open Casual stroll

[Lucid_Nightlight 923]

@Blitz Boom

The guy at the counter went into the kitchen and brought out some extremely undercooked burgers that seemed to have quite a bit of dirt and mold. Lumen, Lucid, and Novia sat down at a nearby table. Lucid took a bit out of his burger.

"Could use some more flies, but it's pretty good other than that."

"They probably were gonna put flies in it, but the chickens ate them first."

"Yeah! It must've been the chickens! Maybe they were working with the seagulls!"

Lucid looked over at Anomaly.

"Those birds are always one step ahead of us."

[EQ_Theta 458]

@Blitz Boom

Lin looked on and listened, seeing improvements come little by little. This is a step in the right direction, both of them learning a little more at a time. Happy with their progress, Lin decided this might be a good time to bring in the first of many compounding lessons that will add to Omen's knowledge. She pointed once more to the vowels and began her lesson.

"You're doing well, Omen! I think we can move on. Remember how abrupt a short vowel sounds like? Long vowels don't have that and you pronounce them the same way you say the vowels themselves. When you say the letter A, you are pronouncing them as a long sound. The third set of words here have examples of that. A as in Name, E in We, I in Line, O in Colt, U in Use."

Frankly this might not really stick unless Lin had some form of instruction manual and maybe a set of practice book for Omen to try. Unfortunately, she had neither and any place that could sell those wouldn't be open in the evening. She remembered giving something for early readers to Mother and her unformed children but even those would be useless to anyone who couldn't read. That was something she overlooked and only remembered just now. If they attempted to try reading it, it'll come off as gibberish and she'll likely have many more students in such short order. Thankfully, having one student now was bearable and if she could do right by Omen, she would likely have another teacher to help her out. 

"Do you want to take a short break?" Lin looked to Omen, satisfied with the latter's progress. "Hopefully this isn't confusing you too much."

Edited April 8, 2019 by EQ_Theta

[Catpone Cerberus 23,591]

@Blitz Boom
Ruby didn't have anything to comment to either Scarcity or to the short interaction between Marley and Spicy, so she spend some time just looking at the coins, but after her companions had finished their short conversation, she spoke "It seems that even Scarcity doesn't know what exactly these are." she stated "Because if she did, she would have told that, because it would make them seem more valuable thus more expensive."

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Nada figured she could explain what she knew about Windigos, "Windigos were magical beings, and based on the history books of ponies from my time, they were similar to my kind in appearance, just light blue and more....ghost-like." "It was told that they brought an eternal winter, but were defeated by the Fire of Friendship." "Lot of details have left my memory, but that is the most important part." "I don't know what happened to them after that, but I do wish their fate was better than that of the three of my kind."

 

 

[Sekel 692]

@Blitz Boom

TWILIGHT SPARKLE

"That, I am honestly not sure about," Twilight replied with a shake of her head. "I know that I managed to complete an old unfinished spell of Starswirl the Bearded's," she added with a head tilt before crossing her hooves over each other. "But it switched the cutie marks of my friends as well as their memories. It took the Elements of Harmony to restore their memories and cutie marks. Somehow, all that coalesced into me becoming an Alicorn. I truly do not know how or why and I can't exactly say how the process occurred either."

@Blitz Boom

KARMIC FATE

"That sounds like a good omen for them," Karmic muttered in disgust. She truly didn't like how her family and friends had treated her and run her out of town. Whenever she looked back, she was filled with contempt and anger, and hatred at what they did and it showed in how aggressively she stacked the Equestrian books in her pile.

'Sounds like there's some hidden anger Fate. Do you want some help?' Atzy asked Karmic sweetly.

"I thought I shut you up, Atzy," Karmic said angrily. "You and I both want to be separate. So just can it!"

@Blitz Boom

AURORA LIGHTS

"Coming from a place where griffins normally fight, you'd think I'd have some knowledge," Aurora mumbled with a shake of her head. "Nope. Pacifist. Or at least I do as little fighting as possible. Sorry."

@FanOfManyShows

WATTS MECHANO

"It gives me more of a chance to ask questions about your personal life," Watts grinned with a laugh. "Like, for example, that mare that came up to us earlier. Did you know her? It sounded like you did."

[FanOfManyShows 396]

@Blitz Boom

Misty looked at him curiously and cogged her head. "That was a swear?" She asked, which would certainly raise concern. "Isn't it a food?"
She chuckled and looked forward. "Oh well I guess."

============================

Sapphire looked at her, trying to recall if she ever finished it, the years she lived were long and the memories occasionally, blended together
She then looked around, wandering before smiling and looking to Emerald. "It's barely finished, but with a bit of effort we could complete it."

Iron walked in, carrying a small rat in a magical aura. "Got one."

"Oh good, now we can get the soul magic."

==============================
The General nodded as they spoke, sure it still felt like overkill but to a degree, it made sense that Warlock needed this type of containment considering what he did.
Especially since it was unclear what he did prior to his imprisonment. "Sounds great, best we do get this together as soon as possible."

==============================
@Dji

"I do but only from when I was younger. She doesn't seem to recall me though."
He walked forward, thinking for a moment. "But I don't exactly care to think of her at the moment."

[Rising Dusk 27,542]

@Blitz Boom

The old pony attacking the workshop managed to get his spell off, causing Orange Glow to gasp.  She thought they had a pretty good plan but the old pone was a bit wiser than expected.  Scarlet hadn't been aware Void was trying to rush the spell caster and cancel his spell until she heard the screams of a burning wicker creature drew her attention.  The red pegasus nearly freaked finding out that the mare she was support to be protecting was heading to battle instead.  Detective Rising would kill her if he found out!  And now it looked like a dark seed was drawing all the wicker creatures, minus the two she immobilized and the burning one Fleet Feather had blow away from Void with a magic missile, to form and even bigger one!  She felt like she read this in a comic recently.  "Think think think!  What would Rising do!?" she panicked.  Orange Glow and Fleet Feather had moved in to bombard the forming creature with arcane blasts and fire, but the larger gathering of wicker parts made to where their damage was minimal at best.  Scarlet remembered something from the briefing the detective gave to The Captain and channeled her mentor.  "Do you have a plan?  Yes.  Is it a good plan?" she mimicked a conversation the two commonly had.  With a hard gulp she finished the mantra nervously, "Nope."  With that, she sped off to the forming creature and started to spin around.  The two other officers gasped and backed off their assault, "Scarlet!" they both screamed.  Faster!  Faster!  Faster!  The O.M.I. Junior Officer became a blur, then a streak of red and silver.  A tornado formed around the creature as her faster pegasus mind analyzed, looking for an opening.  As more and more wicker parts connected, those moments were quickly disappearing.  With one last shot, she dove in to the dark core seedling.  The gathered momentum of her speed she pushed the seed out the other side with all her might and threw it at the workshop.

The dark seed would collide against the metal workshop, but she wasn't looking to shatter it.  As soon as the dark magic dinged the metal exterior of the fortress, the five wards the detective had put up hissed around the inside.  All five glowed bright blue and torn harshly into the spell work that formed the magics of the seedling.  Effectively working to short it out.  Ideally the wards were created to block against offensive spells, but they were just as hungry for dark magic in any form.  Not completely designed for such a feat, it sadly spent all five wards that after their work was down, were just lumps of gold again.

Back on Main Street, the trio were again met with mixed results in their latest efforts.  Slowing inching their way to a solution.  The three pony shaped constructs put up not struggle or fight against the Hydra's Snare, and simply fell apart.  On the other end, the wasp were not happy with what was going on when Black Jack removed the hives from the enemy.  The well trained botanist Bash would spot something a little strange with how easy it was to subdue the other trio, specifically the green goo they released upon falling part.  Fungus started to grow on his Hydra's Snare, which was odd considering how resilient the plant was to such things.  He knew legends of this substance.  Eyes going wide, he stuck his snout into his other saddle bag and withdrew a vial of some clear liquid.  Wasting not a moment to toss it at the disassembling constructions and their green goo.  The moment the vial shattered, the constructs, Hydra's Snare and green goo was doused in silver flames.  The Hydra's Snare riled, but hardly had a breath's moment before it and the fungus affecting it dissolved.  The ultimate weed killer, well green anything killer really, developed by the Zebras and probably the most difficult potion he could think of to make.

Gold Mane and Black Jack had their own probably to deal with as the wasps seemed rather annoyed with the meddling agents.  "Whoa whoa whoa!" the unicorn exclaimed, waving the hives about in some vain effort to stop them from pumping out more wasps.  Starting to have to get on the move and run from wasps trying to sting him now.  "Black Jack!  Shot Put!" Gold Mane shouted at him.  The black and red stallion dove to the floor and covered his head, tossing the hives high into the air so he could redirect his magic into putting a barrier around himself and Bash, who was in the middle of dueling a pair of wasps with a cattail weed, well a special kind that that made steel look like tinfoil.  The barrier wasn't so much against the wasps, though that was a bonus, but for what came next.  With the hives tossed high into the air, the mare gritted her teeth as her horn sparked and she took aim.  There was a audible build up before a beam of gold energy the width of a taxi cart erupted from her horn and ripped through the air with a roar.  Shooting safely of into the sky that could probably be seen from anywhere in the city.  More importantly, bathing the hives in golden light until they couldn't be seen, or ever would again.

When the crystal spiders fell silent, The Captain was cautious when she dropped the barrier around the abomination.  Flare Blitz came walking out of the abomination's viscera still engulfed in fire.  A few steps away, he started to shake his hoofs with each step until the fire was put out.  Pulling his cowboy hat from his head, he put it to his chest after hearing and seeing what he did.  "Poor thing," he said sadly.  "Another soul tormented by this Twisted Gears. He will pay dearly," The Captain sighed, moving a hoof down to gently stroke the mane of the cowering unicorn that still held her barrier in place.  Wind Gale dared to take a peek and lift her hoofs from her ears, "I-Is it over?" she whimpered a little and looked around after dropping her barrier.  "Yes darling... for now," she assured the smaller mare.  "Flare Blitz, search the school for anymore students and teachers in hiding, then escort them out.  Wind Gale, starting transporting the cocooned ponies to the O.M.I. so we can get them free.  I'll deal with this rift," she instructed.  Flare Blitz nodded, putting his hat back on and trotting off to search the school.  Wind Gale crawled out from her hiding place under The Captain and went over to the gathered ponies wrapped in crystal webbing to slowly start teleporting them to the O.M.I. and the support ponies.  The Captain turned her attention to the rift and reworked her barrier spell over it into one that slowly started to squeeze and compress the rift.  She couldn't do nearly as well as Rising Dusk in removing the rift in a few breaths, but she had her ways.

In lands beyond Equestria, the detective sighed.  Well, it was always worth a try to resolve things peacefully.  Someday he'll get a pony that will just understand on the spot what they did was wrong and come quietly.  Stupid books and comics make the part seem so easy at times.  While Twisted Gears might not have given him the whole truth, Rising Dusk knew the dark wizard was using borrowed power.  Magic doesn't lie.  While Twisted Gears might not be able to see the magic the detective can, Rising saw in that spell used to kill the flowers from before.  Powerful, foreign, but he saw that small, hidden weave in the corner.  The begin he was borrowing power from, doesn't share.

