Catpone Cerberus

@Blitz Boom Charir stopped his doings for a moment when Leviathan created the small thunderbolt, but after concluding it was nothing for him to worry about, he continued his investigation. "It's not like I want to be stuck with this thing." Ruby commented, she wanted to get rid of the eye as much as others wanted to take it, but she'd first need to figure out the weird connection between it and her sense, she called it a curse yes, but she knew that its effect was too specific for just a curse, and sure she could have destroyed it, but there was really no way of knowing if that would help, it could also make things worse. Even if Spicy would have offered the drink to Charir, he would have refused, because regardless of any added smells, the smell of alcohol was on the background always, and while he didn't know what alcohol was, he could tell it was not something he'd like, not that anything earthy, sweet and floral was attractive to him either, since he was full carnivore, preferring the metallic smell of blood, fear and death. what? he may have been lot nicer than Ruby, but he was still the same species from the same land. This disinterest was true for most consumables, the fruit and candy were ignored after a short sniff, while the liquor closet and perfumes seemed to be actively unpleasant to him based on his reaction, and they were, not because they smelled bad necessarily, but because of how dominant the smell was, nobody likes it when one thing dominates one of their senses, be it a loud noise or a strong smell. With the radio Charir showed again some of his intelligence, as while at start it was the expected situation, him smelling it and just poking the thing until something happened, after he learned it made sound, he quickly figured out that the knobs and buttons changed how the sound came out, and played around with it for few moments before turning it off. This would be true for any other piece of technology that may have been around for him to look at, he'd poke at it for a moment, learn what it does, and the eventually learn to control it, he may have had no idea how exactly they worked, but he learned very quickly how to use them, this was extension of their kinds quick situational adaptability that Ruby may have had mentioned at some point, they were very quick learners, and could use what they learned to adapt their approach on the fly, that was yet another reason why they were so dangerous, and why same trick didn't fool them twice. "Sure" -------------------------------------------- Some time before, Lyriel moving thigh impassable vegetation out of her way would have been weird to see, but at this point Scarecrow didn't even register it fully in his head due to it being expected from her. "This is oddly normal place for a location like the Everfree forest." He remarked, he didn't mean normal as not special, but normal as....well, not the Everfree forest. "My guess is there's some magic keeping it hidden? Since I haven't stumbled upon this even though I'm sure I've explored the whole forest at this point." "I wonder what kind of magic it must be to even affect a mindless corpse like myself." Having no physical mind, mind control and many types of illusions didn't affect him, since they were dependent of making changes into his mind, a mind that didn't exist. "It seems..calm in here, I don't feel anything myself, but I can tell there's a...calm presence." ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Guess that's that then, until you have other suggestions, we probably should return to the others to see if they found anything, though you could keep looking around while we move, being able to fly and all." If Onache had other suggestions, Trox would agree on those, and if she spotted something, he'd join her in that, in any other case, he'd start heading towards the crowd to see if the other found anything. Sheska was dropped next to the injured ponies, as in, literally dropped, as Sear flew over the crowd and dropped her in, and while Sear and Chega proceeded to scout the area for evidence, Sheska got to work, she didn't have any equipment, herbs or medicine, so healing magic was all she got, and while powerful, it didn't do miracles. She managed to mostly control the bleeding, basically, she would try to stabilize them until they were moved to a hospital, and until something went terribly wrong, she would be able to do so. She didn't speak a word to anyone else than the caretaker when she arrived, stating that she was a healer when she dropped from the sky, and giving calm orders to the caretaker, If the caretaker didn't listen, or was too panicked to understand, Sheska would physically move her when and where needed to, gently first, but she would get more firm if needed to, this also went for anybody that may have been in the way of her trying to help, she was a skilled fighter, so the ponies around her didn't really have any chance in stopping her from doing her job, though she did stay calm the whole time even if someone got tense, she knew what shock of this kind of situation could do to someone, and knew how to deal with such situation. Mentally she took the whole thing well, in fact, she didn't really feel much anything besides being sad for these ponies and all the suffering, she had seen so much in her relatively short life that this was very mild, hay, her own brother had almost been ripped apart in front of her. Sear and Chega also took what they saw relatively well, Chega was more visibly sad about it, but neither of them had any extreme reaction, Sear being a hunter and with them both eating meat, both of them were used to blood, and the biggest shock was the victims rather than the results. They spotted and followed the trail, and when they spotted the fire, Chega immediately created a magical barrier around it, attempting to extinguish it by creating an air tight bubble around it, hoping to suffocate it. Sear meanwhile sniffed around to see if there was any scents that could tip them towards the perpetrator, even something as little as confirming their species, hoping that it helped a bit that the smell from the fire was also trapped in the magical bubble Chega created. They made sure to not touch anything important. The door went ignored, because as they saw it, at this point it was meaningless if it was part of this or not, since the perpetrator was the same most likely, so it was more important to deal with what they had here than leave to check the door.

