> Rise of Equestria: The War Begins
>  by Israel Yabuki
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> A Group Effort
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the land of Equestria, peace and harmony had been spread across through different towns and cities and villages with the help of Twilight and her friends. They had accomplished so much in the past that some of her friends wished they could do it all over again. But for the Princess of Friendship, she was glad to have those old problems over and dealt with. But Twilight had to deal with a few changes in her life both good and bad.

Her friend, Starlight Glimmer had left Ponyville in order to try and get settled into her new life with her new fiance, Sunburst. He asked for her hoof in marriage about a week ago and of course, Starlight accepted. Another thing that changed was that Twilight's friend, Sunset Shimmer had just graduated Canterlot High School and moved back into Ponyville with Twilight and Spike. As for Spike, he started growing a bit taller and aged a bit more maturely with the added bonus of now being able to fly. Luckily, this wasn't caused by his greed, but instead, he was just growing up on his own. He was tall enough to reach Big Mac's height. But he still had no luck with trying to win Rarity's affection, due to her obliviousness of the dragon growing up.

Today, Twilight and her friends were at Fluttershy's cottage, having a nice picnic in her backyard conversing and sharing giggles and laughs about what's been happening lately.

"I'm not kidding, girls! You should've seen the way Soarin got sucker punched by Spitfire! The look on his face was PRICELESS!" Rainbow Dash says, before she laughs.

"Oh, sweet Celestia, I wish I had a camera to capture that!" Pinkie said, before she giggled.

"Too late, Discord captured it for me. Take a look for yourself!" Rainbow gave Pinkie Pie the photo and it showed Soaring getting uppercutted up into the clouds by Spitfire, who had her Wonderbolts outfit on and a mad look on her face. Pinkie soon bursted out laughing so much that she started gripping her sides from the laughing pain.

Fluttershy took a look at the photo and felt a little bit of pity for Soarin. "Poor Soarin, he didn't deserve that. She could've just asked nicely for him to stop, right?" Fluttershy asked.

"It's not that simple, darling." Rarity says. "Soarin's a bit of a..."helpless romantic" when it comes to finding a mare. The more he tried to pursue, the more Spitfire got agitated, which in return caused her to do...that."

"That's pretty smart coming from somepony who's a helpless romantic herself." Pinkie says with a sly smile towards Rarity. Rarity blushed and turned away with a slight "hmph."

"Well, I cannot help it if I'm desperate." Rarity retorts. She then takes a sip of her tea, calming her nerves.

"Ah ain't desperate 'bout it." Applejack added.

"Was there a reason why you weren't looking for a stallion in the first place, AJ?" Spike asked.

"Ah had 2 jobs to worry about. One, helpin' out with friendship problems, and two, workin' on the farm."

"Oh, well I hope you find somepony special very soon, AJ."

"Aww shuck, thanks Spike. Yer a real pal." Applejack gave Spike a playful jab on the arm. "And good luck with tryin' to win Rarity's affections if you ever get the opportunity." she says, making Spike blush.

"Ah, jeez." Spike says, burying his face in his claws.

"Now now, Applejack. I think it's adorable that Spike feels so strongly about me. Isn't that right my wittle Spikey-Wikey?" Rarity asked, pinching Spike's slightly chubby cheeks. Spike had a fake smile on his face.

"Uh...sure, thanks, Rarity." Spike replies. 'But sometimes I wish you'd stop babying me. I'm not a baby dragon anymore. Oh, why do I even bother trying, she still thinks I'm too young. But...why? We're only 4 years apart.' Spike thought sadly.

"Rarity, you do realize that Spike is growing up, so why do you baby him? I mean, he is a teenager." Sunset says.

"I know, but I just can't help it. I know he's a getting bigger, but I still see my cute and darling little Spikey-Wikey deep down inside of him." Rarity says. 

"He's not little anymore, Rarity." Twilight says. "He even shows he's growing up because he helps keep the castle clean without having to be told to do it. He goes out on his own and leaves a note telling where he'll be and for how long."

"Speaking of growing up... Applejack, Rarity, have you two noticed how our little sisters seem to be acting different than they usually do?" Rainbow asks.

"You betcha. Lil' Applebloom's told me she's been seeing somepony special. Ah believe the little feller went by the name of Tender Taps." AJ says.

"And Sweetie Belle has been hanging around Button Mash lately. Those two can't seem to stop playing together and it just warms my heart. I'm so proud of my little sister for finding a nice friend colt who's making my dear little sister so happy." Rarity says before sipping her tea.

"I don't know if I can trust that Rumble kid, Scootaloo's been hanging out with. I know she's growing more independant and she's grasping the ability to fly, but I still kinda worry about her." Rainbow said.

"Wow, Rainbow Dash. I didn't know you could sound so...motherly. If you acted like this back when Spike was still a baby dragon, I'd have asked you to foalsit him." Twilight says with a smile.

"What's that suppose to mean?" Rainbow asked, a little bit insulted. But just before Twilight could answer, all the girls saw that their own cutie marks were starting to act up. Except for Sunset Shimmer, since she was still fairly new.

"OOH, OOH, OOH!!! ANOTHER FRIENDSHIP PROBLEM!!! YIPPEE!!!" Pinkie shouted happily.

"Sunset, follow us to the castle, we might need all the help we can get." Twilight says.

Twilight gathered the girls in a circle and gained the extra aid from Rarity and Sunset to teleport to the castle. Spike, however, was left all by himself by accident. He just shrugged it off and got up, unfolded his wings and flew off to the castle.

"Oh well, at least I'll be able to get a good workout from all of this." Spike says to himself.





Twilight and the others managed to teleport into the room with the Map of Equestria without much of a fuss. The girls all took their seats and took a look at the map to see what the problem was. Twilight explained to Sunset the details on how the map works.

"Okay, Sunset, here's how it works: Whenever there's a friendship problem in Equestria, our cutie marks react in a way where they start blinking as you saw earlier today. Now, depending on which of us is really needed for the job, the map'll display either one or two cutie mark symbols over a specific location."

"Okay, but... why is my cutie mark on there?" Sunset asks, pointing at her cutie mark, floating above the map. Twilight was surprised when she saw this, but what she sees next, shocks her even more: Every single one of her friend's cutie marks were on the map...including Princess Celestia's cutie mark, surprisingly.

"What the? What's going on here?" Twilight asks herself. "Princess Celestia is needed for this, too?"

"Needed for what?" Spike asks, coming into the room and closing the doors. Twilight turns to Spike with a confused look.

"Spike? Why didn't you teleport with us?"

"You left in such a hurry, Twilight, that I decided to fly here. Why do you ask?" Spike responded casually.

"Oops, sorry." she replied with a nervous chuckle.

"Don't worry, it was for a good reason." he forgave, sincerely. "So, who was it that you said was "needed?"

"Surprisingly, all of us, including me... As well as Princess Celestia." Sunset Shimmer answers.

"THE PRINCESS?!" Spike asks, with wide eyes. "Oh boy, something tells me that this is gonna be one tough friendship problem if it's gonna require the princess' help." 

"Well, it's nice to hear that, Spike." said Celestia. The girls and Spike all saw the princess standing right in front of them.

"Princess, I'm pretty sure you're aware of the--" Twilight says before she's cut off.

"I know Twiilight. I was quite surprised when the Map of Equestria called out to me just as much as you were. Now why don't we check to see where we're needed in Equestria." Celestia says, walking towards the map.

Everypony was looking at the map to see where their cutie marks were going too. Their marks traveled all the way towards the west side of the map, almost going out of bounds. Soon their marks started blinking red. Twilight was getting rather confused about all of this.

"I don't get it? It's never done that before, what does this mean?" Twilight asks. "Do you know, princess?"

"Perhaps, there exists a place somewhere in the far west of Equestria. A place probably unknown to this map. There's only one thing we need to do in order to grasp the situation." Celestia says calmly. Her horn started to light up and she used her magic to widen the map of Equestria and allowing the cutie marks to move out more until they finally stopped right above what looked like a town in the middle of a valley surrounded by dens. "Hmm... now that's peculiar." she says.

"What is that place? I've never seen or heard of this place before." Twilight says, gazing at the town on the map.

"Doesn't look like any place in Equestria we've been to." Spike says. He got a look at the dens in certain parts of the town on the map and got an idea on what they were. "Hmm, I might not have been there, but something tells me those are lion dens."

"You could be right, Spike. But we won't know for sure unless we investigate. We need to act quickly, come on." Princess Celestia says in a serious tone that slightly scared Spike. The girls and Spike followed Celestia out of the castle, still questioning about this unknown town and why it was so serious that it required Princess Celestia's help as well.

"What do you think this new place will be like?" Fluttershy asks Celestia. The princess had a bit of a troubled look on her face, like she knew what this place was. Regardless, she looked over at Fluttershy with a casual look on her face.

"No pony knows, but I'm sure we'll find out soon enough once we get there. We just have to have a little patience." Celestia says with reassurance, earning a nod from the timid pegasus. 'Of course, I already know what lies ahead. I just hope he isn't in any kind of danger or anything.' Celestia thought to herself.

Once the group was outside the castle, they find that Celestia has arranged for a couple of carriages for her and the girls.

"Wow, princess. You sure plan ahead." Twilight said in amazement.

"Like my mother always said: Always be prepared." Celestia says. The girls all got into one carriage one at a time, but unfortunately, there wasn't enough room for Spike to squeeze in. Luckily, Princess Celestia allowed Spike to sit in the other carriage with her. With everypony all saddled up and ready to go, Celestia called out to the Royal Guards to pull the carriages and were on their way.

All the while, Spike was pondering about Celestia's behavior earlier. Celestia could tell Spike was concerned.

"Something on your mind, Spike?" Celestia addressed.

"Huh? Oh, no. It's nothing, really." Spike lies.

"Spike, you can tell me anything. Whatever it is that's on your mind, you can tell me."

"Alright. But can you keep it a secret?"

"Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye."

"Okay, then. I was a little curious as to why you looked so...perturbed when you were reassuring Fluttershy of what was at this unknown town, it was like... you knew this place. It was like you've been to this place before." Spike said. Celestia turned her eyes away a little bit, knowing that Spike was actually right. Celestia sighed and leaned in until she was eye-to-eye with the young dragon.

"Spike, what I'm about to tell you should be kept a secret between you and me." Celestia whispered. "Can I trust you?"

"Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye." Spike whispered.

Meanwhile, in the other carriage, Fluttershy was worried and she couldn't stop thinking about why Celestia suddenly had that doubtful look in her eyes when she tried reassuring her about the trip.

"Girls, have you noticed that Princess Celestia is acting...weirder than usual?" Fluttershy asked.

"You've noticed it, too, huh?" Twilight asked.

"Could the princess have another life that she had to leave some time ago?" Sunset asked.

"But if she did, why would she keep it a secret from us?" Fluttershy asked again.

"She probably has her own reasons as to why she's not telling us, so I think it's best that we just let it be for now and wait until she's ready to tell, or at least, show us." Sunset says.

"You could be right, Sunset, dear. Who knows what kind of secret she might have that she doesn't want us to know yet." Rarity says, looking out the window and at the other carriage.

"OOH! Maybe she's got a husband and full-grown children! *GASP* If she does, that means... ROYAL CHILDREN!!!" Pinkie shouts, bouncing on her seat.

"Ah highly doubt that. Ah mean, Princess Celestia's been livin' in Canterlot ever since she banished her sister to the moon a little over a thousand years ago, sugarcube. The only pony I know she use to go out with was Discord and even she told me how she broke up with him because of him givin' into his selfish desire to turn all of Equestria into a world of chaos." Applejack explained.

"Honestly, if she did have royal children...I hope they're princes." Rarity says, staring into space, daydreaming like a helpess romantic.

"Is that all you ever think about, Rarity? What about Spike? He's been eyeing you ever since he was a baby dragon when he and Twilight first came here to Ponyville." Rainbow says.

"Oh, I know. But, I just don't know if it'd work out between us. I know he's volunteered to help me throughout the years since I've known him and I do appreciate it a lot." Rarity says.

"So then...give him a chance. He is getting older, you know. Not to mention, he's growing more handsome than cute. I don't see what the big deal is, Rarity." Pinkie says.

"Darling, please. Let's not talk about Spikey at a time like this." Rarity says, getting a bit agitated.

"I think we just pushed her buttons big time." Rainbow whispered into AJ's ear, chuckling.

"What buttons, I don't see any buttons on Rarity. She's not even wearing a dress. Is it even possible to push clothes buttons? Even I don't think that's possible to do." Pinkie said.

All the girls just laughed at what Pinkie said.

"Pinkie, you are too much!" Rainbow says.

"Too much what?" Pinkie asked with a tilted head. She tilts her hhead straight up shortly afterwards with a smile. "Just kidding, I know what you meant by that." she giggled.

The girls just couldn't stop laughing and having a good time during their trip. But with Spike and Celestia, there was nothing to laugh at after Celestia told Spike her deep secret.

"I never even knew, princess. How long have you been living with this whole ordeal?" Spike asked with sincerity.

"I'd rather not speak anymore about it, Spike. It's just... too heartbreaking." Celestia says, turning her head away as old memories of her past life came flooding into her mind.



The memories of three baby colts, smiling up at her started flooding her mind. Next thing that came flooding in her mind was a stallion's silhouette as well as his warm and loving smile, which was directed straight at her. Those memories soon left Celestia crying a little bit and it certainly didn't go unnoticed. Spike has never seen Celestia cry like this. Not since Luna had returned to her former self after the dark magic was expelled from her long ago.

Spike sat next to Princess Celestia and gentley stroked her hoof, trying to give her some comfort. Princess Celestia smiled at Spike with tears still in her eyes. She leaned her head down and wrapped her hoof around Spike's back, allowing him to give her a hug. She buried her face into Spike's shoulder, sobbing quietly. Spike didn't like to see Princess Celestia crying like this. For a long time, Spike has always loved Princess Celestia like she was his own mother. She helped raise him from an egg and gave him all the love and affection his real parents couldn't since he never got a chance to meet them.

But he didn't care, because to him, Princess Celestia has always been his mother and he was grateful to know that she had been there for him until the day he left with his "sister," Twilight to live in Ponyville. And to see his own mother crying like this breaks his heart. He continued to hold Princess Celestia in a warm embrace until she was satisfied. The hug felt like forever to Spike, but he didn't seem to mind at all as long as his mother got a little better at least.

'There there. I'm right her Celes..er... mom. Don't worry. You've been there for me, now I'm here for you. I know we'll find a way to heal those inner wounds.' Spike thought to himself, still hugging Celestia.
> Struggling Situations
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The gang still had a long way to go before they reached their destination. Some of the girls started growing bored to the point where they'd be napping throughout the day. But for Twilight, she was able to ease her boredom, thanks to the books she brought with her. Sunset also eased her boredom by reading some books. Sunset and Twilight had a thing for reading. They never understood why some ponies in Equestria never take the time to read all these amazing books. But it did give Twilight and Sunset all the more pleasure of gaining more knowledge just for fun and just in case they might actually need to use the info they picked up.

Of course, Twilight knew that there were somethings she could only learn so much from books alone. She would know since she's had to learn her lessons through experience thanks to all those friendship and life lessons she and her friends learned. Even Sunset learned her lessons back in the human world when she was still a student. But after her graduation, she was able to take the lessons she learned and help make herself a better pony.

"Hey, Twilight?" Sunset asked.

"Hmm?" Twilight responded.

"I'm not trying to be rude, but why did Princess Celestia have us taken to this town by carriage instead of taking the train? I mean, isn't the express train able to travel all over Equestria?" Sunset asks.

"I don't know, Sunset. Maybe this town is too unknown to most other ponies in Equestria. There are still a few mysteries in Equestria that have yet to be uncovered and I doubt that we'll be able to discover all of them in such a short time. All we can do right now is keep our heads held high and hope this mysterious unknown town doesn't bring any harm or misfortune to anypony." Twilight explains.

"Now I know why you're the Princess of Friendship. Princess Celestia sure knows how to teach her star pupil. I guess it comes as no surprise, but I'm not too upset about it." Sunset says.

"You sure, Sunset?" Twilight asks.

"Yeah, I don't care if I'm not a princess, because there's nothing better than having a group of amazing friends. After all, it's like you said, there's no greater or stronger magic than the magic of friendship."

Twilight nodded in agreement to Sunset's words. The two of them got back to reading their books. They liked picturing what's happening in the books they were reading. It didn't matter how long the journey was. Twilight packed plenty of books to read, including a few brand new Daring Do books for Rainbow Dash to read.

'Of course, it's going to be difficult to spread friendship across Equestria. There's so many places to go and so many ponies to help solve their friendship problems. And something tells me that this one friendship problem is going to be a bit of a struggle. Probably even for the princess if she's acting so strange today.' Sunset says in her mind.

In the other carriage, Spike had grown tired and decided to take a nap. Princess Celestia had his head laying in her forehooves and she just couldn't stop smiling at him as he slept peacefully.

'Oh, Spike. You've made me so proud to know that you're growing up so well, yet you show just how young and handsome you still are. I'm so proud to call you my son.' Celestia thought. She used her free hoof to rub his scaly underbelly, making the young dragon giggle a bit. 'You're still just as adorable as when you were still just my little baby dragon, Spike. How did time fly so fast? Let's hope it didn't fly by too fast for him to completely forget about me.'





Meanwhile, in the unknown town, Inside a big, wooden, three-story house, a white alicorn stallion with sapphire eyes and mane was staring down at the ponies from the third floor balcony, smiling at the hard work they were putting into their daily lives. Next to this stallion was an earth pony mare with dark red fure, and a bright red, silky smooth mane and had beautiful hazel eyes. The stallion looked over to the mare with a warm smile on his face before looking back at the town.

"How has your father been doing, honey?" asked the mare.

"The usual. Sparring with his old combat partner. Im starting to think he makes a living off of combat. How's our little angel doing, has she finished eating up her dinner?" asked the stallion.

"Yes, honey, she even fell asleep after she filled up her cute little belly."

"Well, she is only 4, so it's no surprise. So..." the stallion paused before he brought up one subject that made himself cringe. "...How is my little brother doing, is he pulling through alright?" he asked. The mare's smile began to disappear when he brought that up.

"Unfortunately, no. He's just been staring outside his window. I tried to converse with him, but he just stood there, not moving and staying quiet. He's been like that for the past 3 weeks."

"He didn't try to hurt you, did he?"

"I offered to give him a hug and he accepted. You know he's not hostile towards his own family. Why would you even think that of your own little brother at all?" she asks with a bit of disbelief.

"Sorry, dear. I'm just worried. Just seeing that look in his eyes sent chills down my spine. He may be my brother, but there's no denying that he's still powerful enough to match up against even our own father. I'm just trying to be cautious." he says.

"Honey, how many times has this town been under threat?"

"Once."

"And who was this certain threat that you, your little brother AND your father worked hard together to defeat?"

"The...Changeling Army. That whole incident really shook me up. But it wasn't the changelings that spooked me, it was my little brother. I've never seen him so vicious with his magic like that. I'm sorry, honey, but I just don't want you or our daughter to get hurt."

"Your brother would never harm a hair on our daughter. He loves her very much. It just puzzles me that even though you're the oldest of 3 brothers, you fear the 2nd oldest the most." the mare was starting to get frustrated with her husband. "I'm starting to think you don't even love your own brother anymore." when she said that, the stallion looked at her in disbelief. He held in his anger and took a deep breath before finally speaking his mind.

"I do love my brother...no... I love both of my brothers, and my father, as well as you and our little girl. I guess, I was just being so paranoid about this whole situation that I just wasn't thinking straight and I have myself to blame for that, dear. Maybe I'll go check up on him, see if he's alright." hearing this from her husband brought back her smile, making her hug her husband.

"Yes, after all, he's going to need all the love and support he can get." said the mare.

"Now I know why I married you. You always know how to look on the bright side. Why can't anypony else be as kind and understanding as you?" the stallion gave his wife a peck on the cheek before walking on back inside the house. "I'll be back soon, Crimson Ruby." he said.

"Take care, Blue Blaze." she replied back.

Blue Blaze nodded and walked down the hall and through the third door on the right. There he saw that the room was all dark, except for the light coming out of the window. And standing near the window across from where the door was, stood a unicorn stallion with the same eye and fur color as Blue Blaze. But his mane colored red. He kept staring out the window, eyeing the town and the ponies. Blue Blaze was about to speak but then the other stallion spoke.

"What do you want." he asked in a low, expressionless tone. Blue Blaze jumped a bit before he spoke.

"I just wanted to talk, bro." Blue Blaze responded.

"Then you talk, I won't." said the stallion in the same tone. Blue Blaze nearly flipped his lid when he said that, but he stopped himself from taking his anger out on his brother.

"Look, I know you're still upset about his passing, but there's nothing you can do, what happened to him was a tragic accident, but he wouldn't want you to sulk like this. He gave this town a reason to keep moving forward. But know that he'll never leave us all on our own, because he still lives in our hearts. So please, bro. Try to cheer up. Not for him, not for me, or the rest of the family, but for you. Because if you don't, the more you isolate yourself, the more you'll overthink your decisions in life. That's what father taught me when we lost our loving grandmother sixteen years ago." he explained. His brother didn't say a word and kept staring down at the town. Blue Blaze leaned in and gave his little brother a big hug to show him how much he loves him. "Hang tough, bro." he says. As he's about to disappear behind the door, he then hears his little brother speak.

"I'll...try." he said in the same tone. Blue Blaze nodded before disappearing behind the door.





Night time had drawn near and Princess Celestia had order the Royal Guards to stop for the night. Princess Celestia and the rest of the girls all got out of the carriages to stretch out their limbs. They could see that Luna's moon had already lit up the night sky. Twilight looked down the dirt path and saw that they still had a long ways to go before they reach the town. She groaned in disappointment.

"Just how far is this place? I can't even tell if we're halfway there." Twilight says.

"We have to be patient, Twilight. We'll get there soon if we just have faith." Celestia calls out from the other carriage to ease her former student.

"If you ask me, dearies, I could use some shut eye. A proper mare needs to get her proper beauty sleep." Rarity says, rubbing her eyes.

"I think we all deserve to get some shut eye. Just look at Rainbow Dash, she's clonked out. And don't even get me started on Spike's snoring," Sunset points out. "I have a feeling they'll be waking up earlier than us."

"Yeah, but who knows, maybe they might oversleep fer a good 12 hours, or maybe 14." Applejack says. The girls all laughed and apparently this woke up Spike and Rainbow Dash.

"Ugh, come on! Can't a dragon get some sleep over here?" Spike shouted from the carriage.

"Yeah, how am I suppose to be refueled if I can't get any sleep?" Rainbow added. The girls snickered at their cranky friends as they head on back to sleep.

"Come on, girls, let's just get some sleep. We'll need all the strength for tomorrow." Twilight says. The girls all headed back into the carriages, except for Princess Celestia. For some reason, she kept staring at the night sky. She didn't know why, but she just felt like looking upwards and gazing at the stars and the moon. 

She stayed standing for a good minute until she yawned and decided to head back into the carriage with Spike. She closed the carriage door and laid on the empty seat, falling fast asleep.

It wasn't long before Princess Celestia began to dream. She was dreaming that she was on top of a hill, sitting underneath a beautiful tree and staring at the horizon as the sun was setting beautifully. What she hears soon after, catches her off completely guard. She hears the sound of a foal, or foals, cooing adorably. She looked down and saw three little foals, all of them were boys. One of them reached out with their little hooves, wanting to give Celestia a big hug.



Celestia felt her eyes tear up with happiness and joy as those three foals reached out for her. She scooped them up into her hooves and rocked them gentley from side to side. The foals couldn't stop giggling and smiling at her. Celestia knew that she was dreaming, but this was definitely one dream she'd never want to wake up from. The sun over on the horizon was setting at a slower pace than usual, but Celestia didn't care, because all that she wanted to do was keep these three foals safely tucked in her hooves, all nice and warm.

Then the foals all yawned and slowly closed their eyes, falling asleep and emitting cute little snores. Celestia never felt so happy and sad before in her whole entire life, seeing her three little bundles of joy drift off into their own dreamland. Nothing was holding back the tears in Celestia's eyes as she held the foals close to her like they were her own children.

"My beloved boys." she said out the ordinary. "I can't wait for the three of you to meet somepony very special. Somepony whom I raised when I left to go to Canterlot. Somepony who'd make a fine brother... somedragon who gave me a reason to keep on smiling and move forward for you and him." She then nuzzled the foals gently, making them coo so adorably.

Outside of her dream, she had a tear running down her cheek, but a smile on her face. For Spike, he could probably be dubbed as the master of clonking out.

In his dream, he was surrounded by mountains and mountains of jewels. He'd keep grabbing a clawful of gems and chomping them down in his mouth like the hungry dragon he was. He laughed loudly as he rolled around in his jeweled heaven. But it was shortly lived when he heard the sound of a familiar mare calling out to him, and not in the way he enjoys as much as he use to.

"Oh, just look at my darling Spikey-Wikey. Oh you're just so adorable, filling up your precious little belly." said Rarity's voice.

"Rarity, come on! I'm not a baby dragon anymore! Why can't you see that?" Spike said.

"Because you'll always be a baby dragon in my eyes, Spikey-poo. Now and forever."

"Well, I'd appreciate it if you would just stop already! Baby-talking me can only go so far."

"Aww, is my Spikey-poo unhappy?" her baby-talking towards Spike was making him a little frustrated until finally, he was unable to control himself and snapped.

"THAT'S ENOUGH OF THE BABY TALK ALREADY!!!" he shouted before his whole dream faded.

His eyes shot open and he sat up, panting. He looked out the window to see the sun rising. He took his eyes away from the window and slumped in his chair, groaning.

"Is something wrong, Spike?" Celestia asks. Spike looks at Celestia with a depressed look. "Why are you so sad, Spike, did you have a bad dream?"

"No, it wasn't bad at first. But, do you know about my crush on Rarity?" Spike asked.

"Yes, what about it?" she asks. Spike sighs before he decides to sit next to Celestia.

"I've always loved Rarity ever since you sent me and Twilight to Ponyville. I was okay with her thinking that I was adorable and all. But as I got older, she doesn't take my crush on her seriously. I don't know if I should give up or keep trying to win her affections," Spike explains.

"How about this, Spike. You just stick with me for a while and if Rarity baby-talks to you, I'll just shield you with my wings and tell her enough is enough."

"What good'll that do?"

"If you want to be seen as a growing dragon in Rarity's eyes, then trust me and do exactly as I say. Do you think you can do that, my son?" Celestia says, finishing off with a playful wink at her dragon son. Spike smiled and hugged Celestia.

"Thanks...mom."

"You're welcome, Spike." Celestia hugged him back. But then, Spike's stomach started growl, telling him that it was time to grab something to eat. With a giggle, Celestia reached into her bag and took out a few gems and then gave them to Spike. "I'll bet being a teenage dragon built up your already big appetite."

"Oh, you have no idea, mom. Thanks for the gems, they're delicious." Spike replied with a mouthful. "So, how long will this trip take before we'll be able to reach the town?"

"Let me check." Celestia leaned out the window to check to see how far they were. She brought her head back in and gave Spike a smile, along with some good news. "We won't have to wait any longer, we've just arrived at our current destination."

