Esquestria: The House of the Sun - A pony cultist experience

[OurLadyOfWires]

"This Library used to have another section, you know? Or maybe this place is a section of that first Library? Well, it doesn't really matter. What matters is that you are here now, so what can I help you with?"

"No, you don't need a library card. You pay with your time, dear. But then again, isn't that the currency we use for everything else? Well, there is also blood of course, but please don't get blood on the books like some of our patrons did."

"What was that? You want to know what happened? Nothing much, really. Just that same old and tired story. They came with their pitchforks, and their torches, and their anger. And they never really realized they were burning their own land."

"The old address? Well, that is something I can give you. There are still plenty of great books there, but be careful not to anger any of the ghosts!"



[Side-stories, omakes and outright theorycrafts will follow, haphazardly and out of order. Here you will see anything that has been made with love and dedication, and that someone, somewhere, deemed precious enough to commit into eternity.]

[CANON stories will have their titles starting with "What of..."]

[NON-CANON stories will have their titles starting with "In which..."]

[IMAGES will have their titles starting with "A look at..." since we do not have a dedicated media threadmark]

Spoiler: Other quests and stories - Did you know we have neighbors?

These are two stories from people who participate in this quest of ours that you should definitely take a look at if you have the time!

Earth Bet: House of the Sun (Cultist Simulator/Worm)

You've been recruited into a cult, something small that turned out to be just a little bit more. However you can't just leave, you agree with their points after all. The world is crooked and there are things older than the history that is known. A shame that most people aren't likely to see it...

forums.sufficientvelocity.com

Chthonic Paean

We call upon the Malachite; who is succulent, who encompasseth, who is renewed. Recursive fanfiction of Esquestria: The House of the Sun, with permission from @OurLadyOfWires. Updates Thursday evenings.

forum.questionablequesting.com

Thank you for your efforts, and I hope we can have a wonderful time reading your stories!

 

[OurLadyOfWires]

Spoiler: Author's Note

Originally, this story was written and posted in another site.

This post was a "celebratory" post, written when the story first reached the mark of one thousand pages of discussion.

- - -



You open your eyes lazily, the softness of your silk-covered bed making itself known as consciousness slowly returns to your body.

You stay like that for a while, of course, enjoying the simple pleasure of being comfortable while lying on your bed. The minutes stretching by as the sunlight calmly shifts its position through the window. You stay like that, lying on your bed, for a long, long while. Until your limbs start to itch and you feel the need to start moving.

So, you do just that. You get up, and begin the long process of stretching your body, letting out a loud meow as you do that.

Yes, a meow.

Because you are definitely not a pony (and thank goodness for that).

Quite au contraire.

You are Opalescence, Opal for short, and you are a cat. But more importantly, you are a cat who just woke up.

Which means that you should go find something to do, lest boredom claims you.

"Meow," you say to yourself, nodding at your own wisdom.

And with that, you hop out of your bed, making your way to the open window and to the world outside.



- - -



You stroll around the rooftops of Ponyville, watching as the crowds of loud ponies trot here and there on the streets far below.

Their workings, as always, feel like a mystery to you. A mysterious hassle, that is, with the way they always seem to be so busy and worried about this and that, and most of the time seem to be trying to fix problems that they themselves create.

But it's what makes them happy, you suppose, so you won't judge them too harshly for it. Take your own pet pony for example. It would not do if Rarity spent the whole day spoiling you and fawning over you. If that were to happen, you would never have time for yourself! So, you suppose it's good that they create their own little troubles to take care of.

However, the fact remains that the affairs of ponies are ultimately not of your concern, so you pay little attention to the crowd of multicolored giants that surround the houses that you are using to navigate the city.

Jump up to a wall, jump down from a rooftop, walk by the shadows of a narrow alley, exchange pleasantries with another cat that you stroll by. You let your paws guide you through the city, walking around without any particular destination in mind, until you spot a familiar building in the distance.

A large multi-colored building, that you know your pet pony visits every now and then. One of your friends also lives there, mind you, although he is a bit of an odd fellow that doesn't speak much. Probably because his race is cold-blooded, or so the gossiping goes.

You wonder for a few moments if you will make that place your next stop, and you shrug, realizing that you don't really mind either way. If nothing else, your friend's pet pony usually gives you a suitable serving of milk, as every good host should, so you suppose you could grace that place with your presence today.

With that in mind, you walk in through the pink open doors of Sugarcube Corner.

"Oh! Hi there, Opal, how are you today?" the large pink pony, who is standing behind the counter, speaks up to you before you even finish entering the building.

Naturally, you meow back at her.

"Awesome! And you also arrived just in time," she says, "I've been having this shuddering in my hoofs all day, ever since I woke up, so I'm sure they'll be here any second now. Say, why don't you pick a nice spot while I go fetch something for you?"

The pony talks excitedly, and perhaps a little too fast, and disappears into a door that leads to the back not long after.

You have no idea what she was talking about, of course. But every time you come and visit she always does that, so you don't really mind. And more importantly, every time she does that she also returns from that back of the building with a saucer of milk.

So, like the good guest you are, you patiently wait. You look around you for a suitable spot, and soon enough you make your way to a particularly cool spot underneath the shade of a table. Close enough to an open window for the edge of a soft breeze to brush you, but not close enough for the sunlight to actually reach you.

In short, you find the perfect spot.

A few moments later you hear the pink pony come out from the back, her hoofsteps growing louder and louder as she makes her way towards you.

"Heeere you go, Opal," she says, putting down a large saucer, filled with sweet milk, right in front of you. "The usual, to one of my best clients!"

You meow her your thanks.

And not a moment after that, the pink pony immediately begins to shiver, a smile appearing on her face for reasons you cannot discern.

"Owowowow… Pinkie Sense… and a strong one at that," she says, probably to herself, turning towards the entrance door as the shivering continues for a few more moments, "that must be them!"

She says that, and then she moves away from your sight.

Not that you mind her leaving, of course.

Although you can still hear her as she makes her way to the entrance door.

And what is more, you also hear another set of hoofsteps coming into the building.

Still, you don't give them much attention. You just listen, as the pink pony begins to talk to whoever the newcomer is.

You just listen, calmly drinking from your milk every now and then, as you enjoy the cool breeze that every now and then blows through the open windown.

You just listen, probably unnoticed, as they talk.

Laughing Hoof! I'm so glad to see you here! I've been having this jittering the whole day, so I knew you'd come!

Pinkie, dear! It's been too long. And of course I came, you know I can't stand going too long without giving you a visit. How are your sisters?

They're all fine, thank goodness. Maud left home to study, but we still keep in touch through letters. I can only imagine how much my family must be missing her, though, seeing how she's the second sister to leave the farm.

Oh, I'm sure they'll be fine. And besides, I'm sure none of you will never really grow apart. In fact, even if they tried, I don't think you'd let them.

Pff, ahahahaha! You can bet on that, Laughing!



Another voice comes, from an open window. Eccentric-sounding to the point of paranoia, a third one chimes in, speaking even as he climbs in through the window.



What're you talking about? Is it about me? It better not be about me. And where's the free cake? I was promised free cake, so there better be free cake!

Hi Comb Keeper, how have you been?

Of course there's free cake, silly. You know Pinkie always knows how to bring us together.

Yeah, yeah, she can set a stage alright. Scooch over, I'm having a seat as well.

Sure! You can sit here. Oh, I'll go grab us some more napkins. And say, Comb, did you find anything new for that collection you're always talking about?

Of course I d-, wait, why are you asking? Why do you want to know? Are you planning on stealing from me?!

Pff, oh Comb. Of course not!

As if we'd ever be interested in your old hoard.

It might be old, but it's mine!

Of course, of course.

And speaking of old, where is he? It's not like him to be late like this.



A bell rings as a pony walks in, even though the door was open and the bell over it was not touched.



That is because I am not late. You two are always early.

Grave Digger! Welcome! I'm so glad you could make it!

I don't much have a choice, Pinkie, and you know that. Someone has to be the voice of reason, and we all know none of you can be trusted with that.

You can say thaaat, but I can see your smileeee!

That is because you are forcibly pushing my lips up, Pinkie.

But you are also happy to be seeing your frieeeeends!

Just give it up, Grave, we all know you are a big softie deep down. Here, why don't you have a seat?

But you can't have any cake!

… Fine…

Fine what?

I'll have a seat.

Aaaaand…?

And it's also nice to see you again…

Yay!

Now could you please get off my back?

Oh, right, sure.

Don't pretend you don't cherish those memories, Grave.

Whatever you say… and move over, that's my place.

Nu-uh. I'm sitting next to her this time. Besides, I saw this empty seat first, so finders keepers!

You really live and die by that saying, don't you…?

Alright, alright, settle down.

Yes, yes, quit the horseplay you two.

And without further ado, let us begin! I declare officially open our session of "Was, Wasn't and Will Be!" So, who wants to go first?



The sound of seats scraping against the floor echo for a few more moments. And soon enough, a heated discussion begins.



I guess I'll start. Wasn'ts are always more interesting than boring old Was-es or uncertain Will Bes.

That is an opinion, yes, even if it is wrong.

Hush, Grave. Do your thing and be silent for now, will you?

Pfff.

As I was saying. I only know of stuff that definitely can't happen anymore, so no harm in sharing the less juicy bits. As long as you all know I'm hoarding the even juicier bits and-

Yes, yes, and you are awesome, and your hoard is large and well hidden and all that. Just dish out the good stuff already!

Fine… So, the thing is, the Moth Master was picked, right?

Yes, but that's a Was…

Patience, Grave Digger. Anyhow, the thing that you need to know is that the Master picking was basically choosing "who would take action". I won't say if they picked the most or the least interesting one, even though I know the answer, but by choosing that they made it so that other actors didn't decide to actively interfere in the Wake.

So the other possibilities are still out there?

Not really, not exactly. The other possibilities are still Wasn'ts, but the other candidates are still out there. Some of them have even been met already. They already met the Lantern and Secret Histories Master-candidate, and they just found the Knock Master… they also very technically met the Winter Master, but I'm not sure if that was a Was or a Wasn't. But the interesting thing is: By choosing the Moth one, they made all the other Masters into Wasn'ts. Their circumstances became thus that they won't become Masters themselves, for their own particular reasons.

Wait, they can't become Masters? But they can reach the Wake, no?

Of course, of course. But that's the thing. They can't be Masters, but they can still be actors.

Interesting…

Well, actors or Masters or whatnot, I hope they can at least be friends! What about you, Grave Digger, any Was-es that you want to share with us?

… there is… a lot of Was going on… everything up until now has been a Was, even, so I don't know what…

Aww, don't be shy. Don't you at least want to give us your opinion on everything that's happened so far?

Fine, I guess… so… hmm… there's still a lot, even if you put it like that...

Maybe start from the beginning?

I'll try… So the thing is, she's doing better than I thought she would, to be honest.

That's great! But why exactly do you say that?

Well… there's a lot of factors. But the biggest thing is that I honestly didn't expect her to learn so quickly, for starters. The Lores, that is, I didn't expect her to be soo... all over the place. In fact, she wasn't meant to. You see, there is an expedition site that's both easy and nearby, and it would reward her with a relatively good artifact pretty early in her story. It was a level four or five trinket, I believe.

High level artifact in an accessible place? Sounds like the Forgotten Mithraeum strategy for an early boon with a Winter cult.

Something like that. But the thing is, she was supposed to… do at least one expedition, and she would then gain a good artifact that would serve as a crutch. That would make it so she wouldn't have to learn so much by herself, and that would also motivate her to go on more expeditions.

Yeah, but, uh… she didn't go to any expeditions, did she?

Nope. But again, she did well. She learned everything, by herself. I honestly did not expect her to do that. Not this quickly, at least.

Oh wow, that's a background with deep pockets for you. I bet that helped her a lot in the House.

It did. I think that, to date, she only failed a single roll in there. Or at least, she only failed to the point of losing an action once. The place was supposed to be a time sink, but instead she's blazing through it with… well, it's not without effort because she worked for it. But still, her pacing is unexpected.

But it can't all be that good, surely? I mean, she's doing it her way, but she's bound to be losing something in return, right?

Don't be such a party pooper, Comb.

Why? It's the truth!

I'm afraid he has a bit of a point, Pinkie… Although he's not entirely right. You see, she didn't lose anything, but another choice that Was was where she chose to live. Being here in Ponyville, she inevitably had the chance to get in touch with... certain notorious characters.

Has she? I wouldn't know.

She has. But the thing is that, rather understandably, pursuing those bonds robbed her of the time to pursue others.

Oh, oh, oh! I know that one, that became a Wasn't as well!

Indeed. A Was is that she made friends with one of the advisors.

Yes! But she was supposed to befriend at least two, and maybe even three or more. But by now, doing that is practically a Wasn't.

As it currently stands, she will be fortunate if she befriends one and a half advisors, in total.

One and a half? How does having half a friend works?

That's a good question, and that's already veering into the realm of the Will Bes, so let me give you three a piece of my mind when it comes to that.

Sure, but no spoilers!

Yeah, no spoilers!

No one can have spoilers!

Which means spoilers belong to me! Me!

Fine, fine, no spoilers… uh… well damn, that really takes the wind off my sails now that I think about it.

Maybe just give your opinion on things like I did? Go for a more general brush?

Hmm… sure, I can do that. Okay, so, Will Be, Will Be… Oh, I know, how about I instead give some advice!

There is that saying about free advise thou-

Shhh! It's her turn now. And we all know Laughing, we can trust her advise.

Well, now that you say that I'm kinda obligated to give good advise, but I'll try my best. So, uhm… First of all, I think she should try to figure out that it is possible to befriend her... let's call them her "special guests", that she has been inviting to her-

Just say Names.

Oh, fine, and here I was trying to be all mysterious… But anyhow, it is possible for her to befriend the Names. It is also possible to make the Names stay summoned permanently. However, the real kicker is that those two things are one and the same.

Well, duh, real friends want to stay close to each other!

Sewn at the hip?

We do not tell Pinkie that sort of joke, Comb.

So that's something she should strive to do. Conversely it is also bad if a Name ends up in the clutches of another party. Especially given how she's choosing to cut herself off from her first employer.

Although that's technically a Was that they haven't seen yet.

Semantics. They'll learn about it before the end of the turn. Anyhow, my second advice is… hmm… Pinkie, is there anything you figure she ought to know?

Maybe some long-term direction? Those are always good.

I suppose. I'll keep it short and sweet then. Taking in account everything she knows, everything she doesn't know, and the direction that the wind is blowing, I really, really think she should aim at the top of the House.

That is always good advice.

Not necessarily, Grave. Not in this world, and not anymore. But given the circumstances, I agree that it is good advice.

I suppose…

And that's it.

Awesome! Now I would like to talk a bit more about…​

The pink pony goes on and on. But you, the unnoticed white cat, has a greater problem right now.

And that problem is that your milk saucer has finally run dry.

Which means that your time here is done.

So, as it is your wont, you get up once again, you stretch for a few moments, and then you make your way out through the nearest window.

And you leave the four to their conversation, about things that were, that weren't and that might be, and all the other problems that ponies invent for themselves just for the pleasure of solving them.

Really, being a pony must be such a hassle…

Oh, and there she goes. Penelope's cat was blind, the poor thing, so I much prefer this one.

Right? Opalescence is a dear. And she's good friends with Gummy!

Cat? What cat? There wasn't anyone eavesdropping on us, was there?!

Just relax. And I promise there is no one eavesdropping at us right now.​

The four continue their merry conversation, over the slices of a sweet chocolate cake.

And before the first client of the day arrives, three of them are gone.

 

[OurLadyOfWires]

Author's Note: This is a long story, no doubt. It was written over several, with a few months-long pauses here and there.

This is a summary of the story, that was written after the end of one of those pauses. So that the author, and some readers, could remember what happened.

If you have not yet read the story up to Turn 14, HEAVY spoilers ahead, obviously.

- - -

A/N: Given the long period of pause this Quest was subjected to, this post is here for the sake of helpful recollection. Feel free to skip this one, and the next, if you are archive-reading.

Spoiler: The Story so far

THE STORY SO FAR​

Dear reader.

Given the long pause that this quest had, it is relevant to have a place that coalesces everything that happened so far.

Please note, however, that this is not an exhaustive retelling of the story. Only re-reading the story in its entirety, as well as the hundreds of pages of player discussion, would truly achieve that.

Still, this is a gathering of everything the QM wrote down, as he re-read this Quest. And consequently it is the gathering of everything the QM thinks is sufficiently important to remember.

Is EVERYTHING that is important here? Again, no. For example, you constantly took care of your family throughout the Quest, and you had several small interactions with your friends and other characters. Not everything could make this list, otherwise it would be too large to be useful.

Additionally, there are some very important things that were omitted. Because even though they were presented in the story, no reader so far pointed them out or made it clear that it was noticed. So, some things remain as hidden breadcrumbs that might be relevant much later.

With that in mind...


Overall considerations:

-These notes will focus on results and relevant observations. This list would be too long if it said that "the Cult located an artifact" if, later on, said artifact was never bought and forgotten. So, a Turn with "few" notes does not equate to a "short" or "unimportant" turn. It might just have been a turn where things were developed, but did not come into fruition.
-These notes are based on the "present". So any observation here is based on your current circumstances in the middle of Turn 15.
-These notes end right before Princess Celestia abolished Equestrian Nobility. Events after that will be covered in the next "Juggling Chainsaws" threadmark.
-Finally, these notes almost completely do not mention your family. You took good care of them, you spent actions on them, and you even successfully healed your relationship with Stormchaser after the crisis that followed Selene's arrival. Your family is currently safe, and reciprocates your love for them. (Your family is currently comprised of Stormchaser, Silky Stream, Selene and Soft Sweeps)

For ease of reading, all turns will be individually spoilered.

Spoiler: TURN 1

TURN 1

-Created Velvet Covers;
-Went on your first Cult "written" meeting;
-Went to the Mansus, and the Woods, for the first "written" time;
-Received your first overarching order: to find a way towards Princess Luna, to either convert her or kill her;
-Took Silky Stream to her first day of school!;
-Bumped into Rarity, an Element Bearer, and made a good impression with her;
-Found a path to the Dreamlands, in order to begin fulfilling your Luna-hunting mission.

Characters met: Velvet Covers, Copper Secateur, The Master, Ponpon, Silky Stream, Cheerilee, Comet Feet, Starry Dancer, Windy Flakes, Jade Whistle, Stormchaser, Soft Sweeps, Rarity.

Lore developments: Moth raised to level 1, Knock raised to level 1, all other Lores at level 0.

Spoiler: TURN 2

TURN 2

-Made your first real expedition into the Dreamlands;
-You found traces of Princess Luna, but not the Princess herself;
-You found Worms! (but you didn't know that back then);
-Long-Martyr of Bethlehem, they are horrifying;
-You also helped Starry Dancer (through a nat100 of all things) to infiltrate Ponyville's government by making her an assistant to the Mayor;
-Hillariously, you never really did cash in that favor with her;
-You also visited Rarity, and became closer to her!;
-And you visited the Golden Oak library, and met its residents.

Characters met: Mayor Mare, Sweetie Belle, Spike, Twilight Sparkle.

Lore developments: Lantern raised to level 1, Moth raised to level 2, learned single-circle ritual from Master

Spoiler: TURN 3

Turn 3

-You furthered your relationship with Rarity and Twilight Sparkle;
-Twilight Sparkle casually name-drops the fact that she went to Princess Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns (Velvet's current shock level: 1);
-You reached (but failed to cross) the Blank Door;

Characters met:

Lore developments: Winter raised to level 1.

Spoiler: TURN 4

Turn 4:

-You furthered your relationship with Cheerilee;
-You furthered your relationship with Soft Sweeps (by a lot);
-You met Filthy Rich for the first time, while visiting his house;
-You comprehend, and pass through, the Blank Door, reaching the place that was the Afterlife of ponykind, long ago;
-You meet Baldomare, and discovered the Lodge of the Sage Pony;
-And you learn the Two Circles Ritual, as you Master ordered you to.

Characters met: Filthy Rich (and his butler), Diamond Tiara, Silver Spoon, Baldomare, Illopony(?).

Lore developments: Grail raised to level 1, Lantern raised to level 2, Two Circle Ritual learned.

Spoiler: THE RITUAL

THE RITUAL

-The Ritual happened, and Princess Luna suffered for it.
-The Quest began in earnest. Limit of four actions per turn removed. Stakes presented. Fear of the Worms learned.

Lore developments: Edge raised to level 1, Moth raised to level 3, Knock raised to level 2, Secret Histories raised to level 2, Winter raised to level 2.

Spoiler: TURN 5

TURN 5

-The search for Princess Luna begins;
-You aided the search efforts enough to draw attention;
-You tried, but failed, to get closer to Comet Feet;
-After previously helping her, you got even closer to Starry Dancer. You actually did not realize how close you were. A pity, to be honest, I really like Starry;
-You got closer to Jade Whistle;

Characters met: Princess Luna (but only in her dreams, as she was asleep)

Lore developments:

Spoiler: TURN 6

TURN 6

-This turn was almost entirely dedicated to your first trip to Canterlot, to aid in the search for Princess Luna;
-You had a very bitter (and not brief enough) meeting with your father;
-Your dedication to the search effort drew the attention of an alicorn;
-You met Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, Princess of Love and the latest [REDACTED] of Harmony. You also made a good impression with her;
-You also met Uncle Steppes! Plus, you dissociated yourself from your family's "bad name";
-You did more than enough for Rarity to become a Confidant;
-Rarity's career into fashion was kickstarted;
-Your further dedication to the search efforts drew the attention of a second alicorn;
-You met Princess Celestia, immortal regent of the Sun, guide and nurturer of ponykind, beloved by all, and the first [REDACTED] of Harmony. You also made a good impression with her;
-You located the place where Princess Luna was. And for that, you were noticed;
-You also participated in the Sisterhooves Social! Or rather, Silky participated, with Soft Sweeps as her sister. The two forged a very strong bond;

Characters met: Velvet Hill, Shining Armor, Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, Velvet Steppes, Princess Celestia, Apple Bloom,

Lore developments:

Spoiler: TURN 7

TURN 7

-Your relationship with Twilight Sparkle advanced a little, and during your visit she casually mentions she can "teleport without any problems" (Velvet's current shock level: 2);
-You made great strides in your relationship with Jade Whistle;
-Your relationship with Comet Feet progressed;
-(And curiously, this is the first turn where Fluttershy's interactions with him are hinted, which means she has known him for months by now. Puts things into perspective.);
-You became aquaintanced with the merchants of Ponyville in general;
-You acquired one Selene!

