open Casual stroll

[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 23,426]

@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.

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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 415]

@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 4,427]

@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.

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@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."

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@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?"

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@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.

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@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?"

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@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 415]

@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 23,426]

@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 26,066]

@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 4,427]

@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 415]

@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 23,426]

@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.

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

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. 

 

 

[Rising Dusk 26,066]

@Blitz Boom

The plan seemed solid in his mind.  Well, it was a plan anyways, just not a good one.  Even with his extra magic sense though, it did little in the grand scheme of things in understanding the primordial magics contained in this alter.  Although he had a hoof up than any pony else, that hoof up though might as been one against a mountain that reached the Moon.  While he wasn't expecting the figure on the alter to actually move and speak to him, he was less expecting the sudden attack.  Quickly putting up a wisp raging barrier, not really all that sure even his counter magic could stand against such unfamiliar magics as this.  It was better than just standing there though. 

Luckily he didn't have to find out though as he was saved for an unknown force.  The silver light, primordial in its own right, but not matching the signature of the attacker in the least.  A second entity? Not really all that much of a question when the darker being confirmed it right after on its own.  How did he miss that?  The vile corrupted magic of the alter must have drawn his attention too much.  And all his work a cutting the connection between Twisted Gears and this alter, had been undone.  "Tough thread..." he commented, but this wasn't a puzzle he was going to give up on.  Dropping his barrier, he reached deeper into the tangled mess of primordial magics.  Sifting through the dark magic piece by piece... There, a silver weave weakly tangled in with the corruption, keeping it secure and trapped.  Although it had saved him not moments ago, the detective was cautious.  Light and Dark were merely powers, not necessarily linked to good or evil.

Rising Dusk was able to see the intent of magics in Equestria, but these tapestries he was observing now were in a completely different language.  Well, that was the best way of putting it anyways.  Forces of nature that he'd love to learn the language of, but he was pretty confident his mind wasn't ready for such a thing.  Extending his senses deeper into the matrix of magic before him to try and find more of what was the silver magic, he could feel the strain of focus starting to take it's toll.  Pulling himself back before he was lost in such otherworldly phenomenons.  

Pulling his senses back suddenly made him aware he wasn't alone in the room anymore.  Nearly jumping out of his skin at the sight of a spectral ghost pony standing by him, reminding him of his fruitless efforts.  The pocket watch in the other room ticked, sending a ripple of green magic through the spider web of threads Rising Dusk had used to connect all the objects and another dozen souls were freed.  Perhaps she was one of the souls freed from the first tick of the watch?  Was she one of the souls that had taken refugee in his mind and had been whispering among the many others?  At this point it was hard to keep up.  With so many whispering talking together, picking out a voice even with his memory recall was impossible.

"It appears Dispelling more than a shadow of a deity's magic is a bit beyond my current abilities," the detective admitted.  He was also starting to notice a common thread in dark beings always being after one's bloodline.  A study for another time.  Turning to more fully face the specter as she floated about the room.  "Were you not free to move on?  Does my spell matrix need alteration?" Rising Dusk asked, taping his chin in thought as he recalled the work he had done.  His knowledge of ghosts seemed pretty limited too as he pulled up books he read on the topic.  Nothing he pursued too heavily.

The sisters?  The unicorn put his hoof down and focusing.  Thus far witches from these lands asking about the sisters lead to a fight.  "Yes," he responded cautiously, reaching out with his senses ready for an attack. 

Edited April 15, 2019 by Rising Dusk

[Blitz Boom 4,427]

@Catpone Cerberus

Marley let out a sigh of relief as he saw that Ruby had not retaliated in some sort of way over the zebra. Unfortunately, this were the kind of behavior that you had to get used to when dealing with their kind, and this one were among the worse, as she did not have the decency to allow anyone the bliss of being unaware of her knowing more than she should. For a zebra, Zhiira were rather blunt.

"I thank you for not reacting poorly to this first impression, Ruby. Zhiira is a great enchantress, yet her manners can be somewhat lacking."

"Have I not set my table, the best I am able?"

"You are well aware what I mean. Regardless, as I see you expected us quite some time ago, I take it that you also have what we are seeking?"

The zebra chuckled and pointed towards the seats and the things she had set up for them.

"I do, yet why move in such a hurry? Indulge a lone mare, and soon you''ll have no worry."