Spike leaned out the window to see the town in his full view. "Whoa... look at this place, why haven't we heard about this town before?" Spike asks himself, with a smile on his face.
> Unexpected Meets & Greets & Reunions
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Spike was still awe-struck at the sight of the town, which looked more like a much more tougher, hard-working version of Ponyville and even the residents were mostly 70% male. It was definitely both similar to and different from Ponyville. Spike wondered what the rules of this town were like. Were they strict, difficult, or easy enough to understand?

If there's one thing Spike knew, he wasn't going to find out from just staring out the carriage window. He opened up the door and stepped out the carriage and stretched out his body. The rest of the girls stepped out of the carriages as well, stretching their tired bodies. The girls walked up to Princess Celestia, unsure of what the customs of the town are. Even Princess Celestia was unsure of the customs, but it didn't stop her from telling the girls what they need to know.

"Alright, everypony, listen up. Just like every other place, except for our hometowns, we're only guests here. So try to be on your best behaviors and don't try to start any trouble. Can I trust you all with this one simple request, girls?" Celestia asked the group.

"Yes, Princess." They say in unison.

"Excellent, now let's not waste any time. I suggest that we all split up so we’ll have better chances with finding anypony with a friendship problem." Celestia implied. The others nodded and split up into different directions.

Rainbow Dash searched through the skies to see if there was anypony who was in need of help. But then out of nowhere, something yellow sped past her, causing her to spin out of control in the air. She didn't know what it was, but she definitely wasn't going to let whatever that was, slide that easily. She chased the thing that sped past her.

Pinkie Pie took the opportunity to pig out at the ice cream parlor. The other ponies just looked at her all surprised and confused as to how she was able to eat so much sugar and not get sick or have a bloated belly. This disturbed the locals in ways where they suddenly lost their appetite because of Pinkie's sloppy eating.

Fluttershy trotted along the path of the town, not knowing who or what she was looking for. But then, she came across what looked like the town's local zoo. For some reason, she felt like she was being drawn to it, so she decided to check it out. She paid to get inside and looked around, seeing all kinds of exotic animals, much different than the ones in the private garden at Celestia's castle.

Applejack searched the east part of the town and walked into what looked like farmlands. Each farm was planting and harvesting all kinds of fruits and vegetables for the upcoming winter. But then, something caught Applejack's eye. An earth pony stallion who was helping out one of the elderly ponies, who looked like they broke their backs. His fur was a tan color and his mane was brown. His eyes were darker shade of green than her own and his cutie mark was what looked like an erupting volcano. She realized then that she had a job to do and kept searching for any kind of problem the locals might actually have.

Rarity searched the west part of the town, which was actually the market. But sadly, none of the ponies here looked like they were having any struggles with their daily lives. They all seemed very chatty and satisfied. Nevertheless, Rarity kept looking, eventually bumping into somepony when she wasn't looking and fell.

"Oh dear, I'm so sorry about that." she said.

"No need to be sorry, it wasn't your fault miss." said a male voice. He sounded like he was a Canterlot pony, but he wasn't. Rarity looked up and saw a light blue stallion with brown eyes and a black mane. He looked like the type of stallion who's a sheltered genius who was groomed for success his whole life. He was carrying what looked like medical books in his saddle bags. His cutie mark showed what look like a wave from the ocean. "Are you alright?" he asked, offering to help her up.

"I'm fine, I just wasn't looking where I was going. My name's Rarity." she introduces herself.

"My parents call me Tidal Wave. Pleased to meet you. Well, I'd better get home. Mother is almost done cooking up supper."

"Well, alright. Take care."

"You too, Rarity."

As soon as he turned the corner on one of the paths, Rarity continued her search.

Twilight and Sunset searched the southern part of the town, and stumbled upon the local town library. But this library was in the form of a tree, similar to the Golden Oaks Library that Twilight use to live in before Tirek destroyed it. The memories of that library still left a few scars and a broken heart inside Twilight. Sunset could tell that Twilight was hurting inside. She gave Twilight a big hug, comforting her.

"Hey, it's alright, Twilight. I'm right here for you." Sunset says.

"Thanks, Sunset. I'm glad to have one of my best friends by my side." Twilight says, returning the hug. She and Sunset eventually broke free and headed inside the library. The moment they stepped in, Twilight went over to one of the shelves, grabbed a few books and took them with her to a table and started reading. Sunset walked over and sat next to her.

"Um, Twilight, what are you doing? We have to keep looking or we won't get our job done." Sunset asks quietly.

"I'm just looking over the rules and history of this town. It'll give us better grasp on how things work here. Go ahead and grab a book or two, maybe they might have more info on this place as well." Twilight implied. Sunset sighed and got out of her chair. She walked over to one of the shelves and only took one book. She went back to sit with Twilight and opened up the book. Twilight looked over Sunset's shoulder and saw the title on the first page: Freedom Valley Legends. "Ooh, very good choice." she said before she got back to reading.

With Princess Celestia and Spike, however, they traveled to the north part of town, passing by a beautiful neighborhood where some of the wooden houses had watermills in the backyard and lovely gardens. The fillies and colts were chasing each other, playing tag and hide and seek, and even playing jump rope. Princess Celestia smiled just as much as Spike was seeing the young ones having fun. Further down the path, stood a big wooden house that was about 3 stories tall. There was a balcony on the 3rd floor.

Spike could only guess that it probably belonged to the leader.

"Wait here." Celestia says as she advances. She walked up to the front door and knocked on it. She got no response and waited for a few seconds before knocking again. This time, the door opened up to reveal an alicorn stallion with the same fur color as her, but his mane and eyes were sapphire blue. Both she and the alicorn stallion’s eyes shrunk when they finally met each other.

“Strange, you look so familiar, yet I can’t exactly put my hoof on it.” said the stallion. Princess Celestia was about to giggle, but she kept it in check so the stallion would figure it out. Spike looked up at the princess with a confused look on his face.

“Um, mom? Is he...you know?” Spike asks vaguely. Celestia only glanced at Spike, giving him a simple nod. Spike looked at the stallion and asked him. “Excuse me, sir? Um, if you don’t mind me asking, what’s the name of this place exactly?”

“Oh this town right here is called the Freedom Village, but as you may have noticed how the rest of the outside land is nothing but a wide open grassland, that’s what our ancestor’s call The Freedom Valley, a beautiful place where we work hard and roam free.” explained the stallion. “My name is Blue Blaze and I’m the leader of this whole town and my job is to protect it.”

“Wow, that’s pretty cool. How’d this place get its name?” Spike asked. Blue Blaze chuckled at the young dragon’s curiousity and stepped aside.

“Why don’t you both come in and I’ll tell you all about it. Usually my father would tell you, but he’s still taking care of some business with his old combat partner. My wife loves it whenever we have kind visitors over, including our daughter.” Blue Blaze says.

“Oh, why thank you, Blue Blaze.” Celestia says. “Come on, Spike.”

“Okay mom.” Spike and Celestia walked inside the house before Blue Blaze closed the door and guided them to the living room on the left hand side of the house. Celestia and Spike took a seat by the window while Blue Blaze went into the kitchen where there was a mare with dark red fur and silky smooth bright red mane.

The two of them started talking quietly to each other about who-knows-what and something told Spike it wasn’t exactly going to be pleasant. Blue Blaze walked back into the living room and sat in his chair, clearing his throat.

“Sorry about the wait. Also, if you don’t mind me asking, young dragon did I just hear you refer to the mare right next to you as your mother earlier?” Blue Blaze asks.

“Oh, yeah. She might not be my real mom, but she helped raise me when I was just a little hatchling, along with the help of Twilight.” Spike replied.

“I see, so what might your names be?”

“My name’s Spike.”

“And I’m Princess Celestia.” just as she answered, Blue Blaze’s eyes shrunk a bit. “What’s the matter, Blue Blaze, is there something wrong?”

“My... my mother was a princess... a princess that my father married 20+ years ago, but my memories of my mother are so hazey that I forgot what she looked like.” Blue Blaze took one more look at Princess Celestia to see if his mind wasn’t playing tricks on him. “It can’t be... is it really you?” The only thing Celestia could so was give Blue Blaze a warm and loving smile.

“So you’re finally remembering? I’m glad to hear that... my son.” Celestia says. Right on cue, Blue Blaze calmly got out of his chair and walked over to his mother that he finally remembered and gave her a big hug and she hugged him back. “To think that after all these years, you’ve changed from a simple unicorn to an alicorn, and you’ve become a well-respected king.”

“A king? But I thought all kings were bad.” Spike said.

“Not all kings, Spike. In this particular town, the king and queen are highly respected just as much as they are highly respective of their citizens. It’s true that even I was once a queen here, but with Blue Blaze and his wife, well, you can already put two and two together.” Celestia explains.

“Hmm, there’s somethings you don’t hear every day.” Spike says, earning a chuckle from his mom.





Back at the town’s library, Twilight was still buried deep in the books, gaining as much knowledge of the town’s history as possible, but jumped in surprise by Sunset’s gasping.

“Sunset, you almost gave me a heart attack!” Twilight whispered.

“Sorry Twilight, but there’s something you need to see.” Sunset showed Twilight a specific page on the book that eventually gave her the same surprised look.

“It... It can’t be!” Twilight said

“But, what if it’s true?” Sunset asked.

“If it is true, we should probably alert the princess right away!”

“How? We don’t know where she might be in this town?”

“Don’t know where who might be in this town?” asked a male voice. Twilight and Sunset turned and saw a pegasus with light yellow fur, orange mane and purple eyes just like Celestia’s. His cutie mark was a flame that was moving really fast.

“Umm, are you a resident of this town?” Twilight asked.

“Sure, I live with here with my two older brothers and my dad.” he said.

“Well, do you think you can tell us if you’ve seen a white alicorn walking around with a teenage purple dragon anywhere in this town?” Sunset asks.

“Hmm, now that I think about it, I did see somepony with those exact descriptions being let into my house by my big brother earlier.” he said.

“Well, can you take one of us there? It’s kind of important.” Twilight asks.

“Sure, by all means, come with me.” he agreed. Twilight looked over at Sunset and she nodded in approval to let Twilight go with the stallion while she stayed behind and read some more. Twilight and the pegasus stallion walked out of the library and down the path to his house.

“By the way, my name’s Twilight Sparkle.”

“My name’s Heat Blitz.”

“Hmm, interesting name. Did your dad give it to you?”

“Yeah. My dad thought it’d be a nice name since I wasn’t born a unicorn like my two older brothers were, but I felt a little better when my oldest brother became an alicorn.”

“Really? How’d that happen?”

“It wasn’t exactly a pleasant event, but... it happened at our grandpa’s funeral.”

“Oh, I’m really sorry for your loss.”

“Thanks, Twilight. You see, it was back when Blue Blaze gave out his speech about grandpa, saying how he was a wonderful leader and a loving grandfather to us and loving father to our dad. But the last thing he said that truly earned him his wings was how he said that he’d pick up the pieces and continue on where our grandpa left off and keep our whole town safe.”

“That’s great! So what was your other brother like?”

“Oh...you mean Eternal Flames?”

“That’s his name?”

“Yeah... our... our mother gave him that name... before she disappeared.”

“What’s your brother, Eternal Flames like?”

“Well... he doesn’t really talk much these days. He spends most of his time in his room, watching the town from his bedroom window all day. Before this whole grandpa passing away, he was always a hard working and slightly sociable stallion, but now he doesn’t socialize at all. He feels as if the whole entire world turned against him when it took away our beloved grandpa.”

“What was your grandfather like?”

“He was one of the bravest unicorn stallions we’ve ever had, next to our dad and my brothers, of course, and he was so kind, smart and very wise. He even referred to his subjects as his own family, just like he did for his real family. It broke our hearts that he had to leave us so soon. But it really affected Eternal Flames the most and now it’s like the family is falling apart so quickly. He’s also been pushing himself past the point of exhaustion trying to become the best combat specialist he can be. He feels like it’s his duty and his alone.”

“That doesn’t seem like a very good idea. That’d just add more stress to himself than what he already has and it could probably break him.” This was way past the point of what the true problem was in this town and it was all thanks to a brand new friend she made. “You know, if it helps, I could gather my friends and we can all try to cheer him up, help him move forward, which is what his grandfather would’ve wanted.”

“What? Gee, I don’t know, Twilight. I mean, he doesn’t like to burden somepony he doesn’t know with his personal problems at all. He’s got some strict principles for himself.” Heat Blitz explained.

“Even so, it wouldn’t hurt for him to hear us out.” Heat Blitz was about to explain, but Twilight cut him off, “Please, it’s our job to help solve friendship problems. Whether as a team or as individuals, it’s our solemn duty to help fix any and all friendship problems.”

Heat Blitz took a little time to think it over as they got closer to his house and then finally, “Alright Twilight, I’ll even let my brother, Blue Blaze know about this.”

“Thanks for understanding, Heat Blitz.”

After their little agreement, Both ponies reached the three-story wooden house and went inside before Heat Blitz closed the door behind them. Heat Blitz and Twilight walked over to the living room where Blue Blaze was sitting next to his wife, Crimson Ruby and in front of Princess Celestia and Spike. Heat Blitz was a little confused with who the mysterious mare was, since he never met her before or the dragon. But there was something about her that made him feel like he’s related to her in some strange way.

“Ah, Heat Blitz, come sit. And you too, miss.” said Blue Blaze to Twilight.

“Oh, thanks.” Twilight walked over to one of the chairs and sat on it. “My name’s Twilight Sparkle, and I’m guessing you’ve met Princess Celestia.”

“Indeed I have. There’s even a little something I never knew about her up until just recently and boy did it ever leave me so surprised and so happy.” Blue Blaze said.

“What do you mean, bro?” Heat asked.

“Tell me, Heat. Have you ever wondered where our beloved mother was? Or ever pondered about whether or not she was even alive?”

“Sometimes, yes. Why do you ask?”

“Well, you can stop now. She’s found us.”

Heat Blitz’s eyes shrunk and his attention turned to Celestia. He felt like his jaw had dropped to the ground and broke through the floor. “Y-YOU MEAN?!”

“I know I can never turn back the clock on what has happened over these pasts 20+ years, but I’m just so glad to see my boys have grown up so much.” Celestia says, getting up out of her chair and walking towards Heat Blitz, giving him a hug.

“M-M-M-M-Mom? Is that really you?” Heat Blitz asked with tear-filled eyes.

“I’m here now, son.”

Heat Blitz’s heart had started pounding fast and his sobbed quietly into his mother’s shoulder, now feeling satisfied that she had found him.

“Shhhh, it’s alright. Mother’s here now, sweetie.” Celestia whispered in his ear, while he let loose a steady stream of his happy tears.

“Princess Celestia?” Twilight asked.

“Yes, Twilight?”

“You actually have children? I mean, I get that you raised Spike when he was just a hatchling, but how come you never told me that you had 3 other sons before him?”

“It’s a long story, Twilight. And I don’t think now is the best time.”

“B-But...” Just as she was about to start, she remembered an important errand she had to run that she had completely forgotten along the way. “Oh no! I forgot to tell you, Princess. But while Sunset and I were at the library, we sort of found something that kind of... gave us another reason to come here.”

“Oh? What might that be, Twilight?”

“Well, I’d tell you, but I think you’re hooves are full at the moment. I can certainly relate to Heat Blitz when my big brother would always be training at the castle while he was working as Captain of the Royal Guard, so I don’t see why I should interrupt this tender moment.”

“Spoken like a real Princess of Friendship. Mom really taught you well.” Spike said.

“Yes she did, Spike.” Twilight agreed.





Back with Fluttershy, she had been traveling all over the local town zoo, gazing at all of the exotic animals and then finally coming across what looked like a large tiger exhibit. What she saw inside the exhibit had given her a surprised look on her face and it wasn’t because of how big the tigers were or how many there were inside, but because of who the pony was that was caring for them.

The pony she saw, was a pegasus with a silver colored mane and a minty-green fur coat and his cutie mark showed a tornado with three leaves on each side like they were wings. Two of the three tigers were being given a nice, relaxing belly rub each, while the third one was enjoying its cat nap. All the while, the pegasus was humming a gentle and soft tune, like a melodious lullaby.

Fluttershy was dumbfounded to find out that there was somepony else in this town who knew how to approach and care for animals, similar to how she does it. She then sees the tigers pushing him away with their big paws, telling him that’s more than enough. He backed off with a smile and flew out of the exhibit right next to where Fluttershy was standing.

“You have a way with animals, don’t you?” she asked, getting his attention.

“Hmm? Oh, yeah. It’s always been my passion.” he replied.

“Are there any other ponies working here? I haven’t seen any other ponies looking after the other animals, are you the only one working here?”

“Sadly yes. There use to be 4 others that once worked here, but 3 of them quit and the other passed away from a sickness that went on for too long.”

“Oh dear, I hope they rest in peace.”

“I’m sure she is. And I know she’s smiling from above.”

“Hmm, yes. You’re right.” Fluttershy then got an idea. “Um, would it be too much trouble if I helped you out around the zoo a little bit? I know how to care for animals.”

“Well, I don’t know, I don’t exactly make a lot of bits in this zoo.”

“Oh, I’m not doing it for the bits, I just want to help because I figure these animals get so lonely when they don’t have enough ponies to help love and care for them.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course...umm... if you don’t mind, that is?” the pegasus pondered about it for a moment before he gave Fluttershy a straight answer.

“Alright, you can help. It’s not gonna be an easy job, but I do appreciate the help. By the way, I forgot to tell you, my name’s Hurricane Breeze.”

“Pleased to meet you, Hurricane. My name’s Fluttershy.”

“Nice to meet you, too, Fluttershy. Here, come along with me. I’ll introduce you to some of the animals here that I know who will love to see new faces.”

Hurricane guided Fluttershy over to the back part of the zoo, showing her the other kinds of exhibits: kangaroos, warthogs, tapirs, orangutans and even a reptile exhibit with different reptiles that Fluttershy has never seen before, such as the komodo dragon. Unlike other dragons, this one didn’t have any wings, despite its full-grown shape and size.





Back at the library, Sunset was still reading through the book that she had found on the Freedom Valley and the legendary tales of the supposed myth. But what was strange about this particular legend was that she feared it could actually be as true as the Nightmare Moon legend. And this could only mean that she and her friends were probably going to be put through yet another difficult challenge.

“5 of them are known, but the 6th is a mystery, huh?” Sunset asked herself. “Hmm... I never would’ve guess... that there was a legend about these so-called "Elements of Freedom.”

She read through the book more to see if there was anything about the Elements that might be helpful, like where they might be hidden away or who the chosen wielders are. She wanted to skip ahead, but she was afraid that she might end up skipping the page with the exact info she needed. She read the books carefully from page to page, gathering as much info as she possibly could.

It then on the 5th page, she finally found the info she needed and found out all she needed to know about the newly discovered six hidden “Elements of Freedom” and their chosen wielders. The only thing left to do for Sunset was to alert Princess Celestia about this.
> Regrouping
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Heat Blitz had finally calmed down from his little emotional breakdown after he had finally found out about his real mother. Breaking free of the hug, Heat Blitz takes a seat next to Celestia and Spike. At this point, Spike got a little curious at why Blue Blaze was always turning his attention towards the stairs out in the hallway. It was like something was up there that was really bothering him.

"Um, Blue Blaze?" Spike asked.

"Hmm?" he replied.

"Why do you keep looking at the stairs in the hallway? Is there something up there that sort of bothers you?"

"Actually, Spike. There's some"pony" upstairs that sort of "bothers" him. Specifically, his little brother, Eternal Flames and he's always under the weather." Crimson Ruby says.

"Eternal Flames?" Spike asked, looking perturbed.

"I was the one who gave him that name." Celestia says.

"I know a little bit about him and I think that's why the map brought us here. You see, Heat Blitz told that Eternal Flames doesn't socialize with anypony anymore ever since his grandfather passed away. Heat told me how Eternal would always keep himself isolated in his room, looking down at the town below." Twilight explained to Celestia.

"Oh dear, when did this happen?" Celestia asked.

"Three weeks ago." Blue Blaze says.

"I guess he took it pretty hard. Did you try cheering him up?" Spike asked.

"I stopped trying." Blue Blaze replies.

"But not me. The only reason he stopped is because he's afraid of his own little brother's strength and how he might turn against his own family. But for the past 3 weeks, he's never laid a harmful hoof on any of us, all he ever does is just make small talk." Crimson says.

"Is he still in is room now?" Twilight asks.

"That's all he ever stays in." Blue Blaze says, unamused.

"Honey!" Crimson says, smacking his shoulders.

"What? I've tried to be nice to the little squirt but nothing helps."

"Blue Blaze, he is your little brother. You should never stop trying to comfort your own flesh and blood, he lost his own beloved grandfather." Celestia scolds.

"Mother, with all due respect, it's been three weeks. Three... weeks! Any other normal pony would try to move on within at least 5 days, or a week at the most. If he wants to sulk in that room of his for the rest of his life, then who am I to stop the little crybaby." Blue Blaze says, cringing.

"HEY!" Heat Blitz shouts. "I can understand why you're upset with my brother sulking over grandpa's death for 3 whole weeks in a row, but don't EVER insult him like that again! Now if you'll excuse me, I've got a big brother that I need to help cheer up." Heat Blitz ran out of the living room and up the flight of stairs.

"Should I go up there with him?" Spike asked.

"No, sweetie. Let them talk things over. As far as they're concerned, we're all still strangers to them, including my son, who's sulking upstairs." Celestia says before turning her attention to Twilight. "So what was it that you wanted to tell me, other than the news about one of my sons?"

"Well, you see, there's something in this book about the "Freedom Valley Legends" that me and Sunset found out about in the library." Twilight replies.

"Oh, I think we have that book." Crimson says. "Hang on, I'll go and get it." she gets up out of her seat and goes over to the bookshelf underneath the window. She got out the first book on the top left part of the shelf and brought it over to Twilight and sat back down on the couch.

"Thank you." Twilight says before openeing up the book. She turns the pages a couple of times before she comes across the same one she and Sunset found. "Okay, princess, here's what we found out. Apparently in this place called the "Freedom Valley," there's a legend about the Elements of Freedom."

"Wait a second, don't you mean Elements of Harmony?" Celestia asks.

"Not these ones, Princess. Although, there are 5 known elements and a hidden one, just like our Elements of Harmony, these ones are named differently. The five known elements here are Knowledge, Hope, Respect, Wisdom and Teamwork. No pony knows the 6th element and haven't even considered looking to find them, mostly because previous travelers either weren't the chosen ones or some brushed it off as nothing more than an urban legend or a myth." Twilight explains.

"Does anypony else know about this?" Spike asked.

"Father does." Blue Blaze says. "When he was still the king, he'd read that book to Eternal every night before bed when he was just a colt. Nowadays, father either checks up on us and spars with his old combat partner out in the valley every day."

"Who's his combat partner?" Twilight asks.

"Panja. He's a lion."

"A LION?!"

"Well that would explain the lion dens on the outside of the town." Spike says.

"Wait, I thought lions were wild predators." Twilight says.

"That's only partly true, but the lions here can talk and act civilized in their own manor. One in particular is the leader of the pride, Panja. He taught me and my brother, Eternal, along with a few other friends of his how to handle themselves in the midst of a fight. We even went so far as to call him "Master Panja," when we were still his student up until about a year ago." Blue Blaze says. 

"Strange... I never heard of a lion for a combat teacher." Twilight says.

"In this land, in this world, anything's possible, Twilight." Celestia says.





Upstairs on the third floor, Heat Blitz had walked over to the opened doorway leading into his older brother's room where he was still standing in the exact same spot. One step into his room and just like that, "Is there something you wanted to talk about?" Eternal asked.

"Um, we have guests downstairs, Eternal." Heat says.

"So it seems." Eternal says, still gazing out his window.

"Come on, Eternal. Don't you want to meet them? I don't want you to be alone all day, you've barely even had anything to eat at all." Heat Blitz says. "I know you're upset about grandpa and all and I don't really blame you, I've have to live with this cold hard reality, too. We all do. But grandpa would want you to mourn over his death forever, he'd want you to be strong and move forward, not for his sake, but for your sake. Please, Eternal, I miss my big brother and that bright smile of his." Heat Blitz explains.

Heat Blitz waited for at least any kind of movement from Eternal, other than his lips, but for a whole minute there was nothing so far. Heat's ears flopped down and was about to give up, but suddenly, he saw his brother slowly turn around to face him. Eternal's sapphire eyes locked onto Heat's magenta eyes, however, Eternal's eyes were dull and still filled with anger and sorrow.

"Fine. I'll join you downstairs, but only for an hour. Will that be enough?" he asked. Heat Blitz, then lunged at Eternal and hugged him tightly.

"Yeah. More than anything." he replied. Eternal's eyes sparked a little bit as he wrapped one of his hooves around his little brother's back.

"Alright, easy does it." The two brothers held the hug for 30 seconds before both stallions walked out of the room and the two flights of stairs. Both of the young stallions made it into the living room and Blue Blaze gave Eternal that cold, unamused look as Eternal did back.

"Don't even start with me." Blue Blaze says, glaring at his little brother.

"Look who's talking." Eternal retorted in the same tone.

"Boys, stop! This isn't how you should behave." Crimson says. "Jeez, can you two go for one whole day without grabbing each other's throats?"

"I would, but I gotta make sure he's gonna not running his mouth in all the wrong directions." Blue Blaze says, giving his little brother the death stare.

"Says the guy who's trying to start it all." Eternal retorts, looking unamused.

"You trying to start something with me? Being an alicorn isn't just for show, you know!"

"You don't scare me, ya big blue lout!"

"GUYS, ENOUGH!" Spike shouted. Blue Blaze and Eternal looked at Spike. "If you're ever going to stop patronizing each other, then you need to stop bad-mouthing Eternal and YOU need to put your grandfather's death behind you and move on, not for his sake, but for your own, if you don't, you'll just end up driving away your loved ones and you can't live with that truth, you understand?" Spike scolded.

Blue Blaze and Eternal looked surprised at the young dragon's words. The two stallions looked back at each other and stared for a moment. They both took a deep breath and let out a sigh of relief before they finally approached each other.

"I apologize, Eternal. I guess I was a bit of a jerk. But the dragon speaks the truth. Grandpa's gone and we to pull ourselves together, just like old times." Blue Blaze says calmly.

"Yes, I apologize, too, Blue Blaze. My actions were childish and uncalled for. I'm still upset about grandpa leaving us, but I'll try to move on." Eternal replied. Blue Blaze smiled a bit.

"Come here, let me give you a hug." he said. Eternal nodded and got close enough to his older brother and wrapped his hoof around him while Blue Blaze wrapped his hoof around Eternal, with the added bonus of one of his wrapping one of his wings around Eternal.

"Aww, that's just so sweet." Twilight said, placing a hoof on her chest.

"My big brothers." Heat Blitz says, smiling.

"It warms my heart to finally see you two like this." Celestia says.

"Let's just hope it stays that way." Crimson says. "It's been quite a while since the last time I saw those two embracing their everlasting brotherhood."

"Well, aside from this, I still can't believe there are these things called the Elements of Freedom!" When Twilight said this, Eternal's eyes shot wide open and let go of his brother.

"You mean the ones my father read me when I was a colt?" Eternal asked. Twilight nodded. "Do you mind if I take a look at it for a moment?"

"Oh, not at all, go ahead." Twilight levitated the book over to Eternal and he started reading a few of the pages somewhat hastily, like he was lookign for some kind of info.