@Starforce "It seems somepony slept well." Frail remarked "Good Morning" her tone was the usual friendly one, though she had a tiny smile on her face and that changed her tone a bit towards sounding happier, she may have preferred living alone, but it would have been a lie to say that Sparkly's cheerful existence didn't feel nice. "Do you want tea?"

@Lucid_Nightlight "I'm not supporting destruction and death, only pointing out the potential of raw magic, in fact, magic is better because you can control it, a bomb capable of destroying a city, will always destroy a city, but magic used by individual can either destroy a city, or kill two individuals without harming anything else." "Sure, it would have taken more time without Earth, but we also would have about 90% less threats without Earth, if it wasn't for Earth, we wouldn't need as powerful of an army as we do now." "*If it wasn't for Earth, we wouldn't need to use resources to keep them out of the Homelands to protect them from worldwide destruction.*" Earth and humanity represented many things Ruby despised the most, so it would take lot of work for her to accept them, not to mention be actually friendly with them, latter possibly being close to impossible. "I trust you with our technological advancement as before, and if you think certain weaponry is needed, so be it, but there's simpler solutions, if you think that fast moving pile of metal is a threat we don't have defenses for, we simply won't allow Earth to bring them here, nor will we allow them build airports fit for use by those things." "*Just remember to make sure nothing we have is dependent on Earth or anyone else, if use of something can be stopped by other nation refusing to give us something, it's a worthless piece of junk and should be replaced with something reliable*" "I too am satisfied with the direction, for too long nations in all three worlds have been ruled by greedy and weak rulers, I will, we will show them what it means to be a strong leader." "No matter how many times they may try to kill me."

@Lucid_Nightlight "My kind will manage fine with or without us, numbers don't matter when the only way of travel is uneven, fiery, hole filled narrow paths between volcanoes in a land where outside species can barely breath without life long damage to their lungs. We are not protecting my kind from outsiders, we are protecting outsiders from my kind, and other forces." "And no, we shouldn't get weaponry we have no local means to produce, we don't know if the right raw materials even exist in this world, we can come up with something better than those lesser intelligence naked monkeys." it wasn't even meant as an insult, since as far as she was concerned, it was a fact. "I don't know what a 'nuke' is, but the way everyone talks about them they sound like powerful weapons, and I'd just like to say that with what I have seen, Enduur, Danthe and Charis can probably already compete, the amount of death Charis's father, who was lot weaker than them, had caused indicates that they could in theory easily kill entire towns if not cities in matter of seconds." Vix slightly pointed at the two heads he had brought as he said it, trying to signal what exactly he meant.

@Lucid_Nightlight "It's quite foolish to rely on something you can't produce, even assuming the hunt is successful, it will cost lot of lives to periodically go hunt more of my kind, since being basically dead skin at that point, even our scales lose their effectiveness after a while without the constant repair that happens when we are alive." Ruby stated, their nation was in good spot for having her, because even in worst case scenario, she could just shed her scales to create more material. "Isn't it also pretty messed up? To hunt sentient creatures for their skin? I'm sure none of you would be happy if I hunted your kind for your skins." "Trust me, we don't care." "But I do, you're beautiful creatures, you don't deserve being treated like cattle." Ruby was again genuinely surprised by this, how could anyone or anything think that about her kind?

@Starforce Lunar said goodnights and waited for Sparkly to fall asleep before leaving the room, she continued doing her thing until the first rays of sun started to show, after which she headed to Frail's room to sleep. Not long after that Frail would wake up and do her morning routines, which was somewhere between 6 and 7 am. If Sparkly woke up anywhere between 7 and 12, she'd find Frail in the kitchen drinking tea with pile of mail next to her, reading a news paper while sorting pieces of glass again, she was quite the multitasker. If she however woke up around or after 12, Lunar too would be up, organizing her cart with cup of tea floating in her magic.