There didn't seem to be a way around this, so Marley had a seat and took a small sip of the tinglyweed tea that had been prepared. Not a rarity by any means, but having it done properly sometimes felt like it, and as could be expected from Zhiivra, the balance were exquisite. He imagined that the cup of blood presented to Ruby would be to her liking as well, were she to try it, though he were not keen on asking where it had come from. Considering she were no hunter, she had probably gotten it from one of the other exiles during a trade, but you never knew with this one. Could well be that somewhere nearby, there were a creature wondering why it were bleeding from a wound that it had not seen happening.

"You wish to be free, of gazes and scrutiny? Then please, have a seat, and perhaps enjoy some meat? It is as fresh as could be, I can assure thee."

The tone in that last statement, along with the dark glimmer that went over the zebra's eye's, might seem like she were hinting at containing a great darkness, but Marley knew her enough to be aware that she simply found entertainment in theatrics. Ruby should be able to tell as well, since her senses would be keener, and therefor shouldn't have much issue noticing the small signs of this being a little jest, though she weren't joking when she said that the meat were as fresh as one could imagine. She knew well that dragons who ate meat, cared not for old leftovers. It were beneath them to enjoy second rate food like that.

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

 

@Catpone Cerberus

The mimic would pull her tongue at the bird before quickly diving down to avoid a fireball headed her way. Lyriel were still trying to get used to these birds holding such destructive elemental power, and winched as the fire passed her. It were one of many reasons why she tried her best to ensure that the scattered nests of these creatures were kept safe, and that the creatures themselves were treated with respect. Nothing good would come from irate beings who could burn the forest down to a pile of ash, if they for some reason wished to. It did not mean that she were going to chase them away or anything though. She had found that if she treated them with the dignity and kindness that she would any other, they would come to accept her, and in some cases like with Agni, would even find some degree of joy in her presence. A rather testing interaction the first week she were here, that were for sure.

Whilst she stayed back here and prepared to go on to see how other animals were doing, Fah'lina would swim with Nada back to where they had come from. A short and uneventful trip, but they had already experienced quite a lot today, so perhaps it were for the best that things slowed down for a little. Give them a bit of time to catch their breath, so to speak.

One fish would try to get near and have a bite of mimic, but the critter shades the sharp-toothed fish away with a display of her over-sized maw and a hiss vibrating through the water. It lost its lust for a furry snack at that point, and scurried away, provided that Nada weren't feeling peckish.

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@Moonlit

"I were just curious,and I don't know that patch you talk about, but if she follows her eternal majesty, Princess Luna, let her know that the descendants of the most devout salute her for her service. Shrine Maiden or Night Guard, we all do what we must for the princess of the night, even when she are not among us."

The Shrine Maidens considered themselves to be the most devout, as they had lived and died in the name of the princess for a thousand years worth of generations, yet they did not think any less of the Night Guard. Their ancestors were once among them too, and even though they had not had a lifetime of war to their name, they were still there to help keep the country safe, and after the return of Princess Luna, had gotten in line to follow her orders and protect her without questioning. To Last, any member of the Night Guard, former or present, deserved her respect, albeit she would still question the devotion of some of them regardless, but that would depend on the pony in question.

"If she were among the others, her work were still good. Our history books tells us that all branches were important for the country, even if they couldn't work together. I've heard they have finally changed that. Now that her majesty is back, that's probably for the best."

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

 

@Zephyr / Karou

"Breathing problems are not a good sign in somepony your age. Have you experienced any heightened anxiety or stress in the situations when you feel short of breath?"

The doctor had a worried frown on his face and used his horn to gather some tools up from the walls. Starting with a stethoscope, which he placed on Zephyr's chest and asked him to take a few calm, deep breaths so that he could hear if something were the matter there. If that didn't turn out to be the case, he would have to go through several other steps, as there could be reasons big and small for this sort of thing. Anxiety or stress were something which should cause too much concern, unless it happened more frequently than once every few months, in which case a change of lifestyle were going to be needed. Same thing if it turned out that perhaps Zephyr had a lack of iron in his diet, which would make it harder for his body to transfer enough oxygen around his system, though the breathing would likely be a more frequent issue if that were the case, and might have something to do with long periods of times with unhealthy eating habits.

Then there were of course the more unsettling reasons, but hopefully that wouldn't be the case. A treatment for that could be a long and potentially painful process.