Characters met: Selene

Lore developments: Grail raised to level 2, Secret Histories raised to level 3.

Spoiler: TURN 8

TURN 8

-You do more than enough for Jade Whistle to become a Confidant;
-Jade Whistle notices something very important in Selene;
-Due to a failed (fizzled) attempt at a scrying ritual for "Princess Luna", your Master is then led to believe that she is either dead or in a place where scrying magic cannot reach;

Characters met:

Lore developments: Lantern raised to level 3, Reflection of the Tapestry developed

Spoiler: TURN 9

TURN 9

-Your relationship with Filthy Rich advanced slightly, also;
-Some of the Cult members were ordered to expand into Manehattan, and you took your chance to have a few meetings with them before they left;
-You attempted to talk to Copper Secateur, but the only thing you learned is that she has a problem. You are that problem, but you didn't realize it back then;
-You furthered your relationship with Comet Feet, to the point that not only he (grudgingly) repeated something that somepony else told you, but also he asked you for a favor;
-You spoke with a very unhinged Twilight Sparkle, who did not take well to the contradictions in the Secret Histories, but you further your relationship with her;
-Due to Celestia's absence, you present yourself as Twilight Sparkle's "mentor", regarding the Lores;

Characters met: Golden Plume (through an interlude), Rainbow Dash (this time, through Stormchaser's interlude)

Lore developments: Knock raised to level 3, Forge raised to level 1, Forge raised to level 2

Spoiler: TURN 10

TURN 10:

-Your first "lesson" to Twilight Sparkle was overshadowed by the need to heal her from Fascination. You did, however, forge a strong bond with Spike, who began to trust you after you saved his sister;
-You were visited by Uncle Steppes!;
-And you met Fluttershy for the first time, the "favor" Comet Feet asked of you being to deliver her a letter;
-Your Flourishing Risen, to which you gave the very mature task of messing with Windy Flakes, found out he has a little project in his home;
-You reach, comprehend, and cross, the Door of Want, the First True Gate, and for the first time you truly enter the House of the Sun;
-You learned a truth about the past, and the present. The past, that cutie marks were not freely given, but instead earned by those who climbed the Mansus. And the present, that the Mansus is cracked and broken, through the commission of a terrible crime, and that the original Gods of Ponykind are either dead or gone;
-Your Master also offered you the lovely gift of murder (to perform his summoning ritual), but you managed to finagle your way out of it;

Characters met: Fluttershy

Lore developments: Winter raised to level 3, Three Circle Ritual acquired, Brand acquired

- - -

I believe a short pause is warranted here.

The following turns are both long and pass by in a blur. It is no exaggeration to say that this is the point where things pick up the pace.

To put it in perspective, we are currently on turn 15. And you only acquired your Brand, and the ability to summon monsters, at the very end of turn 10.

And yet, in the meantime, the whole changeling catastrophe took place.

So, this line of division seems warranted in this recollection post.

- - -

Spoiler: THE MASTER'S SUMMONING

THE MASTER'S SUMMONING

-The Master, that old and terrible thing, was summoned;
-You learned of the existence of changelings, infiltrating the Cult and Equestria at large;
-An eclipse also signaled that "Princess Luna was found", which you immediately knew meant a changeling had fooled Celestia and taken Luna's place in Canterlot. The search efforts were declared finished with that;

Spoiler: TURN 11

TURN 11

-Most of this turn was centered around your visit to Canterlot with Twilight Sparkle;
-Twilight Sparkle casually mentioned she is Shining Armor's brother (Velvet's current shock value: 3);
-She also casually mentioned that she was foal-sitted by Princess Cadence (Velvet's shock value: maximum);
-You learned that, once, the Royal Gardens held something that existed in all Histories. But that thing, that strange statue, has long since been moved;
-You met Princess Cadance a second time, and made a further good impression with her;
-Twilight Sparkle attempted to reach Princess Celestia by breaking into the inner royal quarters of the castle. You followed. And you two were stopped by "Princess Luna". "Princess Luna" then proceeded to very convincingly tell Twilight Sparkle that Celestia does not care about her that much;
-And after you returned home, chasing after Twilight, you discovered that "Princess Celestia" wrote to her that she does not wish to have anything to do with Twilight Sparkle anymore;
-At the end of all that, you did enough for Twilight Sparkle to become a confidant. However, you diverted her back into remaining faithful to Princess Celestia;
-Spike trusted you. He trusted you that the decision you made was the best;
-Twilight Sparkle, and Spike, go missing shortly thereafter, and the unicorn herself is replaced by a changeling;
-Jade Whistle studied Selene, and her first advancement into Knock;
-You founded the Hintchasers to do your bidding;
-You advanced your relationship with Windy Flakes;
-Detective Dull Glass arrives at Ponyville, although thanks to your own coming betrayal his presence never really caused you much trouble;

Characters met: Detective Dull Glass

Lore developments: Secret Histories raised to level 4, Rite of Childhood's End developed, Forge raised to level 3.

Spoiler: TURN 12

TURN 12

-You successfully summoned Baldomare!
-At your behest, Baldomare attempted to scry for Twilight Sparkle. The fact that her ritual fizzled (not failed, fizzled) indicated to you that Twilight Sparkle was being held by the changelings in their hive;
-You gained an audience with the Wolf-Divided. He did not care about you, and yet he hates you all the same. You brought some of his hate back into the Wake;

Characters met: The Wolf-Divided

Lore developments: First Stain upon the Soul gained, learned how to summon Windigos, Edge raised to level 3.

Spoiler: TURN 13

TURN 13

-You taught the Cult how to summon Windigos. Surely, that knowledge will be used only for good;
-You also persuaded the cult to attack the changeling hive at the end of the turn;
-You also followed Comet Feet to Fluttershy's house, at his request, where you confirmed that she is in fact safe from the changelings;
-You revealed to Rarity that Twilight Sparkle was abducted and replaced;
-You aided in summoning the highest degree of Edge Influence on Comet Feet, which will color his actions until the present moment in turn 15;
-Right after that, you visited Fluttershy, who revealed to you that Comet Feet himself spoke to her, telling her he would be leaving. The mare was visibly shaken, but there was nothing else you could do then;
-Ponyville was purged of changelings by Comet Feet;
-A frightened Applejack came to collect her sister, following that, and you managed to introduce yourself to her;
-Starry Dancer was taken under arrest by Dull Glass;
-And you spent considerable effort keeping Ponyville calm, and gained considerable standing with the townspeople in general;

Characters met: Flower Serenade (heh), Flower Serenade's ex-boyfriend (heheh), Flower Serenade's child (heheheheheh), Scootaloo, Applejack

Lore developments: Located the Dry Well deep in the Woods, Grail raised to level 3, Heart raised to level 3,

Spoiler: THE ASSAULT ON THE CHANGELING HIVE

THE ASSAULT ON THE CHANGELING HIVE

-The Cult attacked the changeling hive;
-The changelings lost their ability to deceive the world;
-In a last act of spite, Queen Chrysalis ordered her children on a rampage. Canterlot burned, hundreds died, and all pony cities in Equestria suffered to some extent;
-Princess Celestia destroyed Queen Chrysalis. Nothing of her remains;
-Twilight Sparkle was taken by the Cult to Manehattan;
-This required you to Leash Rarity, so save her from making a foolish decision;
-You made the immutable decision of betraying the Cult, all your actions henceforth will be geared towards that end;

Spoiler: TURN 14

TURN 14

-You finally managed to completely tell Stormchaser everything. Your family became open to Lore education, and will no longer be suspicious of you;
-You did, however, kept Stormchaser as a moral compass, and he is adamantly against doing any rituals on Selene;
-Soft Sweeps lost her entire family, and you took her in as a daughter;
-Scootaloo is… apparently living in your house now?
-You discovered the Valley of Keys, and met the Daughter-of-Axes;
-You visited Fluttershy once again, and found her extremely distressed over Comet Feet's disappearance. You promised to help her. Or rather, you promised you would have her help you in regards to Comet;
-You reached, and understood, the Tribal Door, that ancient symbol of the Trirrivality that accompanied Ponykind for so long;
-You destroyed the Tribal Door;
-You attempted to get closer to Windy Flakes, and you think you succeeded. But more importantly, you think you discovered some worrying tendencies that are currently in his mind;
-You discovered the Ruined Church, blocking the only path upwards in the Mansus;
-You also discovered the Garden of Lights, in the Blank Plains;
-Finally, you discovered The Tower, near the impossible edge of the Blank Plains, and completely finished exploring the Blank Plains;
-You began (through Rarity) to take efforts to distance your name from the position of Loremaster;
-Jade Whistle learned "something" about Selene, more connected to her nature as an alicorn than to her circumstances as a filly, but she will have to further research it on her own;
-Baldomare was unsummoned, and will only be available again at the beginning of Turn 18;

Character met: The Daughter-of-Axes

Lore developments: Second Stain upon the Soul gained, Tribal Door permanently destroyed, Knock raised to level 4, learned how to summon Mares-in-the-Light, Moth raised to level 4

A/N: This will probably be edited quite a bit, for purposes of including Lore colors or otherwise. So please mention if you think anything relevant was omitted, or if you have any comments on it.
And if there is one place I could suggest you read, to help remember smaller (but relevant) details, it would definitely be this!

Spoiler: The Story right now

A/N: Complementing the last post, this is a current "screenshot" of what Velvet has in her mind right now, so we may continue the story while making educated decisions.

THE STORY RIGHT NOW​

VELVET'S IMMEDIATE MEMORY

Firstly, one last look at the most recent occurrences, but this time from Velvet's point of view, so we may understand where her mind is right now:
-On the very end of Turn 13 (a little more than one month ago, in-game time), you spent considerable effort keeping the Cult, and Ponyville, under control, following the widespread panic caused by the Cult cleansing it of changelings (which, to the townspeople at large, who are ignorant of the changelings, was seen as a massive disappearance/kidnapping tragedy).

-Between Turn 13 and Turn 14, the changeling hive was assaulted, and all cities, Equestria-wide, suffered some form of damage. The entire infrastructure of Equestria also crashed into a halt, with communication and transportation stopping for several days, and the first official bit of news coming from Canterlot only a week after the Capital burned.

-Canterlot, in particular, had a great deal of its population tragically culled. You still do not know the gravity of the damage.

-During Turn 14 (during the entirety of last in-game month, that is), you began focusing on how to leave the Cult, cutting your ties with it, and preparing your family and friends. But most of all, you (wisely) spent a great deal of time in the Mansus accumulating power and knowledge, which led you to learn how to summon Mares-in-the-Light and the Daughter-of-Axes herself.

-Now, on Turn 15, you are focusing on clearing whatever evidence of being part of the Cult exists. And most importantly, preparing to jailbreak Twilight Sparkle.

-Finally, keep in mind that ponykind as a whole is frazzled. Every last city saw death, everywhere is currently covered in fear and mourning, and most importantly the mentality of ponies was subjected to Paranoia rather than individualism. Ponykind as a whole just passed, less than two months ago, through a period that will be referred to by its historians as pivotal. However, those changes will be felt most keenly on the long term, in the years and decades to come. For now, there will be no grand societal changes from ponies in canon, because these sorts of things take time. Still, the current mood is... scared, and wounded.



VELVET'S LONG TERM GOALS

Your ultimate objective is to safeguard the world from the Worms. There are five ways this story can end:

Spoiler: THE GLORY

REACHING GLORY

One way is to reach Glory itself, situated at the top of the Mansus. It was the tried and true method of the past, so it stands to reason that it will work again.

-You already know, in-character, how to reach this objective: Reach the top of the Mansus;
-QM has already confirmed that, given your circumstances, this is the best objective for you to reach for.

Spoiler: THE HARMONY

REACHING HARMONY

Another way is to reach Harmony, and teach it how to hide. The light of ponykind is what attracts the Worms to the Dreamlands, and both the light and the Dreamlands appear to be a provenance of Harmony, somehow. Gaining access to Harmony, and somehow interacting with it, might allow you to simply hide that light and protect the world.

-You have no idea how to completely fulfill this objective;
-You hope that helping Selene will aid you, but you are not sure. Although you have confirmed that Harmony somehow interacted, or made a pact, with Celestia and Luna;
-You know, based on out-of-character knowledge, that the Elements of Harmony, the Tree of Harmony, and other things beside have a connection to Harmony. Although that knowledge is not necessarily reliable in this Quest.

Spoiler: THE MOON

REACHING THE MOON

Your Master alluded, even if vaguely, that "The Mansus of old still exists in the Moon". She referred to the Mansus-Moon, when he said that, and also said that it might be possible to have the Mansus of the past "swap places" with the Mansus of the present. Doing that, and reinstating the old order and the old Hours, would certainly put the old protections against the Worms into place once more.

-You have no idea how to completely fulfill this objective;
-You have located a Tower, in the edge of the Blank Plains, that appears to be close enough to reach for the Moon;
-You know that the very first step towards that Tower would be to acquire a Secret Histories Sacrament.

Spoiler: THE WOLVES

DOUSING THE LIGHTS

The last way to safeguard ponykind is to simply douse the lights. No lights, no Worms, no End. This is a "victory" only in the sense that it is a victory against the Worms. Ponykind would, by definition, also lose.

-You already know, out-of-character, how to reach this objective: Acquire seven Stains upon the Soul;
-Currently, you have Two Stains upon the Soul. You can "safely" acquire a Third, Fourth and Fifth;
-Acquiring the Sixth Stain will not result in an immediate end of the game, but only because the Sixth will have a special relationship with the Seventh;
-You have already decided what the Seventh will be.

Spoiler: THE WORMS

DEFEAT

The last way this story can end is in defeat.

-If Velvet Covers die, the story ends in defeat;
-If Velvet Covers is permanently incapacitated, such as being thrown to jail, the story ends in defeat;
-If something occurs that Velvet Covers can no longer live with her family, the story ends in defeat;
-Due to the existence of your "Family" Velvet Covers may not have a life "on the run," and must balance her personal life with her responsibilities to the world.

VELVET'S IMMEDIATE CONCERNS

-At the end of this turn, you will be offered a job at the nascent "Lunar Bureau", and you are doing your best to time your coming betrayal to the Cult with whatever that new institution will entail;

-You know, mostly due to out-of-character interludes, that Celestia is unstable. But you know in-character that you are probably on a first name bases with Cadence by now, judging by your last meeting;

-You are currently desperately trying to destroy any evidence that you were a part of the Cult, and you will try to jailbreak Twilight at the end of this Turn;

-Hopefully, your jailbreaking will be done before Shining Armor arrives in Ponyville. After all, Cadance's trust in you increased when you told her that Twilight was missing, but telling her that also prompted Shining to come to Ponyville himself;

Spoiler: About the Cult's Inner Circle...

-Comet Feet was under a mind-affecting Edge Influence for the last two months. You are about to talk to him, given how that Influence is moments away from fading, after stacking the deck in your favor the best you could;

-Starry Dancer is possibly going insane. The last time you saw her she... was being controlled by the Master, but once that control was broken she appeared to be desperate for it to happen again. The last information you have is that she is going to Manehattan;

-Copper Secateur most likely hates you, even if that is mostly based on out-of-character discussion among readers. She is currently in Manehattan, was given control over that Cult branch, and is in the process of summoning a Winter Name;

-Windy Flakes thinks you know what his "little project" is. You don't. You just know it exists, or existed. Furthermore, you realize he has recently heard something, and that its whispers have substituted the song of his trusty gramophone. You feel like he considers you a good friend, but you are not sure what that means anymore, given the direction his thoughts are going;

-Jade Whistle is fine. She is your personal friend, and is willing to follow you;

-And finally, you are slowly piecing together what happened to the Mansus. If nothing else, the fruit your Master gave you provided you with a flashback. This Turn, you will also attempt to explore the Ruined Church, in an attempt to reach even higher in the Mansus.



A/N: This was honestly a tad shorter than expected, but we will see how it goes. With this, the Quest may now continue.

 

[OurLadyOfWires]

It is night. The moon is high up in the sky, painting everything around you in a pale light.

Everypony is asleep. And you are so far away from the estate that you don't think anypony would be able to see you, even if they were looking out of their window with a telescope.

Still, you make a point of being as silent as you can. You try your best to be as furtive as possible.

Your horn is lit up, letting out a faint glow of magic. You are surrounded by the floating form of several disparate items, from knives to precious stone to reagents, that you need for what you are about to do.

And right before your eyes is the locked door of the barn you have chosen for this ritual.

Tonight, you will summon the dread Name of Edge called Biedde. Tonight, you will acquire the blade that you will send against your enemies… against your would-be killers.

And hopefully, one month from now you and your family will be safe.

You focus yet another strand of magic towards the door, unlocking it from the inside and opening the barn for you to enter-



-when you suddenly realize you are surrounded. You are surrounded, and you are in danger.



You immediately snuff out your magic, your stance going wide and your eyes closing shut as you prepare to fight. Your heart racing inside your chest as your mind attempts to catch up to your instinct. As you try to understand what the hay is going on, and more importantly how you can keep yourself alive for the next few minutes.

You are surrounded. That is the first thing you confirm. You sniff the air and, sure enough, you detect three different presences around you. Two a bit to your sides, and one right behind you. All three of them forming a triangle of sorts around you.

They are all hidden within the tall crops.

They all stink of Lantern and knives.

And the three of them are slowly approaching you.

You don't think any pony could have this sort of presence. Not this early in the fight. You don't think Copper Secateur, or anypony else, would be able to train three adepts into such bright and sharp edges in such a short amount of time. Not when the Cult was dissolved, and thrown in disarray, less than three months ago.

Not when your little war with Copper, so far, can only be measured in weeks.

No, these are not ponies. These are not even mortals to begin with. And even though you have never summoned them, you are immediately sure of what creatures you are dealing with.

Mares-in-the-Light. Three of them, who have been sent to murder you while you are still at your weakest.

Well, to be honest, you don't think they could have picked a better moment. In fact, given how you were just a few hours away from summoning a Name of Edge, they couldn't have chosen a better time.

"But if they think I won't go without a fight, they are sorely mistaken…" you whisper to yourself. And your horn lights up, floating towards you the seven knives you had selected for the summoning ritual.

Your priorities begin to flash through your mind, gathering in a plan of sorts. You are almost sure they don't know that you noticed them. However, they will probably give chase the moment you start to run. So maybe, and just maybe, you should try to pick one of them off while you can.

No, that is a stupid idea. The other two will be upon you before you have a chance to even harm the first with a Wrong Key. And you definitely don't have enough of those to just throw around. Instead, you should run to your home, straight to the annex building. Get Mareinette involved, even if it means the fight will be a little closer to where your family is sleeping.

You can't protect them if you are dead, and you don't think they will be safe even if you do end up dying. You wouldn't put it past Copper to order their deaths after you are dealt with, even if only to spite you.

The muscles in your legs tense, as you prepare to make a run for it.

That is, until you realize that… that the Mares have stopped.

No, they did not stop. Not all of them. Two of them stopped, and the third is still walking towards you in a pace so slow that it is almost a stroll.

And what is more, for all that you can sense how dangerous they are…

You can't really feel that they are getting ready to fight you.

This… you can't really explain it. But your senses tell you that…

That this is a parley. Or, if nothing else, this is definitely not an ambush.

So, despite your growing tension, you turn to the direction that the walking Mare will come from.

And sure enough, the phantasmagorical, pale-white mare steps out of the crop field with a careful gait.

And the moment she sees you, she gives you a short, respectful bow.

After that, she reaches for something in her floating dress.

It is a letter. Which she then leaves on the ground, and takes a few steps back to give you a wide berth.

You cautiously float the letter towards you.

But the moment you place a hoof on its surface, you realize that you are right.

The Mares, you can see now, are just here to deliver a message.

But just like any knowledge, the message they are here to deliver you is anything but kind.

Dear Velvet Covers,

It is delightful to see how well you are doing. I am glad that the fillies are doing well, and that they are all growing… even if their growth ought to be measured in different ways.

Granted, your choice of company is strange. But I have already done worse, so trust me when I say that I am not judging you.

Still, I am glad that you are doing well yourself. Even gladder that I will be able to confirm how much you have grown with my own eyes. You see, I once heard that the best way you can measure a pony is by becoming his enemy. So, I am delighted that I will finally be able to take your true measure.

Because you see, it seems that I will have to kill you in the coming months.

Naturally, it is nothing personal. I always thought (and still think) that you are a very pleasant mare, even if a little too curious and excited (your daughter certainly got that from you, by the way). However, I also stick to my own standards, and the requirement of a summoned creature is to follow the whims of its summoner.

That being said, I don't need to do everything I am told. And I am certainly not a stick, to be brandished by any brute. Which leads me to the reason I am writing you.

I have not been part of an occult war in a very long time. And for all that I don't intend to lose, I still have my own criteria of what it truly means to "win".

So, I would like to propose you that we keep this personal. Or, to be more precise, that we keep this between you and me.

I have no interest, nor do I see the need, to go after your family. And I know you will appreciate knowing that. So, I ask you to do the same. To name: I will not go after your family if your family doesn't come after me.

And I mean it. Your husband and your daughters. All your daughters. If you do not send them against me, I promise not to go after them.

Well, I promise not to go after them. But I can't speak for my summoner, or for her other employee.

Still, that is all I have to say. No need to answer me. I will accept your enemy's invitation into the Wake in a few days, but I sent my entourage ahead of me to make sure the playing field is settled between us.

I will be seeing you very soon!



Your sincere opponent,

Baldomare



PS: And in case it is not obvious, don't try to send Mares-in-the-Light after me. Please, don't embarrass yourself like that. I have an understanding with light.​

You finish reading the letter, the information contained in its glowing ink flowing into your mind through your hoof.