"If I remember right, there was a rumor about the Elements of Freedom being hidden at the Freedom Valley long ago, but the only pony whoever found them were King Cosmos and Queen Galaxia. Rumor has it that they were the ones who created these artifacts." Eternal explains.

But then everypony around him froze in shock when he said that, but the one who was most shocked was Princess Celestia when he mentioned the legendary king and queen of time and space.

"O-Oh my!" Celestia says with a hoof under her lip.

"Princess, what's the matter?" Twilight asked.

"Queen Galaxia and King Cosmos... are my parents." Celestia replied.

"What?! How come you never told me about them?" Spike asked.

"I've ruled over Equestria for so long that I completely forgot about them. I knew that they were quite powerful, but I didn't know they could create the Elements of Harmony." Celestia says, still shocked.

"If I had known you were the daughter of such powerful deities, I'd probably pay you your respects and probably do the same for your parents." Eternal said.

"Well, as nice as it sounds, we should probably go meet up with the others." Spike implied. Twilight then gasped in a panic and ran towards the front door.

"Oh no, I forgot about Sunset! I left her at the library!" Twilight said.

"Calm yourself, Twilight. We'll all go together." Celestia replied. "If that's okay with you." she asks, turning her attention to her boys.

"I suppose it wouldn't hurt to meet more of your friends, mother." Blue Blaze said. Eternal's ears shot up when his brother said that.

"Why'd you call her "mother?" Eternal asked. Blue Blaze covered his muzzle. "This better not be some kind of joke you always try to pull off."

Blue Blaze sighed at Eternal's accusasions. "No, Eternal. I couldn't tell you this, because you might take it very hard, but Princess Celestia is our mother."

"That can't be! How do you know?"

"Do you remember have those dreams about that alicorn's shadow?"

"Yes, but why are you bringing this up?"

"Well, I think it's time for you open up your eyes, because our mother... had found us."

As soon as Blue Blaze said that, Eternal's eyes widened. He then shook his head. "N-No, how?!"

"Why don't you ask her yourself? I'm sure she'll explain everything."

Eternal couldn't think straight, but he took his older brother's advice and walked over to Princess Celestia, who's already walked out of the house with the others. He walked up close enough for him to whisper into the princess' ear, hoping the others won't hear.

"Princess." he whispered.

"Hmm?" Celestia asked, looking at Eternal.

"Is my brother right? Are you actually my mother?" he waited for a response from the princess. Her reaction to his question was a slight giggle and then she leaned her neck down to his level.

"It might be a bit much to take in all at once, but I'm very impressed with how much you've grown... my son." She whispered quietly to Eternal. He stopped dead in his tracks, with a shocked expression. Heat Blitz watched as his older brother became completely dumbfounded.

"Hey, what's the hold-up?" Heat Blitz asked.

"I think he just found out more about Princess Celestia than he thought." Spike replied.

"Yeah, and I don't think he's taking it too well." Twilight added. Eternal Flames' eyes soon hid underneath his red mane, trying not to show off his anger.

"Tell me... why?" he asked in a shook up voice.

"Why have I not told you this sooner, or why did I leave?" Celestia asked.

"Both!" he replied, trying not to explode. Celestia sighed.

"I want to save this story for after we've gathered everypony."

Eternal sighed. "Fine, but can my pals join on this? I... want to surprise them."

"Sure, son."

Afterwards, the rest of the gang exited out of the house and followed Twilight. But as they were passing by an ice cream shop, Twilight heard a familiar voice from inside the shop. She walked inside and saw her friend, Pinkie Pie, munching on what looked like her 17th bowl of ice cream.

"Pinkie?! What are you doing?" Twilight asked, all shocked.

"Hmm? Oh, I was trying to ask one of the ponies who worked here if there was a friendship problem we could solve, but then, I got a little hungry, so I stayed to have a little snack!" Pinkie replied with a squee.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say she's a bottomless pit." said a male voice. Twilight looked and saw that there was a stallion who had a strong resemblance to King Sombra, only he was much younger and didn't have any armor on his body.

Twilight got a little cautious and lit up her horn, teleporting herself between Pinkie and the stallion. She glared at him without breaking eye contact.

"Listen, Sombra, I don't know what you want, but don't even think about hurting my friends, or I promise you that you'll get what's coming to you!" Twilight said, gritting her teeth.

"Oooooh, you sound like that girl with the purple cloak who can use demonic powers." Pinkie says.

"Okay, first off, you don't have to get all hostile with me. Second, just because I look like a younger version of my father, doesn't mean I share his cold, black heart. Third, my name is Shadow Force." he explains.

"Oh, umm..... sorry about that. I just thought tha--......FATHER?!?!?!" Twilight asked, shocked.

"Sombra has a son?!" Spike asked in the same tone.

"I reacted the same way when I heard about him being Sombra's child. However, father never saw that in him, and instead saw him as a lost pony with no family to call his own." Blue Blaze said.

"And thanks to their dad's guidance and the support from the town, they all helped raise me and even gave me this job at the ice cream parlor. It gave me a major sweet tooth, no doubt." Shadow explains.

"Yup yup! But he doesn't eat as much ice cream as I do!" Pinkie said with a squee.

".....Right, umm shouldn't we get Sunset?" Spike asked.

"Oh right, come on everypony." Twilight said. The group followed her down the path of the town and in no less than 4 minutes, they finally made it to the library. Twilight went inside for a few minutes before bringing Sunset out with the rest of the gang. Afterwards, the group all walked back down the path and on the search for more of Twilight's friends, only for all of them to stop dead in their tracks when a yellow and a rainbow blue sped past them, and Pinkie jumped up and down with joy.

"OOH, OOH, LOOK, UP THERE!" Pinkie says, pointing at the sky. Everypony's eyes looked up and saw that Rainbow Dash was trying to get this yellow pegasus.

"What?" Shadow asked, looking up with the rest of the group. But just as he looks up, he starts laughing.

"NGAHHH!!!!" she shouted. "STOP RUNNING AWAY!!!"

The stallion she was chasing after kept giving her an unamused glance before soaring faster in the sky, trying to get away from Rainbow Dash. But Rainbow Dash kept chasing after him. She was never one to give up a chase, unless it was Pinkie chasing after her.

"Will you just slow down already?!" Rainbow shouted.

"And risk being off schedule? Sorry ma'am, but I'm busy right now!" replied the stallion. He kicked his flight speed into overdrive and gain a little bit of distance away from Rainbow Dash. But she, on the other hoof, wasn't going to let her "competitor" get the better of her.

All the while, Spike was getting a good laugh at Rainbow having trouble keeping up.

"Hey, what's so funny? We all know Rainbow's the fastest pegasus in Ponyville." Pinkie said.

"Except we're not in Ponyville. I think she's met somepony who can actually hold their own against her. Especially when he's constantly in a rush. But who is he?" Twilight asked.

"That's one of Eternal Flames' friends. He and his mom and some other pegasi are in charge of the weather here in the Freedom Village. He doesn't really talk to strangers, but he can still be nice." Heat Blitz explains.

"Only he's kinda punctual when it comes to work. He's quick in the head and wings." Shadow added.

"And it looks like Rainbow Dash found herself a new speed rival." Spike chuckled.

"I'll take quite a while for them to stop flying around like that." Sunset added.

"I'll say, but for now, let's just leave them be. They'll come to us in due time." Celestia implied.

"Yeah, but right now we gotta find Rarity, Applejack and Fluttershy. And if I know Rarity, she'd probably get sidetracked over some new lines of dresses or she's eyeing some random stallion." Twilight says. Her eyes widen when she mentioned that last part out loud with Spike listening. "Eh, sorry Spike."

"No no, i-it's alright. Let's just find the others." Spike said. "Umm... hey, Blue Blaze, does this town have a zoo, because Fluttershy is kind of an animal caretaker."

"As a matter of fact, we do have a zoo. It's a little distance away, so I need you all to stay close so you don't get lost along the way, okay?" Blue Blaze replied.

"Okay." everyone replied. Blue Blaze then took the lead and everypony followed him. During the walk to the zoo, Eternal Flames walked up to Spike with curiousity.

"So, Spike, was it?" Eternal asked.

"Y-Yeah, what is it?" Spike replied.

"What's the matter? You sounded kind of bummed out when Twilight mentioned this "Rarity." Is she a good friend of yours or something?"

"Yeah, we've been good friends for about 5 years."

"That's nice to hear. There's nothing more greater than having close friends."

"Yeah, but the thing is... I've always... umm... oh never mind."

"What? Tell me?"

"You wouldn't like what I'm about to say."

"Spike, I can understand fully. Just tell me what's on your mind."

"Oh alright, I've had a crush on her when I first met her. I was only a baby dragon back then. She's the most beautiful pony I ever laid eyes on. I wanted to be able to go on a date with her, but... I just kept getting nervous about it and I always bail on the most important opportunities."

"What kind of things did you do for her?"

"Well, for one thing, I always helped her with work. I let her use my tail as a pin cushion when she's sewing some of her dresses, I help carry her luggage and most of all... I gave her a beautiful fire ruby. In return, I was able to get a kiss on the cheek from her. No wonder she's the Element of Generosity."

Eternal's eyebrow quirked when Spike said all those things. He closed his eyes and shook his head. Eternal knew exactly what was going on. "I was afraid you'd say that."

"What? Is something wrong."

"Well, let me put it this way: You say that she's the Element of Generosity, yet you're the one who's been doing most of the "generous" work instead of her. She practically has you eating out of the tip of her hoof and the only thanks she gave you was a kiss on the cheek?"

"What's wrong with that?"

"Spike, she's taking you for granted. I can already guess she begs for attention from other stallions or even her friends and yet you claim she's the "Element of Generosity?"

When he said that, Spike got a little frustrated with his attitude. "Hey, don't doubt Rarity."

"I'm just speaking from the heart, Spike. If anypony's doing their job as the Element of Generosity, it's you."

"No! T-That's not true! I-I-I could never take away her element!"

"Too late, Spike. One of these days, if she ever loses touch with her element, you're going to have to step up and show the whole world the power you might possess. And who's fault is it going to be for not living up to her important title?"

"What am I suppose to do, give up on her?"

"I'm not telling you to give up on love, I'm telling you to open your eyes to the truth. Just like how I opened up my eyes years ago when my heart was shattered by my ex." Afterwards, Eternal walked up to Blue Blaze, leaving Spike to ponder about why he would say those things about Rarity.

Finally, everypony reached the entrance of the zoo and went inside, paying for the tickets. The groups all scattered around to find Fluttershy. With Twilight and Sunset, they went over to the penguin exhibit where a group of cute penguins were laying down on their backs, rubbing their bellies with their flippers, meaning they must have finished up their meals.

Twilight and Sunset giggled at the sight and kept moving down the path.

"Twilight, who was that stallion talking to Spike earlier?" Sunset asked.

"That was Eternal Flames." Twilight replied.

"Oh, so why was he telling Spike all those things about Rarity? He's never met her."

"I don't know, I guess he's had a rough love life, too."

"Poor guy. Hopefully he turns his life around."

"I'm sure he will. But first, we gotta find our fluttering little friend."

Sunset giggled. Twilight then stopped over at the orangutan exhibit where they stumbled upon their timid pegasus friend, feeding the orangutans with what looked like a pegasus stallion. From their perspectives, it looked like Fluttershy was carrying on a full-blown conversation with the stallion.

"Hurricane, why are you the only one working in this zoo?" Fluttershy asked.

"Well, for one thing, my 2 older sisters don't like "getting their hooves dirty." They never liked having to clean up the droppings the animals leave behind and they don't like being in "smelly cages" with them either and as for my mom, she stopped running the zoo after grandma passed away." Hurricane Breeze replied.

"Your grandma worked at the zoo? What was she like?"

"Oh, she was like an angel sent from the heavens above. She had a heart made of gold and a beautiful melody she would always hum to keep the animals feeling comfortable. But sadly, her time was running out when she caught a terrible illness which took her away from me when I was 13."

"Oh my. I... I'm so sorry, Hurricane. I wish I could've met her."

"You would've loved her. And she would've loved you."

"Aww, thanks."

"Hey, Fluttershy!" Twilight shouted, making her jump. Fluttershy looked up and saw Twilight and Sunset waving at her with big smiles. Fluttershy felt her whole face go red.

"O-Oh umm... t-this isn't what it looks like Twilight." Fluttershy stuttered.

"It's alright, Fluttershy, no need to feel judged." Twilight reassured. "Although, you'll have to come with us so we can find the rest of the girls."

"Oh, okay." Fluttershy looked back at Hurricane. "Sorry, I gotta go. It was nice talking to you, though."

"I'm glad I got to know you, Fluttershy, take care." Hurricane says.

"Hey, if you want, you can bring him along with you. How does that sound?" Sunset asked. Twilight looked at Sunset with a questionable look. "What? I'm just saying, the more the merrier."

"Well, that's up to him if he has the time." Twilight says.

"Do you want to come along with us? I could introduce you to my friends. Oh... umm, that is... i-i-if you don't mind, that is, but if you don't... I understand." Fluttershy asked. Hurricane Breeze thought it over for a little bit until he had finally made his decision.

"Well, as soon as I'm done putting the elephants to sleep, I'll go. In the meantime, you girls go on ahead and meet with whoever you've got with you." Hurricane replied.

"Okay then. Good luck." Fluttershy replied before flying out of the orangutan exhibit. She, Twilight and Sunset all kept on moving forward on the search for the others.

"So, Fluttershy, who was that stallion you were talking to?" Twilight asked.

"Oh, that was Hurricane Breeze. He's the only pony running the zoo." Fluttershy says.

"The only one? Shouldn't there be other ponies running the whole place, too?" Sunset asked.

"Well, there were 4 other ponies who worked here, but 3 of them quit while the other one passed away. Sadly, that one employee was the original owner of the zoo, Hurricane's grandmother. Hurricane said that she was extremely kind to all of the animals." Fluttershy explains.

"Aww, that's so sad. I hope he's doing okay." Twilight says.

"He's a little upset, and he's usually exhausted after a whole day of working. But he still loves what he does as long as he sees the animals smiling. One time he got so exhausted that he fell asleep in the grizzly bear exhibit and they just layed next to him, keeping him warm and cozy." Fluttershy explains.

"Well that's a one in a million chance that's ever happen." Sunset says.





Over on the other side of the zoo, Celestia kept walking with Eternal Flames, trying to spend a little quality time with her son while all of the others still search for Fluttershy.

"Eternal, your brother said that your father was sparring with his combat partnet, Panja. What exactly does he do these days now that Blue Blaze is in charge?" Celestia asked.

"Other than checking up on us, he got this crazy idea about wanting to watch over the village and the valley from atop the tallest mountain. There was only one enemy who caused trouble around the town, and although father drove them away, we lost one pony." Eternal explains.

"I'm guessing it was your grandfather." Celestia says.

"Yes. But thanks to my father for warning us of the enemy and aiding us in the battle, they flew away and my father gained the title "The Mountain King." Although, I don't get why he'd be called that since I feel like I've heard that title somewhere else before." Eternal replied.

"Oh? Where?"

"No idea, but somehow the name still suites him."

Celestia giggled. "I'm guessing he's not exactly full of himself anymore than he use to?"

"You mean like blabbing about being the strongest? No, I don't think I've ever seen him act so egotistical in my whole entire life, but if he did, I was probably still just a foal."

"Hmm, I see." 'Let's just hope he hasn't forgotten me.' Celestia thought to herself.

"Princess! We found her!" shouted Twilight. Celestia looked ahead and saw Sunset, Twilight and Fluttershy running towards her and Eternal. "Now all we need to find is Rarity and Applejack. Rainbow Dash is probably still trying chasing that pegasus stallion all over town."

"Eternal Flames, does your town have any farms?" Sunset asks.

"Yes. The farmlands are on the east side of the village. But first, we have to get the rest of the group." Eternal says, before walking down the path to the hippo exhibit. "You girls go ahead and wait by the entrance, I'll be back as soon as I possibly can, okay?"

"Okay." Twilight says. Eternal took a few steps forward before teleporting away.





10 minutes later, Eternal got everyone back to the entrance and exited out of the zoo, along with Hurricane Breeze, who finally finished getting the elephants to go to sleep. Everypony traveled to the east part of the village, coming across the farmlands, which looked bigger than they imagined.

"No doubt AJ would probably be here." Spike says.

"Who's AJ?" Shadow asked.

"He means Applejack, silly!" Pinkie replied. "She's a harding-working farm mare."

"So is Ground Breaker." Hurricane added.

"Who's Ground Breaker?" Fluttershy asked.

"He's one of our pals. So is Spark Burst, and Tidal Wave." Shadow answered.

"Well that's nice. I didn't know you made a few friends here, Eternal." Celestia said, surprised.

"I met them back in kindergarden. Except for Tidal Wave. I met him down at a local restaurant when he graduated medical school at the ripe young age of 20." Eternal explains.

"How old is he now?" Sunset asks.

"22. He hardly ever plays because of his strict parents and having to watch his little sister." Eternal says.

"That's gotta stink." Spike says.

"No kidding." Shadow added.

"OOH, OOH, OOH, I SEE APPLEJACK!!! HI APPLEJACK!!!!!" Pinkie shouted. She bounced up high into the air, waving at a familiar mare with orange fur and blonde mane. Applejack was out in one of th fields, helping out one of the farm ponies harvest the crops. Pinkie gasped, not because she was helping out with harvesting crops, but moreso with who she was helping out.

"Oh... my..." Fluttershy says. She also saw the pony she was helping. He was an earth pony stallion with tan fur and a messy, brown mane with darker green eyes. He was a little more built than some of the other stallions and his cutie mark showed an erupting volcano.

Applejack heard the sound of Pinkie's voice and looked over to the group. "Howdy, gals! Ah'll be with y'all in a minute, Ah still gotta help Ground Breaker her get a few more veggies to pull outta the ground. Ah promise to finish up as quickly as I possibly can!" Applejack replied.

"Ground Breaker?!" Twilight asked in surprise.

"What? You didn't know he was a farmer? He even helps out with the others. Plus, anytime one of them is too worn out to work, he carries them on his back and takes them to their home. His dad is really proud of him for being helpful and respectful to others." Shadow explains.

"Aww, that's so sweet." Fluttershy says.

Later on, Applejack and Ground Breaker finished up with the work and went to meet up with the others and head back into town, searching for a certain fashionista. Along the way, they still saw Rainbow Dash chasing after the same yellow pegasus stallion in the air.

The group arrived on the west part of the town where the market was. Everypony kept their eyes opens, searching for any signs of Rarity. Applejack's eyes soon landed on Rarity, who was sitting on a bench near this big gate, enjoying her chocolate ice cream.

"Uh, fellers, Ah think Ah found her." AJ says, pointing to Rarity. Everypony looked and saw Rarity as well and approached the fashionista mare. "Howdy Rarity."

'So, she's Spike's crush? I can see why.' Eternal thought to himself.

"Oh, hello Applejack, did you find anypony with a friendship problem?" Rarity asked. But then her eyes landed on Princess Celestia's boys. "Oh my! What have we here?" she asked, walking towards the stallions.

"These are Celestia's sons: Blue Blaze, Eternal Flames and Heat Blitz." Twilight says. Rarity's eyes sparkled, having heard what Twilight said.

"SONS! You mean Celestia's a..." Rarity says with a huge grin.

"Yes, I'm a mother." Celestia chuckled.

"But, I'm afraid you're too late on terms of dating, I'm happily married." Blue Blaze said.

"Oh...umm... well, what abou-" Rarity asked Eternal Flames, but gets cut off immediately.

"Not a chance." Eternal said, turning away with his eyes closed.

"Ooh, ouch, that's gotta hurt!" Sunset says, with a slight chuckle.

"INCOMING!!!" shouted Rainbow. Twilight looked up at the sky, seeing Rainbow diving down, chasing after the yellow pegasus still, but just as he was about to touch the ground, he pulled himself back up while Rainbow Dash came crashing down into the ground. "OOF!!!" she grunted.

"Dashie! Dashie! Are you okay?" Pinkie asked.

"I'm fine, Pinkie. I jus- OUCH!!!" Rainbow grabbed her left wing and massaged it.

"The fearless become blind when becoming too competitive." said a male voice. Twilight saw that the yellow stallion came back down and examined Rainbow Dash. Twilight now had a better look at the stallion Rainbow Dash had been chasing. His mane was spikey and a darker yellow than his fur. His eyes were faded light green and his cutie mark showed a white, power surging lightning bolt.

"Umm... by any chance, are you Spark Burst?" Twilight asked.

"Yes." he replied as he walked up to Eternal. "So who are these ponies?"

"They're friends of my mom." Eternal replied. Spark Burst looked at all of them. His faced looked unamused, but he just nodded and turned his attention to Eternal again. 

"So, I'm guessing the tall alicorn with the multi-colored mane is your biological mother?" Spark asks.

"Eeyup." Eternal replied.

"Heh, you sounded just like Big Mac." Applejack chuckled.

"Eternal, is that you?" said another male voice. Eternal tilted his head to the left and saw a stallion with light blue fur, black mane and a cutie mark resembling an ocean wave.

"Oh, hiya Tidal Wave. Haven't seen you in a while." Eternal said, walking up to him.

"I see you're finally out of your mourning cave. You pulling through okay?" Tidal asked.

"Yeah. Come on, I want to introduce you to somepony special." The two stallions walked back towards the group and Eternal introduced Tidal Wave to the girls. "Tidal Wave, this is Princess Celestia, she's supposedly my biological mother and these are her friends." Eternal pointed to the others.

"Pleased to meet you, I'm Twilight Sparkle. But you can call me Twilight."

"I know we've already met, but my name's Rarity."

"Howdy partner, Mah name's Applejack."

"OOH OOH, ME NEXT, ME NEXT! I'm Pinkie Pie: Party Thrower Extraordinair!"

"Um, hi... I... I'm Fluttershy."

"Sup, my name's Rainbow Dash."

"My name's Sunset Shimmer. Nice to meet you."

"I'm Spike. How do you do?"

"Pleasure to meet you all. And nice to see you again, Rarity." Tidal replied casually. 

"Well, now that everypony's gathered. I now have one request for you, mother." Eternal said.

"Oh? What might that be, son?" Celestia asked.

"I want to know about why you left me, my brothers and my father when I was just a foal."

Celestia knew her son deserved  an explaination. She sighed and sat on the bench and stared at the group, who all took a seat on the ground.

"Alright, everypony. It's time I told you all the truth about parts of my past that I completely forgot. You see, at one time in my life, I use to be a queen." Celestia begins to explain.



To Be Continued...
> The Trials That Unite The Team
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"You use to be a queen?! But how?" Twilight asked.

"And when?" Sunset added.

"It was about 29 years ago when I first met Blaze Burn when he was still a prince. He was a bit of a show off when it came to things like karaoke or combat. I sort of grew fond of him because he seemed adorable at first. But later on, I started thinking he wasn't such a bad stallion. I even taught him how to use a specific kind of magic that mostly I specialize in." Princess Celestia explained.

"What kind of magic?" Eternal asked.

"Fire magic. How do I know this? Well, my mother, Queen Galaxia taught me how to use it, but I had to get in a lot of practice to control it before I could teach it to somepony else. At first, when I learned fire magic, it'd go out of control, thus changing me into my darker self: Daybreaker. This was something that was only witnessed by my parents and Twilight's old student: Starlight Glimmer. This is something I'd rather not show anypony else, just so they won't be alarmed or anything."

"Jeez, I never knew my mother was my father's teacher in fire magic." Eternal said.

"Yes, well, some time after he had mastered fire magic, which took him up until he was 20, We just sort of looked after the village and all the ponies who lived out their peaceful lives. We thought about starting a family, but he was just too young to even start, so we waited for a while. During our time together, I started to relax a little bit and focused on our future, until finally sometime after he turned 25, we had our first born child, Blue Blaze, then 3 years later, Eternal Flames and finally Heat Blitz a year after that." Celestia says.

"Well ain't that heart-warmin'." Applejack says.

"Yeah, but somehow, even some heart-warming stories come with complications." Spark Burst says.

"You're right. One night, when I was asleep with my husband, I had this vision that Nightmare Moon was going to return soon and I couldn't stick around the village to let her wreak havoc. I immediately told Blaze Burn of the emergency and told him I might not ever return. He was pretty bummed out about it, but he understood why I had to leave, so I kissed him good-bye and flew away to Canterlot. All the while, I never lost sight of the day I had hoped I'd meet my sons and my husband again."

"Who's this "Nightmare Moon?" Eternal asks.

"She's my little sister. But her real name is Princess Luna. Long ago, she grew jealous of the ponies sleeping through the beautiful night while they stayed awake during the day. To make things a little less complicated, she raised the moon and I raise the sun. Because she gave into anger and jealousy, and trying to plunge the world into an eternal night, I had to banish her to the moon. For 1,000 years, Luna stayed imprisoned in the moon and I've had to live with the guilt for so long." Celestia explains.

"But then when she came back, Princess Celestia had disappeared and it was up to me and my friends to search for the Elements of Harmony and stop her. Not only did we defeat Nightmare Moon, but we also managed to reunite Celestia with her little sister." Twilight explains.

"I see... so that's why you left. Well, I could understand why you had to leave back then, but why didn't you return when Luna was finally brought back?" Eternal asks.

"I'm afraid I had my royal duties as Princess of Equestria to fulfill and there many other dangers that had arrived some time after Luna was saved. Of course, I also needed to recieve some friendship lessons my former student had to learn when she moved to Ponyville." Celestia replied.

"Dangers? Friendship lessons? Sounds like you've been busy."

"Afraid so, my son."

"So, what brings you back here? I doubt it's just for a family reunion."

"You're right. You see, we were called here by the Equestrian map in order to solve a friendship problem, but so far, we still haven't found out what it is."

"Maybe we can find out when we find the Elements of Freedom." Sunset implies.

"What?!" Shadow Force shouted.

"What's the matter?" Sunset asks.

"The thing is, ponies have stopped trying to search for the Elements of Freedom because of the dangerous trials that ponies have to undergo individually. Of course, it's also dangerous if the ponies go into the Freedom Valley without an escort." says Tidal Wave.

"Well then, why don't you guys have the girls be your escorts?" Spike implies. "They've overcome their trial together when they searched for the Elements of Harmony."

"That's where the Elements of Freedom are different. There are six paths that divide us from each other for some strange reason and rumor has it that if the ponies don't hear this strange noise calling out to them in any of the paths, that means they're not the chosen ones." Tidal says.

"How do you know all of this if you haven't been there before?" Spike asks.

"I managed to get an interview with one survivor and he told me how he nearly lost his life trying to find at least one of the artifacts in order to study it."

"Jeez, you really do your homework."

"Well, I always have to be prepared for stuff like this."

"So I see. Well, why don't you boys try to find the Elements of Freedom?" Celestia asked.

"It's just too risky and we don't feel like losing each other. We've stuck with each other for years ever since we were just simple little colts." Hurricane Breeze says.

"Aww." Pinkie says.

"All in all, we can't afford to risk our lives to grab the Elements of Freedom, and unless there's a dangerously powerful threat involved in all of this..." Spark Burst says.

"Despite how peaceful it is right now, there's no telling when evil will strike. Now I might not know much about the Elements of Freedom, but it's absolutely necessary that we find them. I have a hunch that this search for the elements might actually be different." Celestia says.

