A Changeling finds the fate of all existence thrust upon them
Beetle is a changeling who always felt like her life was meant for a higher purpose than King thorax's lands could hold. It turns out she is a very old soul indeed. She is now exploring Equis and the multiverse, bound by fate to save reality from being consumed by an ancient evil. Good thing her friends are helping!
The Hero faced the greatest challenge of all his life times. Armed with his sword, and the Progenitor shard, a powerful crystal, said to have been the tool the gods used to create the multiverse. From his experiences with it, he felt that it probably was true.
He approached the altar in the astral realm where not a god, but evil itself was worshipped in all of its macabre, grim, bloody, glory. The altar was hideous, with idols of gods long forgotten lining the walls, forgotten because it would be risking madness just to look upon an image of their frightful visage.
He found himself stepping on the head of the serpent engraved on the steps with his feet. He chuckled slightly to himself, still practicing a habit from his reign as King of Aquilonia, crushing the head of the serpent god Set. One lifetime of heroics among many, but a notable one nonetheless. No wonder people thought he was that emperor guy.
A cloaked figure stood near the baleful deity's statue with a struggling lady tied to the altar, a dagger about to be plunged into her heart. The Hero had never understood why it seemed like evil cultists only sacrificed Virgin maidens.
He spoke, "Let the girl go, this is between us Malgotha."
The figure turned to him and lowered his hood to reveal a face that resembled a humans, but something seemed to be off, though it could not be seen. A wide grin spread on his face, revealing pointed teeth. This monster had gone by many names, but he always went for the dark sinister, look.
"How many times have we done this? What is your name this time around, Conan, Taliesin, Percival? Ah forget it, I'll just call you Conan."
The Cimmerian, though only one identity among many reincarnations smiled and drew his sword. "Crom is only one god among many, but I swear by him once more I will slay you for the atrocities you have done throughout your existence."
Malgotha smirked and drew a rapier. "So be it."
Conan and the High Priest went into a bloody confrontation. Conan swung a savage sword strike at the chest of Malgotha, who nimbly dodged him, and managed to stick the side of our hero.
It went on like this for a while each trading blows with the other until each was bleeding from a dozen different spots. Malgotha tripped, and Conan, honorable enough to help him to his feet, got sweep kicked for his trouble.
Malgotha took a moment to conk him on the noggin, chain him to the wall, and dramatically waited for him to come to his senses. How appropriate the number of sacrifice he was going to be.
When Conan awoke he found there was a large crowd of cultists. This was simply a shrine to the concept of evil so there were many different types of evil paraphernalia they had on them. Big medallions bearing the number 666, yells of "Hail Cthulhu!" from a pair of guys in the back, looking ridiculous in their big black cloaks, and the mishmash of various evil symbols they had on them, They got on his nerves.
Malgotha entered, dressed in a fine suit, and a top hat on his head. He bowed to the crowd. He walked up to a marble podium and began to speak.
"665 sacrifices ago, I never thought a shrine dedicated to not just one evil god, but the idea of evil itself, would catch on. Sure I could have made another shrine to Satan, but that guy gets enough attention for a guy who lost a golden fiddle to a country hick from Georgia. Who can really take a god like that seriously? Now I find devotees of all forms of evil flocking here to venerate their powers. And now, for our six hundredth and sixty sixth sacrifice, I bring you a great hero!"
The Crowd cheered as the hero rolled his eyes at how ridiculous Malgotha's flair for dramatics was. He struggled at the chains and broke free instantly. Malgotha simply smirked. He motioned to the audience as they all drew their weapons. They all were fond of audience participation. The Hero fought the millions of cultists until he was overcome, but he was killed in battle, not sacrificed. As such he passed on to the afterlife.
---------------------------------------------------The River Styx, The Underworld-----------------------------------------------------------
Charon found The soul of the Hero once again at the riverbank. As they had done plenty of times, the Hero offered up what money he had on him at the time of death, and he ferried him across.
"How did you die this time? Killed by a dragon perhaps?"
"Stupid bloody Cultists slew me in battle." The Hero shrugged.
Charon chuckled as he rowed. "You are the only soul I know that can justifiably act so casual about dying."
As the raft approached the land of the dead the Hero looked back on Charon, one of the oldest friends he had (a slightly disturbing thought considering how many times one would have to die to achieve that) and said to him before he departed, "So see you next time I die?"