And when you are done, the trio of Mares give you a short bow, turn around, and begin to walk away.

But the growing dread you feel, that you are still being watched, doesn't disappear even after you finish summoning Biedde.





Baldomare, the shining Name of Lantern, has been summoned by your Opponent.

Baldomare has agreed not to target your family if you do not employ your family against her. Any actions from Stormchaser, Soft Sweeps, or Princess Luna (upon her awakening), if performed against Baldomare, will be seen as a breach of that agreement.

You have gained the information that Baldomare is immune to actions from Mares-in-the-Light.

"Baldomare" has been added to your list of Opponents.

"Not that any of this happened, of course. Tap here to go back to where you came from, dear."

 

[OurLadyOfWires]

There is a monster living in the Velvet estate.

"Why hello there, Mareinette. It has been such a long time. How have you been?"

"[Lantern]!"

Correction, there is a monster hanging on to the Velvet estate.

"Is that so? I see, I see… Well, I am glad to hear that. I wish you could enter the Plains, to visit me, but it is what it is."

"[Grail]?"

"Oh, don't give me that look. You know how much I dislike your home. And besides, you know why I need to stay where I stay!"

No, really. A monster is literally hanging on to the Velvet estate.

Like a great, morbid spider hugging a wall at an impossible angle, Mareinette is currently sprawled against the outer wall of the central mansion. Her bony limbs are only partially covered by her dress, as she digs her hoofs into the wall to keep her head close to one window in particular.

Under normal circumstances, her posture would have looked undignified. Perhaps even humiliating. But to the trained eye, her bone-dry body and phantasmagorical appearance makes her look like a scene out of a horror story. Like a crawling, climbing creature straight out of a nightmare, who is clawing its way into an unsuspecting house to perform horrifying acts.

And to the untrained eye, of course, there is nothing wrong. Nothing out of place.

But still, despite her size, and despite her proximity to the windows of certain rooms, the Grail-thing really is not doing anything wrong right now. Quite the opposite.

After all, if not like this, then how else could she have a conversation with one of the estate's guests? How else would she be able to catch up with an old friend?

"Still, you realize she will be furious if she hears you have been skirting her no-entry rule by doing this, right?"

Clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack.

"We'll see who is laughing when I'm the one to tell her."

"[Forge]?"

"Really…? Well, in that case we have a deal."

The large, pale-white skull right outside the window breathes out a sigh of relief.

"Anyhow, you said you have a task of sorts? What do you have in mind?" the other, much smaller mare asks from inside her room. She then approaches the window, and takes a curious look at the larger creature's attire. "And where in the seven Histories did you find a dress like that… that fits your size?"



- - -



There is a monster living in the Velvet estate.

That is a secret truth that is known only to very few ponies. A terrifying reality that lives right behind a veil. A veil that is made out of eldritch oaths, secrecy, and barely-held self-control.

But like most truths, that fact is very unlikely to ever see the light of day.

However, recently, another veil has appeared to obscure it. Yet another layer of illusions and deceits has been lit by the limelight.

And like most veils, it took up all the attention. It dazed and flashed, with smokes and mirrors, until nopony in the estate could talk about anything else.

There is a monster living in the Velvet estate. And nopony knows that.

There is a maid working in the Velvet estate. And everypony heard of her.



- - -



Accounts of her arrival vary. Everypony claims to be telling the truth, and almost everypony claims to have been the first to talk to her. Still, all those versions are most likely wishful thinking, and very few ponies can truly claim to have been there.

Chief among them is, naturally, Subtle Glare himself. After all, he was the one who agreed to hire her on that fateful day. And perhaps he alone knows the truth. However, whenever he is asked about it the old stallion can only cry as the fond memories overpower them.

So, to this day, details about that day are largely unknown. And the truth only exists in bits and fragments, spread over the several stories that run through the estate.

But fortunately, two narratives seem to be prevalent. Or at least, most of the stories seem to be versions that derive from those two alleged testimonies.

On one of them, she arrived during a thunderstorm. A lone mare, poor and humble, yet bewitchingly beautiful, who all but begged to be allowed inside. And for all that her looks and charisma would have let her cross any door, she still insisted on working to earn her stay. Almost as if it was her calling, or as if her arrival had been destined to occur.

And on the other version, some ponies claim she arrived on a bright and sunny day. Floating down from the air while holding on to a magical umbrella. Carried by the winds as much as by her beauty and grace. Claiming she was there to fill a vacancy nopony was aware of. Presenting a flier, talking about a job description, nopony remembered writing.

Regardless of what version is the truth (if either of them is true at all), the charismatic mare quickly gained a place in the Velvet estate.

In fact, to this day Subtle Glare still speaks fondly of the moment he agreed to hire her.



"My fair lady, I cannot possibly accept your service. Nay, I will not. As a servant of the Velvet household, as the steward of the young Lord… as a stallion in love. I simply cannot allow you to toil as a maid, no matter how much you insist."

"[Grail]!"

"Alas, I am convinced."



And from that day onwards, the Velvet estate knew true happiness.

She seemed to be everywhere at once. She seemed to be able to befriend everypony at the same time. And before her first day was done, everypony was talking about her, and nothing else.

They talked about how she seemed so much larger than everypony else. But of course, they meant it in the sense of her being "larger than life". Of course.

They spoke about how she wore her maid uniform so elegantly. To the point that everypony swore that, if she were to donate her dress away, there would be enough cloth there to dress four separate mares. Figuratively speaking, naturally.

They chatted and wondered about her boundless enthusiasm and effortless grace.

And yet, despite all the adoration aimed at her, nopony can really remember her name. Or rather, everypony remembers her name, but nopony can quite agree on what it was.

Some insist she called herself Mare Poppins. Others swore she presented herself as Neigh McPhee.

Still, everypony remembered the way she talked, and the way she walked. Everypony recalls fondly how, during the days she was there, she taught the Velvet estate how to truly listen to the sound of music.

In fact, countless times while she was working on the estate, she would simply begin to sing.

She would sing, and all the servants in the estate, no matter how far, would join in with her.

Why, despite the passage of time, everypony still remembers the words of her songs!

Particularly of her most favorite one.

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens

Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens

Cute little foals all tied up with strings

These are a few of my favorite things



Cream-colored ponies and crisp apple strudels

Savant adepts who write rituals in doodles

Windows on Churches where things can be seen

These are a few of my favorite things



Grail-red dreams from the time of Division

Fading into legend and superstition

Vague mentions of an Era filled with kings

These are a few of my favorite things



When the Snake bites

When the Edge stings

When I feel Thirst

I simply remember my favorite things​

But alas, just like how every day eventually ends, so too did that period of joy and happiness come to a close.

It was a somber day, when she left. A sad day. Tears flowed a-plenty, and every last servant in the estate gathered in the garden to bid her farewell.

According to the calendars, she stayed with them for only five days. But in their minds, she would live on for five decades. And in their hearts? Ah, in their hearts she would live on forever and ever. A ray of light, piercing through the clouds of darkness. A reminder that there is still magic out there, somewhere. And that ponies, real flesh and blood ponies, still exist that embody it.

Still, after she toasted a glass with everypony once, and had a heart-to-heart conversation with everypony twice, she finally bid her adieu. And for all that the Velvet estate felt less without her, without that most graceful of guests and masterful of maids, they were still thankful for her.

After all, it is better to love and lose than to never love at all. Or at least that is what they tell themselves, when her absence strikes them most dearly.

...

And nopony noticed that, as soon as she turned around a corner and disappeared, fair lady Mareinette returned from her short trip moments later. Well, actually everypony noticed that, but nopony noticed anything wrong with it. In fact, they even moaned and sobbed at the great tragedy, that fair Mareinette had just missed the opportunity to meet such a magnificent pony like that maid.

Still, one day later when Lady Velvet herself returned, she suddenly seemed to know everything about everypony. Every last dark secret, of every last servant, despite the fact they only ever told those secrets to one, unshakably trustworthy soul.

So, given how everypony is absolutely sure that she would never betray them, nopony really knows how Lady Velvet learned all those secrets.

It remains a mystery for the ages.





At your behest, Mareinette has successfully gathered information on the Velvet estate.

Spoiler: These are a few of my favorite things!

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0IagRZBvLtw

My Favorite Things from The Sound of Music (Official HD Video)

Spoiler: Votes and results

Available votes/results:

-Silky Stream and Selene: A secret mission to spy on the newcomers! But alas, the two agents were busted by nopony less than uncle Pride himself. (Gain a better "in" with Pride, due to familiarity)

-Soft Sweeps: A pair of (self-declared) "incompetent" maids bond over their mutually familiar hardships. A new friendship is born! (Gain information on Cantrip)

-Ponpon: A game of chess, between two old hoofs. The board is the estate's timetable, the pieces are the maids and servants. Rivalry is born, but so is a deep sense of respect. (Gain information on Subtle Glare)

-Mareinette, Our Lady of Wires: The Velvet estate is taught the meaning of joy. (Gain perfect knowledge on all servants, including Cantrip, Subtle Glare, and ???. Velvet Pride immediately becomes a Confidante. Velvet Hills barges into your house, crying, begging for your forgiveness. Immediately gain fillyfied Áine as your daughter.)

But alas, this History was never meant to be. So maybe you should return to your proper History.

 

[Shaper47]

The Fate of Selene​

You are Selene, and right now you are with Mrs. Velvet.

You are currently right between her forelegs, being pressed against her chest. You enjoy the feeling, that special warmth mixed with a small bit of nice perfume.

It is night and you can't see the moon from the darkness of Mrs. Velvet's room. The room in which she has taken you to be sleeping with her tonight.

Your eyes close and you begin to be lulled to sleep.

Your fur is cut, sniped by what were once horseshoes, and you are grabbed by a dark shadow as a secret is whispered into your ears.

---

You are awake and you are dreaming.

You are in the dark, you are in the shadows cast by the Woods.

You see pitch-black leaves attached to black trees with the faint moonlight above only casting shadows that leaves things more in darkness.

You do not know the moon that shines down on these Woods.

You...

You are not alone.

SNAP

---

---

---

You are being carried, you feel soft fur underneath your hooves as rest on the back of the creature carrying you.

"Welcome to my dreams Selene."

You hear a voice, you know that voice, you have always known that voice from the very moment you...

You feel black leave tickle your coat as Mrs. Velvet pushes herself though the thick bushes.

You remain silent as she senses your confusion and explains to you where you are, as she shares the dark secret she whispers into your ears.

"We are in the Woods."

"In the first forest. In the first continent. Where the first ponies walked. Where they had no maps, for there was nothing to be mapped. Where they had no tools, for there was nothing to be built. Where there was no "self", for there was nothing to do but live, and die. Where ponies remained before they learned the secrets of fire and words. Before ponykind cursed itself with its own God."

You see a light that shines forth in the darkness.

You see a light that bleeds the shadows.

You see black dirt give way to shining water.

You know that light.

Of course you know it. It is your duty to make that light shine brighter and brighter.

And you forfilled that duty. You made sure that the lights gathered together and they shined most brightly together.

Till it was bright enough to call the one who...

...

It was your duty.

Not is.

Not anymore.​

She heads towards the bleeding familiar light, hoofs soft on the branching roots.

She walks though the shadows and leaves black dirt and shadowed roots for black stone.

She walks upon the shadowed bridge and stops halfway.

You can see the light ahead, shining in the form of mist that radiates light.

You can see the shadows behind you, a darkness you can not see though, a darkness in which one is lost.

You can see her by your side.

You can see the kindness in her eyes.

You can see the love in her eyes.

You can see the fear in her eyes.

"It's time for me to share a secret with you Selene. It is a heavy burden, the truth, and if after hearing it if you do not wish to bear it I will take it from you. For there is mercy in the shadows, and in the shadows you will forget."

She places her hoof on your shoulder comforting you.

"Ahead of us lies the dream lands, behind us lies the Woods. But they are tiny matters compared to what lives within you."

And so she tells you the truth, the illuminating merciless truth.

She tells you of the House of the Sun. Of the Gods that once ruled the world, of the Gods who the nature of ponykind is tied to. Of the Gods ponykind had, for they are gone now. Dead or crippled and the Mansus, the reflection of ponykind broken and in ruins.

She tells you of the lores. The secrets she has been whispering into your ears, the teachings that have given you strength.

"The lores make up the mansus, the principles of natural laws. The Hours, the Gods of ponykind reflected and created the lores. The mansus is a reflection of the wake, just as the wake is a reflection of the mansus."

She tells you of how the Hours that equalled, these principles of the world, the divine representations of the lores have fallen.

"The well is dry. The Grail is drained. The Sun is divided. And I suspect that the edge is dulled"

She tells you of Harmony, what little she knows. The force that has usurped the wake, that has taken control of ponykind. She tells you of it's opposition to the lores and the light it forces ponykind to shine, the fire of magic that serves as a beacon.

"In truth I know little of Harmony. In fact I know almost nothing. All I know is a few things of what it has done and my suspicions on it's actions"

"It is possible to subvert a lore and to change its nature. Lantern is subverted by Forge, Forge is subverted by Edge, Edge is subverted by Winter, Winter is subverted by Heart, Heart is subverted by Grail, Grail is subverted by Moth, Moth is subverted by Lantern and Knock subverts all while Secret Histories is subverted by all. Moth was a created by changing Heart while Forge was created via a change of Flint."

"I thus suspect that Harmony's opposition to the lores is born of its attempted subversion of them. The Elements of Harmony that now hold dominion over the Wake represent the new principles of the Wake. Laughter subverts heart, Love subverts grail, Kindness subverts winter, Honesty subverts lantern, loyalty subverts edge while Magic subverts forge."

"An example of Harmony's subversion would be Cutie marks. Cutie marks cover the natural affinities ponies have to the lores. Originally the Cutie marks were a symbol of rebirth, done though the passing of the Door of Want in order to be Branded with a principle of lore. A symbol of the lores, of the mansus. Now they are a symbol of Harmony's dominance over the Wake."

"Harmony tries to prevent the influence of the Hours, of the lores from entering the wake, and crippled as the Mansus is it has had some successes. Indeed I suspect it is only due to how dead some of the Hours are that their lores could be subverted. Which would explain why there's six elements of Harmony for the nine lores."

"Of Harmonies grand plan, I do not know the details but I do know of part of the effects. The dreamlands shine with light, brightened with the cutie mark of every pony that remains under its influence. Even now the dreamlands try to devour the Woods, the core nature of ponykind that remains in darkness in order to shine all the brighter."

"For all the similarities between the both the lores and the Elements of Harmony acting as principals of the world there is a major difference. The Hours represent the lores they embody. Harmony given what is known of it does not represent its Elements unfortunately."

Mrs Velvet sighs, the faintest hints of sadness and irritation in her voice.

"Long have the lores been kept secret, the worms kept secret. A lie that how things really are is that ponies exist in a peaceful land of magic and harmony. A lie that ingores the dangers in Equestria. Lies that reveal that Harmony does not represent its Element of Honesty."

"This wake that we live in has been shaped by the Elements of Harmony. It's a good world for ponies, a bright world where the sun rises and sets each day. A kinder world."

"If only Harmony would be as kind."

She tells you of the Outside. Of what comes from there. Of what Harmony, of what the lights its kind world calls from there.

"Beyond existence is Nowhere. Nowhere is very cold. Nowhere is lit by lamps of black nephrite."

"From Nowhere come cruel shadows that creep through the hinges of reality."

You know of them.
​

"They are called Worms."

You know of their touch.
​

"And if they have their way all will be dying but never dead. Suffering that will never end as they feast."

You know of their goal.​

"Even now they crawl though the dreamlands called by the light of the cutie marked doors."

"Then there are others that come from Nowhere. They are known as Outsiders."

"There is the Outsider Discord. The cruel god the inflicted great suffering upon ponykind long ago."

Wrenched scum, he has our ira.​

"Then is an Outsider that sought entry into this world and was granted it by a pact with Harmony. And Harmony in a repetition of that most abominable of fates divided the Outsider."

You remember your other half.​

"Obeying the laws of entrance by birth, and of departure by death. The divided Outsider was born by a mare in the form of two sisters."

Tia.​

"We know them as the Princess of Sun and Moon, the first Alicorns."

One to rule and one to watch​

She tells you of how she knows this. She tells you of a group who learned of the lores, who sat at the feet of a Mentor exalted in the lores and greatest in Moth, a being of the Woods. She tells you of their concerns over the Alicorns efforts in the service of Harmony that left the doors to Equestria are wide open so that any being or Outsider could just barge into it as it sees fit. That attracted by the fires of Harmony and magic, cruel shadows that creep through the hinges of reality would come The Worms. Of their shared desire and of the Mentors duty to protect the world. So when the Princess of the Moon returned to enflame the lights but still scarred from the nightmare she acted.

You remember she took the form of your sister.​

She tells you have how they broke down the seals upon Luna's memory. Of how they found out the truth. That Luna and Celestia had been working to ensure that the lights shown brighter, that the lights called for the Worms, and that Luna did not know of the Worms. That it was Luna's ignorance that lead to her being Worm-Consumed over a thousand years ago intill Harmony freed her and sealed the memories and the truth of the Worms away from her.

"The merciless truth was to much for Luna. A thousand years of torture left scars Harmony did not heal. And in the end knowledge of what happened and what she had done broke Luna."

She looks at you and as she does a voice deep from inside you seems to grow louder


Because your mind was ready.

Your body was once again in its correct form.

And you remembered the knowledge you contain.

And you had the strength to continue.

And you already knew the answer deep inside you just needed her to illuminate it for you.

"And so Luna fell asleep and the dream we call Selene came into being."

Mrs. Velvet looks at you with those loving kind eyes and what she says next shocks you.

"Now it's time for you Selene to decide what happens next."

You begin to speak your will when​

A hoof reaches over and delicately holds your chin. The hoof tilts you chin up till your eyes meet shadowed loving eyes.

"The choice of what happens to you now is yours Selene."

A voice inside your head is trying to tell you to stop looking into her eyes. But as you look into her eyes that voice gets smaller and smaller, till you can't hear it at all. As if it is smothered in shadows unable to effect you at all.

"And yours alone."

Mrs. Velvet turns your head towards the dreamlands. The home of Luna, where the door awaits that holds Luna's sleeping form. The bright shinning welcoming dreamlands. With the scuttering worms.

"You can choose to wake up. To no longer be Selene and be Luna once more. But remember every dream ends when the dreamer wakes, and it would mean the end of the dream called Selene. I don't know what memories and emotions of Selene Luna will remember and keep. Perhaps you will remember us, your family or perhaps you will forget."

"The lessons I have given you will remain. The knowledge of the lores shall help you. It's part of you now."

"Stormchaser disapproves of course. He wants you to keep being his daughter. He wants to keeps supporting and loving you as your father. He does however understand."

"To me you will always be my daughter and I will keep loving you."

Mrs. Velvet turns your head behind you to the Woods you were just within. The Woods are dark, the shadows long, and yet... You feel a sense of belonging, like a comfortable home waiting for you where you will be safe.

"There is mercy in the shadows and in the shadows you can remain. I can smother the echos of Luna within you in darkness and ensure you remain Selene. You will not remember this conversation. This pleasant life, this joyful dream can continue."

"You can just be a filly. You can continue to have Silky as your sister. You can continue to have Soft Sweeps as your sister. You can continue to have Stormchaser as your father. You can continue to have me as your mother. You can continue to have, to be a part of this loving family of ours."

"Days of fun will continue day after day. You need not bear the weight of the world on your shoulders. You will be free to enjoy this carefree innocent life, you will be loved and be supported by your family."

She turns your head towards her.

"Or you can choose to have both. To wake up while remaining Selene."

"If you ask it of me I will burn the truth of my love upon the world and it will remain forever as a scar upon reality. As a wound leaves a scar. A door that once opened shall never be closed. A path that once we start walking we can never step off."

"A truth that you are Selene and you are loved. And this shall be the truth that can not be denied. And if this is a world that will not let us have what you desire, to be awake and be Selene. Then it will be the world that bends and breaks, not my will. Not my love."

"I will go to where Luna sleeps and I will slay her with the power of my love. I will regret strangling Luna in her cradle, ensuring she will never wake but I will not regret loving you Selene. No matter what."

"A part of me will be in you making us mother and daughter forever. And that part, that thing born of love will hurt. Because sometimes, loving something means being willing to be hurt for it or even hurt by it. Because this love that we will share is worth getting hurt for. And so the dream that is Selene shall become the nightmare that is Selene

She hugs you then and as you enjoy her warm loving embrace and try and decide.

The Shinning Bright dreamlands, where Luna sleeps. Shall you be more then you are?

The dark woods, and the family that is waiting for you. Shall these wonderful days continue?

Or the mare by your side, the mare who's embrace you enjoy, the mare who you have never called mother. Shall you finally call her mother?

The choice is yours and yours alone.

[] "The Velvet's answer is No, and that is always her answer."
There is mercy in the shadows and in the shadows you shall remain.

-You will not remember this conversation, you will not be burdened by the merciless truth, you will remain Selene.
-You will continue to enjoy this carefree innocent life, you will be loved and be supported by your family, Velvet Covers, Silky Stream, Stormchaser and Soft Sweeps.
-Perhaps when you begin to grow you might journey to get a Brand and live your life as a pony like any other
-You will not grow further in the lores

-Stormchaser strongly supports this option
-Luna strongly disapproves of this option
-Velvet Covers will support and love you and you will return that love


[] "Clotho colum retinet, Lachesis net, et Atropos occat"
Every dream ends when the dreamer wakes. You will die, forget the dream, and awake under the morning sun. You will be freed from this claustrophobic life called Selene.