Back at the reception, the Coast Guard had wandered over to the desk and after a few minutes, managed to get a time reserved for three days after this. The receptionist didn't seem to care any more that it were a guard than she had about Zephyr, not even when the mare made a small salute and wandered over towards the door.

However, she halted as her eyes fell on Sun Fire, and after a few seconds just standing there, she wandered calmly over towards the mare and cleared her throat, trying to gain the attention of the mare.

"Excuse me, but are you... Sun Fire? I don't mean to pry, but others where I am stationed have talked about a mare of that name that looks strikingly like you."

The guard were not going to freak, and would keep her distance out of respect of the mare's privacy. She were simply curious. Especially since from what she had heard, this mare were mainly in Manehattan. Quite a trip from there to Ponyville.

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

 

@EQ_Theta

"Treat her like a foal, and start off with picture books. It have visual representations to help her understand what each word is.

You two have known her for longer, so if you know better than this, then go with that, but from what I have seen she copes poorly with a lot of information that requires her to think over what it means. Big words are one thing, but contradictions are a problem too, though I think this have more to do with what she spoke about with having too much in her head right now. We're giving her too much information without allowing her to go through what she already haves. I would suggest that perhaps it would be good to allow her some alone time soon, to just stand around and get through things at her own pace. When her head is cleared up, perhaps she can take more with the lessons, though again, picture books. Just try and inform her not to eat them."

It felt good to not have to be limited by sore lungs right now when he had to go through his thoughts and opinions on the matter of Omen and her... Situation. Rest of him still felt sore, but being able to speak normally were a good sign at least.

As for Omen, this were just his own, personal observations so far. He didn't consider them complete, as there had been many things to focus on, but from what he had gathered at least, Omen were essentially just an ancient being, with the mind of a preschooler. At least when it came to the reading, writing, and likely math as well. Essentials that had not been taught her, and apparently she hadn't been able to pick up on without help from a master who likely had her more focused on learning her other things that had seemed more important than literary abilities. If the world had stayed chaotic, he had no doubt that that would have been the case, yet as Discord had lost and the world gotten stable, this were now among more essential things that she had to learn sooner or later.

That Lin were trying now were commendable, but it would have to be taken slow, and she could likely learn something from how ponies taught the youngest foals. Omen seemed able to absorb knowledge at an increased space if she could fit it into some sort of reason into her mind, so perhaps she'd be well versed in like... 2-3 months, if the studying course was made properly and explained very slowly, with a lot of patience and understanding of when to use bigger words.

"It's good that you're trying to teach her this in any case. She's going to need it to move forward and be able to teach herself some things too, and if you'd like, I can recommend some books to start you off with. The library in Canterlot should have a large section of them, and provided I don't get jailed when we return to Canterlot, I can show you where things are.

And before you ask, yes, I know my way there because I did some of my work in that library. I would prefer not to say who I was trailing though, if that is okay."

There were enough shame in most of his work as it were without him having to add to it by sharing less than ideal details about who his targets may be. Hindsight were an ugly thing that had beaten him over the head many times as it were, and though he would give a name if asked to, he would prefer to hold some things to himself. At least until he'd be interrogated.

"In any case, we'll have to wait and see when she starts to move again. Could be hours or even days more. Worst case scenario, we might have to carry her to the courthouse and try to explain it away as her being some sort of realistic doll. I mean no disrespect to her, but it wouldn't be the most difficult thing to convince others off in this state.

And no, I did not sleep well, but something tells me that I won't for a long, long time either. The swamp gave my nightmares some new ways to torment me that's proving to be disturbingly effective."

Unconsciously, Rosa directed a hoof to his neck to feel if there were something once again, but thankfully still found nothing. This particular nightmare had been a testing one, but he wouldn't burden them with details. It wouldn't make the day any better for them, and frankly, he just didn't want to talk about that. He'd rather go over every detail of his work than speaking of what tormented his mind once more.

"Do we still have some rations left?"

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

 

@Lucid_Nightlight

"Then make him bigger, and he can eat lots of things. Come on, you could ride him like the coolest mount in all of the deserts. I could get it done in a snap."

She still didn't like the lizard, but supersizing animals were always fun, and she did kinda wanna see what this gluttonous beast would do if he had the size and power to eat bigger prey. Perhaps eat a pony or something, she didn't know, though he'd best not try her. Draconequui were not good for the stomach.