"There's something very weird going on." Jenna stated, walking to another locker and using her powers to forcefully open it, she seemed oddly...familiar with the location of that locker "I looked around bit more closely as we walked here, there's lot of...inconsistencies, time isn't correct here, it's not only big things like lockers from decades apart..." as she spoke, she pulled something out of the moldy locker she had opened and started ripping it apart, it was something flat like paper laminated in plastic, she used her powers to be able to rip the plastic too "...even the walls look like parts of them have been build longer ago than other parts..." she seemed slightly pissed as she ripped the thing apart, though it was clear it had nothing to did with what she was talking about "...though I don't have any explanation for it yet, we have to see more of this place for any theories." she dropped the pieces on the floor, trying to play it out as casually as possible to avoid questions from Oliver regarding it, though she knew she probably couldn't avoid them "The darkness is also weird, I don't know if you noticed since you can see better in the dark than I can, but the darkness didn't change, we are in almost windowless room without lights, yet it's just as bright as outside." Bright was probably the wrong term, since it was very much not bright in any stretch of the word. Speaking of better eyes though, if Oliver was to look at the pieces Jenna had dropped, he could probably see one of the pieces that was upright had Jenna's face on it, or well part of it, it was piece of a picture and the exact position of that piece was Jenna's upper chest, thus visible was the lower part of her face down to about halfway of her chest area, her outfit seemed to be bit unusual for her in it, or well, what was visible, the color was black as expected, but it seemed more revealing than anything she had worn since she and Oliver met, not that there was lot visible in the tiny piece of the picture. Jenna proceeded to walk to the nearest light switch and flip it, it actually worked, though the amount of light was minuscule, as only one light in the whole room lit up, that being a shower's light, and even it was so faint that it was probably gonna die soon too, though it was certainly a surprise there was power.

Actually now that Jenna thought about it, cattle was probably a bad comparison, since at least humans had animal rights groups and some laws protecting animals, thus cattle was better treated that humans would under Talon, after all, they were talking about a group that was ready to kill its own kind just because they didn't agree on certain things. "The Order is lot bigger threat than any national military, you can't really have the correct preparations for fighting something you don't know exists, and Talon probably has people in high places giving them lot of intel." "And remember, attack isn't necessarily a full blown assault, it could be just a single person with a gun, or they could blow up the building disguised as terrorists..." "My point is, crowds are the safest, and if they are not safe, nothing is, so act normal but stay sharp, and if you believe in any god, pray they are watching over us." she ate after that, she didn't want lock in any conclusion before she got a response from their 'ally'.