-So ends the life called Selene.
-Selene will pick the ritual used to awaken Luna
--"The Incision of the Heart" - Permanently removes any mind-affecting malus
--The Rite of the Mother and the Father - "It is time to wake up."
---"They know they will never see her again."
-Luna will awaken healed of the Scars of the Nightmare and remembering all that was done to her while she was Luna
-Luna shall retain all the lore levels of Selene and can improve herself in the lores should she find the sources to do so
-Luna's awakening shall have the positive modifiers "A Calm Awakening" and "A Pleasant Dream"
-You do not know how much of the memories of Selene Luna will remember
-You do not know how much of the emotions of Selene Luna will keep
-It shall be the end of the dream called Selene
-Luna as the Princess of dreams may in time come to remember more over the years
-Should it be that Luna decides to inform Celestia of the lores (dependent on memories and emotions kept (mainly emotions) Velvet Covers will not survive
--Should Velvet Convers end due to this the following consequences shall unfold
---Silky Stream, Stormchaser, Rarity, Fluttershy and Jade will be devastated
---Mareinette shall be unbound upon the Wake
---Soft Sweeps shall pick up the torch and the fire inside of her shall burn with her hate for Celestia
---Other predictable consequences

-Stormchaser strongly disapproves of this option
-- He wishes to keep being a father for his daughter
-Luna strongly supports this option
-Velvet Covers will support and love you but shall you return that love?

[] "Wolf thy name is Selene"
"I will cast a shadow upon my kingdom of dreams snaring with cords into a land of thick darkness, as darkness itself, where in that darkness the lights will dim."

-You will remain Selene, you will always remain Selene, you will love her and she will love you, you will always be her daughter, and she will always be your Mother. By the black fire you both share, if not by blood.
-Velvet Covers will slay Luna in her sleep with the double edged blade known as love, she will regret strangling Luna in her cradle (this is a [REGRETTABLE ACTION] by Velvet Covers),
-Velvet Covers will not regret loving Selene
-Your bond of love with Velvet Covers will always remain no matter what happens
-The malus 'unquiet sleep' will effect all those who dream in Equestria
-The dreamlands shall be placed in darkness and thus their attraction of the worms shall have the malus 'shrouded in darkness'
-Upon awakening you shall remember all the memories of Luna and Selene while remaining Selene
-Upon awakening you shall keep all the emotions of Selene
-You will retain all your lore levels and can improve them further
-You will receive an offer for an invitation for your Winter and Edge Sacrament, the price has already been paid
-The black fire that has consumed you does not bear interlopers, you gain protection against being worm-consumed
-The dream that was Selene shall become the nightmare that is Selene
-You will never be alone

-Stormchaser does not know of this option
-Luna is terrified of this option but respects it, for she can not scorn one for embracing love, for reaching back out to what reached out to you.
-Velvet Covers will support and love you and you will embrace that love, for with your Mothers love all things you can endure
-Soft Sweeps approves of this action

 

[jelloloaf]

Originally posted this back on the SV thread, but it never got a threadmark, so I thought I'd crosspost here for visibility. Also, as a bonus in honor of our new site, I've added on a new alternate ending.

---

In which the war ends

---

Copper Secateur was beginning to get sick of abandoned warehouses.

Yes, they were free, yes, they were spacious, yes, nopony would suddenly barge in asking difficult questions about all the blood, but it just felt like every single time there was something to be done, it ended up being done inside yet another abandoned warehouse. Not that this one was really abandoned anymore.

The typical light coating of dust over the drab concrete floor was absent, mostly due to the exhaustive search for traps, tricks, and other such tidbits that might interfere with what was supposedly going to be a parley with Velvet Covers of all mares.

It had been a difficult thing to accept. A truce with Velvet Covers, her rival, her foe, the root cause of at least eighty-two percent of her current problems to date; the idea was frankly absurd. But Copper knew Velvet's reputation, for sneaking and conniving and general Moth bullshit. Velvet had a plan, and she was not going to stand by and let her enact it unopposed.

She couldn't really see what that plan might be, which meant that she had to be extra cautious to make sure she didn't fall into it by accident. Velvet had let her choose the meeting place, but Copper wouldn't put it past her to somehow scry the location out of her mind and preemptively trap it before she arrived or something equally ridiculous. That was why she'd brought over some of her followers more skilled in Lantern to check and recheck that absolutely nothing suspicious was going on. Even now, they were spread out as an early-warning perimeter around the surrounding blocks.

Of course, they might have been compromised as well, but you can only take so much paranoia before you cripple yourself, and Copper would not give Velvet that satisfaction.

There was not a clock in the warehouse, but a loud tick of the minute hand would have been very thematically appropriate.

Copper shuffled around slightly. She was supposed to have arrived by now. Quickly glancing behind her to make sure nopony was attempting a sneak attack, her heart nearly jumped out of her chest when her turn back forwards revealed Velvet standing a few meters away from her. Bucking theatrical Moth bullshit.

Her entire body tensing up, Copper leapt backwards, already planning out which way to dodge the incom-

"I'm not here to fight you, Copper. I promised, didn't I?"

Velvet looked … not mournful, her face remained perfectly calm, but something about her posture indicated a deep tiredness. As though she had just finished doing something very difficult and unpleasant.

For a heartbeat, Copper stared at Velvet, still anticipating some sort of trick, but after a long few moments of nothing passed, she relaxed marginally. Maybe this wasn't a trap?

Velvet slumped slightly as well, letting out a long sigh. "I'm sorry, Copper. I didn't … I never wanted it to turn out this way."

No, no, this was definitely a trap. Copper tensed back up again. Velvet, apologizing? Either she had gone insane or this was a poor attempt to trick her into lowering her guard.

Velvet sighed again. "Copper, I know that this will be … hard to believe, but we don't need to fight each other."

Copper scoffed at that. "You're right, that is hard to believe. Maybe I could have believed that four months ago, but a lot has happened since then."

Velvet scrunched her eyes shut, hoof twitching in an aborted motion to rub them. "It's … difficult to explain, but please, just hear me out. I spoke to the Master and"

… Of course. Of bucking course she did. The Master didn't disappear, she was still talking to her favorite Velvet Covers. Not to her, who had been with her from the beginning, but Velvet Covers.

Velvet – apparently unable to read Copper's mind by the way she didn't react to any of the very hostile thoughts about her – continued speaking. "I know it's a lot to ask, I know that you don't have any reason to trust me right now, but if you could just …" Velvet's voice began trailing off before she let out yet another heavy sigh.

"And why should I?" Copper was beginning to get angry. No, scratch that, she already was angry. "Why should I trust you, after everything you've done? Do you think this is some foals' story where we can just hug and make up and then everything will be all better?"

Velvet looked angry too, and for a second Copper thought a fight was going to break out, but Velvet shook herself, took several very deep breaths, and generally tried to calm herself down, to some success.

"Look, Copper." Another sigh, her breath misting out in front of her. "When the Master vanished, I was just as surprised as you were. I only found out she was still around a few weeks ago, and as soon as she told me that she had framed both of us for attacking first I set up this meeting with you. I don't want us to be enemies, Copper. All that time when we were friends, all the time we were on the same side, surely it meant something."

All things considered, having Velvet begging for forgiveness was quite nice, but not quite nice enough. Not anymore. "It did mean something, Velvet. It meant a lot to me. The cult was the first place where I finally felt important, needed." As Copper continued, her voice got louder and louder. "For the first time in my life, I mattered! I was important! And then you took it all away." She was aware that she might've maybe possibly sounded ever so slightly unhinged, but it was all coming out, and there was no stopping it now. "YOU BETRAYED US, VELVET!"

Velvet opened her mouth to say something, but Copper glared at her until she closed it again. "Let. Me. Finish. Velvet. When I first met you, I thought we had something in common. Happy ponies don't join cults, Velvet. Neither of us felt like we fit into the rhythm of Equestria, we didn't quite match the scenery, we always sang just a little out of tune."

"Because even though we had our Cutie Marks, we never felt quite sure that they were the right ones, because surely this isn't what we're meant to be doing for the rest of our bucking lives! Let's take mine as an example, the humble pair of pruning shears. Makes sense, doesn't it? Because why would an Earth Pony ever want to be more than just a gardener? After all, that's all she's good for."

Velvet remained silent, and Copper didn't care to notice if she was even listening anymore. She was going to get this out and she was going to do it now. "Do you have any idea how good it felt to be told that there really is more to life? That you don't need to just shut up and accept your place? Do you, Velvet?" When she remained silent, Copper scoffed. "That's what I thought."

"When I first met you in that bar, I was willing to put aside my personal issues with your background. Hay, we even became friends after it seemed clear that you were different. Jade trusted you, Starry trusted you, and I trusted you too. And then you took that trust and you made it disappear, just like you do with everything else that gets in your way."

Copper glared furiously at Velvet, who just silently stared back. "We weren't in tune with everypony else, so we made our own tune, Velvet!" Copper stomped down onto the floor, and maybe it was just shoddy lowest-bidder construction, and maybe it was just the heat of the moment, and maybe it was nothing at all, but she could almost swear the concrete cracked underneath her hoof. "We made something all our own, and we finally fit in, and we finally had our place, and we were finally able to belong. But that wasn't enough for you. You wanted exactly what you bucking parasites always want, to be on top of everypony else."

Velvet's face was somewhat blurry though the tears (was she crying?), but she seemed stunned by the sheer vitriol that had just been spit at her. But Copper wasn't about to let up now. She leaned in close, staring Velvet straight in the eyes. "Every bucking meeting it was always you, you, you, and now you're saying it's about us? It's about everything we did together?" Copper took a heaving breath. "So I'll ask you again, Velvet, why should I listen to you? You say the Master wants us to fight, why should I turn away from her too? Why should I turn away from the only pony who ever cared?"

Several long moments passed, Copper panting heavily, and Velvet remaining silent.

"Because." Velvet paused to take a long, cold breath. "Because the Master is dead."

What? No, that couldn't be. Velvet had said she had just spoken with the Master, how could they be dead? Was there something she had missed in …

"She's dead because I killed her, and the Wood with her. I do not want this to have to be a threat."

All the tension drained out of Copper immediately. Velvet's statement was so unexpected that she almost burst out laughing right then and there. No, not almost, she did burst out laughing, in the loud, wheezing laughter that you get from the very best emotional whiplash. It took a good twenty seconds before Copper was finally able to speak again. "Oh, I thought you were supposed to be a schemer, Velvet. Did you really think such a blatant lie was going to work? Really, destroying the Wood, at least come up with something halfway believable." Surely Velvet couldn't be telling the truth.

Surely.

And then just like that, a tiny seed of doubt planted itself in Copper's mind. She hadn't been to the Mansus recently (too much of a security risk, sleeping around all those new cult members), and North Star had been giving more portents of doom than usual (when had anypony last seen North Star?). Copper kept thinking of more and more minor issues that only just now seemed like they might have been connected, and the more she thought about it the more she couldn't stop thinking about it.

As much as Copper wanted to immediately run off to check for herself (just to make sure), she wouldn't give Velvet the satisfaction. She would calmly spend a few minutes finishing up this farce of a meeting and she would only start galloping once she was well out of view.

It seemed Velvet had the same idea – the finishing up, not the galloping. "That's all I have to say to you, Copper. Are we still going to be enemies?"

The answer was obvious. Even if Copper was growing increasingly worried, there was no way that she would ever settle for peace with Velvet Covers. Either she was lying,and thus could just easily be lying about wanting a ceasefire in the first place, or she was telling the truth, and she had just committed the greatest possible betrayal. Copper let out another laugh, short and sharp this time. "Yes."

Velvet slumped almost imperceptibly and stepped back. "Well then. Goodbye, Copper." Her Edge senses screamed at her, and Copper didn't hesitate for a moment. She lunged towards Velvet, tackling her to the ground. At last, she had finally shown her true colors, it was finally time to …

A few seconds later, the doors to the warehouse burst open as heavily armored ponies streamed in and formed a perimeter around the pair. The fight was broken up almost as soon as it had begun, Copper stunned by a flurry of law-enforcement spells and hooves before subsequently being clapped into chains by the Lunar Bureau agents. How had they gotten past her scouts? Unless …

She never should have come here. She had known that Velvet was going to try and trick her, and yet she agreed to a meeting anyway. Every single time she put her trust into other ponies they just stabbed her in the back again and again. She had nopony to blame but herself for this.

Her musings were interrupted by Velvet stepping back into her field of view. Copper stared at her face, searching for even the slightest hint of the pony that she had once called a friend. Velvet Covers stared back at her. The sadness in her eyes almost looked genuine.

A Bureau agent cast a spell, and everything went dark.

---

One of the traditional paths to enter the Mansus is to sleep in a room painted entirely white. While not entirely the same thing, a law-enforcement stun spell and the off-grey of the interior of a Lunar Bureau prisoner transport carriage were close enough for one as powerful in the Lores as Copper was.

Velvet hadn't been lying. The Woods were destroyed. The Dry Well was gone. An enormous waterfall of flaming blood dripped from the sky. What was once an endless expanse of forest was now nothing but ash.

Copper Secateur collapsed on the worn Mansus-stone path and sobbed.

---

Spoiler: Alternate Ending

She was aware that she might've maybe possibly sounded ever so slightly unhinged, but it was all coming out, and there was no stopping it now. "YOU BETRAYED US, VELVET!"

Velvet opened her mouth to say something, but Copper pushed it shut again. When had she gotten close enough to do that? Their faces were almost touching. "You betrayed … you betrayed me."

Copper was panting, exhausted from the outpouring of emotion, and Velvet looked just as stunned. With everything that Copper had just poured out in an unceremonious emotional crash, with such a suggestive position, with the naturally heightened sensations of a Grail influence, it was almost understandable how Velvet had gotten the wrong idea.

"Copper, you know, ah, I … don't really see you … that way."

Copper stared at her in utter shock. Velvet, still tragically unaware of Copper's internal experience, averted her eyes, blushing slightly.

"It's just that, I'm … already married, so, you know … "

Copper continued staring, still attempting to process the thorough derailment of her admitting her hatred. Velvet continued to dig herself deeper.

"And I know the stories about Grail, but it's not really proper …"

Copper finally managed to shake herself free. "Velvet?"

Velvet looked uncharacteristically nervous. "Yes, Copper?"

"What the buck are you talking about?"

Now it was Velvet's turn to stare blankly as her entire argument collapsed around her. "You … weren't confessing your love for me?"

"What the hay, Velvet!" Copper rubbed her face, desperately attempting to wake back up in the real world where things made sense. "We're rivals! Edge dyads! We try to murder each other at least once a month!"

Velvet tapped her hooves together, studiously examining the rafters. "It's a popular genre, that's all. Back when we were still a book club and not a 'book club', you always liked the romance novels the best. I thought that maybe … this was your way of trying to tell me something."

"You thought that me sending a magical ritual to kill you was my way of letting you know that I had a crush on you?" Copper gave another one of her world-famous incredulous stares. "Why did you even come if you thought I was flirting? You're already married!"

"I was going let you down gently!" Velvet shot back, some intensity finally making its way into her voice. "andmaybealsoadoptyou."

"What?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing. No plans for another daughter here, none whatsoever. After all, we've got this whole romance mess cleared up now, right?" Velvet gave Copper one of those annoyingly endearing smiles of hers.

"I guess." Copper grudgingly admitted. "You've kind of derailed the whole confession about how I hate you for ruining my life. It would be awkward to keep fighting now."

"Truce?"

"... Truce."

And so, with Harmony and Friendship once again proven to be the most powerful forces in the universe, the first occult war seen in ten thousand years came to an end.

 

[AuthorTransient]

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Here's the first part of the omake. Heh, I think there's other omakes posted already.

In which (S) Collide – Part 1,

Velvet: Rite

You are Velvet Covers and right now you are... thinking.

You haven't had the time to sit down and think on what you've done for a while now. A long while. There was always another fire to put out, or preparations to put out a fire, or an unexpected event, or... Truth is, you haven't really thought about your deeds because you've always been so busy. Or maybe it's that you haven't given yourself the time to think. Because if you did, you might just realize the scope of everything you've done, and then, and then...

This vacation has been good for you. It was needed for Selene, and you're glad for that, that you can still care for your family (despite everything), but it has also been good for you. And the wedding went off without a hitch, despite – –

Your thoughts spiral.

Honestly, you have no idea how you've survived for so long without getting somepony confronting you with your sins, haha! You chuckle under your breath, but inside, you're almost breaking down in hysterics. By Celestia, you killed a Name! Albeit with the help of another Name, and desolated the Woods in the process, but... is it something to be proud of?

It seems both like only yesterday and somewhere lost in history when you joined a book club with Copper Secateur... whom you just recently tried to kill, several weeks ago.

All the things you've done. How far is too far, and how far is not enough? Do your good deeds outweigh your sins crawling on your back? And do they cancel each other out?

No.

You are not perfect. You know this. And you have tried your best. Maybe there were other things you could have done, actions not taken, fleeting opportunities not used, or choices not pursued that could have led to a different result, but – you have tried your best. And you are still trying your best, and you will continue trying your best.

You marshal yourself with pure pony strength of will, holding everything in check with an iron calm. You take a deep breath, feeling your ribcage expand, pushing against your skin. You let it out. You breathe.

You open the door.




Your preparations are complete. Mostly. Your plan, if it can be called that, is to throw yourself down at Luna's feet and beg for mercy.

Baldomare is watching from the attic above, ready to intervene if necessary. Rarity and Jade Whistle are with her, presumably making small talk.

Fluttershy is in the adjacent room, along with Comet Feet, who is pacing around.

Stormchaser nods his head at you as you settle onto the couch beside him.

Silky Stream looks up at you sleepily.

Soft Sweeps is struggling to stay awake.

Selene is already almost asleep, half-curled underneath a bundle of crocheted blankets that were knitted with love.


You had sent out everyone else – your brother is on an overseas trip right now – and you've told your staff to take a vacation. Even Ponpon, who had paused at the door and said that you could talk to her about anything. You didn't quite manage to look her in the eyes, but she thankfully had not pressed.

The fireplace is warm, although you can barely feel the fire on your skin. Still, you tuck in your daughters before the couch... and pause.

You don't want to die (and you still don't) but now that you've thought about it, getting judged by the same pony you've wronged might be for the best – as long as your family is safe (or Fair Trial, you guess, but even that is contingent on her knowing all the facts). Sometimes you think your sanity is only maintained because of your family. Sometimes you want everything to just end, just so you can stop remembering your regrets. But you move on from those times, because of everypony dear to you. An idea had started everything, the idea that you did not exist in a peaceful land of magic and harmony, the idea that was about secrets, about how the world hides its own in the most unusual of ways, and about how those secrets change and transform while the world isn't looking. That something was in the wrong shape.

And you had realized, slowly, that that idea was right.

Equestria is in danger, and something must be done about it. It is not a peaceful land of magic and harmony, and that is something that had been proved over and over again, from the Worms to the unnecessary sacrifice of the Royal Knights to the Luna imposter to the Catastrophe to the Wolf and your own actions and choices, of which none can be an exemplar of that idea more than the still smoldering Ashes of what was once the Woods – here be horrors.

But you had kept a line in your heart, and you had managed to keep this line, you had managed to keep yourself from crossing that line, despite everything, despite sometimes feeling like the rest of the world had trampled across it. But about where you truly desire to be, and everything you had learnt, you were realizing another idea. Another different idea. Which was that you were doing this for the people dear to you. And this idea was borne from that time Fluttershy had pushed the line back, and the Ashes of your own actions.

And that idea that has been rooting inside of you – is now budding; unfolding, like a blooming lotus, or fires in the night, or the shivering of a moth's wings.

"Mom?" Silky Stream and Selene ask.

When you raise your hoof to your eyes, you find that you are crying.

You open your mouth to apologize, or deflect, but what comes out is a sob.

Your daughters stumble out of their blankets, and you try to push them back, you try to cover up... and you fail. Or rather, you choose to fail.

Tonight, your family is together.

You hug your daughters, and your daughters hug you. The couch dips as Stormchaser's presence settles beside you, to give you a warm nudge.

"You know that I love you all, right?" You ask. "You know that I love you all, very very much?"

At the chorus of affirmatives, you let go and look at your beautiful, beautiful daughters. You are planning to wake Luna soon, but that's not really fair to just spring onto the rest of your daughters, is it? And perhaps, neither is it fair to Selene.

So you speak.

"I need to tell all of you something."

What do you tell your daughters?

[] WRITE-IN

--- --- ---

Mareinette: Ascend

Down, down in the cellar... a horror opens Her eyes.

Standing up in grace as befitting Her station, the Lady opens the door and begins to climb.

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[AuthorTransient]

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Here's Part 2!

---

In which (S) Collide – Part 2

Luna: Wake


You wake up.

You are Luna AND YOU WAKE UP.



For a moment, you can only stare at the gray ceiling, blinking. Feeling the way your eyes close shut and flicker open again.

What happened?

You shift your body under the familiar covers and shut your eyes again, thinking. You had a... you had a bad dream. A dream where you trusted your sister and your sister hurt you. And then you panicked and ran and ran and ran... and had another, different dream.

A dream where your name was Selene, but your name wasn't Selene. A dream where you were a filly, but you realized you weren't just a filly. Where something was wrong, but didn't know what. You toss and turn, stretching your calves and feeling the sensation of crystal horseshoes.

A dream where it was so cold and so painful each movement was a journey, but you had to keep going. A dream where you felt you deserved it anyway, that cold, harsh bitter feeling that made you feel so miserable. Where you felt so, so sad, that it hurt your heart even more than the cold did. Where you didn't want to leave. Where you didn't want to leave alone. But you had to. And you did. You frown and your entire face twists with the motion.

Then, it was a dream where you found something that was a part of you. And you feared it and hated it, but you couldn't stand not knowing. And you remember... you remember that horrible, horrible dream, where you opened the door and found – and found that time you were Nightmare Moon. You open your eyes and look up at the ceiling again. That horrible, horrible Worm. You sigh, and your entire body heaves with the motion.

Finally, as your eyes remain open and you remain silent, thinking of nothing at all, you remember that final part of the dream. When you panicked and hurt your sister. Again, you realize. When you hurried to apologize and was stopped in place. When you remembered that you – you own yourself. Not this trauma, not that Worm, not anypony else. Everything you have ever experienced – the fires, the black river of loss, your sins and regrets and your deeds and actions and choices, they are all a part of you. You hold that realization close to your chest, and you realize that you will fight anypony who ever denies that.