"I'll throw in some bells and a pair of fuzzy dice? Lumen, can you think of anything else I can use to bribe them?"

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

 

@Rising Dusk

When he were rummaging around the threads and finding those belonging to the being keeping Suusha trapped, Rising would find that a sense if pleading would reach out to him. As if something were asking for help, yet had no voice to speak with. He would also find that said magic - though vast in power - were waning under the force of the darkness. Could be anything from a week to a century, but sooner or later, the entrapment would fail. That were an inevitable reality, as grim as it may sound.

"𝔾𝕠𝕠𝕕. 𝕃𝕠𝕟𝕘 𝕒𝕤 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕪 𝕣𝕖𝕞𝕒𝕚𝕟 𝕠𝕦𝕥 𝕠𝕗 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕘𝕣𝕒𝕤𝕡, 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕖 𝕚𝕤 𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕥𝕚𝕞𝕖."

The specter were not going to attack Rising. Quite to the contrary, she had stood ready to force him away if needed be when he once again had started to meddle in the fabric of Suusha's magic. A foolish action that could lead to nothing but ruin, yet it were not her call to make. Besides, this outsider... To even be able to see the weave that made up the deity's magic, were a strong and dangerous skill. There may be a reason why the weakened goddess had found it needed to save this one, when so many more would perish if her power waned completely.

Landing on the ground, she slowly took a step towards a former cursed object on the table - a now cracked glass orb - where she had just heard several voices cry out in joy as they had been released. To think how many more of them had become nothing but victims or ingredients in these vile contraptions...

"𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕗𝕣𝕖𝕖𝕕 𝕞𝕒𝕟𝕪, 𝕚𝕟𝕔𝕝𝕦𝕕𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕞𝕖, 𝕓𝕦𝕥 𝕀 𝕒𝕞 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕪𝕖𝕥 𝕗𝕚𝕟𝕚𝕤𝕙𝕖𝕕 𝕠𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕡𝕝𝕒𝕟𝕖. ℕ𝕠𝕥 𝕒𝕤 𝕝𝕠𝕟𝕘 𝕒𝕤 𝕊𝕦𝕦𝕤𝕙𝕒 𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕥𝕖𝕒𝕣𝕤 𝕒𝕥 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕔𝕒𝕘𝕖 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕗𝕣𝕖𝕖𝕕𝕠𝕞 𝕚𝕟 𝕤𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥.

𝕎𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕝𝕚𝕥𝕥𝕝𝕖 𝕞𝕒𝕘𝕚𝕔 𝕤𝕙𝕖 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕝𝕖𝕗𝕥 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕤𝕡𝕖𝕟𝕥 𝕞𝕒𝕚𝕟𝕥𝕒𝕚𝕟𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕡𝕣𝕚𝕤𝕠𝕟, 𝕪𝕖𝕥 𝕠𝕟𝕝𝕪 𝕠𝕟𝕖 𝕝𝕠𝕔𝕜 𝕣𝕖𝕞𝕒𝕚𝕟𝕤 𝕥𝕠 𝕜𝕖𝕖𝕡 𝕙𝕚𝕞 𝕥𝕚𝕖𝕕 𝕕𝕠𝕨𝕟, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕓𝕪 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝, 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕤𝕚𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕤 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕜𝕖𝕪 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕠𝕡𝕖𝕟 𝕚𝕥."

While the aura of the sisters may seem like something a spell could just replicate, it were a special and unique condition that if remade by a spell, would be possible to just dispel like any other work of magic. Even for a weakened god, this wouldn't be the most daunting task.

The sisters however, had their effects somehow in the bloodline. It couldn't be countered,  as there were no spell on them. Whoever had spawned them may have had one, yet this were genetic, and if they were sacrificed in Suusha's honor, they may well end up unlocking the cage for good, and then Harrowmark would be engulfed in a darkness that would be impossible to escape.

Null and Void weren't the first picks in this endeavor though. There had been one other, whom had passed by the country very briefly around twenty five or so years ago, but the witch had never been able to get a lead, and then suddenly, two fillies had entered their country, carrying the same abilities, and tried to settle down. He had nearly had them too, but the villagers had chased them away before that, and Twisted had been left with empty hooves and a thirst for vengeance. He had not been merciful upon the villagers, which some of the souls released now were a testimony towards.

