wincing, she rubbed her skull and lowered just a tad, gazing at the source of the light.
In the midst of so many long, jutting rubies, she found a tiny cluster of even thinner gems. These were crystaline rods, almost resembling door handles. They shimmered with a bright blue aura which intensified the closer her living flesh got to it.
"Hmmm..." Her voice echoed in the deep, thin cavern. "This had better do the trick."
Reaching forward, Rainbow gripped a stalk of the blue rods with two hooves. She pulled, twisted, and yanked with all her strength.
"Nnnngh!"
Finally, she wrenched a cluster of blue gems free. Three fell into her capable grasp. One, however, fell loose and clattered down into a deeper part of the dimly-lit cave below.
"Awwww poop..."
Rainbow Dash frowned, glanced up towards the mouth of the cave, then sighed. Angling her wings, she dove even further for the fallen shard. She squinted her eyes, looking for the source of the blue rod. She must have dropped for another minute and a half before she stumbled upon a bright bed of rubies, and all of them glowing blue and green.
"Ah... well here's where the party's at," she said, her lips twisted in an aquamarine grin.
The rock had evened out to allow for a plateau full of these glowing shards. She touched her hooves down—careful not to cut her fetlocks on the jagged bits of stone. Stepping cautiously through the spaces, she approached a tall cluster of rocks and gripped them. These very easily snapped off to her touch, and soon she had a veritable bundle of natural, mana-charged stones.
"Whew. At this rate, he'll be the only zebra in the world with his own power bill."
She turned to leave when something familiar struck her vision. The fact that it was something "familiar" deep down in the stomach of a Ledomaritan cave is what startled her. Doing a double-take, Rainbow Dash pivoted about and squinted at a wall.
There was a space of solid stone amidst the forest of glowing gems. From the looks of things, the wall was once covered by gems in the past, but something... or someone had hacked them all away. In its place was an elaborate set of carvings, all in a language that Rainbow Dash could not understand, all save for one pair of words.
"Windthrow..." Rainbow Dash thought aloud. She winced and smacked her skull with a clump of glowing gems. "No, not 'Windthrow,' you featherbrain!" She grimaced, gawking at the omega symbol that was eclipsing a solar crest. "'Austraeoh.'"
Her eyes lingered on the symbols, then on the pairs of cryptic carvings next to it.
"But... when... how...?"
She took a step forward, and her hoof bumped into something. Rainbow Dash looked down to see a long machete, worn by time and ancient use. Curious, she reached down and pulled it up by the handle... only to see that somepony else was gripping to the same instrument.
The skeleton of a long-diceased pony clung to the dull-edged tool. Its gaping skull dangled, pivoting beneath Rainbow's grasp.
"Oh... Hello..." Rainbow winced and dropped the whole machete altogether. "And... uh... ew, much?" She squinted at the dusty, crumbling skeleton before her. The pony's body was surrounded by discarded tools, moth-eaten satchels, and the tattered remnants of what must have been a well-laced robe in its time. "What the heck brought you way down here?" She glanced at the carvings on the wall, and back at the pony. Her eyes stumbled upon the remains of a dozen time-decayed feathers. "Heh. Hunting pheasant? Heheheh—Whoah, wait a second..."
Rainbow Dash knelt down low, her eyes wide. She reached a hoof out and traced the length of the skeletal wing. Sure enough, the avian bones were attached to the spine of the pony itself.
"A pegasus..." Rainbow Dash gulped. "Well if that isn't nifty." Rubbing her chin, she glanced across the dust-laden possessions of the ill-fated soul. She saw what looked like a bundle of wool in the corner, right where the smoothe stone and jagged gems converged. Curious, she reached towards it and turned it over. "Well, okay then."
Beneath where the wool was, a book was lying, an ancient tome that was thicker than any book Rainbow Dash had ever seen. There was no title on the cover of it, only two symbols... the only symbols that could have mattered.
"This just keeps on getting better and better..."
What a tease, how desperately I want to know what that book says and what another pegasus is doing out here where there are none. How foreboding as well, that perhaps another Austraeoh tried and failed.
So... Dashie isn't the first Austreoh? There have been others. Possibly other heroes needed to kick start the "machine" in times past? Or maybe this is some divine plant. A pony, possessed by fate, crawled deep into this cave just to carve that for Dashie, and to leave her the books.
):(, great chapter! Twenty-five push-ups for a job well done.
What? Push-ups is how a Drill Sergeant expresses love and gratitude. Knock 'em out!
should be
Uhoh -- the causality loop is now complete.
This is probably the second most intriguing moment of the whole saga, I can't wait for more!
And once again, we find another mysterious book. It's contents will most likely remain unknown until chapter 180. *sigh* Nonetheless, this was a good chapter.
Oooooooh...this just got really interesting....
Always more questions.
Just when you thought the story was getting predictable...
Gets really relevant around 2:00.
*gasp*
Daring Do!!!
Hoh boy, another pegasus and the potential for some really solid info on the meaning of Austraeoh. This is looking to get reeeeeal good
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Holy shit it IS. The Daring Do books were REAL.
"Our studies of past ages have led us to believe time is cyclical. Many patterns repeat."
Crack The Skye - Mastodon
Curiouser and curiouser...
HOW CURIOUS.
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The first true Pegasus she's met in months, and he/she's dead. How asinine of fate.
Yes, Dash. Down, down, down the rabbit hole, where your fate lies.