The whispers in the back of his mind increased in intensity, just as hands and claws came from the floors and walls.  His horn ignited and he jumped into the air.  A beam of orange energy erupted forth, spiraled with black wisps carved through the floor and walls as he wiped his head around.  Digging deep fissures in the dark wizard's home.  Another whisper shouted at him, a warning.  Landing back on his hoofs, he spun on one and warped up the pixie with his tail before finishing the spin by tossing it at the barrier between him and Twisted Gears.  The energy beam ended but he kept his horn aglow.  "Equestria was in danger of you with or without the sisters.  And they aren't outsiders, they are now Equestrians" he replied calmly.  With the barrier spell analysed, the detective arched and slashed his horn through the air.  A large orange blade lept from his horn, edge sharpened by black wisps that slammed into his barrier and cut through it like a hot knife through butter and would keep going.  Twisted Gears might know how well Rising Dusk is at dispelling magic, but the detective has yet to display his abilities with counter magic.

[Early Sunsets 2,106]

@Blitz Boom

Sun Fire frowned. "I didn't know that. It's too bad the changelings here can only feed off of love. I think Manehattan could use some changelings from one of those other countries," she said jokingly. She waved back at the bat ponies as they walked by, before stopping in front of their home. It was just how they left it; lights off and door locked tightly, waiting for them to return.

Sun Fire and Zephyr turned towards Briar and Brittle. "Thanks, but you were plenty of help today. I wouldn't want to bother you with spending another day giving a tour of the rest of Ponyville. Showing us around today must have been enough of an effort," Sun Fire said, shaking her head. "Well, you guys know where to find us if you ever want to talk to us. See you." She waved at the two of them, before walking up to the front door of their house.

"Hopefully without sirens or draconequui if you decide to," Zephyr said, smiling and nodding to Briar and Brittle. He followed his sister up the three stairs to their home and walked inside, before using his magic to flick the light switch on. He swung the door shut behind him and sat down in front of it, leaning his head back against the door. "That was a crazy first day," he said, sighing.

"It wasn't that bad. At least we didn't meet any rude ponies," Sun Fire said.

Zephyr raised an eyebrow at his sister. "Maybe not for you, but not all of us like a hectic lifestyle like that. Let's see, we learned about an entirely new race, were told a princess lives in town, found out that not one but two draconequui are here, saw the result of what happens when a draconequus gets bored, met a siren, and to top it all off, I have a doctor's appointment tomorrow. Did I miss anything?"

Sun Fire shook her head and pulled her brother to his hooves. "Really, it could have been worse. At least the siren didn't eat us," she said, smiling. She stretched and let out a sigh. "I don't know about you, but I'm going to head to bed. I feel like I haven't slept in ages."

"You go ahead. I've got some stuff to do." Zephyr walked behind the counter and pulled out an instrument he was designing from one of the shelves. "See you in the morning," he said as Sun Fire walked up the stairs to her bedroom. She waved to him before heading to bed, falling asleep quickly. After an hour or two of fiddling with the instrument, Zephyr would follow, climbing into his own bed after begrudgingly setting an alarm for his appointment the next day.

[Blitz Boom 4,621]

@FanOfManyShows

"*round Equestria, that counts as a swear. Personally I find it to be nothing. Back where I got raised, you'd hear a real load of actual vile stuff from the filthy beak on some of them griffons. Would bring even the Coast Guard to shame if they started getting into the spirit of things, but y'know, neither that nor the softer swears in Equestria are supposed to be something to strive for in these areas, so gotta try an' keep it clean for the lil' folks, like you.

Don't worry none though, if you want some phrases that'll turn 'em red and flustered, I'll teach you a few things once you're older, and I know Astral won't beat me up for teaching ya filth."

Chow raised a hoof towards Misty to ruffle her mane a bit, but managed to remember that she weren't too keen on him doing that after the last time, so he just went into an awkward wave and a grin instead. Weren't smooth, but it should do the trick.

=======================================================================

 

@FanOfManyShows

"Good then. We can find raw materials for you to convert later."

It were likely going to take a good chunk of magic and some specific materials, but again, if they could convert like, lead or something into gold, they could get bits quickly, and then sent Iron out to gather up some of the correct crystals. Sapphire and herself were too sought after to just go outside and do this without drawing unwanted attention.

As Iron arrived, holding a rat ready, it seemed like they were about ready to start with another part of their plan though. That being to extract the raw soul energy from this little creature, and then torch the remains. Soulless abominations were never a smart idea to let loose, even when it were merely a rat. The two goodie two-shoes were going to need instructions though, so Emerald floated over to the bookshelf and hovered around a particular yellowed tome.

"There is a ritual in this book that will show you how to extract the soul into an object. Follow it, but instead, run the extraction through the empty crystal and towards an acorn or something else. One of you will run the extraction, whilst the other will focus on binding the magic that runs through the crystal, inside of it. Release what's left of the soul after this by breaking the object you put it into. A soul with no power is worthless anyway.

And keep a flame ready. You don't want the thing to escape afterwards."

========================================================================

 

@FanOfManyShows

"I will arrange it then. I trust that you two can manage staying out of trouble until I return?"

"What, us? Trouble? When would we ever?"

Tidal Wave and Screecher shared a look where the bat pony seemed unsure whatever or not to leave for a moment, as she knew better than to think that Tidal Wave weren't going to cause trouble in some sort of way, yet also that to get things done in this town, she had to arrange it herself. The Coast Guard were an important part of the Equestrian forces, but they didn't carry much actual power in land like here in Canterlot. That were the Night and Solar guard's territory, and with Wing still being new, this were a situation best handled by herself then. She just had to hope that Tidal Wave weren't going to be predictable about getting some alone time with their new colleague.

One of the first things she were going to do, were to send a guard to tell Hogweed to prepare a medical transport for Warlock, so that they could get him to the bunker. It should not be more than a few minutes after that before a guard would be down there, heading for the cell door and looking quite hurried, as he also had some others things on his mind after seeing the coronation.

After she left, it weren't many seconds before Tidal Wave slung herself back in a chair and pointed towards the door the bat pony had wandered out of.

"Now that the fun police have left the premise, you can start easing it up kiddo. Trust me, Screecher is a good general, but she ain't gonna stop being all *Business as usual* like that. If you wanna have some fun, you gotta sneak away from her at times. Come down to Shark Bay and have a good time for example, eh? Actually, have you ever even Been there? Most city guards don't go over to where us Coast Guards runs the show. Hay, a lot doesn't even know how we work, or why we go through generals so rapidly compared to you capitol folks. Darn shame really."

============================================================================

 

@Dji

"Perhaps it have something to do with the usage of the elements themselves? If they require you to work with the others, your specialty is leading them? Unless you all could do so equally?"

Nerzhei tried to think on this in that way, but even then, it seemed strange and didn't make for a case of absolute uniqueness in her mind. And seeing as Twilight weren't sure either, this seemed to go nowhere, so it was best to just sit back, let out a sigh, and then try to let it go, regardless of how much she hated unanswered questions.

"Nevermind. Something tells me that this is a question that will not have answers until I can one day ask the leading princesses about it. If our studies goes well, that is bound to happen sooner or later."

Getting up from her seat with some degree of discomfort from her arm and overall tired body, Nerzhei would brush the lower parts of her robe off with her tail out of habit - since she usually read outdoors, where it were quite a bit more dusty -  then pointed towards the library entrance.

"You're probably going to sleep soon, so let's relocate the things we need to somewhere in there, and we can continue with the book later. I'll read the book about your governing system while I'm waiting."

She were not going to leave said book here though, and she carefully started to pack it away, and put it back in its holster. Much as she considered the princess to be one worth her time, no being existed that she would entrust this book to. It stayed within her sight at all times, and may whatever gods the ponies believed in have mercy upon anyone who tried to take it and keep it as their own.

===========================================================================

 

@Dji

"It sounds as if the struggle of minds are flaring up again. The sooner one of these ponies arrive here, the better."

It seemed to really get to Karmic too, who were getting quite aggressive in both her way of handling the books, and her tone of voice. Likely what Atzy aimed to do, to get the mare unfocused enough to do something foolish, so that she could come out and take control of the body for a time. Or perhaps she simply liked to taunt the one she shared a body with? Changelings were devious creatures, so one could never be sure about them.

"O-Oh my, this is... Uhm, hello?"

Great timing being hat it sometimes were, an aging, golden-brown mare with small glasses had rounded a nearby corner and gotten face to face with the sphinx. She had been told to expect something like this, but she were an archivist. The things she knew of this kind were in books and with written depictions, and that didn't do justice to seeing the large, winged feline with the ornaments made from bones on his being, nor the boring stare that met her as he looked her over. It honestly terrified her a little, even though she had been informed that this one were currently on their side. Then again, she had also been informed that he were wandering with a pony currently, and really, what were the 

"So you are the one he sent?"

"Y-Yes. Head archivist Pen Strokes. It were something about draconic?"

"Yes. I am Enzo, this little one is Karmic. We seek knowledge of separating two entities from another, and placing them in another vessel."

"Uhm... Yes, okay. Are we talking parasites or possessions?"

"Both. Find mention of letting one be given a form of its own, and perhaps you may ask more."

Enzo knew that he could make this mare fear for her very being and then stop the questions all together, yet he saw little to no point. They needed information, not fearing lackeys, and he were very aware that he were being tested by Dew, as well as the current generals, to see if he were secretly a threat. Of course he were, as any sphinx could be, yet there were nothing that gave him a reason to be a threat towards the guards over their enemies.

That being said, if this one, or any other guard for that matter, figured that he were one to threat unfairly, Enzo would speak out on it. He were not here to tolerate abuse.

As for the archivist, she went right away to the stack of books and looked through them as they got sorted, seeing if she could see any book there that may hold some of the information that were asked of her.

======================================================================================

 

@Dji

"Eh, then you're in charge of making sure my wagon doesn't get broken up if there's an attack. Mostly the box inside of it. I can rebuild the wagon with a bit of time and wood no problem, but I need that box to speed up the aging of the booze I sell, and I dunno if Equestria even knows how to fix one of these. I gotta keep the business running, y'know? Especially if my hive's gonna be talking and trading with ponies now. Bits makes the world go round, yeah?"

There were also the factor that he really loved his work that skewed his attention over to telling Aurora how she then could help, in case of an attack. It was very relaxing, but without the box, he'dhave to go back to the old way of aging wine, and he couldn't do that. Not after getting used to the wonders of magic and the incredible convenience it caused to his work. Shaving off potentially years by having this handy tool were a godsend, and without it, he'd end up not having wares on the shelves most of the time. No good at all, and the Haymalayans were a darn long way from here, so getting it sorted might be a massive hassle.

Anyway, so far it seemed calm out here, with nothing trying to bite them. Just some birds giving them funny looks and the usual critter sounds in the nearby bushes. Seemed nice, but this place had a rep, so Happy weren't going to get all comfy and relaxed just yet.