@Blitz Boom "I knew it was unlikely you wouldn't check his background." Ruby commented quietly, she was mainly just thinking out loud, so she didn't expect a response of any kind. "So it was amulets that did that to him...anyway, in case you'd want to know, she got him to go with her by talking about some mother dying, didn't listen that well, her way of talking was....pretentious, and I don't personally like her kind, have had....an experience, with one." while her dislike was partly from just generally not liking magic, magical creatures were on whole another level on her list of dislikes, because for some reason after certain level of magicality creatures became insufferably annoying, she didn't know if magic caused change in personality or if certain personalities just were naturally better at magic, but that didn't really matter since the end result was the same. "But yes, sounds good, and honestly, the payment is just extra, since we were coming here anyway, I would have had no reason to not tell you regardless if he had promised payment or not." may be odd coming from a greedy creature like a dragon, but for her the way she gained things was part of the satisfaction of gain, and since this was probably the easiest and most boring way she had gotten profit, it was also the most meaningless. "The details on what we have been doing and how trust has been formed between us is indeed none of your business, all I'm going to say on that is that it's...mutual stake, so to speak, not too unlike to you and Marley as I understand it." "But for the meeting itself, I see no harm in telling you, funnily enough, our first interaction was when Leviathan tried to steal from me, too bad for her, it was this she tried to steal." she touched the necklace as she said 'this', regarding Charir she said nothing, since she assumed that calling him a package told Spicy enough to assume it was through whoever she was doing business with. Speaking of him, Charir just curiously looked around, now bit more comfortable, he left Leviathan's side enough to look at some things in the room from closer, nothing major, just looking at objects he didn't recognize, smelling substances and/or smells he didn't know what they were, and so on, maybe even poking something gently to see if it reacted to him. He did stay certain distance away from Spicy the whole time though, not getting close enough for either touch the other, though he did momentarily stop to smell the air around her, most likely smelling the alcohol. Ruby wondered if Spicy had done investigation into her while they had been separated, though it would have been odd if she hadn't, not that she was worried, since she hadn't just became Ruby Shine the pony without proper work. She did exist on paper for starters, obviously, since she couldn't own property if she didn't exist, but it was left slightly mysterious since there was only so much you could do. Basically, everything after her arrival to Ponyville matched up, there were few interactions with guards at first as her manipulation and thievery weren't as perfected in the start, but at most that was few small mentions of her getting caught stealing something relatively worthless, if such petty crimes were even written down anywhere, but before that it was very vague, as any information just stated that she came from outside the nation of Equestria from some small nameless village somewhere, and since places like that didn't have any systems to keep paperwork of citizens, it made only sense that any information about her ended there. ----------------------------------------------------- "Sure, lead the way, as stated before, I don't exactly have a schedule, having time until the end of time and all that, and you can trust me, as much as I lack empathy and other positive emotions, I also lack the capability for ill will, as I cannot feel the emotions that usually motivate such actions." Scarecrow stated, he was the definition of true neutral when it came to his emotional state, and his personal principles that he still remembered were luckily towards the good direction. "And it's not like I'd remember where the place is even if I suddenly became cruel." his tone indicated that it was an attempt at a joke, but since he was incapable of truly finding a joke funny, he was bad at making jokes. The bat could wait, he was more active at night anyways, so later they went, more likely they would actually be to be able to interact with him, besides, Scarecrow was curious to see the sanctum of nature, maybe in such a place even he could feel his lost connection to nature. ------------------------------------------ It was true that the princesses probably had something to do with it too, not only due to being the leaders of the nation, but due to power inviting challenge, but it didn't explain everything, wild creatures and magical events didn't have the concept of rulership or power like those trying to take over had, so the princesses most likely had no effect on that, there was also the fact that it was Ponyville and not Canterlot that was constantly being attacked, even those who didn't know about Twilight went there first many times. This time it was the twins speaking, as they were the most familiar with strategies, having grown up in middle of a war, and thus came up with one very quickly "I'd say you and us..." Trox said, addressing Onache directly "...should go directly to the suspected pony, as you can see into their mind and in case things go bad, we are quite skilled in taking down ponies, even non-lethally..." he then pointed at Sear with Chega "...Meanwhile you should go see what the stir is about, and also check the open door to see if everything is aright there, you are known to the community so they trust you most of us, and you can fly, making it bit faster." Sheska cut in "Maybe I should go with Sear and Chega? You can handle yourself, especially combined with Onache's capabilities, but in case this is actually bad, there may be need for a healer." All the lizards seemed to agree, but they waited for Onache's input too.

@Lucid_Nightlight "They won't return there, but even if they did, you can be sure they couldn't care less if you allowed them to kill or not, such is the rule of that land." Vix stated, while very friendly, there was something very familiar in the way he said it, it seemed he had started to pick up certain...styles from his companions. "As it should be." "But what's with these nations that think they can actually hunt my kind? It isn't even logical, because if we are to assume they can actually kill one of us, what use is armor made of my kind's scales then, since they already have weapons to get past that?" "That's like me cutting off plates from a tank to protect myself against my own kind." "That being, absolutely useless, as evidenced by the fact that I could cut the plates in the first place."

@Starforce Both did notice Sparkly's wonder, but neither commented on it, as there wasn't really anything to say about it, in fact, it would have been weird if she didn't find magic special in someway, since it was a new thing for her. "Goodnight." "Night" Lunar followed Sparkly, but didn't watch her draw, since she was doing her own thing, drawing symbols and lines on the paper she had gotten for herself, and it quickly got very complicated.

@Lucid_Nightlight "As if I could do anything to stop any of you from doing anything." Vix remarked humorously, he was full aware that he was surrounded by creatures capable of crushing him by accident, and he did appreciate Quasi's playful comment more than Ruby did, as he too liked to playfully annoy his dragon companions by calling them cute or other similar terms. "Tell her I accept, now I just need to figure out a place where we don't accidentally destroy something important."