"𝕐𝕠𝕦 𝕔𝕒𝕞𝕖 𝕙𝕖𝕣𝕖 𝕥𝕠 𝕥𝕒𝕜𝕖 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕕𝕚𝕤𝕔𝕚𝕡𝕝𝕖, 𝕓𝕦𝕥 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕪𝕠𝕦𝕣 𝕙𝕖𝕒𝕣𝕥 𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕚𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤, 𝕤𝕖𝕖𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕓𝕠𝕟𝕕 𝕥𝕠 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕘𝕠𝕕 𝕚𝕤 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕤𝕠 𝕖𝕒𝕤𝕚𝕝𝕪 𝕓𝕣𝕠𝕜𝕖𝕟? 𝕊𝕦𝕦𝕤𝕙𝕒 𝕗𝕖𝕖𝕕𝕤 𝕙𝕚𝕞 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕡𝕠𝕨𝕖𝕣 𝕥𝕠 𝕞𝕒𝕟𝕚𝕡𝕦𝕝𝕒𝕥𝕖 𝕥𝕚𝕞𝕖, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕤𝕖 𝕕𝕚𝕤𝕥𝕣𝕒𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟𝕤 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕕𝕠 𝕟𝕠𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕓𝕦𝕥 𝕒𝕟𝕘𝕖𝕣 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕞 𝕓𝕠𝕥𝕙. 𝕆𝕟𝕝𝕪 𝕒 𝕗𝕠𝕠𝕝 𝕨𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕕 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕣𝕦𝕟 𝕟𝕠𝕨, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕡𝕣𝕒𝕪 𝕥𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕙𝕖 𝕨𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕕 𝕟𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕣 𝕓𝕖 𝕗𝕠𝕦𝕟𝕕 𝕒𝕘𝕒𝕚𝕟.

𝕐𝕖𝕥, 𝕚𝕗 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕚𝕟𝕤𝕚𝕤𝕥 𝕠𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕕𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕡𝕒𝕥𝕙... 𝕀 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕙𝕖𝕝𝕡 𝕪𝕠𝕦. 𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕘𝕠𝕕𝕕𝕖𝕤𝕤 𝕤𝕖𝕖𝕞𝕤 𝕥𝕠 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕡𝕦𝕥 𝕤𝕠𝕞𝕖 𝕗𝕒𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕚𝕟 𝕪𝕠𝕦, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕥𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙 𝕀 𝕕𝕠𝕦𝕓𝕥 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕔𝕒𝕟 𝕕𝕠 𝕞𝕦𝕔𝕙 𝕥𝕠 𝕤𝕥𝕠𝕡 𝕨𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕚𝕤 𝕥𝕠 𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕖, 𝕀 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕤𝕥𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕗𝕠𝕝𝕝𝕠𝕨 𝕙𝕖𝕣 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝. ℙ𝕖𝕣𝕙𝕒𝕡𝕤 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕗𝕚𝕟𝕕 𝕒 𝕨𝕖𝕒𝕜𝕟𝕖𝕤𝕤 𝕚𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕚𝕟𝕥𝕣𝕚𝕔𝕒𝕥𝕖 𝕨𝕖𝕓, 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕗𝕚𝕟𝕒𝕝𝕝𝕪 𝕓𝕣𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕞𝕪 𝕠𝕝𝕕 𝕗𝕣𝕚𝕖𝕟𝕕 𝕥𝕠 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕜𝕟𝕖𝕖𝕤."

A long shot to put it mildly, but if the goddess saw it fit to spare him, this outsider must be worth a fair chance. If everything failed, she would pray that she could at least drag his spirit off with her, before the witch got it. She imagined that all the hardships that could befall a creature would, if the deity and Twisted were to defeat Rising, which by far seemed the most likely outcome. It were what had happened to so many others who had tried to go against these two in the past several centuries, and she were painfully aware of this, as she had been forced to witness many of the things that happened to those who tried to rise up against Twisted. Her own punishment, for refusing to abandon her goddess those many moons ago.