====================================================================================

 

@Catpone Cerberus

"I wouldn't underestimate her hen it comes to this sorta setting. She might know, but the seller weren't listening, and this here's one of her auctions. She doesn't set a price, she just advises what to start it at, and then see if the boneheads she talks with are game for that."

"Well, there are some nuances to it, but regardless, if you find this a bargain, then the situation in which they are that hardly matters. And while we are on the topic of setting a price."

"What, you think I'm new at this? Each jar will start at 750 bits, and then it's first come first serve on each of 'em. I'm guessing the first few and the last few are gonna get us the most, whilst the middle ones will be where folks ain't sure what to do, and low bids. Still thinking we'll get a net profit outta these at like, twenty grand or so. And that's after Scarcity takes her cut."

It could be somewhat annoying to see your cash getting nicked over by the mare who hardly seemed to do anything compared to what most here had done to get the things in the first place, but when you looked at the secure locations, the right clientele showing up, and a guaranteed policy that nothing would leak, and if they did, it would be handled free of charge, the bits started to look very well spent. Of course, Scarcity made out a fortune on these sorta things regardless, but really, were it any wonder when you looked at what she could offer? Hardly a criminal who wouldn't fork over a cut of their profits for the sake of complete security in doing business. Well, provided it were the right sort of business, as there were certain standards that were supposed to be met even among them, such as no trafficking. Bad stuff happened to those who tried to get that past these sorts of auctions.

"Regardless, if we linger here for much longer, some will just start to think that there is something good here and come to examine. We should keep moving before that happens, and towards... Ah, what if we simply move to the right, and see what we stumble upon? It seems to be quite a selection of various items from this distance."

==============================================================================================

 

@Catpone Cerberus

"It is good that they were vanquished, yet fire is a destructive force that consumes all it touches. That you refer to it as being one of friendship makes me hopeful that it is nothing as bad as that, yet still, to hear that they were not seen again, also leaves the possibility that they were not simply banished somewhere, but were instead extinguished by the fathomless, hungering maw of flames. I pray it is not so, as that is a fate I would not wish upon even my greatest foe."

Being a forest creature, and highly flammable herself, Lyriel had an initiate worry about fire, and what it might end up doing if it were wielded by the wrong sort of being. It were needed in this world to bring warmth, and in her own village, they had once upon a time kept a pyre lit to bring them light in the darkest hours, yet she had also seen what it could do to their homes and their kind when the few rogue dragons had attacked. A few of her fellow dryads had nearly been consumed once, when one had sought them out and attempted to clean what he thought of as abominations from the valley. The two had thankfully been doused in water and saved from their impending fate, as well as regrown after many a moon rooted solidly in the dirt whilst nourishment were brought to them, but those cries of anguish and the sight of fire dancing over a dwindling, pained creature, were something which she would never forget, nor wish would befall any other creature, no matter how much she wouldn't like them at the time. It were simply far too cruel.

"You speak of them bringing something though. A *Winter*? Is that some sort of curse, or object of great power?"

She had only ever lived on a volcanic island, so winter and snow were not something that were seen around the part of Dragon Country where she came from, if anywhere at all. As such, she didn't know what this exact thing were, and as it were brought by these Wendigo's, it sounded as if it might be important that she were aware in the future. One never knew if such a creature would wander through her forest, as many beings seemed attracted to the nearby town of Ponyville, and a lot of those creatures went through here first.

==============================================================================================

 

@EQ_Theta

Omen looked down on the words as Lin explained them. So some words had long sounding vowels, others had short ones. Made a lot of sense when you heard them say the words. However, when looking at them, how would you tell them apart? Were you supposed to just know? Or have others tell you about it first? No wonder foals needed schools then. Who else would know how to tell them the words properly? Their parents perhaps, yes, but everypony seemed to always have something to do, so how could one have time for that?

She wrote down a few on the ground as she repeated back to Lin like a parrot, and were halfway through the word Colt when she just suddenly stopped, and looked down on the words for a few seconds before trying to put in an extra O, and seeing how it looked. It get deleted again a few seconds later. It appeared wrong, and trying to say it with the lesson in mind that Lin had already told her about how the long vowels sounded like you just say the vowel out loud, it became gibberish.

"Long and short. The other letters have that too?"

Below the presented words in her bad hoofwriting, Omen wanted to try something new to see if she understood it right, and put down an A, then looked around at the other words, remembering how the start and finish of some of them had sounded like, and added an L to the start, and an ME to the end.

"...Lame? I hear foals say that sometimes."

The word sounded right, and the letters from other words - ME from Name and L from Line - looked like they would fit in like this, but she weren't sure. That were why she asked Lin, who were doing well in making Omen understand and write at least a few words so far. Unorthodox way, since Mother insisted on the masters of whoever chose to give form to one of her children were to provide them education in how their world worked, including language and writing, but since Master Discord hadn't done his duty here, it seemed okay. Mother had been the one to tell Omen to go out and find her way in Equestria without her master anyway, and this were part of that, yes? Understanding how the world functioned without relying on that sole teacher for these types of lessons. She would have to ask when next they saw her to make sure.

====================================================================================================

 

@Moonlit

"The Hippo part of that word remind me of how others talked of the immense, four legged creature with small wings that were seen in town a little before the attack happened. Nothing akin to a siren though."

Hippos weren't something that had ever been near the shrine, so it were an unknown creature to her, but this were the second time she had heard the word. It were not exactly the same though, and were likely just a coincidence, because that thing she had seen had been nothing like a siren. If this variant were also extinct, then it were also further unlikely to be the same, though Last were not ruling anything out yet. Even if the immense creature had not been what Serenade spoke of, the two she did talk about might have hidden somewhere and survived, or gotten some off spring that had grown up in secrecy. One shouldn't rule out potential threats like this, though if they were like the alicorns of sirens, hope should be that they were indeed dead. Regular ones had been a giant threat to the country, so who were to say what havoc incredibly powerful ones could inflict?

"The Hippocampus creatures, how do you know they're dead?"

====================================================================================================

 

@Rising Dusk

9 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

The dark seed would collide against the metal workshop, but she wasn't looking to shatter it.  As soon as the dark magic dinged the metal exterior of the fortress, the five wards the detective had put up hissed around the inside.  All five glowed bright blue and torn harshly into the spell work that formed the magics of the seedling.  Effectively working to short it out.  Ideally the wards were created to block against offensive spells, but they were just as hungry for dark magic in any form.  Not completely designed for such a feat, it sadly spent all five wards that after their work was down, were just lumps of gold again.

"No... No! This can't be happening."

The old pony looked in horror as the dark seed were torn apart by the hungry wards that had been placed within the workshop. Every twitch and turn as its gnarled and corrupt interior were assaulted time and time again until finally it couldn't take more, and exploded into a small cloud of ash, that fell towards the ground. It would have no effect left. No power, and with that gone, neither would any of the broken up wicker creatures, whose parts fell to the ground as harmlessly as an obscene amount of wood now could do. All that were left were the trapped ones and the one on fire. The last hope he had to do something. Perhaps if he could just cast off another spell, he could still salvage this.

There wouldn't be time for that though, unfortunately, as Void had made her way around the flame wall, tackled him before he could do anything, and pinned him to the ground.

"L-Leave my sister a-alone."

Void's aura would stop him from casting any sort of magic, and her physique would keep him down on the ground with little effort, despite how much he wriggled around, desperately seeking a way to gain distance so that he might continue his foul work.

"Grrr, Minion! Follow my word and set them ablaze. I order you!"

The hulking creature came walking towards them, now only half sized as the fire had consumed much of it's once great form, and with every step, it caused fire to erupt from every other piece of wood it got into contact with. Even if it wouldn't end up making it all the way, this lit wickerman were going to cause a widespread fire that might end up causing a big issue for the town. Especially with the wind blowing towards it.

"Hey big guy, eat this."

That small last hope for the downed Harrowmark resident were shattered as a large blob of some kind of goo smashed into the flaming creature from behind, and nearly instantaneously engulfed it in a pale-grey concoction that smothered the flames and brought the wickerman to a halt. And then Felicia struck, jumping on it's back and forcing it down, where she would plunge both her front legs straight into the creature's chest, impaling the seed and effectively snuff the life out of it.

In the doorway, levitating the end of a hose with a mouthpiece that looked more akin to a cannon that anything else, were Molotov.

"What? This place is a fire hazard. No way I weren't installing this before I even got the forge up.

Say, you folks have any need for all this wood? I have plenty of use for the stuff if you don't."

"It's all over... Everything is ruined..."

Whilst Molotov ignored the gravity in the situation that had just been averted, the pony beneath Void's grip certainly didn't, as he could see the unequivocal failure that had just unfolded, and found himself losing every bit of the air of confidence that had before been over him, as he hit his head into the ground and wished he were still able to cry. It would be so fitting for this situation, as well as what this failure were going to mean for him, and those that had been left behind.

9 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

He knew legends of this substance.  Eyes going wide, he stuck his snout into his other saddle bag and withdrew a vial of some clear liquid.  Wasting not a moment to toss it at the disassembling constructions and their green goo.  The moment the vial shattered, the constructs, Hydra's Snare and green goo was doused in silver flames.  The Hydra's Snare riled, but hardly had a breath's moment before it and the fungus affecting it dissolved.  The ultimate weed killer, well green anything killer really, developed by the Zebras and probably the most difficult potion he could think of to make.

Tough as the fungal infestation would be, and destructive as its spread tended to become, it were no match for the weed killer, that pulverized the infestation already grown, and burned the rest away before it could spread further. The threat of the constructs and their payload had been averted, though the hives yet remained, and the wasps inside were none too happy being around non-infected intelligent lifeforms, with their queens sending wasp after wasp out to assault the ones near it, as just letting one out at a time did not seem to do much.

Them getting thrown into the air did not make the assaults lessen, nor the anger of the simple creatures any less, as they stung and prodded against the barrier relentlessly, and tried to fight the one attacking them with his own metal. He should be able to cut some of them down doing this, but for every one fallen, three more would seem to take its place, and it were quite apparent that these ponies had quite literally rattled the wrong wasps nest.

As the hives got blasted into oblivion however, the wasps below stopped their assault and began trying to fly away. The vibration of their wings would give off a warning sound to those attached to other beings, signalling that it were time to escape. The good news there would be that there would currently be no more attacks going on here, and the ones on the civilians would go away, leaving them free of the effects of their mind controlling toxin. The bad thing however, were that they now had around two hundred wicker wasps swarming in every direction possible to escape the area and establish themselves elsewhere. Unless they could get hold of every single one - which were not easy as some on the civilians further away had already taken off with a head start of at least six meters - Equestria were likely going to have a new species to content with. This might end up being an issue that they'd have to deal with for a long time. A blast of fire wouldn't do much here either, as the height of them flying were in all heights, which meant that they'd have to scorch civilians too, which were probably not a good thing.

