The First "Book" Of The Core Stories.
One day, a terribly long time ago...
Long before Equestria was even an idea.
Long before even the Two Sisters were born
There was an Earth pony colt, all alone in a forest…
The forest wasn't anything special, not like the Everfree forest that had yet to exist for thousands of years.
It had no name, no paths worn through the ground from being walked on, yet it was on every map that anyone had, at least those that knew of it, with one warning.
"DO NOT ENTER"
The reason for this warning was simple, in this forest was a very old creature known as a Nature Spirit. Nature Spirits were known for being very dangerous, especially when ponies intruded on its land uninvited.
However, this wasnt any old Nature Spirit, it was the last Great Nature Spirit.
This Nature Spirit looked like an abnormally large bear, with wood and moss and leaves replacing bone, skin and muscle. The four legs were each longer and thicker than a fully grown pony, the claws looked like they could cut through anything. The body looked sturdy, like a mountain made of not only stone, but wood as well, and a deep green glow could be seen in various locations on and in the body, as well as the eyes.
As this large Nature Spirit was resting, it faintly heard a voice of what sounded like a pony in the distance. Another intruder? it thought. I should probably go see what they are doing in my forest.
As the large beast of nature walked towards the sound of intruders upon his territory, it realised that the source of the noise seemed to be… a pony colt? The pony was clearly an earth pony, not having a horn or wings. He had a dark green coat and a light brown mane with darker streaks. He couldnt be more than eight years old. He also seemed to be alone, and was scared by the large mass of living wood and stone suddenly appearing.
“AHHH!! PLEASE DONT HURT ME!!!” The colt screamed, fell backwards and began whimpering.
The nature titan spoke after a minute of whimper-filled silence, “I honestly have no intent on harming you, young one. Who are you and why are you here, in my forest?”
The small earth pony looks up when he hears this, and after a few second responds.
“I- i wa-was r-running, from the- the uh… bad ponies… i got lost…” he responds.
“My name is Cyvern, um, whats yours?”
“My name? Well, i cannot give you my name for… certain reasons. But you may call me Titan.” The nature spirit replies, not wanting to give out his name to just anyone.
“Well, um… nice to meet you mister Titan. What, um, what are you?” The Nature spirit, now known as Titan, tilts his head at the question. After a moment, it responds, “I suppose I am what you would call a Spirit, specifically one of nature. I am the guardian of this forest, as it is my home and has been for many eons. Hmmm…. Where are your parents, little one?
The colt oddly cringes at the question, “I um, they- that is…” after stuttering for a few seconds he goes quiet. “I think they died. The bad ponies hurt-“ before Cyvern could finish his sentence, a loud voice could be heard in the distance. “Okay lets check over there!” Titan turns his head quickly in the direction the voice came from. “Cyvern, Dont Move”
Cyvern suddenly found himself unable to move for some reason. “Wh- What!? Whats going on?! Titan, where are you going?!”
After casting that spell on the colt to protect him, Titan rushes off into the forest towards the new intruders.
four hours earlier
A group of three ponies, a dark blue pegasus with a white mane, a green unicorn with a blue mane and a dark red alicorn with an orange mane are in the middle of raiding a village. The alicorn is currently setting fire to three houses at once and sees three ponies inside one. Grinning maliciously, he yells to the unicorn, “hey, Rend! I see some over here!”
The unicorn, Rend, runs over to the house and uses Telekinesis to drag two of them out. “Hey Rend,” the alicorn calls after “dealing” with the two ponies, “there was another one in there.”
Rend replies while shaking his head, “Was too small to be an adult, probably a foal so… meh.” The alicorn rolls his eyes.
“Whatever. Shift is making sure nobody escapes, so i guess its fine. Not like anyone is gonna run into the-“ the pegasus, Sky Shift, lands before the sentence is finished.
“Hey, so um. yea, I think I saw a foal run off into the forest. Is that a bad thing?”
The alicorns eyes widen, “YES ITS A- whatever, just go find it!”
The pegasus cringes, then replies “but, i thought we werent allowed-“ “IT DOESNT MATTER, if even one gets away then we are screwed!” The alicorn is angry now, wings slightly spread and a dangerous spell forming on his horn. “We got the rest, its the last one and if you two dont go get that foal, i swear…”
The two non-alicorns looked at each other fearfully then look back at him. Shift nervously says “Yea okay, Aerlan, we are getting right on that, no need to uh… no need to do anything irrational.” The two ponies run strait to the forest, Rend following Shift as the pegasus knows which direction the pony foal went.