@Lucid_Nightlight "It was the magic." Vix pointed out, to which Ruby commented as sort of a continuation "Figured, we don't melt dragons normally, fire that would be hot enough to melt dragon bone and scales would melt us too." it was also almost impossible to manage in open space, and would require specific environment "*It does give merit to what I read though, about our magical heritage.*" it also made her wonder the same thing Quasi did, what were her kind truly capable of? if given access to real power? "What was the second thing?" "Danthe wants to fight you." "Fight me?" "Yes, not to death of course, but a friendly match of strength, we tried to convince her otherwise, but you met her, she's not one to back down." "I mean, sure, it could be fun to fight someone who can actually withstand by attacks." while she didn't express it, she was interested in hearing Quasi's opinion too, though if it mattered was a different question.

"It's less about hurting and more about staying in the shadows, they would happily nuke a city full of humans if it didn't harm them in any way." "They are species supremacists, humans are to them like farm animals are to you, slaves at best, worthless at worst." Jenna pointed out, bit cold, but it was the truth "But you're not wrong, we are the safest among as many people as possible, it's easier to hide, and assuming they haven't gone fully off the deep end, they are unlikely to attack crowds." She ate a bit "If they have gone that far, well, we can only hope the universe is on our side."

Being bothered about it now, Jenna paid extra attention to her surroundings, and indeed, when really looking at the details past the mold, the inconsistencies in time were everywhere, be it different parts of walls having aged differently, different clocks being different aged models, things like that. They would be able to find Oliver's locker, be it more rusty than usual, like everything there, and the insides would match whatever Oliver used to keep there, be it lot more moldy. As to be expected, Jenna didn't really have any hesitation to follow Oliver into the room, reasoning being what she already stated before, there was nobody there. It seemed at this point that anything that usually would rot, decay or otherwise naturally decompose through biological means, like paper and cloth, hadn't done so, and was instead taken over by the weird mold, strengthening the implication brought up by the dead, dried up plants outside that in this place, everything besides the mold was dead, including things like the microscopic life that usually caused things to decompose.

@Blitz Boom Ruby had a neutral expression during the interaction with the staff, her dislike of everyone made a kind of a loop which led to her to be relatively friendly to staff in places, since the fact she wanted to interact with them as little as possible lead to her wanting to make things go as smooth as possible. She didn't pay much attention to the appearance of the casino as they were lead to Spicy, as frankly she didn't care about the dead mare or really anything else to do with this place, she did notice Charir's...preference, but she was not surprised or hurt by it, she wouldn't come close to herself either. Ruby thanked the pony that lead them with a nod as he left, she appreciated that he was smart enough to not get curious, an unfortunately rare thing with ponies, and if it would have been more common, she may have disliked them a bit less, but only a bit. "I figured you'd be on a positive mood." Ruby remarked in the same style as when she interacted with Spicy before, not that it was much different from anyone else. She didn't actually remember if the wake passing's had been mentioned before since she hadn't been fully listening, but it did not surprise her at all and seemed somewhat familiar idea regarding the old pony. "I don't think many would be willing to buy such a stubborn bird." she joked, before going to the topic itself "This is Leviathan, my bodyguard, don't let the size fool you, looks can be deceiving." "And this one, we call him Charir, don't try to speak to him, he doesn't understand a word you say, in business terms, he's a package I'm transporting." as she spoke, Ruby kinda just realized a one more picture she may be accidentally drawing of herself, and she wasn't entirely sure yet if it was a good thing or not, she was a 'pony' with two dragon travelling companions, wearing a cursed dragon's eye on her neck, be it covered by the sebra's necklace, carrying a box with claws and teeth of dragons with her, and in her fake story her client is a dragon...she really just came up as a pony with odd obsession with dragons, implication which was even more interesting if Spicy really believed she was a changeling. She also had literal sense for treasure and was 'allergic' to substance known to irritate dragons...she had to think about it, there could be enough fuel for a fake backup story. "Then for Marley, well, for start, we were actually coming here with him, but something came up, which was important enough that he promised his paycheck just so that I'd deliver the message..." she though for a moment to remember the exact words "...He will be taking undisclosed amount of personal time, and you can open some folder he told you to not open if you value your life." she then stated with tone like one reading from a script "And for what happened exactly, since I don't know what that folder will have, in short, a magical, seemingly religious fox attacked our train and after some very cult like discussion took Marley with it, voluntarily may I add, he was not taken against his will." she saw no reason to not tell that, since that much detail would be something someone that just happened to see it from outside the train would also have. --------------------------------------------------------------- Scarecrow gave acknowledging nod to Crows response, though it made him wonder for a moment if Crow could actually die, it clearly had will of self preservation, but since it wasn't natural being, would it die or would it just rebuild like Timberwolves did? For Crows question, he shook his head, he didn't really feel the connection in the same way Crow did, so small changes went unnoticed, though he did ask what Crow meant exactly, and would focus on its possible response while Lyriel chatted with the mimic. He did notice the Mimic's focus being seemingly more in Crow, and in a weird way it was almost nice, since it was rare he wasn't the most feared thing around. "Indeed, even I can tell there has been a lot of things for a short time." For him there wasn't long days or short days since he had no sense of time, but he could tell the passage of time from certain things, the most obvious being the movement of sun and moon when he could see them. "Maybe this day will stick in my memory for while longer, as it has been a while since things have been this...eventful." ----------------------------------------------------------- The siblings nodded regarding the Solar Empire, that was one of the very few positive things about living under Nightmare Moon, they couldn't even imagine how horrible it was to live in constant sunlight, even if you had adapted for it, though they didn't think natural resources were a problem, since Nightmare moon had somehow managed to keep nature alive without sun, there was no doubt Solar Empire had also magical means to keep the land habitable enough. They also nodded regarding the guard, though they would probably never trust him fully, because if nothing else, just seeing him gave them flashbacks of the things his kind did. Sear and Chega just listened and observed curiously, not wanting to comment on topic they didn't really know about, though they did give small nods of agreements towards the biodiversity of Equeastria and the world. "That's Ponyville for you, don't know what it is about this town, but it seems to attract all the weirdest and most dangerous beings and events to it, haven't seen anything similar anywhere else." Having heard about it few times now, Trox and Sheska also wondered about the town's tendency to be attacked "Could be it's some kind of magical concentration point, studies in our world show that magic isn't evenly spread, just a guess though." he could have talked more about it, but they had something else to worry about at the moment. Everyone would be observing the surrounding in the same way as previously, and again it would be Sear to speak up "This is only a logical reasoning based on nothing I can see, but maybe they went there." she pointed towards the elderly pony residential area "The unfinished building, while it would be a typical choice, there isn't really anyone to harm, and there..." she pointed towards the clothing district "...is bit too busy to do something unnoticed" "Meanwhile there..." again the residential area "...I think most of the population is elderly, they are an easy target, and there could be financial motivation if it's a relative." all the kobolds looked at Sear, not because they disagreed with her, but because the concept of killing one's own parent for money was so horrendous to community species like them that they hadn't even though about it as an option