9 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

"Flare Blitz, search the school for anymore students and teachers in hiding, then escort them out.  Wind Gale, starting transporting the cocooned ponies to the O.M.I. so we can get them free.  I'll deal with this rift," she instructed.  Flare Blitz nodded, putting his hat back on and trotting off to search the school.  Wind Gale crawled out from her hiding place under The Captain and went over to the gathered ponies wrapped in crystal webbing to slowly start teleporting them to the O.M.I. and the support ponies.  The Captain turned her attention to the rift and reworked her barrier spell over it into one that slowly started to squeeze and compress the rift.  She couldn't do nearly as well as Rising Dusk in removing the rift in a few breaths, but she had her ways.

The captain would find no more creatures would attempt to get anywhere near the rift now, and that the process would end up being done peacefully. As for the rift itself, if she could in some way sense the magic, she'd find that it carried the darkness that ran over this creature and as Rising would have felt, the essence of Harrowmark, yet it too would appear to be twisted in some way. A corrupted kind of magic that wasn't meant to be used the way that it were.

Regardless, the rift would close with no objections, and their only issue left would be the caught students and teachers, along with the crumbling school, who were likely going to have to be rebuilt after this. Hopefully it wouldn't collapse on top of them. And hopefully the small rift suddenly opening next to the captain weren't going to be unseen, as something sharp were going through it with quite the degree of speed.

9 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

"Equestria was in danger of you with or without the sisters.  And they aren't outsiders, they are now Equestrians" he replied calmly.  With the barrier spell analysed, the detective arched and slashed his horn through the air.  A large orange blade lept from his horn, edge sharpened by black wisps that slammed into his barrier and cut through it like a hot knife through butter and would keep going.

Twisted had opened this rift in an instant, just as the knife were about to hit him. An impressive trick from Rising's side really, with cutting through his barrier like this before he would have the time to set up something that would work against this, but unfortunately, he weren't the only one that knew how to counter something, and in his case, he preferred to redirect attacks towards hitting some of his friends. He couldn't see them right now, obviously, but he could feel someone messing with one of his rifts, so he could make an educated guess as he sent this attack through that.

The wisps may well try to eat away at the magic of the rift too, but it would take time to snip away at his spell, and at that point, he had already moved and sent a blast of green energy towards Rising. It wouldn't hurt him however, but rather engulf the Pixie that had been swatted before, and pull it back towards the wilderness witch. Apparently, this creature carried some importance to him, as the whispering voices would also seem to incline.

As for a counter attack, that hardly seemed like a smart thing to do in here. His adversary had proven himself quite capable in a purely magical duel, so how about they took this beyond those limits, and bring them towards one more in his favor?

The green gears on his boots twisted a single notch, and suddenly he vanished without a trace, along with the squirming pixie, though his words would linger through the air. A simple spell really that barely took any degree of effort. Except in the way of hiding his location, and the watch were not going to help Rising either this time. That little mistake had been blocked off now.

"It have been centuries since last I had a worthy adversary. One so talented, with unquestionable potential. Far more competent than my current apprentice, yet yours is a mind that will be far harder to break. A challenge I wholeheartedly will enjoy."

A chuckle would end this, and then leave the room silent as Twisted slithered away to somewhere else, leaving Rising alone in his home. Perhaps not the smartest choice, as it did contain a lot of valuable curse items, as well as the altar to his mistress in the other room - which the spirits should warn him about soon - yet it were not as dumb as staying and potentially be defeated like a simplistic second degree thug. One had to chose their battles when facing an adversary as potent as Rising had shown to be.

If Rising went and searched the altar, he would find that there were truth in what he had asserted from the magic he had seen used before. Twisted were not primarily using his own magic, but rather someone else's, and whoever it were seemed to not do so of their own free will. Were he to remove the chained elk skull, and the oozing corrupt dark magic that seemed up from the ground, he would find a beaten up shrine with a defiled symbol of a crescent moon, with a small insect fluttered in the midst of the empty space in the middle. The magic would have replaced the apparent moth of some kind of depiction of a jeweled man with vines of tentacles flowing down his side, that would not be taken off the altar until removed. it appeared to be keeping a steady stream of corrupt magic flowing into it.

Whatever god he prayed to, had more layers to it than it would appear, and the corrupt magic should be well familiar to Rising for another reason: It were the same as the one the sisters had brought to him earlier, just not fully engulfed in this madness.

As for the rest of the house, Rising would find a myriad of things keeping energy trapped and dark magics flowing. He could likely spend months in just the first room, were he to try and dispel every single thing that were a danger here.

========================================================================================================

 

@Zephyr / Karou

In the Everfree Forest, Briar and Brittle would eventually reach the cave which they called their home, and wander past the cover of vines that blocked the entrance.

"Quite an eventful day it have been, wouldn't you say so Brittle?"

"Too many w-wrong things... The s-siren creature, s-she..."

Briar went over and gently put his hoof around the changeling and cautiously dragged her closer to him, that he may embrace her and try to bring her some comfort.

"I know dear. I have seen personally the nature of some of these creatures, but this one may be different. It is a hope we will need to carry with us with all whom we meet, even if many races have proven us wrong to show any sort of trust in them."

Brittle were not taking the invitation for comfort for granted, and slowly put her hooves around Briar. her head nuzzled against his moss covered chest as her breathing eased a little. It always brought her some degree of comfort being around him. The one who had once saved her from the circus, and now were there to keep her safe. She had her trust and faith in him, even when he said something like this.

"...W-Why?"

Briar rested his tired cheek on her head and ran a hoof slowly down her unkempt mane.

"Because I have to believe that nopony is as bad as those who came before them."

He would sing to her after that, until she would eventually fall asleep, then find a good place on the floor where a thick layer of moss grew, and lay down himself. His last thought as he went down, were one of hope that tomorrow would be a new day to prove to Brittle that the world were not as dangerous as it seemed, for neither them, nor the ponies. Perhaps this time, she would learn to find the beauty within it.

The next day, the two would sleep long, so they were not in Ponyville to greet the newcomers in town. But it should hardly matter to them, as they had plenty to see to as it were. They had a doctors appointment to attend after all.

=================================================================================

 

@Lucid_Nightlight

"We didn't even get any hayfries, and the waiter smells badly. This place is great."

What to most were likely the worst dump they could ever set their hooves into, were a slice of non-weirded out paradise to the draconequui. Omen for one especially chowed down with great delight, and chomped down the essentially raw meat like there were no tomorrow. A shame there weren't any worms though. She had looked forward to slurping them up like they were spaghetti.

"I dunno if the birds took the flies, but boo if they did. I bet the spiders took them instead, then the birds ate the spiders, the cat ate the birds, the dog ate the cat, and the dog got eaten by the giant fly monsters. Totally how the food chain goes. It's the birds own fault for being so delicious though. Especially seagull. Those screaming nuisances tastes great with a little ranch and they make funny noises when you bash them down with a hockey stick."

Can you have one conversation without giving me a horrendous visual?

"Haha, the author gets weird images in his head. Hey, wanna really mess him up and go duck hunting after this? It'll be fun. We can bring Henry and teach him how to pluck feathers."

[Lucid_Nightlight 923]

@Blitz Boom

Lucid saw a spider crawling on the table. That must be the one who ate flies.

"Who wants to eat the spider?"

"I prefer the bigger spiders."

"I'm like ants on a stick better. One ant is tiny, but they taste nice when you got a bunch of them."

Lucid looked down a Pringle.

"Pringle says he is more into eating crickets."

"If we are lucky, maybe they let a snake loose in here."

[Moonlit 593]

@Blitz Boom Serenade takes a deep breath, "It's a long story. One told to me by my mother...adopted mother. Tell me, what do you know about the Dark City of Tambelon" Serenade flicks through the book, looking for a very specific entry. Of a...villain so evil, so heinous that she prayed to the Creator that he would never return.

[Catpone Cerberus 23,591]

@Blitz Boom
"Sure she doesn't set the price, but this is auction, there is no set price, so nothing is stopping her from trying to get higher bids, which would happen if something was revealed to be more valuable than first though." Ruby pointed out. She didn't really care that Scarcity took a cut of the price, because not only did she know that it was smart business, but she also didn't see work as something that's worth money, thus in her eyes she had lost nothing and only gaining regardless of how much Scarcity took. She had nothing else to say, and she would follow Marley and Spicy if they were to move, this time only avoiding dragons and other creatures she knew could sense her.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nada was bit surprised first when she heard that Lyriel didn't know what winter was, but she didn't think too much about it and decided to just explain, "Winter is a season." she started "A season where temperatures go lower than the freezing point of water, and this white cold thing called snow rains down. I think it's frozen water, since that's what comes out when it melts." she didn't know everything about winter either, because it was again one of those things she didn't see as worth learning about, and the winters in the forest were pretty...unnoticeable, so she had forgotten some things about it too.

 

[EQ_Theta 458]

@Blitz Boom

Lin was elated to hear Omen piecing the lessons together, coming up with her own word following the example on long vowels. There was a big smile that was growing bigger as they went along, evidently beyond pleased with what they were accomplishing. Perhaps there might be a way to speed things along, but that would be something Lin will need to figure out as they went through more lessons. For now, she wanted to relish this moment while helping Omen along.

"Yes, there are long and short vowels. I don't think consonants have anything like them. Those are letters that aren't vowels, by the way. Your example, Lame, you're really getting this lesson. Let's try working with something different. I'll give you some names and you tell me if the name has short, long, or both vowel sounds. Ready? The first name is Discord, second name is Rosa, third name is Twilight."

Once that was completed, this was about all that Lin could come up with. She was considering introducing the concept of silent letters but that would mean having to go through the consonants, and those were more numerous and they wouldn't get anywhere within a fraction of their lesson done by sunrise. And there was still the matter of double vowel sounds, something that Lin would need to plan ahead to take as many combinations of vowels she knew into account. Lesson one was just about done.

When Omen had given her answers, she would ask: "How did the lesson go? You are doing well for your first lesson and I'd like to know if you can suggest any improvements for me to help you learn better."

[Early Sunsets 2,106]

@Blitz Boom

Zephyr sat up in bed and rubbed his eyes, shutting off the alarm clock with his magic. "Ugh... I hate mornings," he thought. He glanced at the clock, which read ten AM, before shrugging and rolling lazily out of bed. "Eh. Close enough to morning." He went to the kitchen and quickly ate breakfast, which his sister had kindly left out instead of throwing away, before heading to the bathroom to get ready for the day. His messy mane always made things difficult, but he was able to wrestle it into place before heading downstairs. Sun Fire was already there, jotting things down on a piece of paper in her recording studio, the door propped wide open. "Hey, what time should we leave?" he called.

Sun Fire shrugged. "Eleven fifteen? I'm not really sure, I wasn't paying attention to the time last night. What rhymes with world?"

"Furled? Curled? I don't know. Don't ask me for lyric ideas." Zephyr walked back to the counter and picked up where he had left off with the instrument last night. The two of them sat there for a while, with Sun Fire humming short lines to herself every few minutes.

Once the time came, Sun Fire folded up the papers and walked out of her studio, letting the door swing shut behind her. "You ready to go?"

Zephyr sighed and stepped out from behind the counter. "No, but you'll make me go anyway." He followed his sister outside and into the bright late-morning air. It wasn't quite as crowded as it had been the day before, but it still seemed like the town was busier than it should have normally been. 