You shut your eyes once more and just breathe in and out.

Then you get up.



The room is unfamiliar, and the pegasus by your bed even more so. You feel that you should know them... but you also don't. Jamais Vu.

"Sorry," you ask, "where am I?"

You feel like you've done something bad when his face falls, but before you can apologize again, the door opens a crack, light spilling in. You turn to see an old mare who looks familiar but in another way (still a stranger) opening the door. "Perhaps it's best not to answer that yet, dearie? Please follow me."

You frown, but you follow the pegasus and the mare anyway, out of the bedroom and down a series of halls and stairs, still feeling that strange sense of jamais vu as you look around. You expect there to be vertigo as well, but the fact that there's none keeps throwing you off. This is not a Dream, even if this house looks... both familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. The pegasus sneaks glances at you from time to time, but you still can't remember his name nor where he's from.

Eventually, you reach the house's apparent living room. For some reason, your heart is undergoing palpitations. You turn your head to look at the old mare and she gestures you forward. You close your eyes and take a deep breath, and slightly hesitantly, you open the door. Before the light of the fireplace – you see a family of strangers.

Spoiler: Does she remember the dream?

Does she remember the dream?

Modifier:

Final Words +1

Final Realization +1

7 or higher: Luna remembers everything of Selene.

6: She remembers most of it. That there is an enemy, and that you found her, took her in, sheltered her, taught her, raised her, and let her live with her family.

5: She remembers half of it. That there is an enemy, what you taught her, and how you let her live with her family.

4: She remembers some of it. That there is an enemy and what you taught her.

3: She remembers the gist of it. That there is an enemy.

2: She remembers you found her.

1: Nothing.

0 or lower: Hostile.

But -- -- --

Because your mind was finally ready for it.

And your body was once again in its correct form.

And you remembered the knowledge needed to open it.

And, at long last, you had the strength to do what had to be done.



The memories come rushing back. Yes, this is your family. Or was. Or is. Or whatever, dream nonsense. You hoofwave that away mentally and take stock.



Stormchaser, who had been a solid and nurturing rock for you.

Soft Sweeps, who had done her best as a big sister, now in shock – which amuses you, just the slightest bit.

Silky Stream, who is smiling so wide your own cheeks hurt.


...Velvet Covers, who has bowed her head down.



Which is wrong. She shouldn't have to. As you walk towards her, she cowers further down, until she is almost prostrating.

"Velvet Covers," you begin... and you bend down a hoof to help her up (you're taller than her now; you have always been taller than her). "Thanks, Mom."


"I don't, I don't deserve..." She begins, but you shush her and wrap your wings around your mother, feeling how she shivers and shudders underneath your embrace. Has she always been so frail? Has she always looked so old and so stressed and so exhausted?


"It's okay." You remember the dream, and the nightmare as well, and already you are connecting the dots – – and have connected the dots between how she taught you the Lores and how she was the one to find you first, and understanding what she had done – and also what she had sacrificed to help you. "I forgive you."

You let her sob a bit more, and then the moment is ruined as Silky Stream executes glomp number 6 and subsequently glomps both of you. "Squeeeeeeee ~ !"

Softy Sweeps hesitates, but you roll your eyes and wrap both her and Stormchaser in the group hug as well. Then, inhaling, you shake your wings out and stretch. By the Glory does that feels good.


There's a chuckle by the door and Baldomare ("Aunty Baldie!") files back in, followed by Rarity, Fluttershy, an unknown unicorn, and frankly a rather large pegasus – the last of which froze once he laid his eyes on you and went: "Velvet, that is Luna."

That name... that's right, you are no longer Selene, are you? Inwardly, you light a small fire for that young filly – Selene. The dream was nice while it lasted, and helped you immensely. Thank you.

Although it hurts you to do so, you haven't yet fully restored your connection to your Alicorn sister, if only because she would teleport right over here and likely explode the place. No, it would be better to do so in a clearing tomorrow. And as Velvet shares a glance with you, you know there will be a conversation later about what exactly to tell her.

But right now, it is time for a subdued celebration.


You meet and greet with Rarity and Fluttershy, who establish themselves all at once almost opposites to each other but also alike in the most charming of ways.

You learn that the unknown earth pony is Jade Whistle, and that she helped in finding an easier way to wake you, of which you profess your gratefulness for.

You manage to disentangle Aunty Baldie from your sister long enough to give her a hug and whisper thanks.

You sort of shrug at Comet Feet as he introduces himself, who also sort of shrugs at you. Almost immediately afterwards the both of you notice Velvet Covers entering an animated discussion with Fluttershy, at which point you exchange looks with him in comisseration at being the only 'sane one' here.

You greet Mareinette and she greets you back as befitting of a Lady of her station, raising your hoof to her lips to kiss -

"What Are You Doing."


Mareinette Trait Revealed!

THE SUBTLE KISS: Mareinette may hide attacks as completely harmless kisses, pats, smiles, or intimate glances, though they still require combat rolls. Targets may make an intrigue check to realize that damage was done after each successful attack. This compounds with OUR LADY OF WIRES.

DISPELLED BY BALDOMARE


- and you realize that her jaws are open around your foot. You still.


"Mareinette..." Velvet Covers begins, but the monster does not move. "Mareinette, let go."

- and for a terrifying moment, you realize that the monster in front of you is considering disobeying and biting down anyway, her gaze swiveling one way and another, until she slowly, slowly, hesitantly and unwillingly, releases you.

You take one step back, and then another. The room has gone very, very quiet.


Mareinette does not quite shuffle in place. She does not. She does not. She is a Lady, and a Lady does not shuffle in place. Nope.

Not even under the glare that Baldomare is levelling at her. Not even as the atmosphere rackets up, and as you note your sisters backing away and hiding behind Stormchaser, who has one wing slightly raised.


"Mareinette," you can almost hear the tremble in Velvet's voice behind the cold calm, "you aren't allowed to be in here."

The monster smiles. And it is a monster, although your mind rebels against it. Though she looks perfectly fine, despite being the largest pony you've ever seen and a face made out of wires, she looks like a perfectly respectable noble Lady. And you grab that bit, and vehemently grab it like a drowning pony might grasp for straws, and combine it with all the complaints that Celestia used to share with you about nobles, and manage to retain enmity against her.

You stoke that fire as much as you can, and will yourself to remain battle-ready. Something is telling you that the results of this confrontation may spell doom for everypony here.


Mareinette explains politely that -

DISPELLED BY BALDOMARE.


The monster is right in front of you – you dodge the bite without wound – and the horror slurps the single strand of hair up and savors it, shuddering in pleasure. You quickly maneuever yourself away into a more advantageous position.

And you look at two different mothers and two different ideas.

---

Velvet Covers: Strife

You are Velvet Covers, and you were content.

Luna is awake, she forgives you, it looks like you can actually make some headway into improving the world, maybe help Celestia calm down....

...except, you were.

Because you had been operating on a foolish assumption this entire time – that Mareinette would abide by limits and propeiety. But Our Lady of Wires is a monster, constrained only to her whims and moods. She can be nothing else.

Mareinette has disobeyed you, which means that she could have disobeyed you at any time. She has been humoring you. And she has barged into this celebration, and she has almost hurt Luna TWICE –

– which is to say that the only reason why your vision isn't completely red is because you are using a lot of Winter's calm.


[OLD INTELLIGENCE] TRIGGERS

As if sensing the direction your thoughts are taking, Mareinette twists in your direction and bows Her head. She apologizes for trying to take the first bite. Of course, it is you who went through the effort of finding the ingredients, an exotic half-Outsider, that you took the time to raise her up and fatten her just nicely, so you should be the one to try the sumptious meal first. Oh, what an exotic, one-of-a-kind meal! A half-Outsider!

All she's asking for is just a small bite of that sweet succulent blood. Just a little sip. It is all she is asking for. In fact, She will offer you a bargain deal right now! That is how you use the phrase, yes? As long as you share with Her just some of that sweet, sweet drink, She'll rebind herself to you. No need to thank Her.

After all, were the two of you not both fellow connoisseurs of the Grail? Were you not so glad about finally finding a conversation partner in the Grail that you summoned her here? Why, She had had to entertain herself for a while, but it was alright! Because even the wait is part of the meal.


Because, after all, both of you understand: love can only ever be an investment. It is a seed, which you gift and water and grow, all just so to reap everything back with value.

Something cannot be borne out of nothing. To make something, one must consume something.

The Sun is made from the remains of other stars. A fetus consumes a mother's body. A black hole devours everything to grow.

When you love somepony, you are marinating them, fattening them, seasoning them, and preparing them for the end-goal: to harvest their bounty and resources to savor and consume. All that work, all that sacrifice, all to culminate in another's destruction and ceasing to be, so that you can grow! To take in what others have sacrificed, into you!

Because, don't you know? The only reason why somepony would ever love somepony else is to never, ever, let them go.


And you realize that this is how Mareinette loves: all-devouring, all-consuming. Monstrous.

This is Her nature. She can no longer perceive that anypony can love any way else.

Like cherry wine, and even now as you resist it's siren call and burning anguish, you know that this too is part of Her love. Her holy grail.

You reject it.

You reject it with every fiber of your being. It should not be like this.


Love should not be attachment nor obsession, but free-flowing and freely given. It is the joy you feel in your heart when Silky does loop-de-loops in the air, and the bliss when Stormchaser tells you that you are his favorite horseshoe nail, and the determination and vulnerability you felt when you told Softy to follow her heart, and the felicility when the Daughter-of-Axes accepted your name, and when you would always choose to wake Selene, regardless of the loss and pain in your heart, knowing: you will never see her again.


And so when you speak, your voice is certain. "Mareinette, you are to never harm any of my daughters."

The Lady of Wires freezes like She is caught in a spotlight.

Then, She begins to plead.

Like a petulant child.


Please, please please please please-please-pleasePLEASEPLEASEPLEASE-

She bangs her head on the floor.

PLEASE, GLORY, PLEASE!

A half-outsider! An exotic meal none have consumed! Mixed with a pony's flesh, generating a new being wholly unseen! Pony flesh with the sweet, sweet underscore of a filly and the sour taste of an Outsider's blood!

She rolls about on the floor – everypony gives Her space. Desperately, almost frothing at the mouth, She rants and rants.

Why would you dangle this temptation and not even give Her one lick! She abruptly pulls herself to Her hooves and pleads – no, begs you. Just give Her this and She'll be binded to you forever. Please.


But you remain firm.

Or... you would have.

Because Her song and dance and arguments have revealed something far more damning. Coincidentally, Her dress is in disarray. Coincidentally, you are looking at Her. And coincidentally, you see it.


Several beating hearts, still christened with blood. Glistening like dark rubies. Freshly harvested.


And as you look at the Lady of Wires, you realize that She looks more vibrant than when you summoned Her. More filled out. More colored.

No. You Know.

You Know what She has done.

Mareinette Trait Revealed!

UNQUENCHABLE THIRST: For every turn in the Wake, Mareinette will seek out a Grail sacrifice and consume it.


Hasn't the number of your staff decreased, lately? Haven't they been slightly more busy? As if they were taking on the same amount of tasks with less ponies? Haven't there been some absences?

Faceless sacrifices. You don't even remember their names.

Mareinette Traits Revealed!

BLOOD MERIDIAN: Mareinette may spend a combat action to consume the last traces of life and experience from a victim who has been brought to zero hit points to recover 5 hitpoints. This also gives her a temporary bonus of +5 to rolls per life consumed this way until the Turn ends. This action can be interrupted, upon which She loses the action. This action cannot be used while She already has more than Her maximum hit points.

GRAIL OVERFLOW: Mareinette may gain temporary hit points above Her hit point total, up to 5.

ALL-CONSUMING NAME: When Mareinette consumes a living being, their existence disappears from memories. Characters may figure out something is wrong (strange clothes that they would never wear, an empty room with paraphernalia) but it is more likely that they would simply fill in any discpreancies by themselves.


Can you live with yourself if you do nothing, now that you know this?

Thankfully, that choice is taken from you.


Because your eyes widen.

And Mareinette sees your eyes widen, and She realizes what you've seen. And what that means.

And She fucking panics, and raises Her hoof -


"STORMCHASER!" You yell. "GET THE KIDS OUT, NOW! RUN!"


- and chows down on it.

「

!!!

THE SECOND BIRTH COMETH

!!!​

」​

She bleeds.

And suddenly, everything everywhere assaults your senses, all at once.


The sounds of a thick sweet liquid being greedily quaffed. The feeling of flesh giving way beneath your teeth. Your eyes can only stare at the sweet, sweet crimson liquid and you THIRST -

MAREINETTE TRAIT REVEALED

FOR THE OLD BLOOD: whenever Mareinette loses hit points, all targets in the vicinity suffer a cumulative -10 to rolls as the blood spilled intoxicates and causes hallucinations.

DISPELLED BY BALDOMARE


"DON'T YOU DARE!"

"GET AWAY FROM HER!"

+10 (A Sister's Promise)

+20 (A Sister's Oath)

+90 (Alicorn Combat: Luna)

-20 (Wire Mother)

And Luna defenestrates Mareinette out of the window with a beam of light.

---

EDIT: Copying and pasting messed up the paragraph breaks. Fixed.

EDIT 2: Added links at the bottom as well.

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[AuthorTransient]

1 2 3 4 J R 5 S 6 K​

In Which (S) Collide - Part 3

Thanks for the likes and threadmarks, OP!

Spoiler: Extended Author's Notes

For this boss fight opening scenes, I went back to read the first encounter we had with Mareinette in the Ruined Church. Wasn't good enough, so I went to look and listen to Cleric Beast and Ludwig the Accursed, followed by some Signalis. Still wasn't good enough. I rewatched Hellsing Ultimate for a bit, then rummaged a little through Evangelion, Attack on Titan, and Tokyo Ghoul. Looked at some Studio Ghibli movies and some of them were unexpectedly more scary than I remember. Checked through some SCPs as well. And then I realized I had to read the threadmark I've been putting off. When the Glory is dark...

Which was to say, I wanted to write something that when you read it, it would give you fucking nightmares, because you could picture it in your head and frighten yourself. I wanted it relatable.

I hope I accomplished that, because writing the introduction was painful. But that's how you make something Great, is it not? Sacrificing a part of yourself... to draw out the holy grail! AIEEEE!

I'm probably going to go on a months long sabbatical after posting this to recover from this writing frenzy. Anyway, exu-kalibar!

---

And Luna defenestrates Mareinette out of the window with a brilliant beam of light.

Velvet Covers: Mother

The impact rumbles through the floor at your feet, and then a cutting backdraft explodes through the ruined window, sending the curtains and your mane flying. You brace yourself against the wind, biting down on your teeth. The house shudders and the rest of the windows rattle. Behind you, the fire puffs out and leaves dying embers.

You open your eyes and realize your breath is coming in short, harried bursts. "Everypony alright?"

Muttered assents come from around you, but Luna remains looking out the window. You turn to look.

In the distance, the dust cloud is fraying. It looks like Mareinette had hit a small hill at the edges of your estate. Said small hill is probably gone now. Reduced to smithereens.

"Prepare yourselves." Baldomare states.

A frustrated scream reaches your ears. It is loud, piercing, and goes for longer than a pony can breathe. It does not sound equine. You brace.

Then a crimson maleficience disperses the dust cloud and you suddenly realize you can't breathe.


You have been hunted before.

Under the recommendation of Starry Dancer, you had once played 'tag' with the Master, which arguably helped you to survive later.

You had once been chased by several changeling guards through the castle in Canterlot and confronted the Luna imposter with Twilight Sparkle.

In the Ruined Church, you had fled from Mareinette as She sought to slake Her thirst for the first time since the Mansus broke.

And in the Woods, you had almost been subsumed by its Will.



Get up.

But all of that pales to what you are feeling right now.

The closest approximation... was when the gears of history stopped for Baldomare to think. It was the same immense pressure, the same weight of presence. The universe in subservience to an entity fundamental, elemental, and primordial.

What you want. How you live. None of those matters.

You can hear your heartbeat in your ears, and it sounds like war-drums. Ba-thump, ba-thump. You grit your teeth harder, and your muscles clench in emotion.

All over your body, it feels like someone had stabbed a needle into the pores of your skin. The taste of copper fills your mouth, and in the darkness you see the shape of a droplet float away from you. Its fuschia color doesn't change when it enters the white moonlight.

Your blood is trying to escape your body.

Because you don't own your blood anymore. Something far greater than your mortal form has seized the reins and is calling – no, the entity is hunting.

It is hunting all of you.


Get up.

Stormchaser had once treated you to a candlelit dinner. You had been served your salad slathered in gravy upon a cold porcelian plate, placed on a tastefully red tablecloth covering a round table. It had been a delightful experience.

Recent events have you going back to that salad mentally. In fact, recent events have you in place of the Caesar salad, covered in gravy and being served on that red, red tablecloth, for something that was no longer a pony with ruby-red eyes and a bleached white skull and sharp teeth that went clack-clack-clack.

To put it in other words, only Mareinette was at that table, and she is going to stab you through the middle with a sharp knife and raise you up to her maw. Know this: as you struggle feebly to pull yourself off the knife, as you flail pathetically, as you try to do anything at all – she is going to devour you.

She is going to fucking eat you, and nothing – nothing is going to stop her.


Velvet Covers no longer has the trait "Frightened" !

But that doesn't even fucking matter.

Because there is a monster in the Velvet Estate. And. It. Wants. Your. Child.


Get the fuck up.


Slowly, you rise to your hooves. Your entire body trembles under the pressure, and you can feel your blood squirming in your veins, but you push yourself up anyway. Though the weight is great, it is not enough to stop you.

"Hm." Baldomare grunts. She steps forward.

!!!​

Visibly straining, she steps forward. With each step, the pressure lessens, bit by bit. Gathering at her horn is something incandescent.

"I'm not sorry about doing this, Mareinette." She says. "But I am sorry about having to do it." The mare throws her head back and the night is ripped asunder by LANTERN. It fills the heavens like a second sun, and then abruptly it condenses into a single golden pillar — a spotlight bearing down on the Lady of Wires.

But that is no Lady. Not anymore. Uncoiling out of the impact crater is a monster made out of bones and wires. How you ever thought Mareinette was normal you can't understand. Looming like a fully grown dragon, Mareinette has shed her dress, revealing her full size. And it is monstrous.

Spoiler: Body Horror, Blood, Parasites/Worms

Thrice the height of Comet Feet and far beyond his size, red lights glare through a giant skull. No, not just one... One, two, three, four, five giant heads sway in the distance, like a hydra from old monster stories, connected to their body through pillars of thick red cords, as thick as any century-old tree. Red steam hisses through the air with every step it takes.

As if that is not enough, there is a wet squelch and Mareinette arches her back as if in the throes of ecstacy. Writhing crimson tendrils tear themselves out of her body and dance among the night sky, full of terrible bloodlust. A crimson fluid too rich in color to be blood splashes onto the ground and steams.

Like a tide or avalanche, dark crimson worms crawl out of her skeletal body and shifts to cover her bones in a disgusting glut of body armor, squirming horribly.

In the wind, you smell the stench of a fruit gone rotten and sour. Whatever red substance she is leaking is inflitrating the cracks in the crater, hissing and bubbling, popping wetly like sour plums or eyes blinking.


And you realize —

You realize —

What is on the lines, what is at stake here – is more than just your life and your valued ones – it is asking you and the world: are your ideals strong enough to matter?

You don't know the answer yet, but you know this: there is no fate that is not insurmountable – don't you already know that, from climbing the Mansus? There is always a way.


Barely some weeks ago, you and Mareinette? You had a meaningful conversation in the depths of the ruined church about motherhood. She had told you about her children and how they oh so unfortunately couldn't satisfy her thirst.

But this time, you are not going to have a conversation.


There is a monster in the Velvet Estate, and. It. Wants. Your. Child.

And that is something you cannot accept.

---

Spoiler: THE WIRE MOTHER (Unofficial)

Health: 30/50 (highballed)

Temporary Health: 0/5

[ONE WHO IS VERY GREAT]: Mareinette is willing to offer you Sacraments in the Lores of Grail and Heart, should you fulfill her requirements.

[OUR LADY OF WIRES]: Mareinette is immune to the effects of "Monstrous Appearance".

[HONORED GUEST]: Mareinette can "step in" on Velvet's horseshoes, and perform social actions in her stead even if only Velvet should have been able to perform them. (HOWEVER, see "Old Intelligence")

[WEIGHT OF PRESENCE]: Mareinette grants a full level up to the Secret Library for her preferred Lores.

[OLD INTELLIGENCE]: If Mareinette is alone while performing a social action, and a vote is offered, she will instead pick the vote based on what she thinks is best. (This will be based on her personal knowledge of you, as well as her loyalty. This trait can be either positive or negative, depending on interpretation.)

[MONSTROUS APPEARANCE]: Cannot be used for Social Actions. (Immune)

[PROUD]: Will refuse to cast any rituals that do not involve Grail or Heart.

[THE SECOND BIRTH]: Mareinette may choose to sacrifice a tremendous amount of health to immediately break her summoner's bindings. (Used.)

[NEVER ASK A LADY HER AGE]: Mareinette may elect to hide some of her characteristics from you. (She certainly is hiding her health, and she may be hiding other negative traits or skills.)

[THE SUBTLE KISS]: Mareinette may hide attacks as completely harmless kisses, pats, smiles, or intimate glances, though they still require combat rolls. Targets may make an intrigue check to realize that damage was done after each successful attack. This compounds with OUR LADY OF WIRES.

[BLOOD MERIDIAN]: Mareinette may spend a combat action to consume the last traces of life and experience from a victim who has been brought to zero hit points to recover 5 hitpoints. This also gives her a temporary bonus of +5 to rolls per life consumed this way until the Turn ends. This action can be interrupted, upon which She loses the action. This action cannot be used while She already has more than Her maximum hit points.

[GRAIL OVERFLOW]: Mareinette may gain temporary hit points above Her hit point total, up to 5.

[SAPPING FLESH]: Combat rolls targeting Mareinette must reach an overflow of 100 or higher to harm Her.