Aerlan sighs, letting the spell fade away. “If they- we. If we dont find and kill that foal… Father is going to be so mad.” He then flies off towards the forest as well.
present time
Cyvern is left all alone in a clearing, unable to move due to some kind of magic that Titan used on him. All he could think about was his parents and how that mean unicorn took them away from him.
As Cyvern was thinking, he heard a flapping sound approaching. “Huh? Whats- oh no.”
An alicorn with a dark red coat and orange mane lands nearby, but not close enough to see the colt. its the mean alicorn! Cyvern thinks. The alicorn jerks his head in the direction of where Titan ran off to, and says “oh no, dont tell me they-“ a loud bang can be heard in the distance, followed by a roar. Cyvern suddenly found he could move again!
The alicorn runs towards where the sound came from, and so does Cyvern.
As the colt runs silently towards where the sound was, he discovers the unicorn and pegasus from before standing near Titan who seems to have been hurt badly by some kind of spell and is laying on its side.
Cyvern stares in shock oh no! I cant let them hurt mister Titan! the very small, very harmable pony child then does something surprisingly smart. He climbs up a tree, crawls above the unicorn and drops down on his back!
“AHH, WHAT THE HELL?!” The unicorn yells. The pegasus looks over quickly, eyes widening in shock “well hey we found the foal! I think.” The unicorn giving an impromptu ponyback ride yells “Well GET IT OFF ME YOU IDIOT!!” The winged one stares and says “nah, this is your problem.”
“Shift, help Rend or im going to make it known what happened last thursday.”
“HEY YOU WOULDN'T!” The alicorn stares at the pegasus, both fully knowing he would.
“Fffine. I guess ill help him.” The pegasus then tackles the unicorn while the colt jumps off and runs towards Titan. The alicorn looks on to this scene with bemusement.
Cyvern, listen well,
“Mister Titan? How can i-“
I can speak using my mind for a time, but i am running out of energy, that unicorn hit me too hard. I… i do not believe i can survive this, but you can. I know i have not known you very long but i feel that you… you seem to have a spark of something i have not seen in a long time. I need you to trust me, and do what i tell you.
The colt listens to this.
Meanwhile, the two ponies are still fighting for some reason.
“YOU PUNCHED ME IN THE DICK”
“YEA, WELL, YOURE DUMB, YOU LET THE COLT GO”
“OH AND WHOSE FAULT IS IT THAT YOU DECIDED TO NOT TK HIM”
The alicorn looks onto this argument with lessening amusement and growing impatience. “SILENCE!”
The two ponies then stop talking and stare, shocked, at the sudden loud noise.
The alicorn continues “if you two would stop FIGHTING OVER NOTHING, we (and by we i mean YOU) have a child to-“ and before he could finish his sentence, a loud groan is heard in the direction of the nature spirit.
“What the heck?! I thought my Blast Rend spell did the thing in!!” “Well clearly not, hornhead” before the two could converse any further, a bright green light spreads through the area, temporarily blinding the three of them.
“Arrrghh. How… wha- oh.” Cyvern, now having absorbed the Nature Spirit’s Essence, gets up. The colt is no longer a small green foal, he seems to have grown three times his size, he now looks like a full grown stallion.
If a full grown stallion had antlers made of wood, and stones floating around his head in a sort of crown-like shape, irises glowing a deep green. His mind is suddenly filled with images, information about his new power from Titan that came through after the convergence.
Cyvern looks over at the three ponies that killed his village.
“Well then. I guess i should leave now” Aerlan says, eyes wide open in shock, and fucks off so fast that he leaves a dust trail. The two other ponies see their alicorn leader leave, and suddenly get a feeling of dread.
Cyvern, finished processing his new form and powers he discovered in the memories Titan gave him, glares at Rend and Shift with never-before felt rage. “I am going to count to ten before i start.”
Rend gulps “start what?”
Cyvern grins.
”The Hunt”
As Aerlan flies as fast as his wings could move, he could only wonder what the hell he just saw.
“Okay. A Spirit fused with a pony. Thats… new. Didnt realise that was possible. I uh, I need to tell Father about this. He is the king, after all. He has to know what just happened.”