On the way to the hospital, Sun Fire could feel ponies staring at her every once in a while. It was only a few ponies, so it wasn't suffocating like it had been in Manehattan, but it was still unpleasant. Luckily for her, though, none of them approached her, and they made it to the hospital without incident. Sun Fire turned to her brother as they walked through the doors. "Do you need me to go with you and hold you hoof, honey? I know the big, bad doctor can be scary sometimes," she said jokingly, making a face of mock sympathy.

Zephyr shoved her lightly and chuckled. "No, mother, I'll be fine on my own for a little while. Go sit on one of the couches and read one of those old magazines or something."

Sun Fire shook her head and went to sit down and wait. Meanwhile, Zephyr took a deep breath and walked over to the reception desk, not at all ready for his appointment.

[Blitz Boom 4,621]

@Catpone Cerberus

There wouldn't be much in the sense of dragons, and the ones who were, were far too busy scouting out potential items of worth to take notice of her as they wandered around into a section of magical items. An enchanted shell of some sort of sea animal seemed to draw a lot of attention, with the promise of it being able to listen in on most conversations that weren't blocked with strong, magical means within two miles, which had quite the value for most of them. It could be good in Spicy's eyes too, but this much attention meant that the price would sky rocket, and her interest in hearing weird stuff weren't worth this.

After that it was just item after item of either being too highly priced in around the 150.000 bits range or above, or being generally uninteresting for her, as well as Marley. Some things that would give you a temporary disguise of the last being you touched, a painting that forced anypony who looked at it to keep doing so until the line of sight were broken, whilst numbing the brain down to a point where they would be incredibly easy to make tell you whatever you wanted to, several elixirs from zebra's with warning labels the length of Ruby's true form (good effects, too too risque in their opinions) etc. Usually these things could be gathered in a theme of gaining information, or some degree of super-equine power for a short time, followed by a crash the likes of which would require medical care for weeks, if not longer. Fine enough stuff if you had that interest, but really, the only fascinating stuff were far too pricey for their matter.

That's when Spicy bit notice in something that she did like. A strange set of cards made out of fine slivers of various gems, glowing in all colors of the rainbow, plus several more. There were some labels on it that told what the big deal were with this, but the mare already had some degree of idea and wandered over there without a word. Marley on the other hoof, instead stayed there, and gently put a hand on Ruby's shoulder if she tried to follow, before whispering something to her.

"This may be a good opportunity to find that enchantress we spoke of earlier, yes? I think I may know where to look."

If she would listen to him, he would lead the way towards another section of the auction hall. One who seemed to have more of a focus on tribal and/or primitive items, with an increased amount of zebra's suddenly showing up. Not a big surprise, as most of these items had been made by and/or stolen from their kind, and the various effects would hold much value to them. If not for their effects, then at least for the chance to regain what had been locked in a museum and bring it back to their home where it belonged.

==========================================================================================

 

@Catpone Cerberus

"In Dragon Land, it have sometimes gotten colder, but not to a degree were the water would change. I think I shall look forward to witnessing this *winter* when one day it arrives, and experience what it may entail. I thank you for informing me of this season, Nada."

White, frozen water falling from the sky, and this were a season? Where she came from, she knew only of the seasons of spring, summer and autumn, where the temperatures varied mildly and the biggest indication that things had changed were the migration of birds back when they still had real animal life within their valley. To think that here were something where it got very cold apparently were a perplexing, yet intriguing thing to hear, though how she would fare were hard to say. She already considered it to be somewhat chilly here in the Equestrian autumn compared to where she came from, and had added some extra layers of bark and moss to accommodate that. Far colder than that, and things would start to get interesting.

Ah, but that were a worry for another time. Currently, Nada had been very helpful in warning her off this, but as the moon were standing high in the sky, perhaps the siren would want to soon find rest until the sun rose once more. She were not a pony of course, but the siren may still work with the same day and night cycle that they did.

"May I ask, when do you normally rest? Night is upon us, and I would hate to be the one to take precious hours of sleep away from you, considering you likely have many important things to attend the coming days. You would need your strength for that, surely."

=============================================================================================

 

@Moonlit

"I heard that word once, from a vagrant fleeing towards our shrine. She were spouting off nonsense about a darkened city with that name, and some broken word about prophecy and damnation. It sounded like the rambles of a mad pony, and the manetids swooped down to take her just before we could get her back and interrogate her. It was about three years ago."

Honestly, she hadn't even thought about this since then, but the name of the city that Serenade spoke off had rung a bell that shook the dust off this old memory. Mostly Last just remembered it because she were about a half meter from grabbing this panicked, potential lunatic, when the insectoid freaks had swooped down to scoop her up just as she were about to have a chance at safety. The look of fear in her eyes then had been something that Last considered to be a mark of her failure, but not something she could dwell on. Casualties of both their own and civilians wandering into the area for various reasons were not uncommon, and their codex were strict on them having to stay and protect the shrine above everything else, so when somepony were lost, you just had to accept it.

Didn't mean that she hadn't taken some extra enjoyment out of striking down a few nearby bug monsters when she had the chance though. Vengeance were a strong driving force on many a cold, worn down day for them.

"What is the deal with it?"

===========================================================================================

 

@Zephyr / Karou

Zephyr would find that the mare from yesterday were not at the desk currently, but instead a new, elderly mare who seemed wholly uninterested in doing anything else than filing paperwork sat in her place. It would be about thirty seconds - no matter whatever or not Zephyr made noise - before she would lift her head and address him with an uninterested glance.

"You're late. Go down the right hallway, third door on your right. Doctor Snippet will see you there."

That, and a hoof briefly pointing towards the hallway in question,  were all she would do before going back to her paperwork and schedule checking. A very different experience than the overly in your face one from yesterday, for better and for worse.

There were a good deal of patients in the hospital down the path he had been sent. None of them seemed severely injured, but most had bandages and gauze on for various reasons. Not that many broken bones though, considering there were only two crutches here, yet concussions, various flesh wounds, bruised bones, etc. were plentiful. Unavoidable unfortunately, when a good deal of buildings collapsed in the midst of a freak, dome-shaped tornado.

Some greeted t he unknown pony as they saw him with waves and a small *hello* out of kindness, and returned to their own conversations after that if Zephyr didn't decide to linger and just move on to get this over with.

The room he had been sent to were a smaller room, with an examination table, some medical tools hanging pristine and clean on the left-most wall, medicine in a heavily warded and locked cabinet, some rubber gloves, etc. Most pretty standard stuff for a routine checkup.

Oddly enough though, there were also another patient in the room at the same time, getting a check-up from the doctor. Judging by the uniform, it were a member of the Coast Guard, which were a pretty unusual sight this far inland, yet so were it to see one as stitched together as she appeared to be.

"Everything seems in order, but I would like to clean up the w- Huh?"

The doctor bit notice in the other patient arriving, and quickly looked over on the schedule on the wall to see if he had forgotten somepony again. Considering the facehoof he made, it seemed like that were the case, and he wandered over towards Zephyr.

"Oh dear, this is a right mess. Welcome to the clinic, and I'm uh, sorry for this, but could you please go wait in the hall for a little while I finish here?"

"No no, I'll go and wait. You two have a proper appointment right now, and you said yourself that it looked fine. I can just set up a time with the receptionist to get in for a cleaning."

The mare put on her helmet, covered the short mane beneath it and wandered towards the door. She halted momentarily to look directly at Zephyr, which would give him a good look at what were some rather extensive surgery marks around her eyes if he cared for that, and gave him a smile.

"Have a good check-up sir."

With that, she would leave, and make her way towards the main hall to try and have a chat with the receptionist, and see where things would take her from there, leaving the thirty-something doctor with Zephyr in what the doctor himself considered to be a few seconds of awkward silence.

"Yes... *ahem* I'm sorry again for this. I figured you were a no show and the officer were asking around to see if there were a free spot one of these days. It seemed as good a time as any Regardless, my name is Doctor Snippet, and you're Zephyr, yes?

I've been told you haven't had a check-up in quite a while, so we have a lot to go over, though do you have anything that you think is important to check first? Some kind of chronic pain perhaps, or random spells of dizziness, etc?"

He would point Zephyr towards the table and go get a few tools off the wall with his horn to prepare for the examination. Seemed like they had a lot to do.

========================================================================================

 

@EQ_Theta

On 4/10/2019 at 4:06 PM, EQ_Theta said:

"Yes, there are long and short vowels. I don't think consonants have anything like them. Those are letters that aren't vowels, by the way. Your example, Lame, you're really getting this lesson. Let's try working with something different. I'll give you some names and you tell me if the name has short, long, or both vowel sounds. Ready? The first name is Discord, second name is Rosa, third name is Twilight."

"...Master Discord, both. Rosa long, Twilight... Short?"

The princess's name were a strange one compared to the others, and Omen wavered as she got to the alicorn's name for a few seconds, but she would try and guess that this were the case and then see if it were right. It sounded like it were short anyway, but the last part she weren't so sure about. She weren't in doubt about Discord though. It started short and ended long. Several thousand years of thinking and saying his name made her certain of that at least, and in the case of Rosa, it sounded drawn out a lot, so that had to be long she guessed.

On 4/10/2019 at 4:06 PM, EQ_Theta said:

When Omen had given her answers, she would ask: "How did the lesson go? You are doing well for your first lesson and I'd like to know if you can suggest any improvements for me to help you learn better."

"No. I do not know how to teach. Learning things now though. Some words. Vowels. Consonants. Strange things, but important. Yes?"

Omen wouldn't even know where to start to suggest ways to make her learn faster. Lin weren't like Mother, who could connect to Omen's brain directly and interact directly in that way. If she were, this would be easier, as she could just plant these sorts of things in there instead. Not that Mother did that, she just said a long time ago that if need be, she were able to do so. Why she hadn't, Omen didn't know, but it wasn't her place to ask questions like that of her either. Mother knew what was best for them, and if she didn't want to do this, there were an important reason for it.

As for how Lin taught, what were there to say against it? The long and short vowels had been confusing, but she explained it, and taught Omen how it worked. The longma hybrid even got through to Omen how to make a word herself via her lesson, which were something that Omen hadn't done in the several millennia since she were first given form. She had replicated something that she had seen many times, but it didn't count when she couldn't understand what it meant. Not in her mind at least.

It had honestly been a rather productive lesson, and she looked forward to what they were going to do the next time. However for now, the moon were still high in the heavens, and the others would be asleep for hours, so they would have time for something else. Unless Lin just wanted to read or get some other things sorted that she hadn't had the time for yet. It would be good for them both more than likely if it were, as Omen could then finally start to sort through some of the things that had accumulated in her head over the last few, hectic days.

"Think time now?"

==============================================================================================

 

@Lucid_Nightlight

"We just need a good snake call."

Anomaly drew in a big mouthful of air, then let out a sound best described as a drenched, used coffee filter being smacked against a freestanding floorboard. It wouldn't be more than a few seconds after that before a bunch of snakes fell down from a hole in the ceiling and down on her face, confused and looking around for who had called for them, whilst slithering around on said being's head in a small mass of green and brown scales.