@Lucid_Nightlight Vix, being the good hearted creature he was, petted the baby with his free hand like he would a dog, he gave a respectful nod to each dragon, addressing them as he did "Jennu ir [great one]" "Your highness" he didn't know the language, but he had asked Enduur to teach him the words to address Ruby as he found it to be more respectful to use her preferred language. "What is it that requires my attention?" Ruby then asked, to which Vix answered without any fear towards Ruby, though why would he fear her, he lived with three of her kind "Two things actually, first.." he picked up a bag that he had on his back and opened it, there were two dragon heads, Sandwings, they didn't seem like they had been cut or ripped off, rather, it looked like they had...melted off. "...what do you do with bodies?" "What's this about, where's rest of them?" "Long story short, these two based on their conversation didn't really like you, they had their conversation bit too close to our cave, so Enduur told them to leave, they didn't, and instead decided to threaten Charis, now, Enduur is a peaceful dragoness, but you do not threaten her daughters, and Danthe is not a peaceful dragoness, and you definitely do not threaten her sister." "There is no rest of them, until you want to scoop them up from the rocks, their heads are the only thing that isn't unrecognizable charred biological mass." Vix did not seem fazed by what he just described, but well, living with three 'deathwings' did that to you, you saw a lot of thing. "I see." Ruby was actually shocked, this was brutal even by her standards, though she did understand why it was done, nobody threatens a hatchling and survives.

@Starforce "I'll get them, you can wait here." Frail sated with a smile "They are not far." and far the weren't, as Frail barely left the kitchen before igniting her horn and opening a door to a closet of some sort a small distance away and levitating the bags she had been sorting with in and pile of paper and some pens out, there was lot of storage space in her house, but it was organized well so she didn't need to always even see in to find what she was looking for. Lunar also lit her horn, but she took things from her cart that was still next to the front door, a roll of paper and a pen to be exact. "I won't say I'm not interested, but remember that I don't necessarily understand enough to comment on anything." After everything was where it should be, Frail excused herself, "I'll head to the bedroom now, you two have fun."