"𝕋𝕙𝕖 𝕨𝕖𝕒𝕜𝕟𝕖𝕤𝕤 𝕝𝕚𝕖𝕤 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕨𝕚𝕥𝕙 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕘𝕠𝕕𝕤 𝕥𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙. 𝕎𝕖 𝕒𝕣𝕖 𝕞𝕖𝕣𝕖 𝕞𝕠𝕣𝕥𝕒𝕝𝕤. 𝕎𝕖 𝕔𝕒𝕟𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕙𝕠𝕡𝕖 𝕥𝕠 𝕕𝕖𝕗𝕖𝕒𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕞. 𝔹𝕦𝕥 𝕚𝕗 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕔𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕕 𝕥𝕒𝕣𝕟𝕚𝕤𝕙 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕓𝕠𝕟𝕕 𝕓𝕖𝕥𝕨𝕖𝕖𝕟 𝕊𝕦𝕦𝕤𝕙𝕒 𝕒𝕟𝕕 𝕋𝕨𝕚𝕤𝕥𝕖𝕕, 𝕡𝕖𝕣𝕙𝕒𝕡𝕤 𝕥𝕙𝕖 𝕔𝕠𝕣𝕣𝕦𝕡𝕥𝕖𝕣 𝕨𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕕 𝕗𝕖𝕖𝕝 𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕡𝕠𝕨𝕖𝕣 𝕨𝕒𝕟𝕖, 𝕥𝕙𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙 𝕨𝕙𝕒𝕥 𝕨𝕠𝕦𝕝𝕕 𝕙𝕒𝕡𝕡𝕖𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕟 𝕀 𝕕𝕠 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕜𝕟𝕠𝕨. 𝕄𝕪 𝕘𝕠𝕕𝕕𝕖𝕤𝕤 𝕙𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕓𝕖𝕖𝕟 𝕘𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕝𝕪 𝕨𝕖𝕒𝕜𝕖𝕟𝕖𝕕, 𝕤𝕠 𝕡𝕖𝕣𝕙𝕒𝕡𝕤 𝕖𝕧𝕖𝕟 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕟 𝕚𝕥 𝕞𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕓𝕖 𝕖𝕟𝕠𝕦𝕘𝕙 𝕗𝕠𝕣 𝕙𝕖𝕣 𝕥𝕠 𝕗𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥 𝕙𝕚𝕞."

Edited April 15, 2019 by Blitz Boom

[Lucid_Nightlight 923]

@Blitz Boom

"Pringle likes to stand on my head, so making him larger would make him unable to do that."

"Yeah! Pringle wants to stand on his head!"

Lumen looked under the table and found a half-eaten taco.

"Bribe them with this."

[EQ_Theta 415]

@Blitz Boom

"Not much in the way of rations, three packs of vegetables and some dried berries. The latter is on us because there wasn't enough to cover everyone and we thought you wanted something to eat last night. Should be good for one more meal." Sen had tucked away the last of the rations in his pack the evening before and handed one to Rosa along with a generous helping of berries. 

"Picture books..." Lin muttered, staring at the ground before noticing some rations sliding under her nose and drawing her attention back to reality. "Might be useful. I was just about to introduce double vowel sounds and silent letters to her but that'll be really confusing for Omen. Thank you for your offer, Rosa. I'm sure Omen will love seeing those!"

For now, it would seem like Lin is more optimistic about their progress once more. It still bothered her a bit but perhaps there might be some way to provide better instruction to Omen with visuals. She appeared to have a grasp of a lesson when there is something to refer to and something to see. Those books might come in handy. Thing is, Lin was already familiar with the library in Canterlot, having passed by it more than once but like Rosa, she had a sordid past with the place. There wasn't a place or time she could talk about it, preferring to keep her lips pursed on what she really did there years ago. There was a reason the restricted section was under lock and key, surrounded by a patrol of night guards doing the rounds. She wouldn't prod Rosa on his story out of respect. 

"The nightmares just won't make things easy for anyone. Sometimes they feel real, a little too real that you'd wake up in a cold sweat." Sen paused for a moment, about to lapse into a lengthy spiel about nightmares and talking from personal experience. He looked to Omen, hoping she'd be moving about and joining them for breakfast but she must have had a lot of information to process. 

"But there's still the matter of the trial today. I'm just hoping it goes well. I'd hate to see Filigree walking away and feel like everything we went through was for nothing. How long do trials last, if I may ask? You think we'd probably be in Canterlot a while longer?"

[Catpone Cerberus 23,426]

@Blitz Boom
Again Ruby didn't say anything, she didn't have any reason to since Marley seemed to do the talking, though she almost said something to Marley after he thanked her for not being an idiot, as it was slightly insulting.
She just stood there with deadpan expression as Marley and the zebra had their conversation, and only sat down after the zebra asked her to, not because she wanted her permission, but because it was implied that it was the only way to get this thing done. 