Anomaly was having a great time with this, and giggled as one of them ticked her eye with its tongue.

"They're so adorable. Nothing with poison though."

Getting up on her hooves, she would start slinging them towards spiders and rats scuttling around, confusing both prey and hunter alike. All except for one, who she kept with her, as it were a stunted, fat little one who were close to falling down her head constantly, and that were just too good for the draconequui. It gave her something fun to work with.

"Hey, do you wanna see me stretch this into a big snake?"

Please don't, I'm trying t- Oh dear god she's doing it. It... It looks like she's pulling taffy.

Urgh, I'm gonna get sick...

[Moonlit 593]

@Blitz Boom She finally reaches the page, "Tambelon is a Lost City...and lost for a good reason." She turns the page to show Him. "Grogar, a Sorcerer and all around Evil ram. He was....ruler of Tambelon. Long story short, he got banished to the Shadow Realm, and the source of his power was...shattered." She closes the book and dusts her hooves off, "As for how I know the two Hippocampi are dead. My mom, was a Guard, and got assigned to an expedition across the Shimmering Sea. The group found Tambelon...or it found them, not sure. The inhabitants had died long ago, and most had turned to dust....except for the bones of the two Hippocampi, they were." An edge of rage enters Serenades voice, "mounted next to Grogar's throne. Apparently as a example to his followers."

[EQ_Theta 458]

@Blitz Boom

On 4/12/2019 at 6:19 AM, Blitz Boom said:

"...Master Discord, both. Rosa long, Twilight... Short?"

"You're getting there but Rosa's name has both short and long sounds. You're right in saying there is a long O sound but the A has a short sound. Twilight's name has long I sounds. Don't worry though, you'll get the hang of it with more practice." 

It was a fair result seeing that Omen appears to have a grasp of the lesson. Perhaps Lin's earlier examples weren't too good as those were only one syllable words with a single vowel in it, and that the sample names she had given had two syllables and two vowels. Still, the fact that Omen was able to tell some sounds apart was a good thing and she knew she could get better. In the future, Lin would need to gather some reading material and they could spend evenings reading. Certainly seems like they wouldn't be able to bother Sen with the noise they're making; he has been sleeping soundly all this time. 

She wasn't surprised when Omen didn't offer any suggestions for future lessons. This might be one of those things that she'll have to improvise along the way but if anything, this first teaching session went rather well all things considering. Is this what the Equestrian school system goes through? Did teachers have to go through training to be able to do what they do for a living? This was a profession from what Lin gathered in her travels but it was different back home: teaching is just another part of a daily routine and there was no one in the village who did this as their sole duty. 

"Learning about words, being able to read, write, and speak are all important. It's how many communicate with each other, how we are talking with each other is a part of that. We'll end the lesson for tonight but I want you to know there is more to this than what I just taught you. The most important lesson here is to understand, not just to memorize. Words have meanings and it isn't enough to just know what a word looks or sounds like. When you put together entire sentences, the words used to form them create ideas. What we communicate and exchange are ideas; simply putting words together without understanding their meanings only makes nonsense."

"If you need time to process everything you learned, I won't keep you. I'll be here if you need anything."

Edited April 13, 2019 by EQ_Theta
Overlooked Twilight's name having short I sounds. Corrected them now.

[Lucid_Nightlight 923]

@Blitz Boom

"Maybe the author wants to keep one as a pet."

"Yeah! Let's give him one to keep as a pet!"

"Yeah, I bet he loves snakes."

Lucid looked down at Pringle.

"Pringle says he wants to eat the snake."

[Catpone Cerberus 23,591]

@Blitz Boom
Like Spicy and Marley, Ruby didn't care about the expensive things, even though some of them could have been very useful for her. She didn't try to follow Spicy when she wandered somewhere, because she was mostly following Marley rather than her for obvious reasons. She nodded at Marley's whisper, even with the surrounding noise, her hearing could pick it up well. She followed him to the Zebra section...Zebras, that was a creature that Ruby wasn't sure how to feel about, because in one claw/hoof they were weaklings like any other inferior creature, but in another, they were highly intelligent, some of them even competing with her own kind in that aspect, and it would be stupid to ignore that.
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"I'm not actually entirely sure." Nada admitted "Being that I lived in a bottom of a lake in a forest that is always dark, I lost my sense of time pretty quickly and didn't really have ways to tell what the time of day was." "So I kinda just rest when I'm tired" "But now that you mention it, I guess I should start heading back so nobody thinks that I have returned to hiding."

 

 

 

[Rising Dusk 27,542]

@Blitz Boom

Scarlet panted from her effort in shoving the dark seedling out of a mass of joining wicker pieces.  Finding it hard to keep her wings beating as she slowly lowered herself to the floor.  She couldn't understand how the Wonderbolts kept up these kinds of activities on the daily.  Granted they probably weren't do that exact activity every day.  Her hoofs kinda stung a little to from the push, but at least the battle seemed over.  Even as the burning wicker creature returned to harass the group, it was quickly put out by the owner of the workshop finally showing his face.  With a cannon that put out fires and finished off by the shinny spider bot.  She knew a station of fire ponies that would be mighty interested in that kind of thing.  "The wood is on your property, it's all yours," the Junior Officer informed Molotov.  Gathering her strength, she got back up and walked over to where Void had the older pony pinned.  Removing a pair of hoof cuffs from her saddle bag and shackling up the older pony.  Orange Glow and Fleet Feather descended upon the location to take the attacker from Void and into custody.  Releasing their wings with the fight over and the hurry gone.  "Tut tut.  We'll take it from here Ms. Void.  Scarlet, we'll take this one to the O.M.I., you stay here with Void until The Captain calls for the next plan," Orange Glow ordered the Junior Officer.  "Sounds good to me... Ma'am," the tired pegasus confirmed, fluttering lazily off the ground to plop herself right onto the cool, shinny bulb of the spider bot for a rest.

Golden Mane's horn sizzled and sparked a little from the results of the gigantic energy beam she unleashed at the hives.  She reached up and touch her horn with a hoof.  Jerking her hoof away quickly from the heat, "Ouch!  Hot hot hot!"  The wasps were now in a state of chaos, all trying to escape.  It was lucky that the infected ponies were also being released from whatever trance they were in, but now two hundred or so of the little beasties were about to make a new home in Equestria.  Not quite sure how well they could function without their queens, Bash didn't want to find out.  Black Jack moved to remove the barrier around himself and Bash, joining in with Golden Mane who was already moving to shoot down as many wasps as she could with just energy beams.  The Ivory earth pony had sat his butt down and was rummaging through his saddle bags.  In his rush, seeds, vials, nuts and various plants spilled out of his bags onto the street.  Grunted each time what he was looking for was eluding him.  "Bash!  We could use a little help here!" Black Jack started shouting at him.  "I know," Bash grunted with his head stuck deep into his bag.  Finally getting what he was looking at the very bottom.  Pulling his head out with a six petal red flower that had a gold trim.  Holding it up high, he blew gently upon it.  The whole flower dissolving into red and gold dust that caught the wind to fall upon the slowly dwindling swarm of wasps.  It also fell upon the ponies gathered, but as living creatures it wasn't too big an issue.  No more so than the hangover like syndromes they'd already be suffering from.  The dust might not get them all, but it wasn't hard to spread among a swarm.  Golden Mane and Black Jack stopped firing at the swarm when they saw what Bash did.  "That was you the last one?" the unicorn asked as she approached the still sitting earth pony.  Bash was simply staring up at the dust as it infected the wicker creatures and grunted solemnly.  The little wasps would be in for a nice surprise when they were greeted with their first Equestrian moon.

The Captain didn't nearly have the level of magic sense her detective did, but that amount of dark corrupted magic on the other side of the rift any unicorn would probably sense.  Not that she'd really have to for much longer as her spell crushed the rift down into a spec that soon winked out.  The taller unicorn let out a sigh of relief with that all taken care of.  Until she felt the shift in the room as another rift instantly appeared next to her.  Fast practiced reflexes put up a barrier to block the oncoming attack.  All of which was for not.  The wisp sharpened blade cut right through her shield and slammed into her leg.  This was where the dark wizard might have mistaken Rising Dusk's intent, for the orange blade did not cut through her flesh.  Harming the batpony would go against what he was trying to do.  The orange blade wrapped around her leg, and then her other leg, then the other and other.  Pulling tight to bring all her legs together in a hog tie.  Losing her balance, she fell forward until her chest collided with the floor.  Wiggling her hoofs in attempt to get herself free, "Really!?" she growled, annoyed at how this could happen.  Moving to lay on her side and take a look at the spell that so easily got her trapped.  There was only one pony she could think of that was able to do such a thing.  Sure enough, she recognized Rising Dusk's binding spell.  It appears the detective had engaged with the dark wizard.  Zapping the bindings with the release spell he had taught her, the bands dissolved and she was free.  Getting back to her hoofs to then work on closing this new rift as well. 

It was rather annoying at times to fast a criminal a little smarter than the average thug or thief.  The detective was getting a lot of intel though as each of these moves made by the batpony gave Rising Dusk great snap shots of the spell works.  His binding spell wasn't designed for a rift counter, nor was he expecting the gears on his boots to have such a swift teleportation spell hidden in them.  Now that he saw them, he could work their tapestries through some mental exercises to better be prepared for them.  The fact Twisted Gears made the effort to retreat with that pixie was rather curious to the detective. Listening to the echos of the dark wizard from a an unknown location "I have enough voices in my mind, thank you."  His mind was busy with the room he'd been left in.  So many dangers that he could spend months in just trying to rid the world of such darkness.  If he had a darker mind, he could end this madness by linking all the spells together and sending them into a magical cascade until they all unraveled.  The resulting feedback would likely turn all of Harrowmark into a crater however.  Leaving them here though for whichever witch would fill in the power vacuum after he arrested Twisted Gears wasn't a great idea either.  With a sigh, he did what best he could for now.  Black wisps lept at a few select objects that would make this easier and started to snip away at the weaves.  Not in an attempt to dispel them, but alter them into something a little more useful.  With the few changes done to a hoof full of them, the detective then linked them to much bigger and powerful objects.  Taking out Twisted Gear's watch, he inserted its spell work into the matrix he created.  When the minute hand moved on the pocket watch, he watched as a green surge of energy rippled through the whole matrix like a light show.  At the end of the weave he created, several of the trapped souls were released.  

It was the best he could do for now.  Putting the watch on a table, he let it continue to tick every minute and release more souls.  Wanting to explore a little more, mostly at the insistence of the whispers in the back of his mind, he found the alter.  The appearance of the alter, while disturbing, wasn't what the detective was interested in.  Magic from a deity was on a completely different level than that of a moral pony like him.  It wasn't just in size or power, the tapestry itself was beyond comprehension.  Light, dark, primordial, none of it matter to such forces of nature.  Even on a sentient level, it was too difficult to understand what kinds of values they had or didn't have.  If the detective freed this deity from what this prison, would it grant him a boon, was it in its nature to do such a thing?  It would quite likely be as successful as asking a tornado to not destroy one's home.  There is one thing he could do though.  Focusing the wisps on the smallest part of the primordial tapestry, he poked and snipped with one goal in mind.  Severing the connection that was being drawn from the deity and feeding it back on itself.  Creating a nice little pocket that would give a pony trying to reconnect to it a nasty surprise.