Charon smiled, something he rarely did. "Always will."
As the Hero approached the land of the dead, he saw that the gates were closed and being locked by what looked like a 13 year old wearing a cloak engraved with various arcane marks who looked oddly familiar.
The Hero looked confused. "Who are you?"
"Who I am is not important. However I am here to tell you that thy story has not ended. You see, you have a story or 2 still left to write."
The Hero scoffed, "I am no scribe in some dusty library, I prefer to live, and die, by the sword."
The figure smirked. "I have been instructed to give you this to drink."
It pulled a vial out of it's pocket and proffered it to the Hero.
"River Lethe water. You'll need to drink it for this one."
The bewildered hero accepted it and drank it.
As his memories faded away from him, the mental scars and woes from all his lives slowly faded away as he was reborn in a realm that he had never seen in his past lives. I need not say it's name here...
The figure smiled as he shuffled a tarot deck he drew from his cloak and drew the top card to give a bit of a portent for this soul's coming adventure.
It happened that a changeling was born upon that instant in the land of Equestria. One who did not know what the heck was going to happen to them, as the memories that could have possibly prepared the little one for what was to happen were in the subconscious, not to rise until the time was right.
----------------------------------------------------------------------The Temple of Evil----------------------------------------------------------
Malgotha tried everything to try and find his nemesis reborn. He knew he would come back, he always did. Scrying, astral projection, tarot decks, interrogating demons, cross referencing all of the above, all he found was a tarot card, left at the gates of the land of the dead. But he knew if he did not use him as the six hundred and sixty sixth sacrifice, that all would be for naught.
Many years did he toil, putting greater stains on his already unsalvageable soul. Until at last he found a faint trace of his soul signature, in some backwater realm inhabited by equinoids of all creatures. Their magic though was considerable, and would require some caution.
At long last, he was able to narrow it down to a single location, a school dedicated to friendship, as if that was an academic subject. Turns out this incarnation was some kind of shapeshifter. Of course, as usually happened, as that guy usually managed to fake drinking the water of Lethe, her (in this case) memories would kick back in, so he would have to send his two greatest, (relatively) skilled temple assassins ...
"Belgox, Betelvox, I have a job for you."
The two cultists, fanatically devoted to a multitude of evil gods (notably Cthulhu), murderous, and willing to do anything for Malgotha entered the room.
Belgox, the one of the two in a red cloak shouted, "Yeah Boss? What is it?"
"I have someone I need brought here for our six hundred and sixty sixth sacrifice. How will you feel about being sent to a school for friendship for a year? You will be richly rewarded." He pulled out a picture of a silver insectoid horse creature.
Betelgox, the one in a blue cloak, smiled, "A school for friendship? That sounds really fun!"
Belgox turned to his compatriot and sighed, "We're evil cultists, we don't do friendship!"
Malgotha replied "Just don't do a repeat of your last job."
Belgox replied" That should be easier as there is not a herd of elephants in question to rile into stampeding through the place."
Betelgox lowered his head, looking ashamed. Malgotha simply grinned. That is when the two fanatics realized the big spell book on their bosses table was open to a polymorph other spell.
------------------------------------------School of Friendship, Equestria-------------------------------------------------------------------
Beetle was late for her generosity class. While dodging through the crowd and running at full speed, she made it just in time to not be spotted Mrs Rarity and slowly sat down to something unexpected.
"Class there are two new students I would like to introduce, Belgox," A blood-red pegasi with a pentagram cutie mark, odd for a pegasus. "and Betelgox." A smiling blue unicorn who had a black compass rose like cutie mark, but the one that pointed south was was twice as long as the others. Weird thing is, the names sounded familiar, and untrustworthy, and the compass cutie mark brought the word chaos to her mind. Weird.
"They come from... 'Some obscure place in the middle of nowhere, definitely not from a temple to an evil god.' That's... interesting. Now I know they have come a long way so be inviting. "
The students went and took seats, and they oddly seemed to be watching Beetle but when she turned to look at them they quickly diverted their eyes. Double weird.