"What do you think, Eternal? Should we?" Shadow asks. Eternal put his hoof up to his chin, thinking about it. He didn't like the idea of sending his pals out into the valley and potentially never see them again, all the while, a lot of these questions filled his mind: Why was his mom so sure that he and his friends would find them, how will the trip end up differently, and if they do find them, what kind of power will they possess when the time comes for him and his friends to use them?

If there was one thing he knew, it's that he wasn't going to get his answers just sitting around. As much as he hated the idea of going into the valley, he didn't have any other choice.

"If the trial gets too much for us to handle, we get out of there as soon as we can." Eternal says sternly. His friends all nodded and his mom smiled. "Follow me, everypony... I know the way." he said, with his voice sounding a little deeper and more serious than usual.

Eternal walked up to the big gate and wrapped his horn in a red aura, causing the gate to unlock and open up, allowing the group of friends to venture out into the valley. There, they ventured down the path and gazed at the wide open grasslands and the mountains over the horizon.

"Well Ah'll be, this place is beautiful." Applejack says.

"It's so beautiful. It's like a paradise for animals everywhere!" Fluttershy says.

"Absolutely marvelous! How do you manage to live in a place so simple, yet so majestic?" Rarity asked.

"If anything, I could probably fly circles aroun this place! BIG circles!" Rainbow says.

"Yes, it does look beautiful, but the Freedom Valley is actually lion territory. Out here, ponies are guests. Whenever we have a surplus of livestock and their time comes, we serve them up for the lions so they won't have to worry about stalking prey out here. As for the lions, their leader, Panja, delivers us herbs from certain parts of the valley in case some of our locals wind up sick." Tidal explains.

"Hey, at least you're not turning into their dinner." Pinkie says, cheerfully. Rarity looked at Pinkie with an unamused look on her face.

"Pinkie, deary, there comes a time when you should just keep stuff like that to yourself." Rarity implies.

"Oopsies, sorry." Pinkie replied, blushing.

"So how far do we have to travel to find the Elements of Freedom?" Twilight asked.

"It's not that far, just about half a mile until we've reached our destination." Eternal replied.

"I don't think I've ever seen the prince so serious before." Sunset replies to Twilight.

"Neither did I." Twilight says.





Later on, The group had finally arrived at what looked to be a 6-way crossroads in front of them, each path leading to a different kind of forest. Everypony was curious of which path was the right one to take.

"What do you think, son?" Celestia asks. Eternal approached the paths a little closer.

"I don't know, but let me try something." Eternal replied. He closed his eyes and remained quiet. The others looked at each other in confusion until Tidal Wave and Spark Burst figured it out.

"Now I get it." Spark Burst said. He walked up and stood next to Eternal, closing his eyes and stood still.

"Uhh, okay, this is getting weird, what's going on?" Rainbow asked.

"It is said that the Elements of Freedom call out to the chosen wielders in some mysterous way. If they can somehow pick up on the call, then it's certain that they'll follow the right path and be able to pass the trial given to them, in order to obain one of the Elements of Freedom." Tidal explains quietly.

"That's certainly unique. Much different than how we found the Elements of Harmony." Rarity says. Before long, the other stallions, minus Blue Blaze and Heat Blitz, stood still next to each other, closing their eyes and listening in for any kind of sound that might be heard.

Seconds laters, they all opened their eyes and looked at each other... with a nod.

"You all heard it, didn't you?" Eternal asked the guys.

"Yup." said the guys.

"Then let's hurry up. The sooner we find the Elements of Freedom, the sooner we'll be ready."

"Hold on there, partner, y'all ain't gonna go in alone. Yer gonna need an escort just in case." AJ implies.

"Hey, she's got a point guys, this might not be a solo mission. So here's what I'm thinking: One of the girls will travel with us down the paths individually. How about we team up, AJ?" Ground Breaker asked.

"Sure thing, sugarcube."

"OOH, OOH, OOH, in that case, I'll go with Shadow! He did feed me all that ice cream earlier." Pinkie implied.

"I'll go with ol' Sparkster." Rainbow says.

"Hurricane Breeze, can I travel with you?" Fluttershy asks.

"Sure. The more the merrier." Hurricane agreed, with a shrug. Fluttershy squeed.

"So, Eternal, you need a pa-" Sunset says before getting cut off.

"Eternal I'll join you!" Rarity blurted out.

"Sunset asked first, Rarity. Don't be so greedy." Eternal replied, sternly.

"Oh, poo."

"Hey, don't take it so hard Rarity, at least you're still tagging along." Sunset says sincerely.

"Thanks, darling."

"Alright everypony... LET'S MOVE!" Eternal shouted.

"Right!" shouted the others.

All twelve of the ponies traveled down the paths the stallion chose. The ones who couldn't go in just stood at the entrance, hoping they don't get hurt in the process. Blue Blaze and Heat Blitz were extremely worried about their brother undergoing this dangerous trial. But on the bright side, he had a friend who was going to help him in case he got hurt or anything.





With Spark Burst and Rainbow Dash, the path ahead of them was leading to some kind of forest with dead trees, light fog and the feeling of being watched in every direction. Rainbow and Spark felt uneasy, keeping their guards up and scanning their surroundings as they kept marching forth.

"Spark, are you sure this is the right path?" Rainbow asked.

"I know it is. We just have to be careful. But whatever you do, don't panic." Spark replied, keeping calm.

"P-Panic? Who's panicking, I'm not! Nothing can scare me!"

"Uh-huh, sure, whatever." Spark rolled his eyes.

"WHAT'S THAT SUPPOSE TO MEAN?!"

"Shhhhh, quiet!"

Rainbow covered her muzzle with her hooves. The two pegasi kept marching forth into the forest, where they soon hear the sound of somepony crying. Spark Burst shushes Rainbow and signals her to follow him, earning a nod from her and walked down the path more.

Right around a couple of seconds later, they found a little colt who looked to be about 13 or 14, curled up in a little hut, sobbing quietly to himself.

"Hey." Spark said, making the colt jump and face him. "What's going on here?" he asked. All he got from the little colt was a slight whimper. "Don't worry kid, I won't hurt you."

"It's not fair! She should've known better! That was a timberwolf! It's all her fault." said the colt with tears in his eyes and a little scowl.

"All who's fault?" Spark asked.

"Mother's." Hearing this, immediately gave him the idea of what's happened to the poor colt. Apparently from what he's heard, his beloved mother must've gotten in a scuffle with a timberwolf and ended up paying the price with her life in order to save her son.

"Oh... I see... I see."

"Why did I wander so far from home?" said the colt with a sniffle.

"Aww, it's not your fault. It's not your mother's fault. Now, you pay attention to ol' Spark Burst."

"B-but."

"It is no pony's fault. The great circle of life has begun. But you see, not all of us arrive together in the end."

"But what'll I do? I miss her so much."

"And you'll always miss her. But she'll always be with you as long as you remember the things she taught you. In a way, you'll never be apart. For you are still a part of each other."

"My tummy hurts."

"Well, that too will go in time, little fella. Only in time." Spark Burst rubbed the little colt's head, while leaving half of his cut sandwich for him before heading forth with Rainbow Dash.

"Dude, what was all that about?" Rainbow asked.

"Sometimes, you have to explain some words of wisdom in order to bring a little comfort to others. The world can be cold at times, but peace and harmony can always be found. Even when all hope seems lost."

"Who taught you all of this stuff, man?"

"I have my beloved grandparents to think about, as well as my own mother."

"But what about your dad?"

"Sadly, I never got to see my father. He passed away when I was very young. War had broken out somewhere and all I had to know of his existance was his spear. A family heirloom, which my mother carries with honor and wisdom, training me day after day to help defend myself."

"I... I'm sorry for your loss, Spark. I didn't know you had a rough life growing up. I... I'm also sorry chasing you around the town earlier. Can we start over and be friends?"

Spark looked at Rainbow with a warm smile and chuckled. "Of course, Rainbow. I'd like that very much." Rainbow Dash beamed lightly and shook hooves with Spark Burst. At that moment, a glimmer of light came from a short distance from where they were standing. Spark marched forth with Rainbow Dash close behind and got close enough to find what looked like some kind of gold necklace with a white lightning bolt that looked similar to Spark's cutie mark and it was sitting on top of a stone pedestal.

"Spark. I... I think that's yours!" Rainbow says. "Go on, put it on!" Spark nodded and placed it around his neck. At that moment, he felt his whole body being lifted off the ground and felt himself being surrounded by a bright yellow light. He slowly levitated back onto the ground and smiled at Rainbow Dash, knowing that he had passed his trial and now possesses his element.





With Tidal Wave and Rarity, the path was a clear walk for a while. All the while, Rarity just couldn't stop fidgeting about a certain stallion rejecting her.

"Oh, what does Eternal have against me? I just wanted to get to know him." Rarity says. "I can't help it if I'm a helpless romantic all the time."

"It's not really his fault. At one time when he was only 15, he use to have a very special somepony. They'd walk through the town together, talking about their personal lives. Those were the times when he use to smile so warmly and had so much of a positive attitude." Tidal explains.

"Really? Does he still see her?"

"Afraid not, Rarity. A year later, he found her sweet-talking and flirting with another stallion. He got so angry that he broke it off with her and gave the other stallion a huge kick to the face because of how he was enjoying the fact that he was "stealing his mare." After that incident, he stopped trying to find love and just focused all of his time training with our combat teacher."

"That's despicable! Why would she abandon him for another?"

"The stupidest reason: the scar-like birthmarks under his eyes make him look like a freak. She wanted to be with somepony who didn't have the "face of a criminal."

"UGH! Now that's just plain rude!"

"There were a few times when other mares found him attractive, but the reason behind that was because they all found out he was a prince."

"O-Oh. I guess that's one of the reasons why he rejected me."

"Sorry, Rarity. But Eternal's got some high standards." 

"I... I understand." Rarity's eyes soon got locked onto a river. The currents were moving at rapid speeds, making it impossible for anypony to swim across. "Um... Tidal Wave? How will we get across?"

"Hmm, give me a minute. It's time I've gotten down into some deep thinking." 

"R-Right, of course." Rarity backed away from Tidal Wave while he walked up to the edge of the river and closed his eyes entering what he calls the Thought Route.

'Okay, from what I can see so far, I'd say the river current is moving at a rapid 15 or 20 miles per hour. Trying to swim against currents this strong'll result in drowning.' Tidal thought to himself. He opened up his eyes and looked at the other side of the river, gauging the distance. 'Okay, it looks like the path on the other side is probably at least 20 feet apart from where I'm standing. It's too far to jump over, so we'll either have to build a bridge to cross the other side or teleport over there.'

"Tidal, did you think of anything?" 

"Rarity, how good are you with teleportation magic?"

"Oh... not too good, sorry darling."

"Alright, then that only leaves us with one option. We'll have to build a bridge to get across. And here's what I'm thinking, if you can levitate at least one log, big enough to carry a pony or two, we should be able to get across the river without much of a fuss."

"Tidal Wave that's brilliant! Right, let's get to it!"

Rarity and Tidal Waves searched the surrounding area, trying to find the materials to create the bridge. They only found a few broken twigs and small rocks. But then, Rarity found a log, big enough to hold up a total of 2 ponies and levitated it over to the path. Tidal Wave came back and saw that Rarity had found the right log. Without any further delay, both Tidal Wave and Rarity stepped onto the log and Rarity used her levitation magic to carefully cross her and him over the river and to the other side safely.

Afterwards, they jumed off the log and continued down the path.

"I guess we managed to get lucky with this task, didn't we?" Rarity asked.

"Luck played no role in this, Rarity. It was all the matter of using knowledge to your advantage." Tidal replied.

Rarity giggled. "I suppose you're right."

Out of the ordinary, Rarity and Tidal Wave's eyes got their attentions caught by a blue light. They looked up ahead and walked towards the blue light, trying to get a better look. They soon find a gold necklace with a blue ocean wave symbol in the middle, looking exactly like Tidal's cutie mark.

"Ooh, it's so beautiful!" Rarity says, reaching out for it. But upon contact, the necklace gave her hoof a harsh shock and she pulled away. "OUCH!" she shouts. "W-W-What?"

"Here, let me try." Tidal says. He reached out to grab the necklace and... upon contact, instead of shocking him, the necklace glew just as he put it on. He levitated off the ground for a little bit and finally slowly went back down onto the ground on his four hooves. "Ah, now I see. This element must only respond positively to the one whom it feels is the chosen one."

"You could've told me that earlier!"

"I didn't know it would do that to you, Rarity. Now come on, we might be able to meet the others on the other side if we hurry it up."

Rarity let out an annoyed sigh and followed Tidal Wave down the path.





Over with Fluttershy and Hurricane Breeze, the forest they came across was covered with snow and some of the trees still had some leaves on them. Hurricane and Fluttershy kept their eyes and ears open for any wandering predators that might come after them from any direction at all if they weren't careful.

"Hurricane? Do you think there's any vicious predators out here?" Fluttershy asked.

"I don't know, Fluttershy, I've never been here before. But I do know one thing. Out here we are unprotected. This forest is too dangerous, even if the whole forest is covered in snow, it can't cover up our scent. Our only option is to stay close throughout the journey." Hurricane explains.

"Oh, okay. So what are the names of the Elements of Freedom?"

"From what I heard from Eternal Flames, there's Hope, Wisdom, Knowledge, Teamwork, and Respect. The sixth element is a mystery to everypony. Except for the legendary Queen Galaxia and King Cosmos."

"I can understand that, since they made the elements."

"Yes, but I still don't get what the reason was for creating them."

"Maybe just like how there was a powerful being of chaos and disharmony, there might actually be a powerful being of containment and slavery. Of course... I could be wrong."

"Chaos and disharmony? Who controls that?"

"My friend, Discord. He's a draconiquis."

"Seriously? I thought they were extinct."

"Nope, Discord's the only one we've met so far."

"So I see."

Just then, Hurricane Breeze tripped over a rock, landing on his chin. His eyes bounced up and down until they stopped in place, allowing him to spot an injured animal ahead of him. He let out a gasp.

"What is it? What do you see?"

"There's some kind of injured animal up ahead, Fluttershy. Come on!" Hurricane stood up and ran ahead. Fluttershy followed him close behind and discovered it was female wolf. She was covered in multiple bruises and cuts, showing that she was probably caught in a fight. Fluttershy gasped at the sight of the wolf and picked up the pace until they both reached the injured wolf.

"Oh my! What happened?!" she asks. But all the got was a growl and a snarl from the wolf. Fluttershy squealed and backed away a bit scared with Hurricane. But in that moment, Hurricane felt something inside him chase his fears away and he approached her steadily. The wolf growled and snarled even more at him, but he ignored her warning and kept moving closer to her.

"It's alright. I'm not here to hurt you." Hurricane says, sticking his hoof out towards her. But when he got too close, she locked her jaws on his hoof, and he grunted in pain. Fluttershy gasped. Hurricane didn't budge and instead gave the wolf a patient and warm smile. She kept on growling and held her prey in her locked jaws, staring into his eyes with anger and fear in her eyes.

Seconds rolled by until the female wolf felt more comfortable around Hurricane and opened up her mouth, licking Hurricane's bite wound. She then lets out whimpers from her injuries.

"Fluttershy, watch over her while I run into the forest and get some herbs!" Hurricane ran off into the forest while Fluttershy stayed close to the injured wolf. Hurricane scanned his surroundings throughout the forest, finding some aloe and took a few of them. He returned to Fluttershy and the injured wolf and broke a portion of the aloe plant and applied some of the aloe juice onto each wound the wolf had.

Fluttershy helped out, too. Slowly, the wolf's whimpering began to lessen and lessen by the minute. The juice from the aloe plant was healing up just about all of her bruises. Moments later, the wolf stood on all fours and licked Hurricane on the face before walking off like nothing happened. After that was done, Hurricane and Fluttershy continued down the path, but somehow, Fluttershy had a lot on her mind.

"Why did you do that? That wolf nearly took your hoof clean off, why risk it? Doesn't it hurt?" she asked.

"I know, Fluttershy, but I couldn't let fear get in the way of what I believed in: No matter how bad things may get, we must show that there's even a small glimmer of hope. That's a valuable lesson that my grandmother taught me before she passed away." Hurricane explained. "I saw the look in that wolf's eyes that even though she was acting vicious, deep down she was scared."

Those words got to Fluttershy, making her feel more sympathy for Hurricane. But then, a beautifull light green glow appeared out in front of them. They ran towards the strange light and saw a pedastal rising up from underground with a golden necklace having a green tornado matching the same shape as the tornado on Hurricane Breeze's cutie mark. They both gasped.

"Hurricane... I... I think that's yours!" Fluttershy says in surprise. Hurricane didn't say anything and just reached out and grabbed it, putting it around his neck. He started to glow and levitated of the ground for a few seconds before landing back down softly. "Congradulations, Hurricane Breeze." 

"Thanks, Fluttershy." replied Hurricane.





As half of the team finishes up their trials, a patient stallion up at the top of a mountain watches with concern as one particular stallion has yet to face his own trial. One trial that will soon take him by surprise either for the better or for worse. 

"Forgive me..... my son." said the stallion as he closed his eyes.
> Confrontation Of The King
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The forest around AJ and Ground Breaker was filled with so many cherry blossom trees. The petals from the trees scattered everywhere, little by little. Applejack had never seen trees like these before, but she was glad that she got to see ones as unique as these. Ground Breaker was just as surprised as Applejack was, considering that the only trees he ever saw were mostly apples, oranges and pears.

"Ground, what kind of trees are these?" AJ asks.

"I think they're cherry blossom trees, or as our old teacher called them "Sakura" trees. They're mostly common in this little country called  Japonies."

"Well, somepony's been paying attention in class."

"How could I not? Our teacher was a kind lady. So was her husband."

"Husband? What was her husband's name?"

"Panja. He's the leader of the lions. He taught me and my pals how to handle ourselves in combat."

"Well ain't that a surprise. Ah thought lions were vicious predators who eat ponies."

"Nah, they know how to control themselves when we're near them. Whenever they're hungry, we usually give them some of our farm animals who've died peacefully."

"Ah think that's very respectful of you."

"You can thank my Pa for that. He raised me."

"Well, Ah'll keep that in mind." Applejack's eyes soon wandered towards what looked like an elder pony, sitting up against one of the trees. Applejack nudged Ground and gestured at the elder pony. Ground Breaker felt like something wasn't right and he approached the pony.

"Hi there." Ground said. "Is something wrong?" his words got the attention of the elder pony and he looked up with a sad look in his eyes, but a smile on his face.

"Pay no attention to me, sonny. Just savoring my last moments here. I've been through a lot of ups and downs during my years as the caretaker of the sakura forest. It's been my passion to care for them just as my wife did before she passed away last month."

"Ya mean... y-yer dyin'?" Applejack asked in surprise and shock.

"Yes, young lady. But it's okay." repied the elder pony.

"Is your wife buried somewhere near here? Maybe we can take you to her." Ground says.

"You'd do that for me, sonny?"

"Of course. Anypony, young or old, deserves to have their final wish be granted in the most respective way possible and tend to make due on this promise to bring you to your wife."

"You're very kind, sonny. I really appreciate it. I accept."

Ground Breaker smiled a bit and lifted the elder pony carefully on his back. The elder pony pointed to the left side of the forest where there were two boulders. Ground Breaker and Applejack walked towards them. As soon as they passed the two boulders, the elder pony pointed to the left again. Ground turned and saw a tombstone with a picture of what looked like his wife.

"Is this it?" Ground Breaker asked.

"Yes sonny. You can put me down now. I can walk over to her myself." said the elder pony.

"Alright then. If you say so." Ground Breaker gently laid down and let the elder pony walk over to his wife's tombstone where he hugged it.

"I've kept my promise, dear. I'll be home with you soon."

Applejack felt her heart break at this beautiful and sad sight and took off her hat, placing it near her chest. Ground Breaker closed his eyes and looked down, praying in his head that the elder would finally reunite with his deceased wife peacefully in the afterlife.

Afterwards, Applejack tapped Ground's shoulder, getting his attention.

"Ah think it's time to give them some privacy." Applejack implies.

"Yeah, you're right." Ground agreed. The two earth ponies finally took their leave and walked back on the path, but still had the elder pony on their mind.

"Ya know, that was mighty kind of you to grant his wishes, Ground Breaker. Ah've never seen anypony so happy before in mah whole entire life."

"Thanks, Applejack. But I was just doing what I felt was right. He wanted to be as close to his wife as possible when his time comes, and I made sure to respectively grant his wish. No matter how old or young somepony is, even if it's something we don't like, I've gotta respect their decisions."

"Ah couldn't have said it better mahself."

At that moment, a bright white light glew in the distance, catching them both off guard. They ran towards the light and found a pedastal with a glowing, golden necklace with a volcano in the middle, matching Ground Breaker's cutie mark in shape and color.

Ground Breaker grabbed the necklace and wrapped it around his neck. He levitated off the ground for a few moments, glowing, until he gently touched the ground.

"Ah guess that's yer element. Congradulations, partner." AJ says.

"Thank you, Applejack." Ground replied.





Shadow Force and Pinkie Pie walked down a forest with pine trees. Shadow couldn't help but get curious of why Pinkie Pie was always bouncing instead of just walking like others.

"Pinkie, why do you do that?" Shadow asks.

"Do what?" Pinkie asks with a smile.

"The bouncing."

"This isn't bouncing, silly, it's hopping. Hopping is so much more fun then just boring old walking."

"Walking drains less stamina."

"That's okay, I've got plenty of stamina! Thanks to all the tasty ice cream."

"Well, aren't you random at times."

"Like my besties say, "that's just Pinkie Pie being Pinkie Pie. Now what do you say we keep moving on and find that element of freedom, shall we?"

"Uh... right."

The two kept marching forth on the path. Minutes passing and so far, not a single trace of the element could be found in any direction at all. Shadow was getting rather bored with the search, thinking it was pointless to keep going, but Pinkie insisted that they keep going. Her cheerful attitude seemed to lift up his spirit and continued to keep on walking down the path with patience.

As they went further and further down the path, they came across a deep trench. Pinkie gasped. Shadow was curious of how deep the trench was, so he levitated a small rock over the trench and let it fall. He kneeled down and kept one of his ears up, listening to the sound of it making a thud. He waited for a solid 15 seconds until he heard the sound of the rock finally hitting the ground.

"That's far. No way anypony can survive a fall this deep." Shadow says in a serious tone.

"Then what can we do?" Pinkie asks.

Shadow looked around, spotting a broken down bridge. The support beams were still firmly planted into the ground but the rope had given out some time ago. At that moment, Shadow Force thought up the perfect plan and whispered it to Pinkie. She beamed with a squee and ran to the broken bridge with Shadow.

He used his magic to levitate each broken end of the bridge and straightened them. Pinkie hopped over to the middle of the bridge with ease and pull out some pieces of rope out of her mane and tied up the ropes on each broken end before giving him the okay to walk across. Shadow Force nodded and ended his levitation spell, in which the bridge stood nearly still. Shadow Force walked gently across the bridge, being careful not to weaken it more than it already was and reunited with Pinkie Pie.

"Nice work there, Shadow Force." Pinkie said.

"Thanks, but I'm not the one who did all the work. You helped out. There comes a time when you can't do stuff on your own and it'll require a bit of teamwork." Shadow says.

"Yup-a-roonie. You got that right, buck-o!"

Shadow and Pinkie laughed out loud at Pinkie's remark. But their little laughing fit was interrupted by a rumbling in the ground below them. Soon, a pedastal appeared out of the ground with a golden necklace showing a black and purple yin sign similar to the yin sign on Shadow's cutie mark.

"OOH, OOH ,OOH! I think this might be it! GRAB IT, GRAB IT, GRAB IT!" Pinkie shouted.

"Okay, alright. Ease up, will you?" Shadow chuckled. He grabbed the necklace and wrapped it around his neck and felt a strong amount of power inside him as he levitated off the ground, glowing a beautiful purple glow before land safely back on all fours. "Guess it's mine."

"YIPPEE!!! Congradulations Shadow!" Pinkie says excitedly. "Welcome to the team!"

"Thanks, Pinkie."





Finally, down the last path with Eternal Flames and Sunset Shimmer, the path they took seemed to be a short path with a perfectly normal forest, now leading towards some extremely tall mountain. Eternal didn't talk much and kept moving forwards while Sunset tried to keep a conversation with him. But of course, all he did was reply to her with nothing but small talk.

"Eternal, please! Can't you at least slow down a bit?" Sunset asked.

"Sorry, Sunset, but every second counts. I can't slow down." Eternal replied, not looking back.

"You know, you don't always have to sound like the world is ending."

"It's just how I am sometimes."

"Well, if you ask me, it's starting to get old. I don't know what it is that made you act like this, but you need to start loosening up a bit. I mean, yes, we do need to obtain the Elements of Freedom, but acting like how you are now isn't going to do much to help out the team!" she lectured.

Eternal just gave her a glance before looking back at the path in front of him. Sunset knew she was right, but she felt like she might have hit a soft spot on him.

"Oh... sorry about that." Sunset says.

"Eh, it's alright." Eternal replied, expressionless.

"Are you still upset about Princess Celestia?"

"No. I put it behind me. I understand why she left."

"Still, I can't help but feel like you're... er, never mind, I've said enough."

As they marched up the mountain path, Sunset still stayed quiet, thinking Eternal might not be in the best mood to talk to after what she said. She couldn't help but feel like he was hiding something deep in his heart that he doesnt want to tell her for some strange reason.

Aware of her curiosity, Eternal was keeping a secret involving his deceased grandfather. He didn't want to bring it up or he might trigger that past event.

"Eternal?" Sunset asked.

"Hmm?" he replied.

"Did you ever had a nice childhood?"

"For a while, yes."

"Well, can you tell me what it was like, please?"

"Fine, here it is. As a child, I was always cared for by my father. He was kind, loving and protective. Me and my brothers did everything together with dad. We hosted festivals, made peace with the lions, went out to eat, sharing a few laughs, we had all sorts of fun. I felt like the luckiest colt ever."

"What happened?"

"11 years back, when I was in class, my teacher informed me of my ill grandmother. I was told that her sickness was getting far worse. I was scared of what might happen to her, so the teacher excused me from class so I go could check up on her. By the time I got into the hospital with my family, I went to go see if grandma was doing okay, but her condition was getting far worse."

"Did she say anything?"

"She only said these words before she finally passed away: You know I'll never leave you. You can find me everywhere, in the morning light, the evening star. I'm always there."

"I... I'm sorry you lost your grandmother. But what about your grandfather?"

Eternal felt a jolt run past him when she said that word. He hung his head low. "I'd rather not say."

"You sure?"

"This is my burden, and mine alone."

"O-Okay then."

Finally, after a long walk up to the mountain, both Sunset and Eternal discovered a tall, steel gate blocking their way sat down to rest. Sunset had never walked up a mountain as tall as this one. They felt that if they rested up for a little while, it'd give the others a little bit of time to catch up to them.

They were right, because Sunset had then heard the sounds of Pinkie Pie's hopping and multiple hoofsteps getting close to her and Eternal. The girls and the guys all arrived at the top with the Elements of Freedom wrapped around the guys' necks. Eternal immediately got up and walked up towards the gate and knocked three times before backing up a little in case they opened outwards.

Instead, they opened inwards.