@Starforce Frail finished with her sorting, it was one of those forever projects she did to relax, so she didn't mind cutting it short, while she got up, Lunar appeared on the doorway and responded to Sparkly "It's true Twilight wasn't originally an alicorn, but you weren't even a pony, what I find most weird about this is that you are able to generate magic like alicorn would in the first place, where did that come from?" Frail made sandwiches, and poured some watered down apple juice "I have paper you can draw on if you want, I have more than enough in storage."

"Or was, I don't think there's anyone here anymore." Jenna said "Or maybe not, this is all so weird, the time periods just don't match here, even ignoring the medieval armors and weapons, even here, look there." she pointed towards one of the other locker lines, they were different color than the one where Jenna's locker was "In our school, those are, or well, were, the same color as these, but not only that, I've seen old pictures of the school from twenty or so years back, and that's the color they used to be before these new lockers." "Let's go see your locker, let's check if it's identical too, or if it even exists."

"Desperate or confident, doesn't really matter, taking this kind of risk is bad news." Jenna said, speaking bit more quietly now for obvious reasons, taking out the phone she used to interact with the 'ally' and writing a message "Not only did they destroy a village, whatever they did is such that they have brought everyone, you saw those various members of different organizations, my guess is they all are working for them." "They know this would rise suspicion, so they got everyone that would look into it involved themselves to make sure only their people are there." she put the phone away, she gave a fake smile at the staff member that brought them their food and continued after they were gone "Something has changed, why would an organization that for thousands of years has worked in the shadows suddenly change their ways like this." "We probably need to stay put for awhile, no doubt the Order will also be on high alert after this, they are not stupid, they will know this was Talon, it's better to be in a city than keep moving"