[Blitz Boom 4,621]

@Catpone Cerberus

Ruby would be surprisingly ignored by the zebra's and various other beings who came here to have a look around. Instead the striped ones were busy looking over certain objects that had been authenticated as genuine and trying to get a look on whatever or not they believed it, or speaking with a few of the sellers to ask about varied items or ingredients that were present, such as the blood of an elder dragon. A valued ingredient in certain potions, yet a very difficult thing to get hold of, as the elder dragons tended to refuse to give anything away of themselves, even for profit, and the magical value in said blood lost all power if the dragon in question died, so harvesting it from fallen ones were not an option.

The seller of that particular item appeared to be a griffon in a dark-grey robe, whom Marley seemed to do what he could to avoid, which brought them closer to a strange exhibit. A zebra stallion of elder age, sitting in a box with a cauldron and many indecipherable ingredients around him in boxes. He appeared to be taking a nap at the moment with his head leaned up against the wall, and according to the listing, were called Whithel. Apparently a name or sight that seemed to attract quite quite a few eyes.

"Sometimes, zebra's of some renown sells their service to the highest bidder more literally than you'd expect. I don't know who this one is personally, but I can assume that his name speaks volumes in the right circles, if that is all that is listed."

Moving past what he frankly considered quite the iffy auction, Marley lead the way towards the back of the area, where a few tents had been set up for the attending zebra's to finish their concoctions in peace, if they still had some to get completed. Empty glass casings already stood and awaited such things, with a few menial pony workers chatting nearby that were there to move things along if needed.

One particular tent would open the flap as they moved near it, and a soothing, female voice would joyfully speak up.

"Long time it have been, come in and be seen."

Marley rolled his eyes at this before putting on a smile and wandering into the open tent, whilst beckoning Ruby to follow him.

The thing were quite a bit more spacious than it had appeared on the outside - efficient magic use more than likely - and would have copious amount of room even if Ruby were to show her true self. The place were not filled with many things. Mainly a large travel bag of items under a strong protective ward, a bubbling cauldron with a sweet, golden liquid with streaks of red swirling inside of it, a table, three chairs, and a few things readied for guests. Specific ones too, as one of said things readied would be a piece of meat that Ruby would enjoy, along with a drink of her choosing, sitting in a wooden cup.

At the furthest away chair, sat a zebra mare in her mid thirties. Her outfit were somewhat traditional, but the hoops on her being were made of animal bones, and she wore a warm cloak of leather and bear fur. More clothes in the same manner were present to the right of her, slung on the floor, making it appear that she came from an unusually cold area.

The mare were having a sip of water when they came in, and as they neared, she would open her emerald-colored eyes and look at them both with a pleased smile on her face, as if seeing old friends again.

"Marley my dear, it is good to see you here. I see you bring me a friend, whom seeks my help to blend? A dragon's eye is a powerful burden, that is most certain, though fret not Ruby Shine, we will make it all fine."

She took another sip of water and enjoyed it with closed eyes, whilst awaiting what the pair would do now. In case that would be anything resembling a hostile action, Ruby would find that the mare were well protected with several anti-dragon wards, which would be too much of a coincidence to simply write off.

"I greet you Zhiira, though please, try and discourage yourself from teasing my companion."

==========================================================================================

 

@Catpone Cerberus

"Then I wish you a good rest Nada. May your nights be peaceful, and your days full of wonder. If ever you need shelter from the world, or seek me for whatever reason, remember that this place is secure for you, and that you will be among friends here. I'm certain that Agni will await you with joy at least. He seems to have taken a liking to you."

The phoenix cooed at that, and flew over to bat his beak softly on the siren's forehead. A sight that made Lyriel smile, yet also made her pray that this would end well, and not like the last being that Agni had found interest in. Poor little thing shouldn't have to be faced with two examples of hardship this early on in his potentially extraordinarily long life, yet Nada seemed to be a good being, and the dryad would try and have faith in this ending better.

For the time being though, she would bow before Nada, whilst Agni flew back into her mane. About the same time as Fah'lina popped up and looked around to see if everything had calmed down up here so far. The warning coo from the phoenix and the mimic's hissing would suggest no, but they were both in this area now, so they'd have to learn tolerate one another at some point.

=============================================================================================

 

@Moonlit

"Efficient way of keeping others away, but disgustingly honorless against your own people. May he rot among the shadows for eternity."

Last weren't going to say that where she were from, they didn't display those they had defeated sometimes, but it were never used to discourage them, just the ones who came to lay claim to their shrine. To her, that were simple mind games, and something you should only use against attackers so that you could keep your home secure. To do so to make your own people too afraid to rebel or question your rule were the action of a tyrant, and those needed to be brought low.

This one thankfully had, and he would now have to rot in some sort of realm that she hoped were far worse to live in than it sounded. Hopefully it were also far harder to escape than say, Tartarus, where story had it that Tirek had escaped from not too long ago.

"So your mom is a guard then? Solar, Night, Coast or Crystal?"

Those were the four that she knew off, though Luna be praised, Twilight may one day make her own too, as the mare needed the protection, just like any other royal. If need be, some of the locals could be used for that, as Last had seen some individuals that she could recommend, as well as a harsh training regime to see if they would function under pressure, but that would all have to wait until a time where she could have a chat with the princess about security. For the time being, she were more curious about what sort of guard had an adopted siren for a daughter. Something told her that Coast Guard weren't too unlikely, but she knew too little to say for sure whatever or not only they rummaged around the waters or not, or if Serenade's egg had been found elsewhere. Heck, maybe she had been rescued from somewhere, or hidden in a crate that got sent to a town nearby, etc. Too many variables.

===========================================================================================

 

@Rising Dusk

3 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

"The wood is on your property, it's all yours,"

"Hah, nice. That's the kindling sorted for the next four months then."

Keeping warmth inside his home didn't require much in the way of wood, long as he kept the room well insulated, but the need were still there, and all of this were gonna make it a breeze for a while, soon as it were gathered up. Shouldn't take all that long he'd wager, long as they worked smart, though he'd probably be best off running some tests on a few pieces, just to figure out if these wicker pieces were safe to burn. You never knew with inanimate stuff that somehow got to move around.

3 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

Orange Glow and Fleet Feather descended upon the location to take the attacker from Void and into custody.  Releasing their wings with the fight over and the hurry gone.  "Tut tut.  We'll take it from here Ms. Void.  Scarlet, we'll take this one to the O.M.I., you stay here with Void until The Captain calls for the next plan," Orange Glow ordered the Junior Officer.  "Sounds good to me... Ma'am," the tired pegasus confirmed, fluttering lazily off the ground to plop herself right onto the cool, shinny bulb of the spider bot for a rest.

Felicia let out a series of whirs as the mare landed on top of her, which made Molotov laugh for a few seconds.

"Trust me, you don't wanna know what she just said. Don't sweat it though, she'll keep you safe while your friends flutter off to do their thing. And you, sweet thing, your sister's inside. We had a bit of a falling out and long story short, she's webbed to the wall. I was considering cutting her down when this whole debacle started, but if y-"

He didn't even finish talking before Void had gone from releasing the elderly pony to the custody of the two officers and then straight on to running past him and inside his home.

"Heh, funny having a mare just running to my home without holding some sorta weapon. Aaah, good times. Anyway, come on, let's get inside and I'll prep some stuff to collect the wood, whilst you stay on your ride."

A few *words* of protest came from Felicia in regards to her being used as a transportable bed.

"Yeah well, tough. The poor gal did a number saving this place. Least we can do is giving her a ride. 'Sides, she's one of Rising's crew. Gotta be nice to her, right?"

He didn't get a response to that as Felicia began wandering inside the building again, awkwardly through the main door. She were better built to use the top hatch, not this one, but the mare would fall off if she did so, so begrudgingly, she had to make use of this entrance.

As for the new capture, he met the ones chaining him up with an apathetic laughter.

"You honestly think you can just lock me up? He's going to win, and when he does, he'll flay me and my family for my failure here, just to return us and start all over again. There's nothing you, or anyone else, can do against the disciple of Suusha."

His eyes glowed ever so slightly, but that had little to nothing to do with any active magic, and would prove itself to not be a danger of any sort to Orange or Fleet, whom would be able to get him away and ready for whatever would befall him. Without magic, he weren't much of a threat.

4 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

"That was you the last one?" the unicorn asked as she approached the still sitting earth pony.  Bash was simply staring up at the dust as it infected the wicker creatures and grunted solemnly.  The little wasps would be in for a nice surprise when they were greeted with their first Equestrian moon.

Out of the roughly two hundred wasps, 63 would be destroyed by the magical beams, and of the survivors, 125 would either be infected, or would infect their fellow hive members upon attempting to build new colonies. The remaining 12 would be split up into groups of 3 and 9, whom would go far, far away from this city in search of shelter, somewhere that ponies would not find them so easily. They had seen plenty enough resistance from that race to instinctively wanting to build their hives far from their populations, so that they may have a chance of rebuilding, though one from the larger hive did end up getting crushed underfoot of a large timberwolf matriarch as they flew away. Seemingly by accident, but the rest merely went on their way like nothing had happened.

It would involve them hibernating in a hollowed tree whilst their poison would make for a more suitable habitat, and for one among them to be transformed into a new queen. For the larger hive, this would take two weeks, whereas the smaller one would require six, and even after all of that, it would take months before anything resembling a functional hive would have a chance to develop. Much as the officers had tried, Equestria now had an invasive species, which were if nothing else, a partial win on behalf of Twisted.

4 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

Zapping the bindings with the release spell he had taught her, the bands dissolved and she was free.  Getting back to her hoofs to then work on closing this new rift as well. 

The rift would close itself before she got far, fizzling out after its usefulness had expired. Seeing as the detective and Twisted were no longer, fighting, she would not find other rifts coming her way anytime soon either. The Harrowmark menace had better things to do than to wander into Equestria whilst his adversary still breathed free air.

4 hours ago, Rising Dusk said:

There is one thing he could do though.  Focusing the wisps on the smallest part of the primordial tapestry, he poked and snipped with one goal in mind.  Severing the connection that was being drawn from the deity and feeding it back on itself.  Creating a nice little pocket that would give a pony trying to reconnect to it a nasty surprise

The ground shook as the detective meddled with the spellwork, and the small figure that had been standing still in the corrupted imagery, turned itself towards him. Its eyes shone with a sickly green as it focused all of its attention on the meddlesome outsider, who dared to interfere with powers beyond such a petty, mortal mind as his own.

"You Dare to mess with My source of power? Pathetic whelp, you will learn your place."

A dark tendril oozing of dark, primordial power left the altar and with incredible speed went straight for the detective. It would more than likely have caught him and brought the stallion in to be consumed as yet another sacrifice to the entity, if not a string of shining silver came out and wrapped itself around the tendril, and forced it back to where it came.

"Grrr, still you struggle? Your power wanes with every sacrifice in my name. Saving this petulant foal only serves to weaken you further."