"YIPPEE, LET'S GO!" Pinkie shouted happily.

"NO!" Eternal shouted, blocking Pinkie with his hoof. "Don't forget, there's still one trial I haven't done yet." Eternal slowly brought his hoof down and walked through the gate, only to find the top of the mountain having a flat ground and nothing else in sight. Eternal looked around, still finding nothing.

But then... "It's been quite a while, hasn't it?" said a deep male voice. Eternal's eyes shrunk. He knew exactly who that voice belonged to. Just then, out of the corner of his eye, a flash of light appeared and vanished, letting him see a stallion with sapphire eyes and a red mane like his, but his fur color was orange and had scar-like birthmarks in the front and back of each eye.

He was an alicorn stallion who looked to be the same height as Princess Celestia. Eternal Flames looked more serious when he walked towards him, now face to face with the stallion.

"Yes... it has." Eternal replied.

"I assume you've gotten over the incident now?"

"For now, I have. But first, I want to know something."

"Very well, I'll allow it since you and your friends have gotten this far."

"Is you being here suppose to be a trial? Or did you use some trick just so you could get me to see you again?"

"You mean, the trial for the hidden Element of Freedom?" the stallion then chuckled. "You know, despite all that's happened here, your mind is still as sharp as ever."

The Mane 6 were confused with what was going on with Eternal and the stallion he's talking to.

"I don't get it. Why are they just talking to each other?" Rainbow asked.

"If I had to guess, I'd think they're extremely close, like a family." Fluttershy says.

"That's because they are family, you two." Shadow Force replied.

"Okay? But how?" Rarity asked Shadow.

"Just wait and see. You'll be surprised." Shadow Force replied again.

Back with Eternal and the alicorn stallion.

"If this is suppose to be a trial, then what do I do?" Eternal asked.

"It's quite simple..." the stallion replied before pausing. He closed his eyes and then quickly opened them back up, lighting up his horn and destroying the gate, making the others shout and scream. Eternal grew agitated with the stallion's actions.

"You do realize that you almost hit my PALS, right?" Eternal gridded his teeth.

"I was careful, now pay attention." the stallion then turned away and walked towards the edge of the mountain before finally speaking again. "In this trial..... you'll have to cast your fears aside..... and defeat me in a battle of strength and magic. If you can defeat me, then the hidden element is yours, but if you lose, you will leave and not come back until tomorrow. Do you understand... my son?"

".....I understand, father." Eternal replied, looking determined.

"FATHER?!!?!?!" shouted the girls in disbelief.

"You mean that stallion over there is his dad?!" Rainbow asked, still surprised.

"Yup. The one and only Blaze Burn." Ground Breaker added.

"So... he's married to the princess?!" Rarity asked, shocked.

"Yeah, he's still got some kick in him for a 47 year old alicorn stallion." Shadow said.

"Well, at least I know where Eternal got those scar-like birth marks from." Sunset says.

After explaining the conditions to his son, Blaze Burn turned around with his eyes still closed.

At that moment, Eternal walked up and stopped in the middle of the mountain. He felt his surroundings get bigger, but the air felt denser. Nevertheless, he stayed calm under pressure, ready to face his father head on with his undying courage as his only weapon.

"Eternal Flames... It is time to begin. Prepare yourself!" Blaze Burn said as he looked down at the ground with his bangs covering his eyes. His wings spread out and his horn glew. Next thing that happens was the edges around the mountain being shot by magic and causing a ring of fire to appear around the two of the stallions, blocking all exits and the entrance for the gang to go inside.

To Be Continued
> The Ultimate Trial: Father VS Son
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Blaze Burn and Eternal Flames stood their ground, staring each other down.

Eternal took the first move and charged at his father. Blaze Burn stood his ground and and only lit up his horn, only this time, instead of his usual magic, a small flame at the tip of his horn appeared. He aimed it at his charging son and fired at blazing speed, but Eternal caught on the attack and took a step out of the way. 

Blaze Burn turned up the heat by casting more fire magic in a circular motion, spreading closer and closer to Eternal, who tried to dodge the attack, but got hit by the last two flames. He was flung towards the ring of fire, but not too close.

He got back up and kept his charged back at his father, engulfing his horn in a red aura and fired magic blasts like a magical gatling gun. Blaze Burn blocked most of the attacks, using his own fire magic as a shield and dodged the rest of them by tilting his head slightly.

Eternal took the time to slide underneath Blaze Burn in order to land a kick from below to send him flying into the air, which only slightly worked. Blaze Burn flapped his wings upon impact to lessen the damage from the blow and shot more fire magic down towards his son, this time, each one he shot was a bit bigger than his previous fire magic attacks. 

This nearly caught Eternal off guard, but he managed to barely escape with only a few small burn marks, small enough to shrug off. But Eternal was getting more serious the more the fight began to progress and his friends were getting worried about him.

"Is this suppose to be a trial or a massacre?! He's not even holding back!" Sunset says as she watches the stallions still fighting each other.

"Oh he's holding back, alright. Eternal can sense it, too. He knows his father would never do anything to hurt his son, mostly because he loves him too much. Apparently, he's taking it as an insult. He's never liked anypony holding back on him when it came to fighting." Tidal Wave explained.

"Ah dunno, isn't Eternal holdin' back on his attacks?" AJ asks.

"He did at first, but I can sense his magical energy getting stronger. He and the rest of us were taught to never pull any punches and out of the 6 of us, only 3 of us took the advice." Shadow explains.

Eternal Flames started growling as he kept firing his magic at his father who was in the air. He dodged every single one of his attacks without fail before flying back down and readied another fire magic attack, but this time, at close range and blasted Eternal back. He flipped backwards as he got blown back and kicked with his hinde legs, gaining more speed and tackled his father to the ground.

Blaze Burn kicked Eternal in the stomach, sending him into the air. Blaze Burn got up and flew up to his son, readying a punch with his right forehoof. Eternal sees it coming and teleports back onto the ground and launched a magic attack, paralizing Blaze Burn. He gave out a shout of pain before falling down to the ground where Eternal Flames stood on his hinde legs and caught him in his forehooves.

But before he could put him on the ground, Blaze Burn teleported behind Eternal Flames and shot 3 fire balls from his horn and landed all three onto their target. Eternal grunted in pain and turned around with a harsh glare and charged at his father with anger in his eyes.

Blaze Burn had finally put his plan into action and just stood there, waiting for Eternal to get closer to him. When he did, Eternal leaped up to land a spin kick on Blaze Burn's face, but it was blocked by Blaze's magic fire wall, and same went for all of his other physical attacks.

Although, it seemed hopeless, Eternal kept pressing on the attack in the vein hope of landing another attack on his father, but to no avail. He was getting angrier and angrier with each blow that was blocked as his father kept a calm look on his face throughout the fight.

"I don't get it, he's only using his hooves to attack. Why doesn't he just use his magic?" Sunset asks.

"For a very simple reason: he's clouded by rage. Blaze's plan was to push Eternal over the edge in order to gain the advantage over Eternal. His goal is to tire him out and then deliver the crushing blow once he's used up all of his strength." Spark Burst says.

"Tire him out? That's no fun." Pinkie says.

"Fights like these aren't suppose to be fun. Especially not to Eternal Flames. Each fight he's been in, he's never taken any of them lightly." Tidal Wave explains.

"He'd probably choose to fight rather than to just sit down and relax with something to eat. In fact there were times when he didn't get enough to eat during fights." Ground Breaker says. "He got so cranky that he nearly almost damaged one of us beyond repair."

"Oh dear, that doesn't sound good." Fluttershy says, a bit scared. But then, to the sound of Eternal shouting, made her hide behind Hurricane Breeze.

As the fight progressed, Eternal was dripping in sweat while his father was still perfectly fine. Eternal was just standing around, panting and snarling. It had become clear to Eternal that Blaze Burn was trying to wear him down using his own anger and frustration against him. Eternal had to come up with a plan and had to do it fast because now, Blaze Burn started spreading his fire magic attacks.

"You've proven to be a very formitable opponent, my son. But you're still far too reckless to even land at least 5 blows on me and it's with great shame that I must end this fight once and for all. There is no shame in admitting defeat, you can try again tomorrow." Blaze Burn says.

"NEVER! I'm not about to leave my friends hanging because I failed a simple trial! Strike me down all you want, I'm not going to stop until I've beaten you, even if it kills me!" Eternal replied, still glaring. He slowly approached Blaze Burn, in order to conserve his energy. Blaze Burn stood his ground, readying one of his signature fire magic attacks, and Eternal felt his body shaking up.

He could feel the others staring at him. He knows he's fighting a losing battle, but he didn't care. Eternal lit up his horn to prepare another magic attack. Blaze Burn blasted his fire magic at Eternal and knocked his focus out of his own attack and sent him blown towards the exit and landed hard on his back, letting out a grunt of pain before slowly trying to get up.

"Guys... I give you my word." Eternal grunted. He stood up on all fours like a proud prince, only he didn't smile, and only had the face of determination. "I vow to win!" he said, glaring at his father.

'Be careful, son. Making empty promises leads to consequences.' Blaze Burn thought to himself.

Eternal slowly approached his father closer and closer until he was close enough to where he was able to lean up onto his father, still feeling the pain from the last attack. Blaze Burn wasn't sure of what his son had in store for being this close to him with no chance of landing a big blow. But then, that's when the alicorn stallion realized a little too late and his eyes flew wide open.

In that moment, Eternal latched onto his father's neck and shined another red aura around his horn, readying yet another magic attack. Only this time, Blaze Burn was trying to shake him off. He was becoming quite agitated with each attempt to shake his son off of him. Eternal kept a tight grip as he charged up his attack, but he wasn't going to hold on any longer.

"He's got guts, I'll give him that." Rainbow says.

"Hey, you know what, darling? I just realized that Eternal hasn't used any fire magic. He's had plenty of opportunities to attack like that, but he's only using his normal magic." Rarity says.

"Well, he doesn't like to admit it, but Eternal can't cast fire magic. He was never taught how to because his father thought it was too dangerous. Eternal once tried to train himself to use fire magic, but sadly, he could only cast powerful magic spells." Shadow Force says.

"But how come his father uses it?" Fluttershy asks.

"Don't you remember, Fluttershy? Princess Celestia taught him how to use fire magic." Sunset says.

"What? That's totally unfair! I ought to pound that guy into an apple cider!" Rainbow says.

"Calm down now, Rainbow. That there stallion ain't no pushover. Even if you can outspeed him, he's more about using his head instead of rushing into a fight." AJ says.

"You're only half right, Applejack. Blaze Burn may look like he's slow, but he's actually pretty fast as much as he is strong, despite his age. I learned the hard way myself when I first asked him to spar and he told me to give it all I've got, but I didn't listen to him." Spark Burst says.

"He's got a point there." Hurricane Breeze says. "Me and the others watched it with our own eyes and Spark Burst had been beaten because the king said he was "doubting the situation he was in" and when he said that, Spark felt like his pride was damaged afterwards."

"Sad, but true. I was ashamed for doubting the king."

"You know, I don't like to admit it, Spark, but there were times even I had to swallow my pride and admit defeat, but that was a couple of years ago." Rainbow says.

"Let go of me this instant!" Blaze Burn shouted, still trying to shake off his son.

"N-NEVER! Not until I've beaten you, dad!" Eternal grunted. And at that moment, his his born was blinking a bright red light and in the struggle, he unleashed a powerful magic surge on Blaze Burn, powerful enough to shock him and Eternal Flames himself, mostly because he hasn't released his grip. Blaze Burn shouted in pain and Eternal Flames grunted in pain.

The others watched as the two stallions just stood there, taking the damage from the magic surge until the attack slowly subsided and both stallions collapsed.

But unknown to them, a mysterious figure buried deep in the mountain was slowly awakening from their deep slumber, and not in the good way.

Eternal Flames and Blaze Burn struggled to get back on their hooves, but Eternal's attack had done a number on them, including himself since he sustained more damage. But he didn't give up and forced himself to stand up slowly, but his father wasn't far behind. Once they got back on all fours, Eternal slowly advanced towards Blaze Burn, short on breath. All four of his hooves were shaking.

Blaze Burn, however, stood his ground to regain some of his power. His breathing was fairly short, bu slowly, he was regaining his strength. Blaze Burn watched as his son advanced towards him, not caring how hurt he was and in turn, this lft Blaze Burn a little scared. Scared for what'll happen if his son continues the fight in his current condition, so with no other option he took a few steps towards Eternal, closing the gap between the two of them, until he was close enough to try to use his fire magic.

But Eternal senses it and used up the last of his strength to turn around and deliver a double kick to Blaze Burn's face using only his hinde hooves. Blaze Burn felt the pain from his son's kick, and landed flat on his back with a loud thud and a grunt of pain.

"G... Game over, dad!" Eternal says, panting. "You lose..."

"Y-Yes... you're right son." Blaze Burn grunts. Eternal still panted heavily and kneeled down.

"Nngh! You know, dad. I think you've made your point around here. When we first fought, I was well aware that my magic would never match yours. I know."

"Then, why... why did you fight me anyways?"

"Because, even though I was scared of your power, I wanted to face it head on. How else was I suppose to improve myself as a prince if I don't have the courage to do so?"

"Eternal... there's a difference between having courage and being reckless. Do you realize that you nearly killed yourself with that insane stunt?! This was suppose to be a trial, not a suicide mission, have you no shame, you reckless boy?!"

His words made Eternal tighten his eyes closed as he took in the lecture. "Y-You're right, dad. I was wrong. My actions were nearly lethal and unforgivable. I woudn't be surprised if I failed the trial."

Blaze Burn looked over at his son as he hung his head in shame. He could actually feel the guilt and disappointment in his eyes and could even see himself in his son. Blaze Burn sighed and got up and walked towards his son and stood in front of him with a straight face.

"Eternal. Look at me." Blaze said. Eternal obeyed and looked up. "Although, I am disappointed with your recklessness, you admitted to your mistake, which requires a lot of dignity and courage. But you're wrong, son, I may have subtle amount of strength and magic, but that didn't mean I was invincible and your courage and determination was proof that you came a long way."

"W-What?" Eternal looked up at his father with confusion. "What are you saying?"

"Let me put it in simple terms... you, Eternal Flames, passed the trial. And I'm proud of you. The final Element of Freedom is now yours!" upon saying this, Blaze Burn's horn glew a dark red and summoned a pedastal out of the ground, but it wasn't a golden necklace like the others. It was actually a golden crown and had the same fire symbol as Eternal's cutie mark. Eternal reached to grab it and placed it upon his head, in turn, he felt his whole body lift off of the ground and his wounds began to heal as his body was trapped in a beautiful bright red glow until he finally touched the ground with no more wounds on his body.

Eternal checked his body and felt no pain anymore. He looked back at his father and gave him a hug. Blaze Burn hugged his son back and whispered in his ear.

"I'm very proud of you, my son. But promise me not to do that ever again."

"I'll make sure to be more careful, father. I promise." Eternal replied.

"Awww." everypony else exclaimed. And soon, the flames around the edges had finally vanished and Eternal finally joined back with his friends, with Blaze Burn as well.

"You're not hurt anymore, are you?" Sunset asks.

"Surprisingly, no. I guess the element must have some kind of healing power it produces after a battle had been fought or something like that." Eternal replied.

"Well, the important thing is that you're back and we finally accomplished our mission." Shadow says.

"OOH, OOH, OOH, THIS CALLS FOR A PARTY!" Pinkie shouts, pulling her party cannon out and firing it. Eternal leaned his head back to avoid getting blown by the cannon.

"Oh, most certainly." Rarity says, giving Eternal her "ladylike charm" "And I know just who to--"

"Not a chance, Rarity. Have some self control." Eternal said. Rarity's jaw dropped as she got rejected again.

"Ouch! Burn! Heh, heh!" Rainbow chuckled.

"Now, now, let's not start a battle royale over the silliest little arguements. Come along, I think it's time we headed back to the village." Blaze Burn says. Everypony nodded and gathered close to each other and Blaze Burn teleported everypony back into the village.

However, after they left, a strange rumble from inside the mountain began to make itself known, as a really big crack had suddenly appeared and a claw pops out.





Down at the village, everpony was finally resting up by the bench, catching their breath from the long travel, but Blaze Burn had a little time to finally talk with Princess Celestia.

"To think that after all these years, you still look just as beautiful as when we first met." Blaze Burn says.

Celestia giggled. "I could say the same thing to you, but you've obviously matured quite a bit." she retorts.

Blaze Burn chuckled. "What do you mean by "a bit?" I've grown taller, and I've looked over the village from high on that mountain for quite a while now."

"Yes, but I can still tell that you're still trying to re-live your youth."

"I'm only 47, still a young man. Even you still look as young as springtime, dear."

"See, that's what I mean, still trying to re-live your youth... as a flatterer."

Celestia and Blaze Burn shared a friendly laugh before they hugged each other. Eternal nearly smirked at his parents as they were getting along so well. But Spike and Twilight were clueless on why they were speaking like they knew each other.

"Hey, Eternal, who's the stallion that Princess Celestia is talking to?" Spike asks.

"Do you recall how mother said she was married?" Eternal asks.

"Y-Yeah, why?"

"Well, that's who she's married to. That's the former king Blaze Burn. My father."

"That's your father?" Twilight asked, a bit surprised. "Just how old is he? He looks like he's probably around Celestia's age."

"True, he does look like it, but he's actually 47." Eternal explained.

"Really? I never knew that!" Twilight says.

"You learn something new every day."

"Yes, you're right about that, Eternal." Celestia said. She approached the others. "Well, it looks like you've finally gotten the Elements of Freedom. So, do you know the names of your elements?"

"I think so, princess. This might sound crazy, but, I can tell that this one is the Element of Teamwork." Shadow Force says, looking at his necklace.

"I can just feel that this one is the Element of Hope." Hurricane Breeze says.

"I know this bad boy is the Element of Respect." Ground Breaker says.

"I can easily deduce that mine is the Element of Knowledge." said Tidal.

"And as for mine, it's the Element of Wisdom." said Spark with confidence.

"Good, good. And what about you, son? Do you know what yours is?" Celestia asks.

"Let's see. I know my trial was a test to cast my fears aside. Although, I did get a little reckless, I'm fairly sure that my element is actually...... the Element... of Courage!" Eternal says.

"...Correct." Blaze Burn says.

"Well, I suppose congradulations are in order. How about we all go out to dinner? You've all worked so hard and you all deserve a little treat." Blaze Burn says. The idea seemed to make Pinkie squeal in excitement and she pulled her party cannon out, shooting confetti everywhere.

"What the?! Where in the blasted blue blazes did she get that thing?" Eternal asks.

"Oh, that's just Pinkie Pie being Pinkie Pie." Rainbow says.

"Uh..... okay?"

But just then, the ground began to rumble and the villagers started to panic, dropping everything and taking cover in their houses or in the other buildings. The lions over in the valley ran around roaring and taking shelter in their dens, while the whole gang was struck with shock.

"YIPPEE, ANOTHER CLIFF HANGER!!!" Pinkie shouted.

"Wait what?!" Eternal asked, confused.

To Be Continued
> Rise of the Everlasting Song
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The rumbling goes on for quite a while as the locals take shelter, unaware of what's going on. Even Twilight and her friends were getting a bit scared. Except for Pinkie who was let the rumbling in the ground take her in circles without her moving a single muscle.

"He-e-e-ey, th-i-i-i-i-s i-i-i-i-i-s, f-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-n." Pinkie exclaims happily with her shaky voice.

"Pinkie, what's wrong with you, are you crazy?!" Twilight asked.

'Did she really just ask that?' Rainbow thought to herself.

"Pinkie, this is no time to be playing, something's not right here!" Spike says

"We can save the arguements for another time, but right now, we've got ourselves an emergency. Everypony take shelter and don't come out unless I say so! Celestia, you search the village and the valley for any ponies that need help tryiing to take shelter. I'll go head back on the mountain to get a good vantage point on where this is all coming from, got it?" Blaze Burn explains.

"Alright, but just be careful! This isn't a natural earhtquake!" Celestia warned.

"I'll do my best, dear." Blaze Burn unfolded his wings and flew off towards the mountain and Celestia hovered over the village to find anypony who had trouble finding shelter. Twilight and her friends ran back with the princesses sons over to Blue Blaze's house where his wife was waiting for them with a worried look on her face.

As soon as everypony was inside, they closed the door and hid in the living room. The rumbling somehow began to get worse and worse. Suddenly, there was wail of fright. It came from Crimson Ruby who had a little filly in her hooves who had the same fur color as Eternal and Blue Blaze, but her mane and tail were a striped scarlet and midnight blue color and had scarlet eyes like Crimson.

"Crimson, who's the filly?" Twilight asks.

"Her name is Flaming Sapphire. She's my daughter." Crimson replied.

"Mommy, what is the ground shaking? I'm scared!" Flaming asked, looking at her mom with tears in her eyes.

"I don't know, sweetie. But it'll be okay, I've got you." Crimson held Flaming Sapphire in her hooves closely while Blue Blaze held his wife and daughter close to him. Eternal Flames walked over to the window, even with the ground still rumbling.

"Bro, are you crazy?! Get away from there, it's dangerous!" Heat Blitz shouted out. But Eternal didn't listen and he lifted up the window to peek outside. The streets were empty, which meant that Princess Celestia had evacuated any wandering ponies in the village to safety.

Soon, Princess Celestia returned to the house the others were at, but only stopped at the window her son was looking out from and told him, "Stay inside, I'm going to check on your father." and then flew off to the mountain where his dad was. But there was a sickening feeling inside Eternal, like something bad was going to happen if he doesn't go with her.

He backed himself up a few feet before charging at the open window and leaped out, heading into the direction where his mother was going. The others were shocked by Eternal's actions.

"Is he nuts?!" Rainbow asks.

"Yep. But, then again, he was always like this for as long as I can remember. If I have anything to say about it, he's not gonna head out there all by himself!" Shadow Force says.

"D-Darling, you don't mean?" Rarity asks.

"Don't tell me you're heading out there, too!" Spike says in surprise.

"You guessed right, I'm going with him! If he heads out there alone..." he paused before backing up a bit and getting ready to jump out, "...I wouldn't forgive myself if he ends up dead! Eternal's done a lot for me and the guys and I won't let him fight this alone!" Shadow then charges at the open window and leaps out, running as fast as he could to catch up.

Sunset also felt the sickened feeling inside her. In fact, everypony did. So, one by one, the gang all leaped out of the window and followed Eternal. All that remained were Twilight and Heat Blitz. She saw the look in Heat's eyes as he backed himself into the wall, shaking.

"Heat Blitz, what's the matter?" Twilight asked.

"I'm scared. Scared for myself and my brother." Heat replied.

"Then why don't you chase after him?"

"If I do, I'll just get in his way. What use can I be if I made a vow to never fight?"

"Heat Blitz, just because you don't fight, it doesn't mean you shouldn't be there for your brother. You know he never thinks badly of you. He needs you as much as you need him."

"You really think so?"

"I do. So, you want to tag along?"

Heat Blitz paused for a moment to think it over. He could either stay and watch over his niece with his oldest brother, or he could go with Twilight and help Eternal. He took a deep breath and said, "Alright, Twilight, let's go, Eternal is waiting and I won't let him go alone!"

"That's the spirit!"

Unlike the others, Twilight and Heat Blitz ran over outside through the front door and flew off at rapid speeds to catch up with their friends.





Meanwhile, Blaze Burn was struck with shock as he witnessed what looked like a dragon claw coming out of the crack and latched onto the surface. Blaze Burn backed up a bit, ready to attack if whatever was inside the mountain wasn't friendly. Soon the crack in the mountain grew bigged until a loud, deafening roar shook the whole mountain, causing boulders to tumble down the steep slopes.

Princess Celestia heard the sound and covered her ears with her forehooves. She feared the worst for Blaze Burn and flew over to him faster. Upon arriving, Blaze Burn was up in the air, covering his ears and she thought he had heard the same sound as her.

"Honey, what happened?" Celestia asked.

"I don't know, dear. But whatever's in there," Blaze Burn said, pointing to the big hole in the ground on top of the mountain, "doesn't sound friendly at all! Have you evacuated everypony to safety?"

"Yes, everypony's safe."

"Good. Come on, we've got to see what's in that hole." Blaze Burn flew down with Celestia and walked over to the edge of the hole and saw some sort of figure, almost like a pony. But when it faced upwards, the figure opened its eyes, which were a yellow-ish green color. Its pupils were slitted like dragon eyes and it grinned before flying out and landing on the other side of the mountain.

Upon closer inspection, she was a pony/dragon hybrid. Her fur was a dark purple color, much darker than Twilight's and had black dragon wings. Her legs were silver colored with dragon scales and had claws. She had two dragon horn colored dark grey that were twisted. Her cutie mark was a multi-colored dragon that was spiraling into an oroborus like it was eating itself. Her mane and tail were a teal-ish lavender type of color.

"Ahh, finally. I was getting tired of sleeping in that disgusting prison." she said, adjusting her neck.

"Who are you?" Blaze Burn asked, still feeling cautious.

"I am Melodia Sortis Aeternalis! But, you can just call me Melodia." she replied. Her attention locked onto the princess and she got close to her and grinned. "Long time so see, Princess Celeatia, I wish I could see your loving little sister, I would've loved to see her weep in agony... while I take you down." Melodia's tone in her voice got a bit deep when she spouted out that last statement.

Celestia's eyes shrunk. 'No...i-it can't be!' Celestia thought. Blaze Burn saw the shock in her eyes and approached the princess with concern.

"What's the matter? Do you know her?" he asked.

"Afraid so, dearest. She was a childhood friend that me, and Luna grew up with thousands of years ago, but then mother said she tried to lead the dragons to enslave the ponies, so she sealed her inside an icy prison, but now she's free to unleash her fury." Celestia explains.

Melodia laughed at Celestia's words. "Guess you really take after your beloved mother, Queen Galaxia, letting your eyes be decieved by lies and betrayal."

"Don't you dare bad mouth my mother!" Celestia took half a step forward, lighting up her horn in a bright yellow aura with her wings spread wide open. "Tell me, Melodia. What kind of business do you have here, now that you've been freed from your prison?"

"Oh, nothing much." Melodia remains silent for  good 10 seconds until she stares directly at Celestia with her wide grin and menacing dragon eyes. "Just that I'm going to break you in so many ways your family broke me thousands of years ago... when my beloved father was taken from me!"

"So confident, and yet so arrogant. Do you honestly think we're going to let that happen? If so, then you've got another thing coming, Ms. Melodia." Blaze Burn says as he stared her down, his horn lighting up with a simple flame at the tip. Melodia simply gave him a bored expression.

"Hah! I've heard plenty of empty threats coming from a pathetic stallion. From what I can see, you must be Celestia darling and loving husband. How precious. But you can never defeat somepony as strong as me, no matter how strong you might claim to be."

"Talk is cheap, Melodia. If you claim to be as powerful as you say, you'll have to back up your claim with solid proof by knocking me down where I stand."

"Honey, no! You don't know what she's capable of!" Celestia warned. But when she looked at where Melodia was standing, she vanished.

"Well, if you want proof..." Melodia pauses. Celestia and Blaze Burn searched the mountain to find her, but could find no trace of her... until Celestia caught a glimpse of her next to her husband. "...then I'll be happy to show you first hoof by blowing out your eardrums!" she finishes.