Ruby indeed was able to know the real intent behind Zhiira's tiny gesture, but she still examined what had been served to make sure there was nothing that didn't belong in them before actually consuming anything. After making sure there wasn't anything that she knew could harm her, she took a piece out of the meat, which indeed was fresh, like was the blood, a rather rare treat outside freshly killed prey, since such things lost their freshness pretty quickly. 

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Nada let the fish swim away, and just chuckled at the small interaction between it and Fah'lina, she didn't really know why she did find such things amusing, but she assumed it was because of her past isolation, since amusement was rather rare around the lake. When the two would arrive to the house, Nada slowed down and raised from the water quite slowly in case there was someone home, because she didn't want to scare them by suddenly appearing behind them or something.

[Moonlit 593]

@Blitz Boom Serenade nods, "I'll let her know. I know she was really happy when Princess Luna returned, and was doubly happy when something with the Night Guard happened. She was over the moon" Serenade smiles, "when I told her I reported directly to Luna." She puffs her chest out, she is proud of her position. 

[FanOfManyShows 396]

@Blitz Boom

She looked at him, curious yet also surprised that such a word was a swear. She'd figure something like that would be, safer.
"It's not like I need to know that though."

She picked up a book she saw on the table and looked to the cover. "Oh interesting, Astral wrote a diary."
She turned slowly to Chow, her look without words asking the question she pondered. 'Wanna read it?''

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

Sapphire chuckled as she watched Iron pull out the book. "This sounds weirdly easy."

Iron glanced at her. "What sounds easy can be hard to perform."
He said this will pulling out the specified book, pulling together everything he could gather.
"Even if the soul escapes we could just find something else."

He scanned the words of the book, every letter and in between that might risk failure if missed, you could see the calculations in his eyes.While reading it he got things together, Sapphire finding a stick and lighting it with a simple spell.The interior of the crystal glowed as he spent whatever magic was left inside while casting the spell, and then a soul ripped it's way out of the rat. With a eerily similar appearance to Emerald's own form currently. Eventually they got it inside the crystal with some time and a lot of trying to catch it

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

The general let out a breath of relief, as if he'd been holding his breath the entire time.
"Really?"

"Because I can't handle this persona of a general, I'm not used to doing more than pointing a stick at somepony while giving orders, let alone an entire army.
Yet somehow, despite all odds I handled a powerful wizard." He said with a weirdly crazy chuckle before abruptly stopping. "But anyway, Shark Bay sounds nice."

The spotting of a unicorn guard caught his eye, whom appeared to have been there for a while. "Wait, who are you?" He looked to the unicorn, who would've arrived when Screecher left if Tidal had noticed her earlier, she glanced at both of them.

"So sorry, I got lost a bit. Not used to this area of Canterlot."  She rubbed the back of her head, smiling awkwardly. "What was that about?"

"Ahem, your name?"

"Oh! I'm Opal Luck." She said, chuckling again as her composure continued to fall apart.

[Sekel 685]

@FanOfManyShows

WATTS MECHANO

"So you can't care or you won't care of what you think of this mare?" Watts questioned before spotting a familiar alleyway and trotted to it, forcing Zealous to follow after.

@Blitz Boom

TWILIGHT SPARKLE

Twilight noticed the way Nerzhei revered her book and sighed softly. "Yes, I think it is time I went to bed. I'll just put away what we've done and store the scroll here," she told Nerzhei, magicking the scrolls and quills into a compartment in her desk. "If you need access, you can just press the top of this panel with your claw," she added, and where there was once a smooth desk, she put her hoof on a section in the upper right corner, and a section of the desk slid open to reveal the scrolls and quills. "I'm sorry I can't answer more of your questions because I don't know the answer to them myself."

@Blitz Boom

KARMIC FATE

"Oh, don't mind me. I'm just going out of my mind here," Karmic muttered in frustration when she slammed the last Equestrian book down on her pile. She ignored the timid pony that spoke with them in favor of sitting to the side and staring hard at a patch of grass in front of her hooves.

'Easy, little Fate. You'd either throw us both in jail with that attitude or you'll wind up burning a hole in that grass patch,' Atzy communicated to Karmic, causing to form a growling sound from her throat.

@Blitz Boom

AURORA LIGHTS

"Yes, sir, I can do that. You can count on me!" Aurora grinned, giving Happy a small salute. She resumed her walk with him and was content in the silence, glad that nothing was out to get them yet.