Whoever this hateful, growling voice belonged to, were only met with silence from whoever kept him back, and soon after, the dark power would once again be locked down on the altar, corrupting the image behind it as it had done for a long time now. Rising would also find that his meddling of the magic had been undone, and further attempts at messing with this would likely result in him being engulfed for good next time. Whoever had found it needed to keep him alive were, as had been stated, weakened. A deity it were still, but the power were barely containing the darkness, which should be incredibly obvious to Rising's keen sight on how their magic compared.

If he wanted to cut a wedge between the power of Twisted and this deity that he served, Rising would have to find another way, as apparently, meddling with the deity itself were only going to cause further ruin.

"𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕤𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕕𝕟'𝕥 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕕𝕠𝕟𝕖 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕥."

He would also find that he had company. A spectral pony, in her twenties at the time of her demise by the looks of things, and sporting an outfit similar to what Lily wore back at the O.M.I. office. Just more modest, with a longer shirt and a less sizable hat. She appeared to have a green coat with a brown mane and tail in a flat, dull design, as well as crude glasses which she glanced at the detective through.

"𝕊𝕒𝕒𝕤𝕙𝕦 𝕚𝕤 𝕒 𝕤𝕡𝕚𝕥𝕖𝕗𝕦𝕝 𝕘𝕠𝕕, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕔𝕣𝕠𝕤𝕤𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕡𝕒𝕥𝕙 𝕓𝕣𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕠𝕟𝕝𝕪 𝕣𝕦𝕚𝕟 𝕥𝕠 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕓𝕝𝕠𝕠𝕕𝕝𝕚𝕟𝕖. ℍ𝕚𝕤 𝕖𝕤𝕔𝕒𝕡𝕖 𝕞𝕒𝕣𝕜𝕤 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕕𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕙..."

She floated around a little and gazed over things. It had been a long time since she had been something even resembling free, and having these sights again were perplexing her, almost as much as the fact that this outsider had been saved, when so many others had simply been devoured. What made Rising so special in the eyes of the warden? Were it that he could cleanse corruption? Where she hoping that perhaps he would be the one to turn the tide? Hm, the will and reasons of the gods were never clear, but this had to be considered.

"𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕤𝕚𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕤, 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕪 𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕤𝕒𝕗𝕖 𝕗𝕣𝕠𝕞 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕤𝕡?"

========================================================================================

 

@EQ_Theta

On 4/12/2019 at 2:40 AM, EQ_Theta said:

"You're getting there but Rosa's name has both short and long sounds. You're right in saying there is a long O sound but the A has a short sound. Twilight's name has short I sounds. Don't worry though, you'll get the hang of it with more practice." 

Hmm, and here she thought that she had understood it right. There were still much to learn here before she had the vowels down then, but it sounded like she understood two of them at least. It was a good place to start.

On 4/12/2019 at 2:40 AM, EQ_Theta said:

"Learning about words, being able to read, write, and speak are all important. It's how many communicate with each other, how we are talking with each other is a part of that. We'll end the lesson for tonight but I want you to know there is more to this than what I just taught you. The most important lesson here is to understand, not just to memorize. Words have meanings and it isn't enough to just know what a word looks or sounds like. When you put together entire sentences, the words used to form them create ideas. What we communicate and exchange are ideas; simply putting words together without understanding their meanings only makes nonsense."

"If you need time to process everything you learned, I won't keep you. I'll be here if you need anything."

After being faced with this barrage of things that she weren't entirely sure what meant, Omen would just space out again. As it had sounded important, she had tried to wrap her head around it, yet there had simply been too many big words and confusing things said within to make her able to get through it, and as such, she ended up shutting down once more.

Morning would come around with the sun starting to rise, and she would still not have moved a muscle, after about six hours of nothing. Rosa would start to move again before that, waking up with eyes wide open and letting out a loud gasp. His right front hoof went to his throat, feeling after something which had felt so real mere moments ago, but there were nothing. Nothing but the soreness of his body that made itself quite noticeable right after that.

At least the sun were not currently burning into his eyes. He used toned glasses for a reason, much like many other bat ponies who traversed in the day hours needed to. It wasn't so bad that light would literally blind him, but it were still annoying and limited his vision, which for somepony in his profession were a severe handicap. Couldn't have a spy that missed things easily.

"Urgh... How long were I out?"

Felt like it must have been a while, as he felt pretty knackered from laying on the ground. Few hours perhaps?

Looking around, his eyes quickly fell on the silent Omen standing in a strange position with a blank expression on her face. Seems like however long it had been, it had included another mind melt for the strange mare. Guess Lin and her must have discussed something important and potentially convoluted after he fell asleep.

==============================================================================================

 

@Lucid_Nightlight

Anomaly held her new four meter python and turned away from Pringles.

"Nuhuh, this one's mine. Eat one of the others."

The snake would wobble around, still not used to this elongated body of its, and upon slamming down and impacting Anomaly's head, she started to stroke the confused creature.

"There there Mr. Slithers. The bad, bad reptile isn't gonna get you. You just wait until we get you nice and mutated and you'll be much better than this grumpy meanie could be."

She pulled her tongue at the lizard (thankfully forgetting about the snake the others wanted sent towards the author) and if experience were to be believed, she were about to be bit again. These two would probably never get along. Especially not if Pringles tried to eat her new pet. If he did, she'd so find a way to open a portal back to her world, and sic her good old stone mutant on him. Datt Mamon should give the thing a right scare.

 

[Moonlit 593]

@Blitz Boom Serenade blinks, "You know, I've never thought to ask. I know she retired on medical grounds after the expedition. And her closet was ALWAYS offlimits to me, and I know she kept her armour in there. Night, I think?.....or Coast....I know she had a patch with the acronym REINS on it." She shrugs, "I know from what they've told me they found my egg near Horseshoe Bay. I plan on going to see them after, probably drag Ziggy with me. You want me to find out?"

[Early Sunsets 2,106]

@Blitz Boom

Zephyr nodded at the ponies who greeted him, but didn't stop to chat. He didn't particularly enjoy talking to ponies he didn't know, and his appointment certainly didn't make him any more sociable. He stopped by the door, took a deep breath, and walked into the room, only to stop abruptly when he saw another patient already in the room. "Did I walk into the wrong room? Or did the receptionist give me the wrong directions?" he thought, glancing at the two ponies. Once the doctor confirmed that he was in fact in the right place, however, he let out a small internal sigh.

Zephyr glanced at the unusual pony as she walked by. Even after having lived in a large city for the better part of ten years, he wasn't sure he'd ever seen anypony quite like that. He gave his head a small shake and turned back to the doctor. "Yeah, that's me." He walked nervously over to the examination table and sat down, perching on the edge of it. He thought for a moment and scratched the back of his head. "Now that I think about it, I have had trouble breathing sometimes the past few years. I always just assumed that was because I'm getting old, which feels strange to say."

[Lucid_Nightlight 923]

@Blitz Boom

Pringle was going to bite Anomaly, but he got distracted by a nearby cricket and ate it.

"That cricket never stood a chance. And Pringle, you really shouldn't eat snakes anyway, you're not supposed to eat anything larger than your head."

"Yeah! That's unhealthy!"

"Try something healthier like dirt or something."

[EQ_Theta 458]

@Blitz Boom

Seeing Omen space out and seemingly shut down as Lin finished the evening's lesson was a surprise to the latter. It was going very well until it ended, and somehow it was discouraging to Lin who spent the rest of the evening worrying and wondering about what she did wrong. Was it how she phrased her lesson? Too many big words? It was premature of her to suddenly go into this while expecting Omen to understand so much in such a short time. 

Even into the morning, Lin was restless. The morning sun had peered over the distant edge of the trees with the orange glow coming into view and the longma was pacing back and forth, many what ifs and what could have beens running through her head. The sound of Rosa's sudden gasp broke her from her focus, with her letting out a yelp in response. She stopped pacing about and looked to Rosa fortunate enough to catch his question. 

"Oh, good morning, Rosa. I'd say you were asleep for several hours. You fell asleep just as we finished setting up camp for the evening."

At that moment, Sen was stirring, then slowly waking up. His eyes opened to the sight of Lin, Omen, and Rosa coming into view with traces of the morning sun's light coming into the cave entrance. He noticed Lin was rather forlorn and confused, a look that he knew from before, one that told him she had a problem that she'd been dwelling on for a long time with no solution in sight. 

"Something's bothering you, sister," Sen chimed in. 

"I... I was teaching Omen how to read last night. It was going well but I'm afraid I messed up when Omen just stayed silent and didn't say anything after a while." She looked to Rosa and Sen this time, looking to know if they have something advice. "Could I have done better if I didn't use big words? Or maybe teach in a way that lets Omen discover what the lesson is on her own? Do either of you know if there is a good way to teach Omen how to read?"

Sen looked to the ground, then to Omen, unsure what to say and couldn't provide an answer. Lin then turned to Rosa hoping he might have some suggestions, though there's time enough for that later. 

"How are you feeling, Rosa? Sleep well?"

Edited April 14, 2019 by EQ_Theta

[Catpone Cerberus 23,591]

@Blitz Boom
Ruby didn't think much about being ignored, Zebras may be intelligent, but they still lacked the senses to see through her disguise, and why would they care about random mare? Sure she had expected someone to at least look at her necklace, but she didn't really care. Seeing things like blood of elders mad Ruby curious though, as she knew someone who would have use for something like that, so she wondered if he was here, since he wasn't the most law-abiding pony out there even though he wasn't a criminal either. to her usual manner, she responded by just nodding when Marley explained about the sleeping zebra.

Ruby too rolled her eyes, she had totally forgotten that zebras spoke like that, it was particularly annoying for her because while zebras were sometimes rather cryptic when they spoke, she preferred quick and clear conversations. She got wary when they got in, seeing that things seemed....too inviting, for her especially, considering that there was meat and a cup of blood.

(I assumed you left the drink to my choice, inform me if I was wrong so I can remove that part.)

The zebra's reaction to them and the fact that she knew Ruby's name and seemed to hint at knowing what she was naturally didn't help with Ruby's wariness, even though she had heard that their kind had habit of....knowing things, and she didn't do anything..at all really, as she just stayed silent and let Marley talk, only blinking as a gesture of greeting. In normal situation she would have probably at least threatened the zebra, but she didn't want to risk it for too reasons, first being that they were still in very public place, and she didn't believe a tent would hide much if she attacked, and second was because she wasn't stupid and could guess that someone who seemed to know too much about her would also prepare for her possible attack.....and there was also the fact that they were here for her help, and it would be idiotic to attack someone just before asking for their help.

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Nada bowed as a thank you "May your days and nights be pleasant too Lyriel, you're also welcome to visit me regardless how the situation with ponies end up." Nada smiled at the phoenix as it came to do it's what she assumed was bye bye of sorts "And it was nice to meet you too Agni, you're always welcome to come and listen my songs if feel like it.". She chuckled a bit at the interaction between Agni and Fah'lina, but then turned towards Fah'lina "Aright Fah'lina, we should head back home so nobody gets worried" she then after waving to Lyriel and Agni dived into the river.