"HONEY, WATCH OUT!" Celestia shouts. But it was too late, Melodia let out another deafening roar, catching Blaze Burn off guard and blasted him off the ground and caused him to plummet down the mountain and Celestia felt the painful ringing in her ears.

"Well, what can I say? He asked for it, so I brought it to him." Melodia shrugged

"Y-You monster!" Celestia exclaimed in frustration. Melodia laughed and approached Celestia with a grin on her face, and showed that she had the advantage.

"I've been called worse, but hey, what do you know princess? You could never even begin to comprehend what I had to go through thousands of years ago."

Celestia was clueless on what she meant by that. But then she remembered the pain she inflicted on Blaze Burn and lit up her horn in a yellow aura. Melodia was starting to like the princess becoming more tense and her horns lit up, being covered in a silver type of aura. In a flash of light, the two powerful beings locked themselves in an aerial magic combat.

Princess Celestia started off with multiple magic blasts scattered in every direction, locked on Melodia, but Melodia was able to dodges all of her attacks. She roared again, but Celestia used a spell to protect herself from her deafening roars and retaliated with a magic shock wave. Melodia dodged with no trouble and moved about at blinding speeds which Celestia could still follow.

The two powerful beings kept pressing on their assaults, never giving each other an inch.





Meanwhile, Twilight and her friends traveled down the forest at high speeds trying to get to the mountain as soon as they possibly could. Eternal was kind enough to let the others catch up to him, but he felt that sickening feelings that something happened to his parents. He wasn't going to sit around and wait for a miracle to happen, that much he knew for sure.

But then, something caught his eye up ahead and he went to find out what it was. At that very moment when he was close enough, his eyes shrunk in shock. He caught sight of his own father, lying on the ground and not even moving a muscle. Eternal ran towards him a little faster. As he got close, he turned his father over and placed his ear on Blaze Burn's chest. He could stil hear his heartbeat, which meant he was still very much alive, but he still didn't know who did this to him.

Twilight and her friends caught up to him and got the same reaction to Blaze Burn as Eternal did. "Sweet Celestia, is Blaze Burn alright?!" Twilight asked.

"He's alive, just unconcious. Whatever did this had to have been somepony strong enough to match his strength, or even surpass him without a struggle." Eternal explains.

"But the only ones I know who could surpass him are Discord and Princess Celestia. The only problem is that Discord never came with us and Celestia wouldn't do something like this." Spike says.

"If there's one thing we do know, it's that we're not going to get the answers just standing around. We've got to get to the top of the mountain. The princess might be in trouble!" Spark Burst says.

"We can't just leave Blaze Burn here!" Hurricane Breeze says.

"Then I'll stay behind and treat his wounds! You guys go on ahead!" Tidal Wave says.

"How can you treat his wounds? You don't have your medical equiptment." Shadow said.

"Here it is!" Pinkie shouts, holding out a large first aid kit. The others looked puzzled with Pinkie.

"W-Where'd you even find the time to get that?!" Tidal asks, dumbfounded.

"A true party thrower extraordinair never reveals her secrets." Pinkie replies with a squee.

"O...kay then?" Tidal says, a bit nervous of Pinkie's abilities.

"Umm, everypony, we've still got a long ways to go! The princess could be in danger!" Sunset says. The others nodded and kept running until they reached the mountain, while Tidal Wave stayed behind in order to treat Blaze Burn's wounds. But along the trail, Sunset could somehow feel Eternal's anxiety and fear for his mother and she couldn't blame him. He never had the chance to grow up with her and to have her lost after meeting her would break his heart and, to her own fear, lose his sanity.

"How tall is this mountain anyways?!" Spike asked.

"About 1,000 feet!" Eternal replied.

"Couldn't we just fly up there?" Rainbow asks.

"It's no good! The higher you try to fly up, the denser the gravity becomes! Only a disciplined alicorn can fly up there without the risk of being pushed down!" Spark Burst explains. "I couldn't even fly up there myself, and I've always been training my whole life!"

"Oh, Princess Celestia, please be okay!" Fluttershy says.





Back on top of the mountain, Princess Celestia and Melodia were staring each other down, panting lightly, having spent some of their magic. The only problem was that Celestia was struggling to keep up and Melodia was hardly even breaking a sweat during the fight. Melodia then slowly approached the princess with a condifent grin, rambling about the past events in her life. However, she was being too vague.

"Why am I not surprised? You always take after your pathetic mother, obeying her every command and letting her lies turn you away from the horrible truth that stands to this day. A truth that left many scars and bruises which can never be healed or taken back." Melodia explains.

"SILENCE! You know nothing of my mother! She was a wise and caring alicorn who cared deeply for me and my beloved sister many years ago!" Celestia replied in frustration.

"Correction, she only cared for her own kind. Not the heathenous wretch of a creature who was created by one of her kind and the enemy that she despises so much!"

"I said SILENCE!"

"They say the truth hurts, but you haven't even opened up your eyes to that yet. Perhaps I can open up your eyes and we'll see if you can handle the truth. Either way, I've got you right where I want and there's nothing you can do about it anymore, Princess Celestia"

Celestia growled and lit her horn up and prepared another attack, but then, she got caught off guard by the sound of a familiar voice behind Melodia.

"You'd be best not to question the powers of my mother, if you know what's good for you." Eternal said. Celestia tilted her head and saw her son, along with the others.

"Eternal, what are you doing here?! Get out of here, it's not safe here!" Celestia warned him.

"Hah! So not only are you married, but you also have a son? How adorable. I could just pinch that little colt's adorable little cheeks of his." Melodia says, looking at Eternal. But, this made Eternal glare at Melodia and stepped towards her with a hint of hostility in his eyes. "Aww, would you look at that, he thinks he's so tough that he can take me on so easily, how cute." she said with baby talk. Obviously, she wasn't taking him seriously and kept provoking him to come at her.

"You're gonna get what's coming to you if you don't shut up." Eternal snarled.

"Whoa there, don't go losing your temper. That's just what she wants! You gotta keep your cool when you approach or you'll mess up your rhythm." Shadow warned. Eternal looked at Shadow for a few seconds and nodded before turning back to face Melodia.

"Just who is that creature?" Fluttershy asked, scared.

"It's definitly more than just a pony, it's also part dragon. I guess she's the very first species of pony/dragon hybrid the entire world of Equestria." Twilight says. "But what's wierd is that this hybrid seems to know a lot about Princess Celestia, it's like she knows her."

"I think you might be right, Twilight. I've never seen Celestia look like that!" Spike says.

"But who is she?" Rarity asked.

"Well, since you're so curious, I'll tell you all. I am Melodia Sortis Aeternalis! But, you can call me Melodia for short, now where was I? Oh yes! Now I remember." Melodia says. She turns back to Eternal Flames, who charged at her at a fast pace. He attacked with a spin kick, but it was blocked by her scaly legs, forcing him to pull back, only to feel a sudden jolt of pain.

"Grr, what the?" he grunted, kneeling down.

"Eternal, what's wrong?" Sunset asks, running to him.

"She only blocked my attack, but those scales are tough! It's like I kicked a support beam, only worse!"

"But that could only mean one thing! She must be a descendant of the previous dragon lord. The one whom ruled the dragon kingdom before Torch did!" Twilight says.

Melodia laughed. "Your friends seem to have done their homework! Care to try again?"

"Sorry, but I'm not making the same mistake again! Instead, TAKE THIS!" Eternal lit up his horn and blasted Melodia, but she blocked it with ease, breathing out a fire wall to protect her. "Hmph, typical dragon instincts, no offense to you, Spike."

"None taken." Spike says. Eternal was soon caught by surprise by Melodia, who kicked Eternal into the air and followed up with a thrashing of her own. She left claw marks, bite marks, and bruises with each blow she layed on the stallion, making Celestia shout.

"STOP THIS RIGHT NOW!" Celestia shouts. Melodia just laughed it out and held Eternal by his forehooves, showing off how powerful Melodia was.

"Aww, so sorry. I just couldn't help myself. Here, you can have him back." Melodia replied. She threw Eternal back at Celestia and she caught him in her magical yellow aura. She held her injured son in her hooves with tears in her eyes while he barely moved himself.

"S-S-Sorry mother..... I failed." he said.

"Don't talk, just keep breathing and I'll try to heal you." Celestia said, looking into Eternal's eyes.

"You monster! What makes you think harming innocent ponies is alright?" Twilight snapped.

"Yeah, you think you're so tough, just because you're a different breed? You're not so tough!" Rainbow called out to Melodia and started pushing her buttons.

"You should be ashamed of yourself! What would your mother and father say about this?" Fluttershy says, making Melodia flash her fangs.

"I've met a lot of bad dragons when I was just a little dragon, but YOU... you're far worse than them! You're nothing but a heartless, terrorizing monster!"

"SHUT UP, YOU FOOLS!!!!!" Melodia shouted before roaring out loud, almost deafening the team, making them cover up their ears. Once she stopped, she spoke. "Who do you mortals think you are?! For disrespecting me and my pride, I will BREAK YOU ALL!!!!!"

"Guys! What's going on?!" Tidal Wave shouted, coming up the mountain. But just as he reached the top, he caught sight of the creature in the air. "Oh sweet makers, who is that?!"

"Well, aren't you a cute little posh stallion." Melodia sayed with a grin.

"Umm... thanks, I guess?" Tidal says, blushing.

"Hey, don't let her get to you! Look what she did to Eternal!" Ground Breaker pointed to Eternal, who was still in Celestia's hooves, being healed.

"WHAT?!" Tidal asked in disbelief.

"It's true! She gave 'im a thrashin' and almost killed him!" Applejack says. Tidal became more upset when he was given this info and turned his attention to Melodia.

"I don't know what kind of motive it is you have for wanting to cause this trouble, but I can never forgive you for what you've done to my dear friend, Eternal!"

Melodia grinned and admired Tidal Wave's determination, but that didn't mean she wasn't going to just play around and mess with his head. With everypony finally gathered together, Melodia was about to show a glimpse of the torture she claimed to have experienced long ago.

To Be Continued
> The Fall of Truth
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Melodia slowly made her way towards Tidal Wave and looked straight into his eyes, like she was staring into his soul with that same grinning expression. Tidal felt like he was trembling a bit with fear, like he was staring into the eyes of what felt like his executioner. He waited a whole 15 seconds for something to happen, but all she did was laugh to herself.

What she does next is light up her dragon horns, and making a little filly appear out of thin air who had light grey fur and an aqua blue mane and tail, matching the same color as Tidal Wave, which made Tidal grab Melodia's shoulders in anger.

"What do you think you're doing to my little sister?!" he shouts in anger.

"TIDAL! HELP ME!!!" his sister shouted.

"Who in the?!" Applejack says in shock.

"Of all the rotten, dirty tricks! Why did she have to hold Rain Drop hostage?" Shadow growled.

"Rain Drop?" Pinkie asks.

"Tidal Wave's younger sister." Hurricane Breeze says.

"What? Come on, let's go take her away from that freak!" Rainbow says, getting ready to make her move.

"Back up, mortal! She's my prisoner." Melodia replied, sending Tidal flying backwards towards the gang before she backed up herself. She still had Tidal's sister in her magic grip. Tidal Wave got up and and glared at Melodia more, wanting to charge at her. But he feared that if he did, she would either send him flying back again, or worse, hurt his little sister. "Now, it's time to let the fun begin."

"Listen here, you monster! Let go of Rain Drop right now! She has nothing to do with any of this! Why are you so obsessed with torturing us?!" Tidal asked.

"He's right! Your battle is with me, Melodia! If you want to take your anger out on anypony, choose me, you said it yourself that you wanted revenge!" Celestia added.

"True, I did say that. But I'll hold off on you for a bit and have a little fun, torturing your so-called subjects, because I'm going to teach them what it's like to lose a loved one!" Melodia says. She levitates Tidal's sister closer to her and grabs her with her claws.

"AAAH! NO PLEASE, DON'T HURT ME!" Rain Drop screamed.

"STOP!" Tidal ordered. In that moment, Eternal Flames was beginning to regain his conciousness and his sight as he caught sight of Melodia, holding Tidal's sister. His eyes widened and his anger only increased, witnessing the cruelty she was bringing to one of his friend's relatives. "Don't you dare! If you strike her with so much as one claw on her little head, you'll regret it!"

"Talk is cheap. You need to take action and prove your point." Melodia says, unamused.

"Tidal! Help me, please! Don't let her take me, please! Let me go! Let me go! LET ME GO!" Rain Drop kept on screaming out loud in fear. Listening to her crying for help was making Tidal more scared for her life and all he could do was watch his terrified sister squirm.

Eternal glared and flashed his teeth in anger before breaking free of his mother's hooves and tackled Melodia, with an added punch to the face. His attack was enough to punch her off the mountain and release her grip on Tidal's little sister. Then Eternal caught her before she fell.

Everypony sighed in relief and Tidal Wave approached Eternal. "Thank you, Eternal! I thought she was done for if you didn't stop her in time." Tidal says.

"I know, but how exactly did she get her claws on Rain Drop in the first place?" Eternal asked.

"I don't know! I think it had something to do with her looking straight into my eyes for some apparent reason and getting that weird look in her eyes. It was like she was probing my thoughts, or maybe probing what she thought was most precious in my heart!"

"What?! Just how many tricks does she have in that sick, twisted mind of hers? Ugh, it doesn't matter now, what matters is that we take Rain Drop out of here and back to her parents. It's not safe here, so we need to act as fast as we can, okay?"

"Alright. Come on, Rain. Follow me!" Tidal said to his sister. She nodded. But just as they were about to run down the path, Melodia flew back up to the mountain, looking madder than ever before. Her eyes locked on Eternal, Tidal and Rain and she snarled at them. Eternal and Tidal stepped forward, keeping Rain Drop hidden behind them for her own safety. Melodia was trying to think up a way to get back at them. That's when an idea popped up in her head, and she grinned evilly.

"Now there's an idea. Enjoy your last moments of freedom while you still can, mortals! This is only just the beginning of a really bad day!" Melodia called out before flying off. The group was clueless on why she had taken her leave like that and casted it aside for a while. Everypony went over to Eternal and Tidal, checking on them to make sure they were okay.

"Eternal? Are you alright? It doesn't still hurt, does it?" Sunset asked. She checked Eternal's body for any injuries that might still be on him. She only found one set of claw marks, but somehow, these were probably much larger than Melodia's dragon claws. "Eternal, where'd you get those?" she asks.

He looked over to his side to where she saw the claw marks. "Those were from a sparring session with my master when I was 15. I got careless and ended up getting this scar." he replied. He didn't sound like he was bothered by it in the slightest.

"Does it still hurt?"

"No, not anymore." Eternal turned his attention to his mother. She had a troubled look on her face, so he approached her to find out what it was. "Mother?"

"Hmm?" Celestia asked.

"How is it that Melodia knows you? And why does she have this grudge against you?"

"It's a long story, Eternal, so listen up." she didn't sound too happy about this, but everypony still gathered around to listen to what she had to say. "You see, it all started thousands of years ago when my sister and me were just starting out as young mares and we came across this other filly who was hiding in the bushes, and that filly was none other than Melodia. She was shy and didn't have many friends."

"So... you made friends with her?" Eternal asked.

"Yes, right after she sneezed out flames. She was part dragon, but she was still nice to hang out with and I couldn't help but feel like she was a sister to me and Luna. We would always hang out with each other after mother finished lecturing us. However, mother found out that I was playing with a "heathenous wretch of a creature," as she put it and forbid me from ever getting near her. She told me that our friendship was all a facade just so she could help lead her father and the dragon army to victory."

"Did you even ask if that was Melodia's plan, mother?"

"I wanted to, but I couldn't sneak out into the night to ask Melodia myself. She'd always keep saying it was for my own good that I didn't see Melodia."

"Princess, I could be wrong, but sometimes even parents tell lies to their children in order to hide a dark truth from them that they don't want them to know. My guess is that Melodia never intended on pursuing those ambitions in the first place." Tidal Wave says.

"I had the very same feeling, too, because mother told me she had taken care of the "pests" and I could finally go out and do whatever I want. I was so devastated that my mother took away Melodia from me and Luna, but Luna was most upset about it."

"But then, maybe if we meet Galaxia or see Melodia again, we can find out what really happen." Sunset implies, looking confident with her idea.

"But how? Melodia's being vague about her past. She's not going to just tell us what happened."

"That's why I have my newfound powers from the human world. I'm able to look into other ponies' pasts just by placing my hoof on them." Sunset attempted to place her hoof on Eternal's shoulder, but he backed up a bit, feeling uneasy with her finding out about his past.

While everypony was talking about it, Twilight noticed that Spike was looking a bit serious. Something was on his mind and she wanted to find out.

"Spike, what's wrong?" Twilight asked.

"I just can't but feel like there's something more to Melodia than what's on the surface, but, somehow I just can't quite put my finger on it." Spike replied.

"Well, you're just going to have to wait and find out!" Melodia called out, catching everypony by surprise. Only this time, what the group finds on Melodia, left a sickening feeling in them. Melodia had come back with the Alicorn Amulet wrapped around her neck. She grinned, expecting her foes to be scared and she got the right reaction from them as she expected.

"She did NOT just go there!" Shadow says, backing up.

"Of all the rotten tricks she came up with, she just HAD to choose that!" Rainbow Dash says.

"Say what you want, but now it's time put my plan into action!" Melodia shouted. The next thing she did was grab Rain Drop with her magic. Tidal Wave ran and stopped at the edge of the mountain, reaching out to grab his sister back, but it no avail.

"LET HER GO!" Tidal shouted.

"Not until I've taught you what it means to suffer!" Melodia replied. She brought one of her claws close to Rain Drop's face and she screamed in fear again. "SILENCE!"

All Tidal could do was growl at Melodia. She was too far for him to jump at and too high to reach. Just then, Sunset Shimmer teleported herself in a flash of light straight onto Melodia's back and placed her hooves on Melodia's shoulders and soon, a rush of her past memories rushed through Sunset's head. Melodia grew angry with the others being so persistant and smacked Sunset off of her.

At the same time, she slashed at Rain Drop and knocked her straight down the mountain with Sunset. The sight of the two being struck down by Melodia was enough to make Eternal Flames and Tidal Wave snap and confront Melodia, as well as provoke her.

"HEY!" both Tidal and Eternal shouted. Melodia looked at them, annoyed.

"What do you little colts want now?" she asks, unamused.

"SHUT UP! Let me get something straight here, Missy! No pony is to lay a hoof, or a claw, on my little sister, but you went and crossed the line!" Tidal growls.

"And showing no remorse whatsoever only serves to further your punishment! I will not show you any mercy whatsoever or hold anything back!"

In that moment, Eternal's horn lit up and used his magic to levitate Tidal Wave and moved him towards Melodia where he latched onto her, wrapping his hooves around her. Eternal leaped up into the air and slammed Melodia down onto the slope while she was distracted.

He then let gravity do its job and allow him to plummet down the mountain and catch up with Tidal and Melodia and began his team assault on her with Tidal. The others watched in shock as the tree plummet down the mountain, hitting the rocky edges with brute force. Never had any ordinary pony ever done something as dangerous or risky as Eternal and Tidal did.

"Quick! Everypony go after them! I'm gonna go get Sunset and Rain Drop! HURRY!" Twilight ordered. Everypony obeyed and either ran down the path or down the slope. Twilight, on the other hoof, flew down into the direction where Sunset and Rain Drop plummeted. "Sunset, whatever you do, don't give out on me, I promise that I'll be there as soon as I possibly can." she said to herself.

Back with the three tumbling ponies. Eternal and Tidal were landing blow after blow on Melodia, making her pay for what she did to their friends and family. But she wasn't a pushover and used the power of her Alicorn Amulet to power up her own magic, using it to enhance her own physical strength and lash out at the two stallions with more devastating blows. Though her attacks were very effective, Eternal Flames and Tidal Wave kept pressing on the assault, letting their rage fuel the fire inside them.

"You're gonna regret the day you ever messed with me and my friends, you monster!" Eternal shouted.

"Talk is cheap! There's no way you'll ever defeat me! I possess all the magic in the world! What good will it do for you if you can't even land a strong enough blow on me?!" Melodia retorted.

"So what if I didn't have a horn or have any wings, at least I still have the guts to drag you down while I still have breath in my lungs, you fool!" Tidal retorted back.

"I might not come close to my mother or father's magical abilities, but having all the magic in the world doesn't mean you're the strongest in the world!" Eternal says.

"Quiet, mortals!" Melodia sassed back. The three kept plummeting down the mountain slope and pressing on their attacks, punching and clawing at each other, leaving nasty bruises on the stallions, but Melodia used her magic to keep herself from sustaining injuries from the fall.

Meanwhile, Twilight had made it down the mountain and found Sunset lying on the ground. She gasped and flew towards her faster, checking to see if she was okay. She had no injuries, other than the tiny claw marks on her right cheek and her heart beat was steady. Although, Twilight knew even though she didn't look like she was injured, she still used a healing spell on Sunset in case her injuries were internal.

The moment she did this, Sunset began to stir and slowly open up her eyes. She looks up and sees Twilight with a relieved look on her face.

"Sunset! Thank goodness you're alright." Twilight said, hugging her. Sunset hesitated to return the hug at first, but she then returned Twilight's hug. "What happened up there?"

"Twilight... Melodia... she didn't do anything wrong." Sunset said, all shooken up.

"What are you talking about?! She literally held that filly hostage and she attacked you! How can you say she didn't do anything wrong after she did that?!"

"You don't understand, Twilight! I saw her past! She's..." Sunset paused and felt tears running down her eyes as the memories of Melodia flooded her mind. "...Melodia's father was taken from her by the very same alicorn that decieved Princess Celestia!"

"What?!"

*CRASH*

"Uh-oh! Something tells me that didn't sound too good!" Sunset got up on all fours and walked over to where she and Twilight heard the crash. Twilight followed Sunset, worried about her and the others and hoped they didn't all get hurt.

Back with the others, Eternal and Tidal were both on the ground, beaten and bruised up from the fall while Melodia was panting and sweating, still on all fours. Her perspective on the two stallions fighting her together made her think that there was more to them than she thought.

"I guess I underestimated you both. You put up a decent fight, but now it's time purge this place you call home and finally have my revenge!" Melodia says, before flying off to the village. At that moment, the entire gang, along with Twilight and Sunset finally reached the two fallen stallions.

"Whoa, I guess their strength wasn't enough to stop her." Shadow says.

"It might be enough if they'd use their Elements of Freedom! Those aren't just for show, you know. Twilight and the others used the Elements of Harmony to defeat Nightmare Moon, Discord and Tirek, so why didn't you guys use your elements?" Spike asked.

"We'll worry about that later! Right now, these boys need medical attention! Twilight, Sunset, Can you two perform any magical healing spells?" Celestia asked.

"I can use it, so can Twilight." Sunset says.

"Good, then all together now!"

Celestia's horn glew and so did Sunset's and Twilight's as they used their magic and finally rid the two stallions of their fatal injuries from the fall. Eternal and Tidal began to stir and finally, they stood up, rubbing the back of their heads, groaning.

"What happened?" Eternal asked. But then.

*SMACK*

Eternal's right cheek felt like it was burning, like somepony had just smacked him. He turned to see that Sunset Shimmer had done it and she glared daggers at him.

"What in Celestia's name were you thinking?! Do you realize that if you weren't careful, you could've killed yourself AND your friend here?! Why did you do that?!" she asked, demanding an answer. Eternal could see the anger and fear in her eyes as well as the tears. No mare in the entire village ever cried that much about him for doing something so dangerous that almost costed him his life.

He hung his head in shame and said, "I apologize. I just couldn't stand Melodia hurting you or Rain Drop and let her get away with it." In turn, Sunset was shocked that Eternal felt so strongly about her, and even went to such lengths to put his life as risk for her and others. But the fact still remained to Sunset that what he did was wrong and she called him out.

"Still, that doesn't mean you just rush into things like that! You need to start strategizing whenever your in a spot like that, so don't ever do that again!"

Eternal nodded. "Alright. I'll try to be careful next time."

"There's not gonna be a next time if we don't get back to the village! We have to hurry while we still have the chance or Melodia'll destroy it and the homes of the locals!" Tidal says.

"Hold on, we're missing Rain Drop! We haven't found her yet!" Eternal says. Tidal Wave got scared and ran into the direction of where she had fallen. He ran as fast as he could and he just couldn't stop worrying about his little sister, whether or not she might've survived the fall.

"Rain Drop, please be okay! Your big brother's coming! Just don't give out on me!" Tidal said to himself, speeding up his running pace. Finally, he came across a pile of snow where Rain Drop was laying down unconcious, but still alive and well. He ran up to her and picked her up in his hooves, dusting the snow out of her mane and shaking her lightly, trying to wake her up. "Rain? Are you okay? Please, wake up!"

The sound of his voice made her stir and her eyes opened up, seeing her big brother. Once her vision was back to normal, she gasped. "Tidal?" she asked. He nodded in approval. Rain Drop's lips began to quiver and she leaped forward and gave her brother a big hug. "TIDAL!" she cried.

"Shhh, it's alright, Rain Drop. I'm right here. Just let it all out." he whispered to her. He hugged her back, holding his little sister in a warm embrace. Rain Drop cried in her brother's shoulders. Seeing his little sister this scared broke his heart and made him more angry at Melodia. After she calmed down, Rain looked at her brother with a little hint of fear in her eyes.

"Tidal? Who was that monster? Why did she take me hostage like that?"

"I don't know, Rain. But I'm not going to let that happen again. Come with me, the others are waiting."

"The others?"

"My friends. We're going to work together to stop that monster that did this to you."

"Really?"

"Yes."

No other words were spoken. Rain Drop only nodded and went with Tidal Wave back to where the others were waiting and put on his serious game face, ready for the challenge that lied ahead. After a little bit of running later, they finally reunited with the others.

"Alright, no more waiting around! It's time to give that Melodia what she's gonna get coming to her. Whatever you guys do, do not let your guard down. Is that clear?" Eternal asked.

"Loud and clear. It's showtime!" Shadow says.

"Right!" Everypony shouted all at once.

"Then this time... we use these." Eternal pointed to his crown with the Element of Courage and the other necklaces with the other Elements of Freedom. Everypony gathered into a big circle and used their teleportation magic altogether and reappeared in the Freedom Village.

Once there, the locals were shouting and screaming in fear from the buildings as Melodia used her magic to levitate all the buildings off the ground. Her eyes glew red and she laughed out loud. Twilight could still remember the day Trixie used that very same amulet to take over Ponyville. She shuddered at that memory and shook it off, focusing more on the corrupted being in front of her.

"Melodia!" Eternal shouted, catching her attention.

"Ugh! Not you again! What do you mortals want now?!" she asked, more annoyed and angry. Her eyes glew an even darker red and her horns glew as well.

"You will not lay another claw on anypony else here! The fact that you show no remorse for any of your heinous acts, you will pay the ultimate price: Being imprisoned for all eternity." Eternal explains. He lights up his horn and causes his crown and the necklaces around the other guys' necks to glow. All six of the stallions levitated off the ground and shined in a bright white light.

"Pah! If you think that little trick is going to stop me, be my guest! But afterwards, I'll carry out my plans and purge this place once and for all!" Melodia shouted, laughing loudly. The magic coming from her Alicorn Amulet corrupter her the more she absorbed its power.