After a long lesson on Generosity, Beetle was finally free to head to the library to talk to her friends, a griffon named Ajax, and a dragon named Calphryxius where she noted that the two new students were tailing her to the history section where she was waiting for her friends, straight across from the horror section where both of them seemed to be watching her under the cover of reading H.P. Lovecolt (why they had the writings of someone so intolerant of non ponies was anyone's guess) The next thing she knew they were right up next to her. Unbeknownst to Beetle, Belgox had drawn a slightly anachronistic taser and reached over to give Beetle the full blast, reaching behind the back of betelgox and,
"AUGH!"
It turns out Belgox's reach was a bit short and everyone stared at Betelgox who glared at Belgox and quickly said while still twitching from the electrical shock, "S-Sorry... This story really is terrifying!" They slowly moved to another, less filled, section of the library.
"For crying out loud Betelgox, you didn't need to draw so much attention!"
"You'd scream too if you had a taser put to your backside!"
"By Cthulhu, this incarnation is tricky! We need to redo our extraction strategy! We don't want a repeat of last time!"
Belgox still had the words 'F.B.I!!!! OPEN UP!' ringing in his ears.
Unbeknownst to the pair of cultists, they were being eavesdropped by Beetle and her friends, who had shown up and decided to find out what the heck was happening with those guys.
I would like to take a moment to let you know that the story you are currently reading has taken me much danger and pain. Each line represents my stealthy work to take notes on goings within the dimensions of which you read. I barely managed to evade the wrath of the guardians of the multiversal barriers, face the demon Polybius, which I accidentally freed from a binding in an old arcade cabinet, and spend five nights as a security guard for a rip-off Chuck-E-Cheese to hire a taxi (which I found more dangerous than Polybius, to be honest), just to get back to this realm with the chapters you already read.
Shortly after the incident in the cafeteria, and some brainstorming, they decided that the best plan of action would be to ask the councillor, Mrs Glimmer, who was rumored among the students to know a bit more about the darker bits of magic than the headmaster would approve of. Even though it was an assumption based on previously trying some pretty evil stuff, it was the best shot they could think of.
Beetle knocked on the door.
"Come in!"
"Hello? Mrs Glimmer? I have some thing I need to ask you. Do you know anything about these symbols? I could not find anything in the library."
"I'd be happy to help! Let me see."
Mrs Glimmer looked confused, rubbed her eyes, looked at the sketch again, and her face turned pale.
"I don't know where you learned about these symbols, but these are not anything that would be found in our library. In fact, whatever book you found this in is one of the few things that are considered forbidden contraband here. I will have to ask you to turn it over."
Beetle looked a bit cowed, but responded, "I did not get these from a book! These are sketches of the cutie marks of two other students"
Mrs Glimmer shut the door, and looked Beetle in the eye.
Mrs Glimmer pulled a long neglected tome off of a shelf in the corner. She probably should have burned it, but after what she had gone through, she kept it to keep herself from making the same mistakes. That symbol emblazoned on the cover still brought memories of his laugh.
She opened it to the 13th page, "I suppose you have heard of how I figured out how to separate the cutie mark of a pony from them. In truth I had help... I had been searching for a long time for how to accomplish such an unspeakable feat. Until I found the book of the immaterium. It told of things that would make our god of chaos, Discord, look like a poseur. I learned of an ancient power which knew all secrets. His name was- " Beetle's mouth moved of its own accord to speak, "Tzeentch, The Changer of Ways."
Starlight Glimmer looked puzzled, "Where did you learn about him?" Beetle looked as befuddled, "It slipped out! I've never heard that name in my life!"
Starlight looked her in the eyes, "We'll discuss this later. Anyway, he gave me a scroll explaining how to remove the mark, and I promised to give them to him upon their owners death. I only realized later that the mark was not the thing he wanted. It was the soul that came with it. You know the rest of what happened. Anyone who would bare that mark openly is bad news. "
------------------The tower adjacent with a good view of the councilors office ----------------
Belgox put down his binoculars.
"They're on to us 'Vox. We need to grab them tonight."
"But Bel! We dont have a serious plan!"
"It's our only chance! How would you want the boss to terminate our contract? We actually had to sign in blood, and you know what that means! 6. Feet. Under. We still need to work for that stingy son of a-ah-ACHOO!!!"
"Curse you."
"Thanks."
"Get some chalk, 13 red candles, and a virgin. We have work to do. "