[PUPPET OF THE RED SANDS]: Mareinette does not suffer from any status of being 'Wounded'.

[WIRE MOTHER]: Mareinette gains +20 in combat against any entity that can be considered to have a mother and they have a -20 malus when targeting her.

[UNQUENCHABLE THIRST]: For every turn in the Wake, Mareinette will seek out a Grail sacrifice and consume it.

[FOR THE OLD BLOOD]: Whenever Mareinette loses hit points, all targets in the vicinity suffer a cumulative -10 to rolls as the blood spilled intoxicates and causes hallucinations.

[ALL-CONSUMING NAME]: When Mareinette consumes a living being, their existence disappears from memories. Characters may figure out something is wrong (strange clothes that they would never wear, an empty room with paraphernalia) but it is more likely that they would simply fill in any discpreancies by themselves.

[Other traits negative, unknown]

Multi-combatant fight. Mareinette will only "compete" to wound the Luna, but may be wounded by all other combatants.

What will Velvet's focus in the upcoming battle be?

(a) Attacking Mareinette

Velvet Covers will focus on ending the threat to Luna's life as soon as possible. This grants her +10 to combat rolls as she attacks Mareinette with the fury of a mother protecting her child.


(b) Defending Luna

Velvet Covers will focus on defending Luna. This grants her +20 to rolls but succeeding will not harm Mareinette. If Mareinette's combat rolls are above both Luna and Velvet Covers' combat rolls, Velvet Covers will take the wound first.


(c) Balance

Velvet Covers will adapt according to the tide of battle. This does not grant her any bonus, but Velvet Covers will be able to harm Mareinette and Mareinette's combat rolls will have to be above both Luna and Velvet Covers' combat rolls to harm Luna.


(d) Support

-(d1) Support Comet Feet

Comet Feet is the Edge expert, so supporting him may be for the best. Other than adding half of the final result of Velvet Cover's combat rolls to Comet Feet's combat rolls, Velvet will not contribute to the fight.


-(d2) Support Luna

Luna may not be at the same level of Lores as you, but she is an alicorn. Other than adding half of the final result of Velvet Cover's combat rolls to Luna's combat rolls, Velvet will not contribute to the fight.

1 2 3 4 J R 5 S 6 K​

 

[Sveta08]

The Door that May Yet Be



Sleep was always fleeting.

It had been for a thousand years. Perhaps before then, it was easier. When you didn't have to look up to see the face of your dear beloved sister stretched across the moon. Maybe in a time now before memory it was softer. The night breeze didn't hold whispers of regret and questions of betrayal and hurt from so long ago. When you could close your eyes and breath for a moment for yourself. When you weren't alone.

You are Celestia. And sleep is fleeting.


You nearly hurt him. You didn't mean to, or rather, you weren't trying to hurt him. When he told you you needed to sleep. To rest and actually close your eyes. He jumped to say not that you seemed bad, and not that you were unpresentable. But that it was part of it.
These magics. That rest is required. But, not quite rest. Something like it.

You nearly broke Midnight Dew when he told you to rest. That it was the way to reach this place.
You are not unfamiliar in old and strange magic. No one alive could question or challenge you on the past and the mysteries it held. Having lived through so much of it, who would know better? Some ratty old book, or the ruling eternal princess of the sun? No anyone with some sense about them even bothered to entertain the idea. And this... magic, if it was even magic... is different.

Even to you.
That is why you didn't kill him.

Some part of you might have balked at that idea. That you would break one of your loyal ponies for the simple fact of asking you to rest. Some small part of you once would have said they only wanted the best for you, foolish and impossible their wants and visions were. Too young to really understand. Some part of you might have even wondered about the looks they gave. And the dreams that he mentioned. And the fear in his eyes.

Maybe once. If she was still here. If you were still waiting.
But not anymore.


He tried to explain how he found it out. A full dossier available to you with everything said and left unsaid free for you. Everything he knew, and guessed, and didn't know how he knew. That last category gave you the most trouble. No scan found anything foul and implanted in his brain, nor thoughts pushed and wormed into his ideas. It was just something he knew. Somehow.

The instructions, at least as far as he had figured though, had been simple. A whispered few words. A lock of hair cut. And then, rest.
And it was at that last step you were struggling. Every moment spent laying there, waiting. Feeling. Knowing there was more you could do. That Luna was still out there, somewhere. Lost, hidden, hurt, taken, stolen from you. That she wasn't here. And that you were... here. Closing your eyes.
Only the knowledge that he had found something that was close stayed your hooves. Prevented you from flying off and continuing the work.

Every second of the day had been pushed to the limit. Everything that had been weighing you back and down pushed away. And now... Only your focus on so sharp a goal was in your way.
Of rest.
The second you realized it, the sleeping spell was cast.





Stone. Underhoof.
You are standing.
And the Moon is here.

Before you even realize the stone underneath your hoof isn't the stone you were on before. Before you feel that distinctly ur-numb sensation that crossed your coat. Before you even managed to look around and take in the place you find yourself, you.... feel it.
Or rather, you don't.
Your Sun. It's not here. But there is light of a newborn day on the distant horizon.
Your Sister's Moon. It's not here. But the heavens are filled with a moon unfamiliar to you.

This is not your home.
You can see why, if not quite how, Midnight Dew knew this wasn't right. That this was tied up in this.

After a moment, you finally begin to look around. Dark blue stones litter the ground, both structured and disorganized in one. Cut in a way you can't quite picture at first, and don't bother giving a second thought. Earth and something that might have once been vegetation around. But more than that...
There is Ash.
Plumes and piles and heaps of it, like a world had been burnt. Rolling on out towards the horizon like the crude scorchmark of a baleful sun. Something you understand only too well. And as your hoof brushed it, somehow, it felt warm to you, impossible though that was. That too, you don't bother giving a second thought. There is something more important.

There is a light in the distance.
Here in a world with the moon chained to the heavens, when you, your sister, has been stolen from you and hidden in some dark corner of the world where even you can't find. Here, in the space between reality and sleep, the moon is still and there is a light on the horizon.
Only you can bring the dawn. Maybe it was that, maybe it was the indignity, maybe it was plain irritation and curiosity. But you walked towards the light in the distance.





Ash was before the Sun Princess, and ash was all that remained in her wake.
At one point the building, if you can even call it that, came into view. Something structured without walls and supports, made of nothing but the same stone you felt far beneath your hooves. It's own sun chained to the top, unmoving and unflinching in it's light.
Once, people might have wavered. Once, maybe you would be tempted by the snipping and shearing of sounds in your ears. Maybe once you would have stopped and considered the building before you, the ash that sprawled throughout, the world you entered in and what the sun and the moon here meant. Maybe you would have seen more, found more, known more.
Maybe if the things in the ash didn't smell something too familiar on you, they would have hounded you.
But you are too focused. Too resolved. Too.... diligent and aimed now. All the rest is... cast aside.

For the first time in an era, in their First Dream someone reached The Manus.

Steps.
Floors.
A path.
A Door.

The First Door.

The Blank Door.

And past it-
is somewhere you should never go

 

[spiderhellian]

In Which the Dreamer Snoozes

You are Velvet Covers. And on a night so very like another night, in a room not that different from another room, you feel a flash of jealousy for the one mother who has been in the same spot you are now. At least she knew you would be there for her daughter, the charge she had returned from the beyond to protect. She knew nothing of what lay ahead, but at least she knew one character in it.

You have no idea what are you sending Selene into with these words, and this rite. And yet, you know you must say them anyways. So, as tears drip down your face, you stutter them out.

"W-wont… won't you go wake her up, love? Y-you know… y-yo… you know how groggy she c-can get… after she sleeps for longer than she should."

Click to shrink...

---

You are Stormchaser. Every other month you leave behind your home, and bid your wife and children farewell for what feels like far too long. It is a fresh wound each time, but at least one you are experienced in taking. Like shepherding a storm or tracking a tornado, it gets easier with practice.

But you have never had to do this. To look at your child, and send them away.

"It is time to wake up."

Click to shrink...

You do not know how these things are supposed to go. But in an instant, the rite's effect seems clear. The dreamer in front of you stirs, a stray limb shifting across the bed. Before you can leave, before you can sob, she opens her mouth.

She grunts, "Mmph!"

And mumbles, "Five more minutes!"

Was that how this was... supposed to go? You really don't know these ritual things well, but surely not. Did you misphrase the words? You can't, you won't, let down your wife. Not ever, but especially not here and not now. So you try again.

Your voice is a little steadier as you intone, "It is time to wake up, Selene."

You earn yourself another grunt, a little grumpier. Selene rolls over, though her eyes remain stubbornly closed.

Maybe... maybe you messed it up, saying her name? Biased the way the winds would blow? You steel yourself, and whisper again.

"It is time to wake up, Princess Luna."

You can't quite make out what she says this time, her voice quite muffled by the fact her face is pressed deep into a pillow. Was it "Sleep"? Or "Stop"?

But one thing is clear: it seems like it's time to break out the big guns...

---

You are Velvet Covers. And you're not sure why you saw your husband come downstairs, grab a jar, fill it with water, and then return back up. But you are quite sure you do not want to know.

Spoiler: AN

Have you ever tried waking up a sleeping child?

 

[spiderhellian]

A Lioness Hunts

You thought, by this point, you understood the wreckage that the Mansus had been left as. You had seen and traversed the shattered ruins of the shattered stairways. You had navigated the bloodthirsty shards of what was once the Concursum, avoiding their mirrored edges. You have gazed upon a door obliterated (and one ruined).

As you step up to the Malleary, you are reminded of the truth of that ancient history. All that wreckage was mere — "mere" — side-effects. It was shock-wave, echo, corollary. But it was not the true act of destruction.

You know this, because that true act of destruction is what you gaze on now.

You imagine the Malleary was once a place of efficiency and efficaciousness, if not elegance. Now it is ruined. In twisted pipe and spilled metal (or is it magma), the Forge of Days wrote a testament to one of the most important lessons she taught: the artisan may achieve their highest goal only by destroying their most precious tool.

What an artisan she was. What a tool it was. If only you better understood her goal.

But that is why you are here, is it not? Though as you pick your way through the wreckage, making a passage more often than you find one, it's clear that clues are going to be awfully hard to come by. The same is true of any curios you might bring back from a dream so threaded through with the lore of making. The same is true, really, of anything usable at all. This place really has been destroyed, more than it has been transformed.

You are just about to turn back — or wake up? — when you pause. Because you are being hunted.

---

You hear a breath amidst the ruins, and it is not the breath of bellows. Something rises and then falls, and it is not a hammer. And then out of the corner of your eye, you catch a glimpse. Of something unbroken, perhaps unbreakable. Something that amidst the ruin, remains seamless.

Your senses are screaming by this point, and your flight has grown wild. You are afraid, but -- for now -- you remain in control of that fear, and channel it to add your own touch to the ruined Malleary, carving passageways in hope they transform into an escape route.

But the thing that chases you is, as ever, stronger.

It leaps. It lands atop you, and brings you to the cold metallic floor. For a moment still you shift, and fight, and try to keep going. And then a mouth encircles your neck, sharp teeth poking into soft flesh, and you freeze.

You think of Silky. You think of Stormchaser. You think of Selene, and Soft Sweeps. You most certainly do not move a muscle, even as you feel the predator's warm breath on your neck.

It could have been an instant, it could have been an era, it could have been seven years. And then the mouth moves away, replaced by a single razor-sharp claw. You do not move, you do not look at the creature who has granted you this moment of mercy, even as you almost gasp in relief.

---

"A scarred mare. An era alone, and they send me a scarred mare."

The voice is slow at first, an instrument not used in millennia being picked back up. For all that, it is smooth.

"And do you know what an era it has been?"

"All this," the creature gestures, and you see a bright-golden paw point to the surrounding ruins, "Really makes for a piss-poor forge."

The words come faster now, "Truly, I'm lucky to make a Manticore instead of a house cat! And even when I do, so what? I send them on their merry way, hoping they'll make it to the Wake. Do you even know how much a pain it is to never see the results of your work?"

The voice pauses in its onslaught. "They do make it to the Wake, right?"

You find the claw against your throat lifts an inch, giving you room to speak. An image of a blood soaked cave, filled with slaughter, flashes bright in your memory.

"Yes, we have Manticores," you reply, your voice only trembling a little.

"Oh thank the Golden General. I can't even really send a good creation against my oldest friend, given what he's up to. One of that knife in the dark's more brilliant maneuvers, spending an entire damn era in the one role I can't have too much fun with him."

The entity growls, a sound deep in its throat that sends chills down your spine. But maybe… maybe that was its version of a sigh?

It continues, "And then they send me a scarred mare. Really!"

For all its seeming irritation, the creature takes a step back (though its claws stay out). You remain motionless, but the creature goes on, "Well, get up. Let me see what they've sent me to work with, here."

You could flee, but you would be caught. You could fight, but you would lose. So instead you rise.

---

Before you is a Name. That's unquestionable. With a bit of distance, and a few moments to catch your breath, you can almost feel the strength, and violence, and endurance that the creature exudes. It reminds you of its breath against your neck.

Similarly unquestionable: what's before you is a predator. One that likes its prey warm, and running, and then freshly killed.

But other than that, you have questions, and you peruse the Name even as she looks you over in turn. She is great and golden, a form out of old University lectures you have more than half forgotten.

But if you are simply trying to understand what you see, she is forming a judgment. She mutters to herself again, "A scarred mare!"

Slowly, however, her lips turn up in a smile.

"But you have made monsters, haven't you."

---

When you awake, you have a Forge-hot, Edge-sharp name on your tongue. You have a long scratch on your neck. And you have her chiding reminder still ringing in your ears — "Really, get that scar sorted out!"

Spoiler: AN

Had an idea about Biedde's dyad partner that I wanted to write up. This is thinking that it's the Lion-goddess Menhit, who is not going to settle for being some Lion-pony, no she is not.

I also think the Malleary will be a cool place to explore, even if it's sub optimal to do it this turn. I hadn't made the connection to its destruction and the secret of the FoD the Lionsmith invoked in breaking his sword until now!

 

[spiderhellian]

A Blade, a Web

The memories start to hurt, when you look too far back. They cut like a serrated knife, slicing brutally rough through the tissue of your mind.

But you're not one to shy away from things that cut. So when you do recall your past, you do it in full.

"So. That's how I met her. And why I owed her."

You've just poured out some of the more brutal pieces of your life. Like an open artery spurting blood. And what does the mare in front of you do?

She nods. She has tears in her eyes, but she smiles at you, touches you softly. And then simply nods, and asks you to continue.

She's not bawling? Or angry? Or scared? What an infuriating Mare.

You love her so much.

And so you do.

---

You tell your story like you see the world. People have desires, and goals, and wants. Those all clash, and the stronger one comes out on top. (You know it's stronger, because it's on top.)

(Well, this is how you saw the world. It might not be that way any more. That Mare at your side, her approach… it's insidious.)

There are subtle blades and sharp blades and definitely there are blades that don't think they're blades at all. But they're all just blades, cutting through the world.

Except for one. The creature you know as the Master… she's not a blade. She's a spider (though you're not as scared of these as you once were, thanks to the Mare by your side showing you a web covered in the morning's dew).

She's a web spinner, spinning strings that fling a blade one way or another, directing and manipulating every cut you make. You hate it. You absolutely hate it. A blade that cuts for a reason not its own is barely a blade at all.

And worst of all, you don't even know the strings she's strung. You can't see them to slice right through them.

You hate her. And you fear her. And yes, you serve her.

---

The months pass. The bodies fall. The blade you are gets honed to a razor's edge.

And it seems you may have met another web-spinner. You thought she was a clever blade, if dull and chipped. But she's just always… there. Helping, she says, and listening and questioning and undoubtedly stringing strings you cannot see.

She might think she's innocent, but every month, she's climbed a little higher. Gone a little further. And you know just what that takes.

---

You don't talk much of what she already knows. And she knows that she saved you.

---

Things come to a head. You think she's gone, and it's over. You are so, terribly, wrong.

You make an offer, and she offers a deal. She will free you, if you bind another. She will cut your strings, if you will tie one stronger than ever.

And you don't really have a choice at all.

The mare at your side makes to chime in, but you won't be cut off here. You really didn't have a choice at all.

At least she's gone. Which leaves only the one web weaver around.

---

She's there almost as soon as your rope in the plot is done, like she was waiting to close in on a wounded foe. You know she acted as if her strings were severed, but you also know she's a much better actor than you.

You hear she's in some elevated role, spending weeks away from Ponyville. It sounds like an achievement beyond that Old Thing's wildest dreams for one of their chosen.

She asks if you could spend some time around her estate. You… well, you do like her husband, that's fair enough. But you wonder if she's still keeping tabs on you. And who's she's keeping them for.

You hear of a wedding, and a chill runs down your spine. You wish you could cut something, but that would make her sad. You can almost hear strings being pulled, and she might be doing the pulling.

You don't trust her. You don't know what she's up to. You hate her.

"You don't know her." A soft voice chimes in.

"Yes. I don't know her, and I hate her."

And here she comes. Walking up the path.

Spoiler: With an Edge 4 Influence:

…Carrying a Bazooka.

Spoiler: AN

I think we should really consider Comet's perspective on us. The turn start was a reminder that Velvet's internal view contrasts pretty harshly with the external one, and I think as a thread we fall into much the same sometimes.

I really liked @Starlit Horizon's thoughts, and think they're pretty accurate. I'm definitely not sure we should do this fleeting (Comet did nothing we wouldn't) but we should go into it with clear eyes.

…and I don't think we should bring an edge influence

 

[angelsadvocate666]

In Which It Isn't Fair

It wasn't fair.

That sentiment was one Copper Secatour knew well, the three words like old friends as they lingered in her mind. It wasn't fair that she was dismissed wnd ignored for the circumstances of her birth. It wasn't fair, that the Master had so rarely turned his loving attention to her. It wasn't fair that she had to work so hard, sacrifice so much, to gather even a modicum of authority and control within the Cult when she was practically a founder. It wasn't fair that Velvet Covers, that loud-mouthed, over privileged, disgustingly noble bitch was so much more powerful in the Lores. And it definitely wasn't fair that she could hold command over so many fucking Names.

Copper and her minions hadn't been prepared for their coming. How could they, when half of them weren't even known to her branch of the Cult—or, really, her Cult flat out—and the other half were already so well suited for bypassing their protections? Baldomare and the Daughter of Axes was bad enough. Between those two they could have located anything they wanted and broken through the defences without a care in the world. But that wasn't enough for Velvet fucking Covers. Oh no. She wanted to burn down everything Copper had ever built and spit on the ashes.

Baldomare and the Daughter were old monsters. All Names were, she had come to understand during her time commanding Neighnia. They were gods in all but name—pun not intended—wielding powers beyond a mortal's reckoning and following desires no pony could ever really understand. But even they compared to the other two. The daggers that Velvet Covers must have been keeping hidden for just this moment, when she finally, properly, betrayed Copper for the last time. One was a creature of bone and wires, so versed in Grail even Copper was like a foal beside her elder, and the last was more of a blade than a pony. Some ancient soldier, called up from the horrors of the past to serve a pony that deserved so much less than his service.

The four Names—four of them!—cut through every trap and trick Copper and her Cult could have thought up. Baldomare located every hideout, every storage site and meeting place. The bone mare interrogated her followers so deftly and cleverly that they were thanking her for the opportunity to spill their guts until they knew every detail of the defenses and Cult heirarchy. Then the Daughter tore through those defenses like a hot knife through butter, stealing everything of even minimal value, even as the soldier hunted down her leaders, her advisors, and anyone that might muster even a modicum of retaliation or organization to strike back.

The Cult she had worked so hard to build was done. Within mere days, all of her effort was just ash on the wind. And now, as Copper lay on her knees, staring up into the eyes of four old monsters as they discussed just what to do with her in the center of her greatest stronghold, she had only one thought in her head.

It just isn't fair, dammit.

AN: Don't mind me. Just a horrible, funny thought I had of what would happen if next turn we basically said "you know what, fuck everything else. Copper is done", and sent all four Names over to Manehatten to just do as much damage to her and her Cult as is physically possible.

Bonus points if we send Selene along with her extra action just for the lols.

 

[Venerable Ro]

In consideration of the Wolf.

It is known that in the beginning The Forge Of Days loved The Sun In Splendor, and the Mansus celebrated and anticipated their union. Alas, The Forge feared the possible consequences of this union and murdered her lover in the Intercalate.

This was a Regrettable Action.

Many ills came of this, chiefest of them all the Wolf himself, the bitter hour-thing made up of hatred, loathing, fear, betrayal, regret, and every other sort of cankerous spite. All of these fruits of the Forge's betrayal of her lover, herself, and the possible future damned out of fear of calamity.

The Wolf is what it is.

The Wolf knows what it is.

The Wolf Hates what it Is.

The Wolf is a yearning that cannot be satisfied.
The Wolf is a revelation that cannot illuminate.
The Wolf is a fire that cannot bring warmth.
The Wolf is a conflict that cannot be won.
The Wolf is a scream that cannot end.
The Wolf is a misery that cannot be expressed.
The Wolf is a hunger that cannot be sated.



The Wolf Is A WOUND IN THE SOUL OF THE WORLD!

Consider this, every Hour and every thing like unto an Hour surely knows its own nature, self-certitude is one of the few things that all the Lores hold in common. Certainty of purpose, certainty of existence, certainty of meaning.

The Wolf is an aberration, a wrongness, a mistake. It knows in its bones that it should not be, and yet it is. It is an Hour eternally preserving and perpetuating the circumstances and values that brought it into being, as all Hours must, according to their nature.

The Wolf is the hour of loathing, the hour of fear-the-possibility, the hour of regret, the hour of the Iconoclast and the Suicide. The Wolf desires, more than anything else, to end, for it hates existing as much as existence hates it. But the Wolf cannot end, any more than any other Hour may end so long as its virtue and Lore persist in the world. So for the Wolf to end the world must first end, thus the Wolf hates the world for forcing the pain of existence on it, thus the Wolf ever seeks the ruin of the world.