Eternal saw that there was no talking Melodia out of this. He was given no choice but to carry on the attack, along with his five other pals. Even now, his eyes had glown pure white.

Twilight felt like the Elements of Freedom might actually possess the same abilities as the Elements of Harmony and the proof was being witnessed by her own eyes. However, instead of a rainbow being blasted from their elements, a bright beam of light struck straight at Melodia and caught her off guard and she let out a screech of pain as she got blown back and hit the ground.

During the aftermath, the gang waited for the dust to clear off and the 6 stallions gently floated down after their attack was finally launched.

Once the dust cleared, the gang all saw Melodia laying on the ground, motionless. Eternal got a bit worried and hoped the attack didn't finish her off, so he approached Melodia. He leaned down with caution to feel her heart beat, which he luckily heard perfectly. Melodia was still alive, but she was far from finished, and to his shocking realization, she wasn't imprisoned at all.

His fears only became more severe when she woke up, laughing to herself. She locked her eyes on Eternal with an evil and bone-chilling grin, making him jump and move back from her. Melodia got back on all fours and stared down the gang with the smile of death.

"I don't get it! Is there no end to her destructive power?! What's she made of?!" Shadow Force asked.

"I don't know, but she's not normal!" Hurricane Breeze says, backing up with fear.

"Let's try it again!"

"NOT SO FAST!" echoed another female voice. The rest of the gang jumped in surprise, looking in all directions to find where the voice came from. Their eyes turned slowly towards Melodia. Her Alicorn Amulet began to glow a dark red color and shot out sparks of magic from its red gem. The ground began to rumble violently than it did before and the others became feared by what was going on.

Then, in a blinding red light, the Alicorn Amulet levitated off of Melodia and span out of control, shrouding itself into a gradually growing dark cloud. The sounds of laughter came, not from Melodia, but strangely, from the Alicorn Amulet itself. Soon, a pair of two red eyes opened up in the dark cloud and locked onto Twilight and her friends, laughing evilly at them.

To Be Continued
> Betrayals and Heartbroken Memories
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The dark cloud had begun to dissipate and clear up, allowing the gang to get a better look at the creature they saw before their very eyes. Melodia was grinning even more, knowing very well that her plans had actually fallen into place and felt like she was finally going to get what she wanted. With the dark cloud now out of sight, the creature had finally revealed itself.

She was a black alicorn with red eyes, but no pupils. Her mane was grey and had on leg armor and had black and red wings on her back. She wore a black cape with red trimmings. The cutie mark on her flank resembled the Alicorn Amulet, but it was black and red.

Eternal gave the mare a serious glare. "Who are you?" he asked. The mare chuckled and approached Eternal Flames and leaned down towards his eye level.

"So, the little stallion wants me to introduce myself. Very well, but I'm only going to say this once, so keep your ears open when you hear my name." she says. She whispers in his ear. "I... am... Zoor!" she lights up her horn and Eternal immediately backs up and retreats towards the gang before she had the chance to try to strike him down with a powerful magic attack. "Now, who was the one that freed me from my imprisonment after thousands of years?" she asks.

"It was I!" Melodia called out. Zoor turned to look behind her and found Melodia approaching her. Zoor turned her whole body around and gave Melodia her full attention. "I released you from your prison by absorbing their combined attacks and fueling you with my own magical abilities! Now my magical powers are yours to use for your very own, including the song of the dragons!" she explains.

Spike got freaked out when she said that. "I was afraid of that!" he said.

"What do you mean, Spike? Is the song of the dragons that bad?" Twilight asked.

"Afraid so. If played, then any and all dragons near and far will fall under the hypnotic song and follow singer's every order against our will!" he whispered.

"Excellent. With these newfound magical abilities, I will finally once again rule all of Equestria and seek my revenge on the one who opposed me: Master Starswirl the Bearded!" Zoor exclaimed.

"YES! And what about me?" Melodia asked. Zoor looked at Melodia, who was filled with excitement. Zoor laughed at Melodia and approached her with an evil grin.

"Please, even though you have freed me from my prison, I do not see how a pathetic little weakling like you could ever hope to be of use to anymore! You're nothing but a useless pawn. So take your weak little flank out of my sight and NEVER EVER COME BACK!!!" Zoor said, as she lit up her horn. She launched her attack on Melodia and blasted her into the sky and over to the forest of the elements. "Now that the little wretch is out of the way, I have a world that's rightfully mine to take now!" she exclaims. She laughs evilly as she lit up her horn and used her magic to disappear without a single trace to find her.

At the same time, after Melodia was caught completely off guard, her magic grip on the buildings in the village loosened and the buildings fell back down into place. 

The others were speechless on what had just happened. Including Eternal. He was dumbfounded by the fact that Zoor had backstabbed Melodia after freeing her. But this was also the first time in years he had ever been struck with so much fear that he froze. Sunset approached him.

"Eternal? Are you okay?" she asked.

"There's no way we can beat that thing... at least... not like this." he replied. "And Melodia... I know she's the enemy but she didn't deserve something like that."

"You're right. We've got to find her as soon as we can!"

"Then let's waste no time. Tidal Wave, you're the only one with the most medical experience so I need you to come with me and Sunset and find Melodia. There's no telling how badly she might be injured, so we have to be well prepared for this." Eternal ordered.

"I understand." Tidal agrees with a nod and got his first aid kit from Pinkie once again.

"But, what about me?" Rarity asks. "Aren't you going to bring me along with you?"

"He-llo! This isn't a vacation, Rarity! You stay here with the others and check up on the locals to make sure no pony is hurt, then we'll meet back at the entrance of the village." Eternal ordered.

"Come on, you didn't have to yell at Rarity like that!" Spike said.

"I didn't want to yell at her, but I had no choice. She just doesn't get the message!"

"The message?"

Eternal sighed in annoyance and signalled Spike to get closer to him. He nodded and walked up to Eternal and let him whisper in his ear. "Remember how you said you had a crush on Rarity and how I said she just kept taking you for granted?" his question was met with a nod from Spike, "Well, I keep trying to make it clear to Rarity that she's not my type and I don't have time for dates! Besides, with the amount of time you've been in love with her, I have no business to pursue her at all." 

"Oh... well, thanks." Spike replied quietly.

"No prob. Now come on, you two." Eternal ordered Sunset and Tidal.

They both nodded and left to find Melodia. They approached the gate leading to the Freedom Valley and opened it up, running down the path of the valley leading to the forests. But they didn't know which path she might have landed in. 

"Eternal, I've got an idea. I'll check the path on the far left, you check the left path in the middle and Tidal Wave can search the 2nd farthest path on the right. If she's not there, we'll take the paths next on our rights so we'll have a better chance." Sunset explains.

"Good thinking. Just be careful." Eternal said.

"I'll be careful if you promise to."

"Done." Just as Eternal was going to run down the path, Sunset stopped him.

"Hold on!" she says, grabbing his shoulder. He turned towards her, seeing a troubled look in her eyes. He held off on running into the forest and listened to Sunset.

"What's the matter?" he asked.

"Do you remember when I latched onto Melodia up on the mountain?" she asks.

"Yeah, how could I forget?"

"This might not sound believable, but... I was able to see into Melodia's past and... she went through a traumatic experience as a little filly. She was tortured and brutally beaten. Her father... the ruler of all dragons... his life was taken away from him and in front of his daughter's own eyes."

"What?!" Eternal shouted. "How do you know if that's the truth?"

"One of my special abilities is to see into other ponies' pasts. Melodia's past held a dark secret that she probably didn't want others to find out about. She was probably too scared, or ashamed to tell the others and find out whether or not they'd believe her."

"But if that's the-- oh dear!  I... I gotta go find her, quick!" Tidal says before taking off. He ran down the path on the farthest to the right without even thinking about it. Eternal wanted to go after him, but Sunset placed her hoof on his shoulder, getting his full attention and shook her head.

Eternal realized from both Sunset's and Tidal's expressions that this was something that only somepony like Tidal Wave can try to fix and Eternal was not allowed to interfere. Though, he didn't like his friend going alone, he had to respect his wishes and see this through his way. In the meantime, he and Sunset ran down the other paths in search for Melodia if she was down one of the other paths.

Tidal Wave was right to run down the path and found Melodia laying in the dirt. She was really covered in bruises and her breathing was faint, but stable. Tidal Wave got closer to her and opened up his first aid. He began treating Melodia's wounds and helped her stablize her breathing more. The moments rolled by and Melodia began to stir and grunt in pain from the damage she took.

"Just relax, give it a second. You're still not strong enough to walk yet." Tidal implied. Melodia gave him a glare, but he didn't back away from her. She scoffed.

"Why bother? I got what I had coming. I suppose I deserved to be tossed aside." she said, looking down at the ground with the look of dissappointment in her supposed smile. Tidal Wave had never heard her talk like that and his friends would think he's nuts if he told them what she said. But he knew all too well she was just trying to act tough to mask the real hidden torture in her eyes.

"Melodia, you don't have to keep up this act anymore. I know why you did all that stuff." Tidal replied. "But I'm still very upset with how you targeted my sister."

"What else is new?" she asked, retorically.

"I know that you lost your father a long time ago and you witnessed it with your own eyes. I'm very sorry for the horrible pain that you experienced during your childhood."

Melodia flashed an angry look at Tidal Wave. "What do you know about my past?! You know nothing! You don't know what it's like to be looked down upon just because you're different!"

"Melodia, just because you're different, doesn't mean it's frowned upon."

"IT WAS, THOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO!" When she raised her voice at him, he could see the tears swell up in her eyes, but she does her best to hide them.

"Well, hear me out. Being different is not a bad thing anymore. Although, I can't say the same thing for my parents, because I don't act like them. They thought that acting the way I always do will make them think I'll just end up in the slums with no power whatsoever. In my family, all my parents cared about was being the most powerful ponies next to the King's family. I only had my little sister who understood me as much as I understood her during the time when I mostly raised her."

"Aww, boo-hoo, such a sad story, but what does that have to do with ME? You had a warm bed to sleep in and fresh food stuffed inside that stomach of yours! I was always dangling from the walls in chains and fed this disgusting liquid every time the queen felt I was punished enough!"

"All I'm saying is that no matter how different we look or act, we are who we are. And right now, I can't stand to see you have to deal with the demons of your past and have to suffer because of them. I want to show you that no matter how dark the path may be, there will always be light at the end of the tunnel. And I want to be able to pull you out of that darkness and be by your side."

"B-But... I... Your family a-a-and the village... why are you..." Melodia stuttered. She sat up with a questioned look in her face, as she had never known that a simple earth pony would actually help her, despite everything she had done to them and their family and friends. Then, next thing that happens catches her by surprise. Tidal Wave wraps his hooves around her and gave her a warm hug.

She gasps and tried to brake him away from her, but he held on tight. "Please, Melodia. You don't have to be alone in the dark, anymore. You can still try to move forward and we can help get you settled and we can give you a brand new fresh start in life." 

And in that moment, for the first time in thousands of years, Melodia formed tears in her eyes and started crying in Tidal Wave's shoulder. She hugged him back and sobbed loudly, quivering with grief and guilt. 

"I'm so sorry! This was all my fault! I was so hung up on getting revenge on all those who shunned me away and feared me as a child, that I failed to see the pain and anguish I put you all through! I promise, I will never hurt anypony ever again for as long as I live!" she sobbed.

"Shhhh, just let it all out. I'm here." Tidal says, getting choked up himself. Tidal Wave sees Melodia's dragon wings wrap around him and her like a blanket. He didn't object to it and held her warmly in his hooves, easing the pain in her heart. 

"Why? Why would you be nice to a heathenous wretch of a creature like me?"

"Because you're not what you're claiming be. You're not a heathenous wretch of a creature, or a bad pony, or a mistake that everypony thought you were. You are Melodia Sortis Aeternalis: A pony/dragon hybrid who wanted to seek out freedom and sanctuary from the cruel world that misjudged you so badly. And most importantly, you are a mare/dragoness who deserves to be treated like any living creature in this world."

For that moment, Melodia had never felt so happy about somepony who had said such heartwarming words of wisdom and made her feel special. She only pulled away to look into Tidal's eyes and smiled at him before she leaned back in and whisper to him.

"Thank you so much, Tidal Wave. You have my word that I'll try to make things right."

"I wouldn't expect nothing less, Melodia."

She pulled him in for another warm hug and he hugged her back just as Eternal Flames and Sunset Shimmer had arrived at the scene and saw how Tidal Wave had succeeded in taming Melodia and smiled at the sight of them finally uniting as friends and allies.

In that moment, Sunset's cutie mark began to glow, which meant that hers and the other girls' friendship problem was finally taken care of. They waited for Tidal Wave and Melodia to break free from their hug so they could finally head back with the others. After about half a minute of hugging, the two finally broke free of the warm embrace and Eternal walked towards the two of them with a calm look in his eyes, even though Melodia still thought he might still be crossed with her.

Tidal Wave looked up at Eternal, who looked back down at him... with a warm smile and a nod. Tidal Wave was surprised, because Eternal had never smiled like that for a long time. But to see one as bright and reassuring as his, told him that he wasn't angry.

"You've done good, Tidal Wave. You've done good." Eternal said. His attention went towards Melodia, who had her back turned towards him, still unsure if he was upset with her or not. Eternal placed his hoof on her shoulder and she closed her eyes tightly. "Melodia, it's alright. Look at me." he said. Melodia turned and faced Eternal with an uncertain look and shook a little bit. "No matter how badly the pain felt  when you were young, it was the wrong thing to do when you endangered the lives of innocent ponies."

"I know... and I'm truly sorry for everything. I just felt so alone when I had lost my father years ago. He was the only family I had left." Melodia said sadly.

"How? How did that happen?" Eternal asked. Melodia turned away, closing her eyes tightly.

"I think I can shed some light on this. But you guys should be aware that what I saw in her memories was something that even leaves scars in me." Sunset explains. She approaches Melodia and placed her hoof on Melodia and looks over at the guys and says, "Grab my hoof and don't let go." Tidal Wave and Eternal Flames nodded and grabbed Sunset's hoof and she began to transfer Melodia's memories to the two stallions. In that brief moment, not a word was said, just the looks of shock, sadness and anger.

When Sunset let go of Melodia, Eternal's expression began to change. His bangs covered his eyes and he started emitting low growls. Tidal Wave looked at Melodia, now understanding what had happened and approached her, placing his hoof on her claw.

"Now I understand. I'm so sorry, Melodia. No pony should go through that." he says, almost crying.

"To think that I respected her... but to find out how much of a monster SHE was... I can never forgive her for what she's done to a little filly! If I find that mare, she's DONE FOR!" Eternal snarled.

"Calm down, Eternal! You don't even know where to find her." Sunset says.

"Then, if she ever shows her face again, I'll make sure she doesn't try this on anypony else!" 

"There'll be plenty of time for threats, but right now, I think it's best that we take Melodia with us. The others are probably wondering what's taking us so long." Tidal implied.

"Fine... but I'm keeping an eye out for that monster if she ever shows up. And I don't mean you, Melodia." Eternal said, a bit calmer, but still feeling a bit hostile. The group of friends all gathered together and were about to teleport back to the village, however, Melodia spared them the trouble by using her own magic to teleport the four of them back to the village.

Tidal Wave leaned down and placed Melodia up on his back. She yelped at his surprising actions but later accepted it and just let the fatigue take over and she wrapped her forlegs around his neck, soundly falling asleep as they finally approached their friends. At the same time, the rest of the gang rushed over to the four ponies and surrounded them in a big circle.

"Sunset, did it go well, she didn't hurt you, did she?!" Twilight asks.

"It's alright, Twilight. She didn't attack me or the boys. In fact, this might sound crazy, but she's actually being given a second chance to redeem herself." Sunset explains.

"WHAT?!" everypony asked in disbelief.

"ARE YOU CRAZY?! She nearly tried kill you and Tidal's sister earlier!" Rainbow shouts.

"And let's not forget that Princess Celestia told us how Melodia shot Blaze Burn down the mountain! What good'll it be it let that thing run free." Applejack asks, pointing at the sleeping hybrid on Tidal's back.

"Hey! You didn't see what Sunset showed me and Tidal." Eternal snapped, glaring daggers. Applejack quirked an eyebrow at his expression.

"What're y'all talkin' about?"

"Are you aware of Sunset's ability to look into ponies' pasts?" Tidal Wave asks.

"Of course, bu....oh, lemme guess, somethin' bad happened to Melodia in her past life." AJ guessed.

"Yes. And it wasn't pretty. If you want, then I'll explain it, but I warn you, her memories aren't exactly the sweetest kind of memories a filly has ever made." Eternal says. "Tell me, have any of you ponies ever wondered what it's like to have your hooves chained over your head and have them dangling from the ceiling, because that's what Melodia went through. And let's say there's this ancient so-called guardian who had something to do with all of this and she's the reason Melodia acted the way she did today."

"What are you talking about, deary? What "guardian" are you talking about?" Rarity asked.

"The same one who raised mother: Queen Galaxia, my grandmother." Eternal says, glaring. Pinkie Pie levitated a few feet off the ground, gasping before landing back down on her hooves.

"I... did not see that coming!" Pinkie says.

"But, why would Queen Galaxia hurt Melodia? Surely she wouldn't stoop that low. She and King Cosmos were the most powerful guardians in all of Equestria before the two sisters." Fluttershy says.

"Fluttershy, many guardians come with flaws in their lives and I think from Eternal's expression, Galaxia had that one big flaw that probably made him discredit everything about Queen Galaxia. I just pray that he doesn't do the unthinkable if he ever meets her face-to-face." Spark Burst says.

"Eternal, my son." Celestia says, approaching him. "Are you sure all of this was because of mother? Please, I have to know if this is the truth!" she begs with tears in her eyes.

"Seeing Melodia's memories with Sunset's help makes me wish it was all a lie. Even if we try to deny it, memories always reveal the hidden truth." Eternal says, still looking down, holding in his anger. Celestia didn't want to believe it, but there was no hint of lies hidden in her son's words. Celestia backed away from her son and hung her head down in shame. She turned to Melodia, who was still sleeping on Tidal Wave's back and she approached him with guilt and sympathy. "Melodia, my dearest friend, I'm so sorry for everything that's happened to you and not being there for you when you needed me."

"I can only imagine what she might say if she heard you say that." said a male voice. Celestia looked in front of her and saw that Blaze Burn had fully recovered from his fall. She approached him with concern, though, feeling like she could've done more to save him.

"Dearest, you're not still hurt, are you?" Celestia asked.

"I only had my ear drum nearly blown out, but other than that, I should be fine. I apologize for making you worry about me so much." Blaze Burn replied. "Including you, my son." he says to Eternal.

"I'm just glad you're okay, father." Eternal replied.

"Come on, Eternal, you always refer to him as "father" and not "dad." Can't you at least stop with the formalities for once and talk to him like he's "family" and not a "high-class pony?" Heat Blitz asked.

"It's alright, Heat Blitz. He's just being himself. Now, how's about we get to fixing the village? Then, maybe later on, we can get accquainted with our new friend and ally." Blaze Burn says.

"It'll be a challenge to fix up everything in this village if it's only one of us, Blaze Burn. After all, this was my home at one time and I want to help restore it with you." Celestia says.

Blaze Burn chuckled. "I think it's a great idea." he replied. Now coming to an agreement, the two alicorns stood closely with each other and lit up their horns in unison, casting their combined magical energies together and coating the entire village in it. The light shined so brightly in one instant and then disappeared, revealing the village finally being restored to its original state. Princess Celestia and the former King Blaze Burn smiled at each other and the village before approaching Twilight and her friends.

"I suppose this means our work here is finally done, everypony." Celestia says. The girls nodded.

"Hmm? What do you mean?" Hurricane Breeze asked.

"Well, to be specific, Hurricane, we came here because of a friendship problem and we all got called here by the map of Equestria, which was sort of rare. I know it seems a bit difficult to take in at first, but, in reality we're actually the spirits of the Elements of Harmony, just like how you and your friends are the spirits of the Elements of Freedom here. And now that our work is done, we have to go home." Fluttershy explains.

"She's right. After all, I'm sure you guys saw our cutie marks blinking earlier, right?" Twilight asks. Eternal and his friends and family all agreed with a nod. "Well, that was the sign telling us that our work here is done, and we have to get going if we want to stay alert for anymore threats."

"Wait, what about that monster that sent Melodia flying? She's still on the loose!" Spike says. "Don't forget, she still has the ability to sing the Song of Dragons! At any rate, she mi-- AGH!!!" he shouted. Spike kneeled down onto his hands and knees.

Twilight ran to the teen dragon with concern. "Spike, is something wrong?" she asked. As she got closer, Melodia woke up from her little nap and looked up to see Twilight approaching Spike and could hear a familiar melody being sung from a far distance and she knew it meant danger.

"STOP, DON'T GET SO CLOSE TO HIM!!!" Melodia shouted. Twilight looked back, which proved to be a big mistake because Spike also looked and had his predatorial eyes locked on her. Sunset felt uneasy with the way Spike was looking at Twilight and ran towards her.

"Twilight she's right, get away from him!" Sunset says, tackling Twilight away from Spike, who shot green flames, but missed his target.

"The next time we meet, you won't be so lucky! Remember this day!" Spike growled before flying off. As soon as he was out of sight, Melodia took one look at Rarity's expression and immediately caught wind of the situation, knowing what she was about to say.

"Oh no! Spi-" Rarity says.

"Don't you dare finish that sentence!" Rainbow Dash said, cutting her off.

"Phew, thank you." Melodia sighed in relief.

"What are you girls talking about?" Eternal asked. Rainbow went over to Eternal.

"Rarity's had this annoying habit of calling Spike by these nicknames like "Spikey-poo or Spikey-Wikey." Rainbow whispered in his ear. Eternal face hooved himself.

"Sweet mother Celestia, how does he put up with her?" he asks.

"We'll worry about that later! Right now, we've got to find a way to bring Spike back!" Twilight says.

"Twilight's right! Spike's done so much for Equestria than we give him credit for! But we're going to need you boys to come along with us if we are to succeed!" Celestia said.

"What?!" the boys shouted in surprise.

"But, the Freedom Village is our home. What's going to happen if we leave it behind? What if some other evil entity shows up and tries to destroy the village?" Hurricane Breeze asks.

"Nonsense." said another male voice.

"What? Who said that?" Eternal asked. He feels something land on his shoulder, catching him by surprise and he turns around, meeting his older brother eye-to-eye.

"Hah! There's no need to worry. You and your friends have forgotten that I'm the new leader of the village, so anything that tries to harm anypony here has to answer to me." Blue Blaze says.

"Are you sure about this?"

"Don't worry about me. I'm still strong enough to hold my own. But it's still your decision on whether or not your want to join the others. But if you want my advise, I say you should venture forth, this way you and your friends will be able to learn and grow. The village can only teach you so much and I say that you've learned just about everything you need to learn in this entire village and the valley. And you should always keep in mind that as your older brother, I'm so proud of you."

The words coming from Blue Blaze made Eternal silent for a few seconds and in return, he gave his older brother a big hug, earning a hug from him in return. Eternal pulled back and said, "And I'm proud I got to grow up with the best big brother in the whole world." he then turned to his friends and told them, "Guys, whether or not you choose to stay here, I'm heading back with mother."

"If you're going, then I'm going with you, too!" Heat Blitz says. The other guys all walked up with confidence in their eyes and in their spirits.

"So are we!" they said in unison. Eternal was surprised that all 6 of his friends were coming along with him on his journey, his respect for his friends grew more, knowing that he'll always have their backs as they've had his back throughout all the years he's known them.
> Farewell, Freedom Village
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Alright then guys, before we leave for Ponyville, I suggest that we all pack up our stuff and say our farewells to our friends and families. They deserve to know that much." Eternal implied. "Same goes for you Heat Blitz, if you're coming with me we'll have to tell Crimson and Flaming we're leaving."

"I know bro." Heat Blitz replied, putting on a sad smile. "I'm really going to miss the bundle of joy. She was always a little ray of sunshine to us."

"I know, but this is something we have to do in order to grow. Plus, every once in a while, we can always come back and visit whenever we're not so busy saving Equestria. Now come on. Like father always says, it's never a good idea to keep the ladies waiting for long." 

"What does that make me, chopped liver?!" Rarity asks, feeling offended.

"Only if said pony brings up the subject." Eternal replies with a bored, straight face.

"OOH, burn! I'm liking his style already! I can tell that we are gonna get along just fine with you guys around." Rainbow Dash says, patting Eternal's back hard.

"Hmph! Well I never!" Rarity scoffed. She turned away from Rainbow Dash with her eyes closed, with her snout pointing up into the sky. Pinkie Pie confronted Rarity with her usual happy attitude.

"Aww, cheer up Rarity. At least you still got Spike worshiping the ground you walk on, even though he's been crushing on you ever since he was just a baby dragon. It's too bad that he was put under hypnosis by the Song of Dragons against his own will." Pinkie explains quickly. Rarity stares at Pinkie with her "not helping" look, instantly making Pinkie feel like she's said enough.

"Anyways, I'd better get going. Come along Rain Drop. Mom and dad are probably still worried sick about you, and are wondering where you are," Tidal says to his little sister.

"Coming," Rain replies. She follows Tidal Wave and stays close to his side, yet she feels uncomfortable with Melodia being so close as well. She's wide awake but she still has her forelegs wrapped around Tidal's neck and won't let go of him. Rain feels a hint of jealousy running through her mind since she would always latch onto Tidal's neck every time she was tired and wanted him to carry her to her room if she ever stayed up late, reading her favorite books.

As she was taking that short trip down memory lane, she feels Tidal place his hoof on her shoulder. She stops, and looks at her big brother. "We're home now sis," he says. He points over to the two-story building a few feet in front of them. Just as they approach the front door of their house, the door opens up and shows a male and female earth pony.

The mare has the same light blue fur as Tidal Wave, with a mane and tail like Rain Drop's fur. The stallion has a black mane and tail like Tidal Wave, yet like Rain's mane and tail, the stallion has aqua blue fur. The parents greet them looking surprised and worried.

"Mommy! Daddy!" Rain Drop shouts, running to her parents. They kneel down and hug Rain Drop, holding her safely in their hooves.

"Rain, we were worried sick about you what happened?!" Rain's mom asks.

"I don't know, I was just reading a book, and next thing I know, I end up on top up of some mountain by this strange pony who looked like a dragon. I was crying and screaming for somepony to help me and then she goes scratches me before she threw me off the mountain," Rain explains.

"She's telling the truth mother," Tidal says. "If you don't believe me then this lady on my back is living proof."

His parents looked in shock and disgust when Melodia lifted up her head and waved at them.

"Salutations." she said, plainly.

"How dare you do this to our daughter! Do you have any idea what you've done?!" Tidal's dad asks.

"Father, allow me to explain," Tidal says.

"No absolutely not, the last thing we need to hear right now is your excuses! It's bad enough that our little Rain Drop was hurt, including you!" Tidal's mom says as she walks up to her son and hugs him. "I just can't stand the fact that you fought this monster and got your little sister involved in this!"

"I know, mother. I was scared for her, too. But you have to listen to me. I'm not going to be around in the Freedom Village for very long." Tidal replied. His mom and dad looked at him with confusion. "You see, my friends and I have already done everything for this village. But if we stay here, we might not get to explore and learn what's beyond the village and valley all put together."

"Absolutely not! You'll be doing no such thing until you've--" his father said before he cut him off.