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It doesn't make sense for a time loop to start/end here, another Austraeoh is the only thing I can see working. Now, if that other Austraeoh ALSO happened to be "Rainbow Dash," that could get interesting. That said, I think the more simple explanation that history repeats—or the pegasus is an adventurer by choice—works more neatly over the "throw Rainbow Dash at it until it works" explanation.
1962055
Now THAT would be interesting. The book Rainbow found could have been the basis of study for Daring Do, who perished trying to unlock the secrets of the machine-world and Austraeoh. Initially I had just assumed the departed compatriot was an earlier Austraeoh or similar actor, but a scholar fits much better into the picture. Particularly a pegasus scholar who had several pieces of literature written about her exploits, with a flair for the dramatic and an insatiable appetite for both adventure and knowledge.
It could all, of course, be something different entirely. That said, a scholar is less convoluted than a second Austraeoh. A scholar is also less threatening than a predecessor who tried and failed. Most importantly, I want to read that book (a thick tome oddly reminiscent of one I saw in a piece of art not too long ago).
Normally I just don't comment when I have nothing to say.
But this was.
Woah.
What in the world.
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stuffpoint.com/my-little-pony-friendship-is-magic/image/75567-my-little-pony-friendship-is-magic-celestia-mother-of-god.png
1962664 If everytime Dash dies she gets a restart until she gets it right would make the most sense. I mean that it would explain how she escapes "certain death" all the time. She subconsciously remembers what went wrong each so she doeant do it again and now this is as far as the previous Rainbow got.
Rainbow's gunna have to step it up.
Daring Do it is!
so if i am to understand correctly, this pegasus had a reason for being there, to hide perhaps. from what, i cannot say.
if i may predict, Austraeoh is a bit of a larger than life character, a savior for the pegasus race if you will. our little Dashie might play a larger role than Luna predicted. is she not only the savior for the pegasi, but for the world itself? and what of this dark half? might it have been an exodus point?
if what i predict is true it brings up a greater question: what on Celestia's green earth would compel such devotion to escape? and what does Axan and her siblings have to with any of this?
so many questions, so much time to be had. "ADVENTURE!!"
Its the origanol daring doo
This cave seems mighty far away from Equestria for any but rainbow dash to have travelled successfully. You would think that if it were Daring, her exploits would have spread beyond Equestria, but so far we have seen next to nothing from Equestria make it out of Equestria, much less over countless mountains, valleys, blighted land, and desert. Save for one chromatic pegasus, of course.
I bet belle and Pilate will be captured when dash returns to the surface.
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Maybe. The whole discovery is as contrived as the chapter title says it is. There's a level of snark and macabre comedy here that I think should be taken into account. That is, a simple explanation works better than a quantum or abstract one. Chances are this entire discovery is brushed aside, sans whatever info is needed from the tome, and then only gets brought up when it's more convenient for the plot.
Mmmmm. I'm betting those symbols will have to be deciphered by PIlate. And OASIS will run out of charge before we decipher anything of great importance.
Predictions: Check.
$10 bet: Check.
IC better write this in. I don't wanna lose any money.
Quite a few spelling errors in this chapter. The most interesting one being the substitution of 'lost' for 'loss'.
Still, that aside, I think it's one of the most compelling chapters so far.
I'm with the Daring Do camp for identification of the dead pegasus.
Ooh, another pegasus, far from home (we can only assume, anyway). With an instruction manual for Dash! I call shenanigans. Anything this well lain out never amounts to anything good... well, only one way to find out - Onward!
Yeah! I don't think it's 'another' Austraeoh. More like a pegasus that was obsess with the whole story around it. Daring Do would be awesome though....just saying
IIIIIt's Dashie's evaluation time!
Well it looks like Dash's troubles with caves are finally paying off.
So dud she find a door to the Machine? I thought that that was it, but it wasn't clear. Also, there's this pegasus skeleton here as well, so we've got that. It appears they were researching Austraeoh/Eljunbyro before they died. It remains to be seen what this whole thing is about...These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
Well, a book. Books have writing, and writing has letters, but those letters have meanings in the words that they form, and when those formed words form a sentence, they can create answers, and answers would give us information, and that information will give us more questions, and if we get more questions....
We'd need another book...
Onwards!
Aha! So pegasi do exist!
"The ruling king must know this, and I will test him. I will murder him time and again until he knows this."
>she was at a lostt to figure out which of them where innately enchanted
Do you mean "loss" and "where"?
Another Pegasus? Gasp. I don't think it's an Austraeoh, though. And what could be in this book? It'll probably be forever and a day before we find out.
This is interesting. Now, what's this about a book?
finally she got to the book, now she can destroy it and search for the next one
... oh wait ...
curious...
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Glowing gems, dead pegasi, carvings and a book, oh my.
Yeah, that's not suspicious or anything.
What the hell. Carvings, a
hatchetmachete, a pegasus, a book with the Symbols.It's clearly aliens.
Another Pegasus perhaps it was the last spark that tried to restart the world
Looks like Dash wasn't the first pony to try this crazy journey. The last one failed pretty bad by the looks of it. And the last line of this chapter couldn't be more true.
~SolidFire
lost
___________________
deceased
_________________
So dead pegi on in a cave. Evil flying army after them ... this should be interesting.
Another ingredient added to the thickening plot?
Or did Dash simply roll high for the random encounter?