And yet, AND YET, Hours have ended before, even though the world persists. Hours have been slain, though not by their own efforts (for what principle of the world would pursue cessation?) Hours have been supplanted. By the natural laws of the Mansus, an Hour may be mantled by one who overwhelms their principle, as the Grail drank the Tide, as the Forge shattered the Flint, as the Moth consumed the Wheel.

Maybe, just maybe, the Wolf might be ended by a greater Wolf, the agony of existence yoked to one whose agony is deeper yet.

THE WOLF IS THE WOUND IS THE PRISON IS THE WORLD IS THE PRISON IS THE WOUND IS THE WOLF.

---

Edit: That was far more of a pain in the arse than it needed to be to make look right. Frak doing fancy coloring tricks on a mobile phone.

 

[Sveta08]

Have a... story? A prediction? A guess? Another History?

.... Ah! That's the right way to put it.
A Pathway

---

The stench of it still clung to your throat.

Still felt like a pebble stuck in your hoof. Still clung to your coat in a way that would never come out. No matter how hard you scrubbed.
No matter how firmly you held Stormy, or how soothing his words would be when you woke up.
No matter how right it was to see and hold Selene when she finally woke up. Even when she called you Mother for the first time.
Even when Silky began to grow and show her age in ways she shouldn't, but that her heart refused to let her back away from.
No amount of pride, or fear, or love, or compassion would coat that raw, acrid taste.


You are Velvet Covers. And you just woke up from what you wished was a dream.


You still tried.

It didn't matter it was too early to begin the day. That once all was said and done at the Bureau you would be tired because you started the day too early, that didn't matter.
Sitting here, dwelling, thinking... wasn't going to help.
Doing something wasn't going to help either. But you could at least try.

Brush held by magic worked its' way through your mane. Cleaning. Straightening what was there. Cleaning what wasn't there.
Ash
He wasn't underhoof here. But you could still feel it. Still smell him. Still hear the space that would have been his voice.
The latest in a long line of mistakes.

.... no.
Consequences. Not mistakes.

You tried to push him from your mind.
Tried to not remember the thing like joy he felt, showing you his gifts.
To forget what you asked of him to do.
The feeling of him up against your legs, leaning like a doting child.

One that coated the walls around the Manus in wounds made the wrong shape and suffering that tasted like a smile with too long teeth.

You failed.
But you still tried.

---

It was a coincidence.
Or, it would have been if you still believed in such things.
Maybe it was an escape you needed for longer than you could remember. Maybe it was a more recent escape than that.
Or maybe it was just a coincidence.

But you needed a minute.
A meal.
And a drink.

Normally, you only take a modest meal. Something easy on the stomach, fairly filling, and something that won't bother you even as the hours wind long. Filling, hearty, good food you could say. And the chefs in the capitol are second to none, baring save perhaps the princesses own attendants. Granted, considering your position, they may very well be one in the same? A question for another time.
No, normally breakfast is a simple affair. Something to eat, move on, and keep you going.

Today, it was a goal.


But it was the tea that made you pause.
Not the meal that you asked for. Not the pause of the attendant as they took your request and ran off with it. Not the gleaming shine of the ware that it came in on. Not the price you are sure every single piece of it would afford.
It was the tea. Or rather, the drink.

Two drinks. Your own request after all.
One your traditional blend of tea, long since perfected by the staff here after having Pompom share with them her secrets.
The other, what you could best describe as a 'morning constitutional.' Something to settle the nerves, to calm the mind, to help wash a way the ichor that wasn't in the back of your throat. More a remedy than a drink, tea or not.

But, it was red.

A very specific red.
Not the right one in taste you could soon attest. Apparently it was a mix with cranberries to try and make the taste more appealing.
But it was the right shade. It was at the right time. It was when your mind was busy and your hooves working.

A coincidence.
Surely.

But it was a seed of an idea.
Or not even a seed. But a potential. A question not thought to be asked, suddenly seen in the light.
A disgusting question. But maybe...

---

It took the rest of the week.

The hours between in the wake full of work that was surely important. Full of requests that were more critical than the last and that all needed you to see to them. Every moment a part of every day that carried on end over end over end. Useful moments. Distracting moments.

But it took until the end of the week for you to return home.
Moments stolen from the people who truely mattered to steal away. A few words proved all it needed. Telling the guard you will be headed home early. Telling your servants you will be home late.
An unpleasant reflection of when you brought her here.

You walked to the annex. It was the place she was kept. Where she made herself at home.
You walked with confidence, if not fear. Till reaching the cellar door.

It was open.
She was waiting.

All it would take would be walking down those steps. Decending down into a place that was her home as much as it was hers.
So you pushed past the scent. Past the feeling of something not quite dead and not quite gone. Deeper down where the world was velvety red and the world was awash in a scent too sweet to be anything but rot.

You walked even when you felt her gaze on you.
Walked until you found your seat. Till you could sit. Could look back up to her.



"[Grail]!"



The creature spoke with the same warmth they always seemed to. Spoke of a joy in meeting them again, and of welcoming Velvet back once more into the little place she had made her own. There was an offering of a drink, or perhaps a request for a visit. Such things by her lips were always too similar.

But of course, they both knew Velvet could not accept a drink. Of her reluctance to visit. It was a joy. And it was a question. The same question given by the tilt of her skull. The same question that always was asked in kindness. Not in offense, but in sincerity.
And Velvet...

"I... have a child."



"[Grail]..."



She agrees with you once more. A wistful sort of word, remembering the brief image she stole of the child on the eve of her summoning. A beautiful child in her own words. One too precious for this world.
As much as you wish to not have her even remember Silky... you shake your head.

"No. I.... I have a son."


And the change is... slow.
Her skull straightens, looking back down at you. Reconsidering your words. Reconsidering what that means.
Velvet black and red robes shift as she moves. Moved to think. To listen.
To taste.
What you want.

And it's impossible. To see the change on a skull. To feel skin tug back into a smile. To see empty eyesockets filled with pride and glee. But you know that is true when she looks back at you. You know with the same certainty that you know the sun will rise and the moon will set. It's absolute. And she...

Is proud you would ask.



"[Grail]"



The sun has risen by the time you leave. What you have learned is...
A different path



Velvet Covers has learned the Ritual "A Mother's Love"
This is not a Regretable Action. This is a Regretable Action

 

[Venerable Ro]

What can I say?
There has been a good bit of talk of Mareinette lately, and now with a new son...
Well, she does have a thing for foals and Velvet's blood. I just put one and one together.

Click to shrink...

So you did. Well then, as the man once said, "one good death deserves another."

You wondered, long after all was said and done, if this had been His plan all along. He was, after all, an Hour, or something close enough as to make no difference, surely even He wasn't totally mindless? Was it self-hatred, was it weariness, was it a natural conclusion to His own destructive nature, or did they genuinely surprise Him with the audacity of their scheme?

Only the Lantern-Mare knows, and Good Baldomare never cared to enlighten you on the Mad Wolf's thoughts.

Not that you cared to ask...

---

You are Velvet Covers, and you have done many things you regret, and a few things you Regret.

This, however, is not one of them. As you watch Soft Sweeps gingerly clamber up the stained staircases you're struck by just how much the mare has grown, how she's battled her traumas, how she's come to peace with them, and how she's preserved her wounds as a precious memory. No, you do not regret a moment, not even that moment, because it has led you here, to this time and this place, where you are so very proud of this mare, your Daughter.

But you're still a mother, and so there's no such thing as too much support!

You hop a bit further up the stairs and come alongside Soft, giving her a quiet nudge and warm smile. She smiles back first hesitantly and then with a glint of determination. She nods, after long nights of guilt, confessions, and forgiveness, there's nothing left for either of you to say.

.
.
.

The air grows denser and danker with a scent of old blood and older hatred as you climb, until at last you turn some ineffable corner or crest some imperceptible horizon. There He is.

THEWOLFTHEWOUNDTHESCARTHEREGRETTEDTHEHATETHEMALICETHEPAINTHERUINTHEBLIGHTTHEWARPTHEROTTHE--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
.
.
.

It takes you a moment to realize, Soft Sweeps is hugging you, you're shaking, you can't see anything but her coat and the feathers of the wings she's also enveloped you with.

She smells like mint of all things, sharp and cool all at once.

Her gaze is searching, she's leaned her forehead right against yours, her gaze is searching and oh so filled with understanding.

I don't deserve a daughter like this.

You realize you've said that out loud as Soft raises an eyebrow.

"No, no you don't. Just like I don't deserve a mother as wonderful as you, just like he (she tosses her head towards her back) doesn't deserve either of us. Love's not about deserving mom; love's a sharp, brittle thing that'll slip out of your hooves and cut them apart. But it's worth it, it's always worth it, because the memories will never fade and you'll never doubt it was real. I'm your daughter Mom, for better or worse, that's my choice, and that's what love is."

"Choice."

She pulls back a little and stands from where you were both huddled on the floor. Her gaze is cool and her eyes are fierce as you steady yourself. The writhing, snapping, bleeding form far away and so massive as to seem nearby doesn't seem quite so terrible now.

Which is good, because Soft Sweeps is marching away from you.

Towards The wolf.

"You hear that Wolf?" She shouts over a rising earthquake-growl, "Choice! It's about choice! The one thing every thinking being is capable of, the one thing every being ought to have, the one thing that makes life Life instead of a sad imitation! The choice to love, the choice to hate, the choice to dwell on suffering or peace, the choice to covet your wounds or forgive them, the choice to die today or live until tomorrow!

Her voice softens-

"The choice you never got."

The silence is deafening.

The Wolf seems, almost confused; one (head?) staring at soft, the other slowly pulling itself free from the shattered section of stairway it had futilely impaled itself on. The only sound is the constant drip and deluge of rotting blood pouring from innumerable wounds.

"Choice." Sweeps continues, "the other Hours got a choice didn't they, a choice to climb or descend, a choice to seek and prolong their existence, even a choice to depart. You didn't get that, not at the beginning and you still don't have it now."

The Wolf has climbed to its feet, blood pouring down like a summer monsoon, its roar like a rabid earthquake.

"I AM THE WOUND AND THE ROOT, I AM THE FIRST REGRET AND THE FINAL RUIN, I AM THE WOLF, THE DIVISION!"

"You are, yes, you are all of these things. Because you were made this way, not because you chose it. You are also in pain, and suffering, and despair, because you were made that way, not because you chose them. That's not right, nothing deserves to suffer like this, be made to suffer like this."

"Not even you."

The Wolf is very close now, the endless blood has frothed up like an ocean save for the little hillock of Mansus-stone you're standing on, the waves caused by the Wolf wading through its own blood lap at your hooves. Two torn and ragged heads like mountains stare down on your left and right, their/its attention fixated on Soft Sweeps.

"WHY?"

Soft Sweeps stares unflinchingly back, "You saved my life."

As the Wolf rears back she clarifies, "Well, Mom saved my life, but she could only do it with your gift, so I wanted to thank you, and let you know that you've done at least one thing in the world that didn't end in disaster. You could have killed mom when she met you, but you didn't. I know you didn't mean for anything good to come of it, but thanks to that choice I'm alive today."

"So thank you for sparing Mom's life, and giving her the chance to save my own."

"YOUR "MOTHER'S" CHOICES KILLED YOUR PARENTS."

Soft closes her eyes for a moment as you cringe with an old shame. Then you startle as she reaches over and gives you a soft but firm wing-hug

"Yes, they did, and yes, they died. Sometimes I feel as if everything's going so well, and then I wake up some mornings and the pain is so fresh I feel as if I'm dying all over again. That pain is never going to leave me, but I never want it to. I choose that pain, those memories, to keep and treasure just like I treasure my mother. The pain means it was real."

A shriek of rage has you both covering your ears as the two heads of the Wolf begin tearing at each other.

"PAIN MEANS PAIN! THERE IS NO DEEPER MEANING, THERE IS ONLY THE BLOOD, ONLY THE HATE!"

Soft Sweeps screams back, her voice cutting through the din.

"MY PAIN MEANS WHAT I DECIDE IT MEANS! NOBODY ELSE GETS TO MAKE THAT CHOICE FOR ME! NOT MY MOTHER, NOT STRANGERS WHO THINK THEY KNOW ME, AND NOT EVEN YOU! MY CHOICE, YOU HEAR ME? MINE AND NOBODY ELSE'S!"

The echoes of Soft Sweep's scream of fury seem to last for an eternity, a backdrop to the frozen tableau of two Wolf heads, their teeth in each other's necks, staring with one bloodshot eye each at the pegasus hovering right in front of them.

"MY CHOICE, my wounds, my memory. I will die someday, but not today. I will be my own worst enemy, but I will go on. Life is fleeting, but the pain means it was real."

The look on the Wolf's faces is indescribable, a bewildering mixture of fury, astonishment, and disgust spread across two titanic muzzles. Alongside an almost unnoticeable flicker of satisfaction?

"CHOICE? WOUNDS SALVED BY CHOICE? HATRED QUENCHED, BY CHOICE? PAIN GIVEN MEANING?
BY CHOICE?"

Mane blown askew by the Wolf's breath, Soft Sweeps nods firmly and with finality. "By CHOICE. Always by CHOICE.

"CHOICE." The Wolf, muses?

The Wolf stands still, in contrast to its previous frenetic self-savaging the stillness manages to be even worse, which you ruefully admit is in keeping with the Wolf's nature if not its habits. Soft hovers in equal silence, watching as the Wolf stares off into the distance.

Eventually, you're not sure how much later, something happens, something shifts to break the moment.

The blood begins to slow, the wounds, impossibly, seeming to run dry after an eternity.

HATRED IS KNOWLEDGE, FURY IS INSIGHT, WRATH IS CERTAINTY. I AM HATE AND HATE IS WHAT I AM. I AM WHAT I AM BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT THAT BITCH MADE ME, NOT BECAUSE I CHOSE IT.

The Wolf is actually sagging now, to your amazement, sinking down to its haunches and then its belly as the inexhaustible flow of blood from its uncountable wounds runs out.

I AM THE WOLF DIVIDED, BORN OF MURDER, BORN OF BETRAYAL, BORN OF RUIN. I AM AN EVIL DAY.

The Wolf's two heads rest, one on its paws, the second on the first.

I CANNOT BE KILLED, FOR HATRED NEVER DIES.

A single vast eye peers up at a bewildered Soft, something indescribable in its unwavering gaze.

"I cannot be killed and so I must live. If I live, then I may choose. I choose. I choose something other than what she made of me."

The Wolf's eye closes, and slowly but surely something so ubiquitous you hadn't even noticed it, a heartbeat, comes to an end.

---

[An Old Wound Staunched] A (in hindsight extremely ill-advised) journey to the shattered stairs with your daughter has somehow lead to the peaceful ending of the Wolf Divided. You can't begin to fathom the implications of this, but you can already feel the dispersal of his influence on the Wake, and on you as well. [Stains On The Soul] have become [Fading Stains] and will likely prove surprisingly easy to wash away with time and the right care.

[Lone Wolves Wandering] Your sons are confused and directionless without their Father's rage goading them on, while still dangerous and driven by their natures they no longer have anything like their old power behind them. They still love their mother though, and may return for guidance.

[Hour-Mantling Ascendant] Soft Sweeps has seemingly done something out of the oldest legends, on par with The Colonel and The Moth. What this truly means for her is far beyond your meagre knowledge. Soft Sweeps gains [???], [???], [??????]

---

Bloody Zog, gotta love hyperfixation. where did my evening go? So much editing, so much Wolf-angst, so much never-to-be-sufficiently-damned color coding. Hopefully I got Soft Sweeps somewhat right, attribute any inconsistencies to her deepening understanding of Edge and Winter.

 

[Greymere]

In Which The Woods Shine Bright

You are Trainee Compass Rose, and tonight…

Tonight, you will take your first proper steps into the Dream.

You've been preparing for this all week; taking in the snippets of advice from your seniors, pouring over the Bureau's archives, even drawing the attention of your favored Lore this evening before you went to sleep.

Because tonight, you will be entering the Woods, that final step needed to become a proper agent of the Lunar Bureau. You have proven your mortal skills, you have proven your esoteric skills, and all that remains is to prove your ability to walk the Dream.

Though, admittedly… despite all your worries… all of your seniors have assured you that this is basically just… a formality. A social ritual to signify your graduation to a full agent. That the Woods, while certainly disorienting, are not dangerous.

Or, at least, they are not dangerous anymore.

Because ultimately, there lies the source of your anxiety. That if you look deep enough into the oldest section of the Bureau's archives, you can find records of how this place used to be: an ocean of burning, hateful ash frozen in time. An ocean of ash that would love nothing more than to devour you whole, save for the blessing of protection that covered the Bureau even in those early days.

But those days are long gone, and now the Woods are here instead, ever since the first Commissioner of the Bureau ascended to claim the highest throne of the Mansus. Or perhaps before. Or perhaps after. The details aren't exactly clear, but that's only to be expected when it comes to the Lorekeeper.

So for now, there's nothing left but to move forward, following the path of deep blue Mansus-stone from the Crossroads to that distant gleam surrounding the walls of the Mansus (though the Mansus has no walls), the pure light of Glory refracted into a prismatic display by the countless crystal trees of the Woods.

And the moment you cross that threshold, where stone becomes crystal, you realize why your seniors assured you that your worries were unfounded.

Because you can feel it.

Despite the too-vivid colors surrounding you, emanating from every leaf and piece of crystalline bark. Despite the overwhelmingly bright and dazzling nature of the Woods.

It feels a bit like a heartbeat, echoing out from the earth beneath your hooves, carried by roots that drink deep of a different light. It feels a bit like a blanket, lovingly crocheted and tucked around your sleeping form.

You think that, maybe, that the Woods love you.

-----

Once, the Woods were bright and vibrant, for ignorance was bliss.

Once, the Woods were darkened, when ponykind cursed itself with its own god.

Once, the Woods were destroyed, in an act of desperation that would forever carry the taste of regret.

Once, there was a seed, taken from a shining tree hidden in the Wake and planted in ash.

Now, the Woods are bright once more, not in ignorance but in hope.

-----

The Crystal Wood guards the walls of the Mansus. As any student of Histories knows, the Mansus has no walls.

Spoiler: 'sup

Have my first omake. Spawned from the random (and probably unfeasible ) thought of "yeah the last seed of the Woods was destroyed, but there's another super-magic tree out there isn't there? And what do trees have? Seeds! Or at least cuttings."

Or, in other words, what if we grew a new Woods from cuttings/a seed from the Tree of Harmony.

Also this is my first time doing non-ttRPG related creative writing in… a while? So hopefully it reads all right

 

[spiderhellian]

Beauty and the Beast

You are Copper Secateur.

And you're trying really, really, hard to not get distracted.

This is the House of the Sun, after all. You can feel the light of Glory tickling your face. It's not a place to be focused on anything other than your aims, your goals, your desire. That way lays distraction, and then deception, and then quite possibly death.

You've passed the Gate of Want. You've honed your desires into a razor-sharp tool. You should be good at this.

But Velvet Covers is just. That. FRUSTRATING!

---

You thought you had grown stronger than this. Or that the… business you took care of before you fell asleep would have been a suitable distraction from her. Or that the cool breeze a certain guest has lent this city might settle your mind.

But even as you were falling asleep, you were still wrestling with the rumour that had blown in: your one-time recruit, one-time co-advisor, one-time rival, present-day Foe is now Director of the Lunar Bureau.

Maybe this is some mess of Moth absurdity. Ever since the Master disappeared, you've never quite felt settled, in the world as much as in your own skin. He had been a presence in your life for what felt like years, and though you don't doubt Starry's Moth-prophet proclamation, you do doubt that his strings are fully gone. Velvet might still be dancing to them, having been elevated into some darker secret and deeper plot. It would be just like her to leave the rest of the cult behind for her own ambition.

But truthfully, you don't think it is. The pony who ignored everything she owed you for that first introduction to the occult, the noblemare who turned her back on the cult when it needed support the most, the one advisor who always kept her secrets close... You're not surprised the only secret she left you with was her betrayal. Because while you don't know much about this Lunar Bureau, you can already feel it's meant to hunt you.

That last thought draws you back to your surroundings. Finally. Add that to your frustrations over Velvet, she distracts you when you're meant to be exploring.

Which nay have been a dangerous mistake. Because you've wandered off course, and the back of your neck is itching. You feel a whiff of desire, and you know it takes a violent form.

If before you suspected you would soon be hunted, now you're definitely being hunted.

---

It goes quickly. A hunt. A pounce. And then you're face to face with a Name.

For all Neighnia has taught you about ending, you really don't want to meet your's here. You still have so many desires left unfulfilled. But, like so many decisions that have shaped your life recently, it seems like it's not up to you.

The face in front of you has bright gold hair. Razor sharp teeth. And, unmistakably, that mouth curves into a smile.

"Nod if you're leading a rebellion against the status quo." It takes a moment to drag your attention away from those teeth. But as soon as you do, you nod.

"Nod if you need to be stronger." The Glory shining down, that still feels so far distant to you (and undoubtedly less distant for her), catches your eye as you nod again.

"Nod if the one you fight bears scars." You… pause? Maybe she does, but you don't really know, do you? You hesitate, and the predator in front of you snorts a laugh.

"She does. I can smell it on you."

She continues, "Shaphur's sword-shards, I've missed the taste of corrivality. War in the Wake has such a spice. The monsters you can make of it!"

Her breath is hot against you, and it smells of blood. She pauses for a moment, before she leans forward, the smile not fading from her face.

She covers your eyes with her paws, claws pricking against your skin, and with the Glory's light blocked from view you find yourself beginning to wake.

You're left with a Name in your mind, a ritual on your tongue, and that rich, burning, sensation of a desire about to be fulfilled.

Spoiler: AN

I came across this quote buried deep in the SV thread:

Of every creature in existence, I bet the Baldomare could tell us how to get away from the master. At least for a while.

Click to shrink...

That you know of.

"Wait, why are you asking me this instead of... oh... you haven't met her yet? Pony-Jesus, Velvet, it's almost as if you haven't set hoof in the Mansus ever since you got your Brand!"

Click to shrink...

That quote is from the discussion of the Changeling assault! And who would "her" be but the Name of a power whose very essence is "Rebelling against a terrifyingly strong master"?