"Until I've what, follow in your greedy hoofsteps? Sorry, but I'm not like you, father. I don't care about money or having the power to control others. I prefer to walk my own path and start off fresh. I'm not your little colt anymore and this is something that I have to do. Plus, I can't just abandon Melodia after everything she went through thousands of years ago." Tidal explains.

"Stop trying to butter me up, you sweet talker!" Melodia chuckled, pinching Tidal's cheek.

"Ouch! Watch the claws!"

"Oh, stop being such a foal."

"B...But Tidal Wave, are you sure about leaving? What about your sister?" his mother asked.

"Mommy! Daddy! Stop that! Yes, I may be a little young, but that doesn't mean you should treat me like a foal and use me as some pawn to make big brother stay here! If you really love my big brother, you'll stop being so greedy and start acting like a family for once! Now stop arguing with each other and make up like a real mommy and daddy does with their children!" Rain Drop intervened.

Their parents were taken by surprise by their daughter's words. Even Tidal and Melodia were caught off guard by how she told off her parents. Tidal turned back to face his parents and they turned to face him with the look of, to Tidal's surprise, guilt and anxiety. His father approached him first.

"Listen, Tidal Wave. I know I wasn't always the best father, and I know I hurt you. But the thing is, I just wanted us to stay together and prevent the family from falling apart." his dad said.

"Father, moving out of the house is a big step in every mare and stallion's life so they can learn to continue onward for their own sake, as well as to make their loved ones proud. I love you, father, but I can't stand having to put up these constant arguements between you, me and mother. Throughout my whole life, all I wanted from you guys was your love and support and these five simple words: I'm proud of you, son. Please, let's stop this meaningless family feud and make up for all our past mistakes." Tidal explains.

"Look, it's not any of my business to interfere with family affairs, but you two should be ashamed of using your son as a meal ticket to stay in power next to whoever leads this village. Parents are suppose to be kind and loving to their children, even in the darkest of times. I know, because that's what my father would always do when I was just a little filly long ago. There was even that last act of courage where he gave up his life just so I could live another day, and it really scarred me since then." Melodia explains. "You should be grateful for all the accomplishments Tidal Wave has done for the both of you over the years."

Melodia's words seemed to have really gotten to Tidal's mom and dad. Their eyes were filled with regret as they looked at Tidal Wave again.

"Is that really all you wanted from us? Just our love and support?" his mom asked. Tidal nodded with a nervous smile, hoping to get his wish. His mother sniffed. "If it means that you'll be happy, then I'll be happy to say "I'm proud of you, son." she wrapped her arms around his, sobbing quietly. She and Tidal's dad savored their son's final few moments in the Freedom Village.

"I'm sorry for not being the father you wanted me to be, Tidal Wave. If there's anything else you want us to do, then go ahead and tell us and we'll try to make it happen." his dad said.

"Just make sure that Rain Drop lives a cheerful life. A life that I couldn't even begin to imagine. That's all I want the two of you to do." Tidal replied. His parents pulled away from the hug and nodded and backed away, allowing Rain Drop to give her big brother a hug.

"Don't forget about me, okay?" Rain asked.

"I could never forget about you, Rain." Tidal replies warmly.

"I love you, big brother."

"I love you, too, little sis."

Tidal nuzzled his little sister and headed inside his house to start packing up his saddle bags, getting ready for the big move with all his friends, including his brand new close friend, Melodia.





As Hurricane Breeze was coming up to his house, Fluttershy followed him close behind. She had never met his family before and wanted to meet them first hoof. Hurricane had no problems with her tagging along with him, but the same couldn't be said for his sisters.

When they finally reached the front door of his house, he reached out to open the door, but it opened up, revealing his loving mom, Her fur was silver colored like Hurricane's mane and her mane was minty green like her son's fur, but her eyes were golden yellow. 

"Oh, Hurricane. Welcome home. Is this a friend of yours?" his mom asks.

"Yes ma'am. My name's Fluttershy. Who are you?" Fluttershy asks.

"I am Sunny Breeze. If it wasn't obvious, I'm Hurricane's mother. It's nice to meet you." Sunny and Fluttershy walked up to each other and shook hooves with each other. "You know, I don't think we've ever met before, are you new here to the Freedom Village?"

"Well, yes. Hurriane and I became really good friends. I met him in the zoo. The poor stallion's been working so hard all by himself to care for the zoo animals." Fluttershy explains.

"Mom, can I ask you something?" Hurricane asks.

"Sure, sweetie, anything." Sunny replies.

"I want you to look after the animals at the zoo."

"The zoo? What for?"

"If you haven't found out yet, I'm leaving the Freedom Village. A dangerous threat was unleashed a short while ago and now it's escaped into the outside world. There's no telling where it'll attack, so I've got to go with my friends to put a stop to it." Hurricane explains.

"What?! Hurricane, you can't go out into the world, it's dangerous!"

"That's why I'm packing up all my necessary equiptment before I leave soon. Of course, I can't ask you to take on the task alone, so can you make sure my sisters know about this?"

"Oh, we can hear you, and you can just forget it you little twerp!" said another female voice. Fluttershy gasped and looked over Sunny to see two looked just like Hurricane Breeze with their matching silver manes and tails and their minty green fur coats, but their eyes were golden yellow like their mom's.

"Angel Wings, listen, I can't have mom doing all the work. You only saw me working at the zoo and no pony else because I put more time and love into nurturing all those animals."

"And that concerns me, why, Hurricane? There's absolutely no way we're going to work at that stinky zoo caring for those smelly animals anymore! If you ask me, you should just save us all the trouble, close it all down and take those disgusting creatures to another zoo." Angel says, turning away. 

"That's just plain rude of you to say that!" Fluttershy intervenes.

"And just who are you suppose to be, his marefriend?" asked his other sister.

"My name is Fluttershy, and just who are you to disrespect your own little brother?" Fluttershy asks, feeling her anger starting to build up.

"I am Summer Breeze. And what we're talking about doesn't concern you, so back off." she replies. Her attention returns to Hurricane Breeze, "Now, if you want to keep that zoo, that's fine, but working at a filthy zoo isn't the type of work for two mares like us."

"Honestly, little brothers can be such a pain. How grandmother ever dealt with you, we'll never know, you might as well save us the trouble and--" Angel wings before she gets cut off.

"Stop...right...THERE!!!" Fluttershy intervenes.

Angel and Summer looked at Fluttershy, but then became struck with fear when she unleashed "The Stare" on the two mares and approached them slowly.

"Whoa, c-chill, sister!" Angel said nervously.

"Don't "chill, sister" me! Hurricane Breeze is your little brother! Ganging up on him and insulting him in front of his face is an insult to older sisters everywhere! And I should know, because I too am an older sister to my little brother back at my home. He may have had a rocky start in wanting to start his own career, but I wanted him to always keep trying and never give up. A good sister always shows her love and support to her little brothers and/or sisters, but you two are just too self-absorbed in your own easy life that you hardly ever see the pain your little brother's been feeling ever since his beloved grandmother passed away!" Fluttershy said, crossed.

"I have to agree with Fluttershy, you two should be ashamed of yourselves! And I think it's about time you two started helping out around the house! Your brother has done a lot for our family and I've just about had enough of your stuck up attitudes! Now apologize to Hurricane Breeze AT ONCE!" Sunny Breeze ordered, shouting that last part at her daughters.

Summer Breeze and Angel Wings flinched and took a step back together. They just looked at Hurricane with the feeling of digust, which then turned into guilt. They approached Hurricane Breeze and leaned down a bit to his eye level and actually saw and felt the pain their little brother had buried deep inside his heart, but they never gave him the chances to let him confess because they made him feel powerless.

"H-Hurricane?" Angel Wings asks. "I... w-we're sorry."

"Why?" Hurricane said, hiding his eyes in his mane. His body began to quiver. "Why did you always have to belittle every little thing I ever did just because I wasn't born as your third sister?"

"It was a terrible mistake, we admit it, but the truth was... we had a little trouble with trusting you as our little brother ever since daddy went missing. I guess we thought that he had something against you and we sort of went along with it, but you never did anything bad. We didn't want to admit we were wrong, and I guess our pride got in the way from seeing how much we've hurt you." Angel says.

"So in other words, we just wanted to say we're sorry for everything we've done. It wasn't right for us to go against you and we want to make it up to you. If you want us to help mom run the zoo when you leave, then that's what we'll do if means you'll be happy." Summer adds.

"Y...You really mean it?" Hurricane asks.

"Yes. And we want you to know one more thing." Angel says. She and Summer wrapped their hooves around Hurricane and pulled him in gently into a warm hug. "We love you, Hurricane. And we always will."

"No matter what you do or how you choose to live your life. From now on, you'll always have our love and support and we promise to take good care of the animals here." Summer added.

Hurricane smiled warmly and hugged his sisters back. "Angel Wings, Summer Breeze, thank you both so much, you don't know how much this means to me." he said. After a few seconds of hugging, he let go of his sisters and walked inside with Fluttershy close behind. "Well, I'd better get to packing. Oh, and I'll make a list for you girls, so you'll know what you need to do when caring for all the animals."

"Alright." his sisters and mom replied.

"I'm glad you were able to work things out with your sisters. I bet you feel better now that you're not going to be fighting with them anymore." Fluttershy asks.

"If you hadn't tagged along, they'd probably still have these "trusting issues" with me. So, I mostly have you to thank for all of this, Fluttershy." Hurricane replies.

"Aww, you're welcome. What are friends for?"

Hurricane smiled and nodded and walked into his room while Fluttershy waited for him outside his bedroom door as he started packing his things, getting himself ready to leave.





Ground Breaker was heading back to his home to break the news to his dad. Applejack tagged along with Ground Breaker just so she could keep him company. 

"Ya know, Ah don't think Ah've ever seen yer dad before. What's he like?" AJ asked.

"Best dad anypony could ask for. We've had our ups and downs when it came to life on the farm, but he's always taken very good care of me since I was just a foal." Ground says. "He's the only family I've got since I was never able to meet my mom. I don't know where she is or why she left, but, in all honesty, I'm just glad my dad had done everything to raise me right."

"Ah getcha, and look how good ya turned out. Ah'll bet yer dad is gonna be surprised to hear about how yer movin' out and goin' on a new adventure."

"No kidding."

Ground and Applejack had a few good laughs soon afterwards. A few minutes later, Ground Breaker and Applejack reach the house and Ground opened up the door. In doing so, he caught the scent of something tasty in the kitchen and he licked his lips in hunger. His dad then walks into the living room. His fur was a solid brown color, though a bit darker than that. His mane and tail were all black and his eyes were dark green, the same exact color as Ground Breaker's eyes.

"Well, now. Nice to see that you're still in one piece. A lot of crazy stuff went on out there and I was worried that you might have gotten hurt. But, at least now I know you're okay." he said.

"Thanks, dad. Here, I want you to meet my friend." Ground Breaker said. He took a step to the side and showed Applejack to his dad.

"Howdy, partner. Name's Applejack. Ground Breaker's told me lotsa good thing 'boutcha." AJ says.

"It's nice to meet you, Applejack. I'm Earth Shaker. I always knew he'd find somepony special." he said. Ground Breaker facehooved himself in embarrassment.

"Dad! She's just my friend! You know I'm old-fashioned when it comes to relationships." Ground replied.

"I know, I know. I'm just playing with you. So what exactly brings you by? I can already tell you're not here to retire for the day or just to grab a bite to eat. So what's on your mind?" Earth Shaker asked.

"The thing is, dad, I've got to get my saddle bags packed up. I'm planning on heading over to this place called Ponyville, meaning me and my friends are leaving the Freedom Village."

"Oh? What's the occasion?"

"Remember how everything in the village went all nutsy-coo-coo?"

"Yes?"

"Well, that was from this evil entity who awakened from her slumber and brought out an even stronger evil and now that stronger evil entity is out there somewhere, waiting to strike."

"Yer son ain't lyin' sir. Ah saw the evil creature with mah own eyes, too." AJ added. For a little while, Earth Shaker had said nothing and only stood eye to eye with his son. Earth Shaker wasn't comfortable about Ground wanting to move out of the village with whatever evil creature was out there. But at the same time, he knew that there was nothing he could do to stop his son from making his own choices.

Earth Shaker let out a sigh and approached Ground Breaker, putting his hoof on his son's shoulder. "Just remember that even though I don't want you to get hurt, I want you to know that as your father, I have to know when to let my own son go so he can grow and learn."

"Dad, are you saying...?" Ground asked.

"Yes. If you want to go out into the world, then I won't stop you. After all, it'll save me a bundle on my food stocks now that you're moving out." Earth Shaker chuckled, giving his son a playful hit on the shoulders. Ground Breaker laughed it out like it was a joke. "Either way, I'm proud of you, my son." he said. He pulled in Ground Breaker and hugged him and his son hugged back.

Applejack took her stretson hat and placed it over her chest watching as Ground as his father were saying their goodbyes to each other. Seeing a bond like this made her think about her parents. Once Earth Shaker was done and let his son go, Ground Breaker walked to his room and began packing his things.





Spark Burst had flown over the village, heading back to his house with his friend, Rainbow Dash. During the whole flight there, she wouldn't stop rambling on about the things she wanted to "teach" Spark about when they get back to Ponyville.

"Tell me, Spark. You're a fast flyer, and a great fighter, right?" Rainbow asked.

"Umm... yes? Why do you ask?" Spark asked.

"I'm just sayin', not a lot of pegasi can fly fast and kick flank at the same time! Unless you're somepony gifted and talented like myself, then it's no surprise."

"Rainbow Dash, modesty is a virtue. Those who boast about self-greatness will eventually lose face. And for the record, I wasn't gifted when I became the way I am now."

"Aww, come on, Sparkster. You should feel proud about your own greatness."

"Bragging isn't my style. It'll only serve to cloud all the hard work I've endured to get this far."

"Well, aren't you a riot at parties." Rainbow crossed her hooves, bored with his attitude. "At least mostly everypony over at the Wonderbolts Academy doesn't take the fun out."

"What's the Wonderbolts Academy?"

"Well, since you've been living out here, I might as well tell you. The Wonderbolts Academy is just the most awesome of awesome places where only the top-notch pegasi become the best flyers and serve to protect the citizens of Ponyville. I can even put in a good word about you with a pretty awesome friend of mine who's captain of the Wondebolts, if you want."

"Umm... hmm... I'm not sure, but I'll take it into consideration."

"Sweet! So where's your home?"

Spark Burst scouted the village from above and spotted a two-story buildings with a pond on the backyard, and a smirk appeared on his face. "Follow me." he said. He and Rainbow flew down towards the house and landed at the front porch. "Hold on for just a moment." he told Rainbow. He opened up the door and right in front of his eyes stood a pegasus mare. She had a long, blonde mane, same color as Spark Burst's blonde, spikey hair and had minty green eyes just like Spark's eyes but looked more brighter than her son's. Her fur coat, however, was white.

"Whoa, are you Spark's mom?" Rainbow Dash asked.

"Yes. My name is Lightning Storm. And who might you be?" she asked.

"I'm Rainbow Dash, I'm Spark's buddy." she replies.

"Long story short, she started chasing me all over the village while I was working." Spark added. Lightning Storm chuckled and looked at Rainbow Dash, who started blushing a bit.

"Heheh, I'm a little competitive. Sorry about that." Rainbow replied.

"That's alright. But I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I did train Spark Burst." Lightning said.

"Yeah, he told me about that. I've got a lot of respect for you for that!"

"Thank you, Ms. Dash."

"Hey, no problem"

"Well, if we're all done with these trips down memory lane, I've gotta pack my saddle bags. The others won't wait for me for very long. Not while that threat is still on the loose." Spark says. He flew up to the second floor and approached the door to his room. But then, he took a side step, moving away from the door as his mom flew up and stood in between her son's room and Spark.

"I'm well aware of the situation, Spark. But I can't allow you to go out on your own. It's too dangerous. You're the only family I have left after my husband passed away." Lightning said in a low tone.

"I know. It may be dangerous out there, but this is something I have to do." Spark replied.

"The answer is no!"

"I'm old enough to make my own choices. And I'm not going to be alone on my journey. My friends will be tagging along with me on the trip."

"Spark, I can't take that risk. You're much too precious for me to lose!"

Never before had Rainbow Dash seen or heard of a mother being so protective of her own son to the point where she would be refusing to let him leave, even if he wasn't traveling alone. She knew that she wasn't in a position to interfere with these family arguements, but she wanted to do something to help convince Lightning Storm to let her son go on his trip.

"Look, Lightning" Rainbow said, flying up to the 2nd floor. "It's none of my business to meddle in your family arguement, but what's the point of training your own son into a combat genius if you're not going to let him walk his own path, it just doesn't seem right. The whole point about teaching your kid all that self-defense excercise was to help him grow and learn to be an independant stallion. I know that you don't feel comfortable with it, but that's just part of how life works Lightning."

In the midst of the arguement, Lightning stopped and felt shocked at what Rainbow said. It was true that Lightning didn't want to let her son go. He had grown into a strong, and wise fighter than his own father despite his young age, but she still couldn't bare the thought of losing her own son.

She knew she had to make the right choice, even if it wasn't the easiest choice a parent could make. She looked down with her mane drooping over her face. "Spark." she said. "If this is what you want, then I won't stop you, but just know that no matter what, if you ever need me, I'll always be right here." Lightning looked up with a tearful smile, "You've made me so proud of how much you've grown."

Spark Burst smiled back and approached his mom, hugging her. "And I'm proud to call you my mother, thank you so much for everything that you've for me. I love you, mom." he said.

"I love you, too, Spark." Lightning whimpered. She hugged him back and sobbed in his shoulder. Spark Burst unfolded one of his wings and wrapped it around her. Lightning sobbed even louder in Spark's shoulder, wrapping her hooves around him tightly. Rainbow Dash could tell that they needed some time alone and flew back down to the first floor and waited.

For a little while, Spark held his mother in a warm hug and then finally let go. She moved out of the way to his room and allowed him to pack his saddle bags.





Twilight and Sunset went with the three brothers, Blue Blaze, Eternal Flames and Heat Blitz back to their house, wanting to keep them company when they say their good-byes to their family, minus the oldest brother, who has a village to look after. All the while, Twilight was still a bit worried about how Spike had fallen prey to the sound of the Song of Dragons. She only hoped that no matter the danger, they would do all that they could to bring back Spike safe and sound.

Sunset could feel the sadness inside Twilight's heart and couldn't blame her. Spike was like an adorable little brother to her and to see him get caught overtaken by that song was heartbreaking. Even if she wanted to at least ease Twilight's pain, the fact still stands that Spike was missing. 

Finally reaching the house, the four friends walked inside. Twilight and Sunset walked into the living room and waited for the boys to take care of business. Twilight was still looking sad and she wasn't going getting any better, so Sunset sat closer to Twilight and placed a hoof on one of Twilight's shoulder.

"Don't worry, Twilight. I know it'll take some time, but we'll bring Spike back." Sunset says.

"Didn't you see the way he... looked at me?" Twilight asks with tears in her eyes. "That wasn't the same Spike I hatched from and egg when I was a filly!" Twilight couldn't keep the tears in any longer and buried her face in her hooves, along with the addition of her wings. Sunset couldn't do much to ease her pain except hug Twilight and rock her gently back and forth.

Meanwhile, upstairs, the three brothers met up in Blue Blaze's bedroom with his wife and daughter. Flaming Sapphire wasn't sure why they needed to meet up, so she asked her dad.

"Daddy? What's going on? Did something bad happen?" Flaming asked.

"Why don't we let your uncles explain it, sweetie? It's very important." Blue Blaze implied.

"Oh, okay."

"I'm sure you know this already since you told me earlier, Blue Blaze, but I need to make this clear to Crimson and you, my little niece." Eternal says. Flaming and Crimson nodded. Eternal took a deep breath and said, "I've decided to move out of the village and travel to Ponyville. There's nothing left for me to learn here, so I hope you both understand this.

"What? You're leaving? But will I ever see you again?" Flaming asked, feeling sad.

"Of course, sweetie. You should know that good-byes aren't really forever." Eternal replied.

"Same goes for me. I'm going with Eternal and his friends. I don't think there's anything left for me to do in the village, so I might as well pack up and head out." Heat Blitz says.

"What? Are you sure about this?" Crimson asks.

"Yes, I'm sure. Besides, I just watched one of my friends fall into a trance in front of my very eyes and now he's out there under the control of an evil entity."

"Which is why my friends and I are going to get him back. But right now, I think Twilight needs all the comfort she can get now that her #1 assistant is gone at the moment." Eternal implies.

"You're right about that, bro. I don't know how much help I'll be, but I'll do what I can."

"Wait! Uncle Heat and Eternal!" Flaming exclaimed. She got both of her uncles' attentions. She ran up to them with her cute little hooves and hugged Heat Blitz first, sniffling. Heat Blitz hugged his niece back for a while until he had her face him.

"Don't forget about us, okay?" Heat Blitz asks. Flaming nodded and turned her attention to her uncle Eternal Flames and walked up to him.

"We won't forget about you." Eternal added. Flaming smiled tearfully and hugged Eternal. He hugged her back and gave her a peck on the forehead.

"I love you, uncle Eternal and Heat." Flaming says.

"We love you, too, kiddo. Listen to your mom and dad and remember to be good, okay?" Heat says.

"I will."

"Come on, bro. We've got some packing to do. Get your saddle bags ready." Eternal says.

"Right!"

"Good luck, boys. And thanks for everything." Crimson Ruby says. Eternal and Heat nodded and walked out of the bedroom and headed to their own rooms and started packing their things.





At the ice cream joint, Pinkie Pie was pigging out on yet another large bowl of ice cream. Shadow Force, however, went in the back and chatted with his boss. He explained everything about what had happened earlier and the next thing that really shocked him.

"Look, boss. I just want to say that I'm grateful for everything you've done. You gave me a pretty neat job and I've had nothing but good memories here. But, because of the situation that went on earlier with that crazed evil maniac, I have to resign from my job and move out with my friends." Shadow says.

"You what? Well, gee, I didn't think you'd leave so sudden. But, are you sure you're making the right choice, I mean, you've made a lot of customers happy here as well as made them feel welcome. If you left, the locals would miss ya very much. But if this is what you have to do, then I won't stop you." his boss said.

"Thanks, boss."

"You're welcome. But could I ask you one thing?"

"Sure, what is it?"

Shadow waited for his boss to respond and he ended up pointing at a certain pink pony who had her face buried deep in an ice cream sundae. "Who's gonna pay for her bill?" he asks.

"HAH! You seem to forget that I have a habit of saving my bits. This time, it's on me." 

"Cool, thanks, Shadow. But, I don't think I'll have enough ice cream left in the freezer for the others if she's munching on any more bowls."

"Alright, I'll try to talk to her. In the meantime, you know where I hid my life savings." Shadow leaped over the counter and walked over to the ever-hungry Pinkie Pie, still making her munching sounds as she devours her sundae and Shadow tapped her on the shoulder. "Hey, Pinkster."

"YIPE!" Pinkie shrieked. She leaped up and started bouncing off the walls. Shadow quirked an eyebrow at how she even does what she does. Pinkie lands back on her chair with her eyes shrunk. "Oh, hi there, Shadow, what'd you need, is there something wrong? OOH! Do you think you can hit me another tasty ice cream sundae, OOH, and with extra sprinkles, too!"

"Uhh, that's not a good idea. Listen, I think it's best that you lay off on going crazy with all the ice cream, there's only so much stocked in the freezer and everypony else needs to enjoy their fair share, so I think you've had enough for one day."

"Aww, but I wanted extra sprinkles."

"You can get extra sprinkles back in Ponyville. But for me, when I get there, I'm gonna find myself a brand new job and start off fresh."

"Well, I could always put in a good word for you at Sugar Cube Corner. They're loaded with all kinds of tasty pastries and I'm sure Mr and Mrs. Cake'll love having you around"

"Uhh... no thanks. But don't get me wrong, I do have a sweet tooth, but I want to try something else. I feel like if I end up working at another sweets joint, I'll end up on a sugar crazed rampage like you did with your ice cream and I'll get out of shape, ya know?"

"Oh, okay."

"Look, no need to trouble yourself, Pinkie. I can look for a job on my own. Now, come on, the others are probably waiting for us at the entrance by now."

"Gee, aren't you in a hurry to leave. So much in a way where you just can't pay the bill." Pinkie retorts playfully, while she was walking out the ice cream joint with Shadow.

"Wrong, the boss and I have two seperate safes stored away and I told him he could use the bits from mine to pay the bill and luckily, he knows the combination. " Shadow says.

Moments later, Shadow and Pinkie Pie made it back to the entrance to the village where Celestia, Blaze Burn and Rarity were waiting patiently. The others arrived shortly afterwards. Once everypony was gathered, Celestia addressed them all and had them gathered together.

"Alright everypony, listen up. Our job here is done, but that doesn't mean we should celebrate. We've lost Spike and it's our duty to bring him back! However, because of her ability to use the Song of Dragons, we must be cautious with how we pursue her." Celestia says.

"Then, how are we suppose to stop her if she's got a whole dragon army by her side?" Rainbow asks.

"I've already thought of a way to handle the situation. Twilight, Sunset." said Celestia.

"Yes, princess?" Sunset asked.

"I need you two to check every square inch of the library in your castle on any information regarding Zoor while I check the the archives in my castle with my sister. Blaze Burn, you should tag along with me. I know it's going to be difficult to leave your hometown, but we're going to need all the help we can get if we ever stand a chance against Zoor and save Spike."

"Very well, then. But how are we going to head back? There's only two carriages and 17 of us. It'll be next to impossible to fit everypony in the carriages." Blaze Burn says.

"Not to worry, my magic can expand the interiors while the outside looks the same."

"Hmm, not bad. Guess I should start hitting the books more often."

"Aww man, don't tell me he's gonna become an egghead!" Rainbow says, annoyed and disgusted.

"Hey! What's that suppose to mean?" Twilight asks, giving Rainbow Dash a slight glare.

"Uh, heh, nothing Twilight." Rainbow replied, chuckling nervously.

"Don't start arguing now! The sooner we get out of here, the better!" Eternal says. He didn't even wait for a response, he just immediately walked over to one of the carriages, but got blocked by the Royal Guards as they stepped in his way. "Wait, what the?"

"Only the princess and her escorts can enter!" the guards said.

"It's alright, gentlestallions. That young stallion and his friends are traveling with us back to Ponyville. Please, allow him to enter the carriage." Celestia says. The guards moved out of Eternal's way and allowed him to pass on through. Celestia lit up her horn and expanded the interior of the carriages while the exteriors still remained the same as they were. Eternal climbed into one of the carriages with his friends one by one, including his mother and father.

Twilight and her friends all climbed into the other empty carriage. Once everyone was all set and ready, Celestia called out to the guards.

"Alright, let's not waste any time! Take us back to Ponyville immediately!" she commanded.

"Yes, your highness!" The guards shouted. The guards pulled the carriages away from the Freedom Village and ventured down the path towards Ponyville. As the entire group traveled further and further away, Eternal Flames looked out the window in the direction of his hometown.

"Farewell, Freedom Village." he said. He brought his head back in the carriage and leaned back, staring off into space now that his journey in the Freedom Village was done and a new journey was about to begin over in the town of Ponyville, and it wasn't going to be a pleasant one.