@Blitz Boom Ruby didn't offer to pull the cart, but not because dignity, she didn't see it as degrading in any way, quite the opposite actually, having lived a life like she had, she preferred to do physical labor, like everything else, herself, and in her eyes those who needed someone else to do such things were weak and pathetic, though there was a difference between a need and convenience of course. The reason she didn't was more for sake of her act, since she knew that a pony like what she pretended to be would not pull the cart herself until absolutely necessary, and Leviathan was supposed to be her employee, though it was slightly odd to her that generally bodyguards also did things like that, since that slowed down the speed the guard could react in case they are needed. Charir didn't climb on the wagon this time, as he had gotten enough rest to the point that he wanted to use his own legs, though he did stay close to Leviathan, keeping her between himself and Ruby. "I have a hunch on who that may be." Ruby stated coldly as she looked at the picture of the mare "Didn't personally know her, but Spicy and Marley told a little about the mother of the casino's owner, and I'd say the....demeanor in the picture matches the image I got of her." "If I'm right, this is more a celebration than mourning period for most, though the owner himself may be upset, seemed like the kind of individual to have the false believe that just because someone is same blood as you, you need to support them." obviously Ruby didn't support this believe, wanting to have her own mother's separated head in her claws some day. After telling this to Leviathan, and possibly leaving the wagon somewhere if there was clear system for that, she approached the nearest staff member and asked "Who would I ask about the whereabouts of specific guest?" and if it wasn't made clear at this point by signs or something else, she would also ask what she should do with a cart that she was bringing to somepony staying at the casino, after which she would approach the individual she was instructed to, and if it was another staff member, she'd ask in what room was Spicy staying, and that in case she wanted to know who's asking, Ruby Shine was asking, and that she had an important message from Marley, and also her stuff. If however it was the owner himself she was pointed to, she would be more blunt. simply asking where Spicy was and that she had her stuff and a message for her ears only. Charir meanwhile was his curious self, though he stayed more obviously close to Leviathan, seeking security in this very much unfamiliar situation, it was pretty clear at this point which dragoness he liked more, though it wasn't entirely just because Ruby's similarities to their mother, it was also to small extend the opposite, because while Leviathan was quite small for a dragon as far as Charir was concerned, he could tell she was lot older than Ruby, so in relation to their lifespan, Ruby was a young adult at best, while Leviathan was closer to full adult, thus, instinctively, being only a kid himself, Leviathan became in a way his new mother figure, while Ruby was more like a big sister, even ignoring the fact that she most likely was literally his sister. ----------------------------------------------------------- Scarecrow didn't really know what to say to Leviathan's little story, so he just gave an empathetic nod/bow, the kind where, if he would have had eyelids, he would have closed his eyes. As usual he kinda just observed the even that unfolded around him, he didn't want to interfere in nature, even if it was a clash between an unnatural bird that happened to be his companion and arguably unnatural squirrel. "No and yes." Scarecrow stated "It is true its actions are slightly concerning from point of view of normalcy and nature, but, and no offence to you Crow, for unnatural Everfree forest creature created by mad draconequus, I expected worse." "Though it should be mentioned...." he was now addressing crow "...as I am unable to form any kind of emotional connection, if you end up causing trouble, be it on purpose or not, that is worse than the benefits your companionship gives me, we may have to reconsider our relationship." "I do trust you, and considering your willingness to stay with me, I at least hope there is some kind of benefit you get from me too, so I wish not to break the partnership, but the truth is, I am uncaring, and ultimately have selfish wants like every thing that exists, and because the protection of innocent is the last thing left of the morality I once probably had, I am not willing to risk my potential to help for sake of disguise." he felt it was best to be honest, even if it would risk offending Crow enough for the separation to happen now, because even with that risk, he had endless time, and certainly, eventually, be it after several millennia, he could socialize without a disguise anyway, and while sure it would mean the game he had to go through was a waste, to him it was more an annoyance than anything, and as much as he wanted to, he couldn't really empathize with what Lyriel had to go through in it to truly care. ------------------------------------------ "Solar Empire is a desert, and they have plenty of kobolds too, so we can adapt to that." Trox mentioned, not really expecting any kind of response, just pointing out. Chega thought for a second "It could be none of us have settled in a desert here, at least not in Equestria, since I doubt anyone would choose one specifically, and I don't see the kind of situation happening that would force us to do so, in Equestria that is, since outside Equestria there's bigger deserts where there could be less choice in the matter." this was again very analytical answer, as Chega thought about her past studies. "That's what makes the guard so annoying to deal with, they are predictably unpredictable, yet also unpredictably predictable." "They are blindly loyal to their superiors, and very blunt, if they want to kill you, they will tell it to your face as they are doing it." "So either he is truly loyal to Celestia, which would mean he's telling the truth, or he's still loyal to Daybreaker, and is lying to everyone." Chega listened with interest, getting bit more information about the other word, Daybreaker, that was an interesting name, she would need to ask about that when the time was better. The group kinda expected Onache to lead the way, but after it became clear that wouldn't happen, they all started observing in their own way, first was Sheska and Trox, due to their background, they paid more attention to the creatures around them, was someone looking after someone else with wondering gaze? maybe someone looked annoyed that someone had pushed past them rudely? Comments about odd individuals, things like that, signs that someone who was more aggressive than the norm had gone past. Sear meanwhile, being skilled hunter among other things, was the one to notice the marks on the ground, though while finding the griffon marks slightly odd with the wider, she didn't think much of those, as griffons were generally heavier than ponies and left deeper marks, so she mainly focused the the ponymarks, since hoof marks that are different than the hundreds of other hoof marks usually implied something, there was also other reason she found that to be the more likely culprit, even if the griffon was the more obvious one if following stereotypes. Chega's way was bit more unique, as she climbed on Sear and stood on her shoulders, looking over the crowds in case she could spot something. "Heavy pony hoof steps going towards the more quiet parts of town."

@Starforce "yep" "She's a quick learner, even Twilight herself had more trouble, so I guess they aren't identical in that." Lunar added, not following Sparkly into the kitchen right away, but being close by, they had been in ponyville when Twilight had practiced flying, and they saw her now and then since it was done in a public place. "I'd say it has to do with the teacher partly, can't imagine what it would be like to try to learn flight from Rainbow." Frail didn't break her focus on what she was doing, but at the same time, she didn't seem to be overly focused on it "But glad to hear nothing went wrong, I already took out bandages in case somepony got hurt." she said with slight humor, though it was true, there was a set of first aid on the table in Sparkly's room. Frail turned towards Sparkly, still continuing the sorting, seemingly having no trouble doing it correctly even though she wasn't looking at it "Are you hungry? Thirsty? I can still make something before I'll head to bed." she gave a friendly smile.

@Starforce Frail had taken one of the bags she had brought with her from the shop and was now sorting the insides into smaller bags, she was doing that in the kitchen as Sparkly and Lunar came inside, and when she heard them, without interrupting her sorting, she spoke "Did you have fun out there?" What exactly she was sorting would come apparent if one was to go to the kitchen, it was broken glass, and she was sorting it by color.