This reminded me that there's every possibility the Lionsmith-aligned Edge name doesn't lay ahead of us in the Mansus, but lays behind somewhere, in one of the areas we did not so thoroughly explore.

If so, I really hope this is a scene that has not come to pass, and will not. That's part of why I'd like to hamper Copper's continued exploration of the Mansus by means of Ash.

 

[spiderhellian]

The Mother Desires

Some Notes on the Consequences of Metallurgy, Pt 1.

Spoiler

Description: A thick notebook, filled to the brim with an ancient philosopher's notes. Most of them are meaningless and not worth the time it takes to read them, but your attention is caught by a description of the time he spent a week actually working in a forge ("My first peregrination beyond these walls in a decade!").

At least the few pages where the blacksmith he attended snatched this book out of his hands, and wrote them herself, might prove interesting.

Study Start Text

Spoiler

You've made metal into a dagger, and you think that's all you've made? No. A dagger makes a killer. A killer kills a king. A dead king means a decade's war.

You've made metal into a hoe? You've made a farm, and a life, and a family.

Study End Text

Spoiler

The few lines that follow the Blacksmith's text are perhaps the only lines of value the philosopher offered.

Every tool you make, makes the world around it. And every change you make changes the world around it. When you make something, you do not know all you will change.

The Deepest Desire

Spoiler

Description: Some crafty voyeur once dug a small tunnel, that reached under a nearby pleasure-house. Amazingly, her secret was never discovered during her lifetime, and you are the first to know it in at least an era. Perhaps she was bored or perhaps she sought blackmail, but for whatever reason she spent some of her time in that tunnel recording the conversations going on around her in this journal. At times, her pen ink flowed particularly freely, leaving splotches the size of wine-stains.

Study Start Text

Spoiler

Yes, dearest, I know you think you've known it all. All the pleasures. And trust me, I saw you when you first came in -- I know you've suffered your share of torments too.

But if you say all your desires have been fulfilled, yes, I will call you a liar. Again and again and again. And yes I will do it in front of your friends, because they should know the truth.

Oh, come now, I didn't mean that to hurt you. But even if you do not know what it is you desire, I promise you that there is one you have never known.

Yes, dearest, I could teach you about it. It will take a number of months, and a little time off work, but you can learn.

Study End Text

Spoiler

I will offer you this warning, dearest. This is not a desire that can be sated, not really. You can suppress it -- you know how to lock a piece of yourself away, don't you? -- but it will remain a desire all the same. You will never leave it, and it will never leave you.

And perhaps one day, when your willpower is weak, or your strings are snapped, or the weight of the world becomes a little too much -- you will indulge.

A Tragedy, in One Act

Spoiler

Description: There was once a playwright who killed himself, and then wrote a play. You know this, down to the very order of those events, because you can feel the grief and disgust seeped into this tome even all these eras afterwards.

You can also smell the blood, which the author used as ink.

Study Start Text

Spoiler

I SAW IT I SAW THEM I OPEN AND I GO

Study End Text

Spoiler

Stage right: ENTER THE DAUGHTERS.

One: The stairs are broken!

Another: This place is wounded, yes. What did you think that meant?

Another: It is a lot easier to slither, than to walk.

Stage left: ARISE, THE MOTHER

The Mother: My Children. My Daughters. I have been looking for you.

THE MOTHER encircles THE DAUGHTERS.

THE MOTHER devours THE DAUGHTERS.

Off-stage: Screaming.

EXEUNT.

Spoiler: AN

After this chapter, I had a grim thought about what Axe's mother might have done. What kind of "bad things of old" she wished "had been buried away and forgotten". What kind of thing forced her to swear herself to another, after her mother "did what she did".

What if the Mother of Ants ate all those Great Hooded Princesses, those snakemares who were her children, in that moment where long-held desires were finally unleashed?

…It's probably totally wrong, isn't it, doesn't really explain the sisterhood piece. Oh well

 

[Alan975]

The thing is doing


View: https://x.com/TGJ975/status/1839835155185160478/photo/1


Also -

Let's see her full toolset with the winter realization.

THEN we can make plans.

Click to shrink...

Would you like it if we waited till after we've reached Glory to get on with our problems? Because things are being pushed forward as if we have infinite time and control when events trigger.

 

[Turamarth]

@OurLadyOfWires here are some AI-generated images for the quest.

Spoiler: Velvet Covers

Spoiler: Velvet Covers 2

Spoiler: Cultist Rarity

Spoiler: Depressed Twilight

Spoiler: Depressed Twilight 2

Spoiler: Depressed Twilight 3

 

[Sveta08]

Now then.
We have seen a book. Or, rather, a notebook. One talking as though someone from the past talking to themselves. Remembering in writing what they needed to remember, and what needed to be forgotten.

But.
There was a single word in there that drew my attention. One that inspired... a curiosity. An interest. The word-

...

Huh.
It's gone now.

Ever more curious.
Regardless, have a writing. Unlike the others, I could not tell you from who, or from where, or why. And, also unlike the others, it might be difficult to explain.
Hopefully you can at least see what I am saying.
In which the world is bent

---

There is a misconception that they have been making. A useful deception I admit, even if it feels too old for that. But, it's useful to recognize it for what it is. It is a deception.

They speak of the past like it is dead. Which, it is. They speak of the present like it is alive. Which it is. They speak of the future like it has yet to pass. Which it is.
But they speak of these three in those terms. The Past. The Present. The Future. Like all good deceptions, they are true. But they are deceptions none the less.

What they call the past, the present, the future... It is something else. People hear Past and know what that means. How it impacts them. How it fits into their life. But, the deception lies right there. It is an understanding that they themselves reach.

Even now, I worry if I am to write these things in my age if they will be stolen and understood. But, here, in this place, only those who go looking will find this. And by then, it would be too late.


It is not the past. It is the World as it Was.
It is not the present. It is the World as it Is.
It is not the future. It is the World as it Will Be.

Even now, I can feel it as I write those words. How they wriggle under my pen. Because they struggle against them, and find them not wanting. But I can write it just as that.
Because it is the last that we put into place. It is language.


In the World as it Was, a knife was always a knife. A fruit was always a fruit. A memory always a memory. Truth was truth. And those things are still true.
But those with eyes to see would see that those things are just that. That there is no sharpness to that knife. There is no ripeness to that fruit. There is no softness to the memory. No glare to that truth.
Because it was language. Like all of them, it does not change anything. Only how it's seen. How it's interacted with.

Language. Its purpose is as cruel as it is simple. If the words themselves lack that power, then there will not be those who go searching.If the World Is and the World Was, then something is seen as having changed. If it is just the Past, and The Present, then the answer is obvious. Time, nothing more. No reason to go searching. To go hunting.
So, the power was lost to those words. Not that they lack the power, but that the knowledge of that power, what it is... can be lost. Forgotten. And if no one knows to look, then it will be lost.
A knife will still cut. But if people never think to see a knife for something more, never think of it as anything other than a knife...
Of all them, this was the simplest to construct, if longest to execute, and even longer to believe. But now, in my old age, I believe I can say it seems to have settled in as the new norm.


Before language, there was others needed first. History had to be turned. Names made simply into names. Leaders made just that. Time itself given it's own order. Constructed and set to fall in place. To land in exactly the right way, to repeat back in on itself. Every day starting anew, the sun to rise, the moon to set. To be connected to itself.

Nowhere better to explain that than the first. The most difficult. The simplest to explain.
The edges of the map were filled in.

If there is an edge, there will be people who will seek it out.
If there is a corner, there will be those who look for it. And past it.
If there is something to reach, it becomes a goal.
If it all simply continues, if there is not division and there is not disc... alarm, then it will continue.
What is, is, and will continue to be. Until what is becomes what was.


It will be a better world then. The future.
I wonder if they will see it.

 

[Sveta08]

Well!
Now that I have the time and energy to write a little bit, and we are all up and excited about Biedde and sacraments... I propose an alternative thought!
Something else, that could be true! But one I don't know is true.
More than other long thoughts I've written out, this is the closest to a half-prediction. Make of that what you will.

In which someone's value is weighed

---

What is most valuable?

A common thought exercise as much as a measure of practicality, you find yourself following that same question time and time again. The first answer, Glory, is always the same. Always has been since you felt the brand to touch your skin. Every moment it's allure still sits in the back of your mind like a flickering candle. Ever out of reach, and requiring to be burnt to touch. And even then, something has to burn to hold it.
So, it's the wrong question. What's most valuable. But it's a useful question none the less.

You are in your room. Or, office would be a better way of putting it. The secrets that need to remain in the Wake written down here, the lores and laws you have found that could not be etched upon the surface of your mind or body scattered throughout. Not wildly like a mad prophet though. No, that would not do. It would be unpleasant. Unseemly. And that just wouldn't do.
It is yours. So it must be clean. It must be polished. It must be pleasant and inviting.


You are Copper Secateur, and you are trying to balance this months budget. The question of value always comes up when you do this. And is more literal than most would think.


Bits are valuable. Obviously, they are valuable by their very nature of a currency. But they are valuable as a tool. What syrupy words you can spill help, but having an incentive that people take home with them always helps clear up misunderstandings. Recruit people to the cause. If you draw people in saying they will gain something valuable, they will think of bits after all.
And it's not like you are lying, you think with a silvery grin. They do get something valuable, if they are lucky.
Your attention.

Because time is valuable. Incredibly valuable. No matter how many hooves you have, no matter how many people under your thrall, there is only so many hours in a day. For now, you think. So your time is valuable. Spend it wisely. The matter of finances is handled slowly by you, but quickly by your assistance. All you are here for is-

Loyalty. To sniff out those who can handle these budgets cleanly. Quickly. See how many are devoted to you and only you. How many people might try to sneak something by you. Whether they should be rewarded for their initiative... or made an example of. Your time is valuable, so better spend it finding problems that others can spend time answering. Because the better it is, the more perfect everything under you is...

The more you can focus on what's important.
Glory
Revenge

Really it's both.


But, this month has been... a disaster if you are honest.

The last few months you have been hemoraging bits like no one else trying to keep all your suppliers online. That new Lunar Bureau hasn't dropped the hammer on any of them yet... but there's that Yet. The nobles themselves weren't safe, so you and the people you have to buy from, sell to? Whoever isn't making themselves scarce is making themselves more expensive. And of course... of fucking course... you can thank Velvet Covers for that.

Leave it to that mare to somehow worm her way up into... that. Because nothing less than the princesses own guard would be good enough for her. No, she had to go on and be the damned alicorn's bridesmaid.
... Come on. Focus. Refocus.

Bits. Bit troubles. That's the focus.
Because the Lunar Bureau has been a threat the last few months. This month was...

The Manus.
It changed.


Ash coats the entire Wood. Or maybe it's better to say that Ash has supplanted The Wood. Full of that sticky dirty smell that just can't quite be washed out with a good wine or a pleasant evening. No, it's... it's worse now. Not darker, but worse. That alone would be bad...

But they are dead.
Every summon. Every species. Everything that you have been carefully cultivating, carefully crafting and maintaining from The Woods is dead. Lost in the blink of the eye at the stroke of midnight. Hundreds, Hundreds of bits and dozens of days and a dozen or more lives lost all because... The Woods is gone.

It is going to be a very very expensive month.

---

You had just about finished the plan when you got the call. Which, itself, was unusual.
You don't take calls. You hand out the orders, and your people handle the problems.
And moreover, noone, noone interupts you when you are actually busy handling this side of things. The last one who did wound up far more useful dead.

But still, you are getting a call.
Which means something had to have happened. Something that changes your plans. It's the only reason they would risk it.
Your ire because you made a plan without the full info, or your ire because they interrupted the plan.

So, you answered it.
And scowled past a pleasant smile. Listening to the wonderfully delightful frightened and enraptured words that flowed out like honeyed wine.
Because... something had changed.

You didn't bother answering. You simply hung up.
And began preparing for a walk.

---

The most valuable thing, you have found, is Glory. It is the power to take revenge, to be revered, and to make the world dance in your hoof.
But the most valuable tool for that... is people. Something you learned a long, long time ago.
They have more hooves to work. More eyes to see. More ears to hear.
And apparently...

More lives to be threatened.

You are currently in one of the offices of a tool of yours. The base of operations they keep in Manehattan. A tool you grabbed and wined and dined because of his reputation.
As well as his name.

"So tell me, Mister Steppes"
Your words laced with a rich, warm poison that he relaxes at. The faintest of tugs required as the chains you wove around his mind, his heart even are pulled.
He is not The Velvet you want. But he is ever so useful a tool.
Especially when she slips up.

"Just who came to visit you?"

 

[des-pair-2]

You are Velvet Covers, and you are currently in Princess Celestia's solar.

Which isn't really unusual, because you are here to deliver your quarterly report. You didn't need to deliver it verbally, paper would have sufficed, but you feel she needs to talk to more ponies.

You idly wonder how long ago she spoke to another pony.

The report begins by narrating progress on the goals of the Bureau. The number of changelings found, caught, and killed. Their pony collaborators included.

There will be no report on the Bureau's official goal again. No clues will ever be found and you trust that she will reveal herself when she is ready.

You then slowly shift to talking about the Bureau itself. All the minutiae you think she needs to know.

And you feel her attention drift. You don't know if it's because she trusts you to deal with it, or if she simply doesn't care. Perhaps both. Perhaps neither.

Your voice gets slower as you reach the end of the report. But you can't end it yet, because you have one more thing to say.

"The constables have apprehended a pony who claims to have been your student, Sunset Shimmer."

You say that, and you feel her attention return. Return, and intensify. You avert your gaze to the floor; staring at the Sun has never been good for your eyes. You don't know how long you have stood there, and you don't know what expression she is making, but eventually she responds.

"Deal with her at your own discretion."

Nodding in acknowledgment, you finish your report and leave. You walk with measured steps, not letting any nervousness show, until you are safe in your office.

With a sigh, you look at the papers stacked on your desk and begin working. Now what to do with her...

 

[spiderhellian]

Ode to the Baldomare

When destiny came a-calling
The Baldomare wasn't there.
It wasn't for a failing,
It wasn't out of fear.
Yes she'd seen it coming,
Yes she'd marked the day,
She felt the histories humming
And sent them on their way.

She who shines so brightly —
A Mare who plucks at strands —
She held to one too tightly
Twere bound like iron bands
She loved him in her climbing,
Though not enough to stop.
Now she knew the histories' timing
But she would not let him drop.

Her love was cold and quiet
Her love did not speak at all.
And yet she denied it
The act that harked the fall.
The light cries navigation,
The light burns mercy clean,
But here she chose negation
A choice so rarely seen.

The pilgrims marched in order
The SUN their clarion call.
Could be they ignored her —
Though she surely knew them all.
It was an act awaited,
The histories narrowed to a point,
So they continued unabated,
To turn the world ajoint.

She had fought and killed and struggled,
And succeeded in her climb.
But now she felt untroubled
As she sat sipping at her wine.
The Sun could wait its turning,
The rites could wait their flame.
For in the quiet they were sharing,
She knew a softer claim.

Spoiler: AN

A different take on the Baldomare to my previous apocrypha (hypocrite indeed!) The opening quartet of lines came to me a while back, but it took a while to flesh it out.

Also I don't think I've ever written an actual poem before, outside of 10th Grade English, so I would definitely appreciate feedback!

 

[AuthorTransient]

1 2 3 4 J R 5 S 6 K​

In Which (S) Collide - Part 4

There's no going back from this. The maresquerade has been blown right open.

The sky has turned an unholy rich red and Mareinette – she is the size of your house, and growing even larger.

Ah...

An unsightly beast... a great terror looms!

Mareinette the Twice Born is coming...

Spoiler: Escape Rolls

Silky Stream successfully escapes!

Soft Sweeps successfully escapes!

Stormchaser successfully escapes!

Velvet: Support

You allow yourself one moment to survey the battlefield and is gratified to learn that most of your family have escaped.

Not Luna, however.

Not Selene.


Then there is no more time to think, because Mareinette is upon all of you.

Spoiler: Combat Rolls

[Multi-combatant fight. Mareinette will only "compete" to wound Luna, but may be wounded by all other combatants]

Ally Buffs:
ILLUMINATION: +30

Ally Debuffs:
Currently none.

[Current Mareinette overflow (damage occurs on 50): 0]

[Current Allies overflow (damage occurs on 100): 0]

Mareinette's Turn. Multiattack.

First roll: 33 + 40 (Old and Terrible) + 20 ('Wire Mother') + 5 ('Blood Meridian') - 5 (Outnumbered: 1) = 93

Second roll: 94 + 60 = 154

Third roll: 86 + 60 = 146

Fourth roll: 26 + 60 = 87

Fifth roll: 10 + 60 = 70

Allies Turn:
Frontend:
Comet Feet: 70 + 39 (Personal Combat) + 30 – 20 ('Wire Mother') = 149

Velvet Covers: 8 + 29 (Personal Combat) + 30 - 20 = 77

Luna: 52 + 10 (A Sister's Promise) + 90 (Alicorn Combat: Luna) + 30 + 38 (Velvet Support) – 20 ('Wire Mother') = 200


Overflow: Mareinette – 0, Allies' - 36


Backend:
Baldomare: ULTIMATE FATE WORKS on Velvet Covers

Jade Whistle, Fluttershy, Rarity: Preparing...

Her hooves dig into the ground, shattering it as she leaps. For some reason, your mind compares it to that of a manticore, pouncing on prey.

Then Comet Feet is there like a whirlwind of blades, slashing across her bones without mercy. And you – your magic seizes one of her hooves and pulls.

Mareinette immediately overbalances. As she struggles to regain her balance, specks of light gather in front of Selene's horn until it finally explodes out into a controlled beam, sending Mareinette skidding backwards in another dust cloud.

But when the dust clears she looks to be no worse for wear – only more frustrated.


The night air is freezing. It actually takes effort to prevent your teeth from chattering.

What you're facing down is worse than Comet Feet, worse than the Master... even worse than the Wolf. As Mareinette stalks towards you...

!!!​

You feel a hoof on your shoulder and when you turn, Baldomare is giving you a soft grin. She tilts her head.

That's right – you are not alone. You're with friends.

With an exertion of her will, you feel your brand flutter. It's a really weird feeling.

But you think you can see things a bit clearer now. Or perhaps you can read Mareinette a little better. As if you are reading her actions before she makes them.

Spoiler: Combat Rolls

Ally Buffs:
ILLUMINATION: +30

(Velvet only) ULTIMATE FATE WORKS
Reading the Record: 43 + 26 = 69, 3rd​ Breakpoint Reached


Ally Debuffs:
Currently none.


[Current Luna overflow (damage occurs on 50): 0]

[Current Mareinette overflow (damage occurs on 100): 31]

Mareinette's Turn. Multiattack.

First roll: 96 + 40 (Old and Terrible) + 20 ('Wire Mother') + 5 ('Blood Meridian') - 5 ('Outnumbered: 1') = 156

Second roll: 88 + 60 = 148

Third roll: 76 + 60 = 136

Fourth roll: 10 + 60 = 70

Fifth roll: 1 + 60 = 71


Allies Turn:
Frontend:
Comet Feet: 91 + 39 (Personal Combat) + 30 – 20 = 140
Velvet Covers: 72 + 9 + 20 + 30 + 30 (Reading the Record) – 20 + 20 = 151
Luna: 52 + 90 (Alicorn Combat: Luna) + 10 (A Sister's Promise) + 75 (Velvet Support) + 30 – 20 = 217


Overflow: Mareinette – 0, Allies - 112
Mareinette suffers one damage! -100 to Allies' overflow.
FOR THE OLD BLOOD activates x 1!

Backend:
Rarity and Fluttershy successfully escapes!

Jade Whistle: Attention of the Laws on Velvet (takes effect next combat round)

Baldomare: Dispels FOR THE OLD BLOOD x 1.

Then, Mareinette charges.

Moonlight blasts hit her one after the other but visibly to no effect. The crystal horseshoes of Selene take to the skies instead and you slither and flit-flit-fly out of the way as Marienette careens into your house.

Or what was your house.

This is fine. There wasn't anybody left in there anyway. Oh, but the bits to repair all of that - !

Of course, while you've been lamenting internally, you've not been idle. Your magic pulls at weakened structures and more of the roof collapses on top of Mareinette, causing her body to buckle somewhat as Comet Feet goes in for a fly-by, while a second charged beam smashes into one of her heads and causes it to wince.

Crimson liquid drips from her - but is just as quickly scoured into smoke from the light.

Mareinette shakes her head, as if recovering from a daze. She pleads, "[GRAIL]!"

Spoiler: Contest

Mareinette: 39 + 60 ('Social' bonus) = 99
Baldomare: 91 + 30 + 30 = 151

DISPELLED BY BALDOMARE

But even without Baldomare's help, you already have the answer in your heart: no, Mareinette, you cannot have my child.

As if in response, turbid red streams streak across the sky, gathering around her. Despite your friends and your best efforts, they do not stop.

TRAIT REVEALED!
[KINGEATER]: Mareinette is capable of channeling and adding a Grail influence to her combat bonus.

Now Mareinette stalks forward again, her five maws wide and gaping and heaving out crimson mist, her eyes like blood rubies against the night sky.

Spoiler: Combat Rolls

Ally Buffs:
ILLUMINATION: +30
(Velvet only) ULTIMATE FATE WORKS
Reading the Record: 98 + 26 = 124, 6th​ Breakpoint Reached

Ally Debuffs:
Currently none.

[Current Mareinette overflow (damage occurs on 50): 0]

[Current Allies overflow (damage occurs on 100): 12]

Mareinette's Turn: Social Action.

Allies Turn:
Frontend:
Comet Feet: 93 + 39 (Personal Combat) + 30 – 20 ('Wire Mother') = 142

Velvet Covers: 90 + 29 (Personal Combat) + 21 (Attention of the Laws) + 30 - 20 + 60 (Reading the Record) = 210

Luna: 22 + 10 (A Sister's Promise) + 90 (Alicorn Combat: Luna) + 30 + 105 (Velvet Support) – 20 ('Wire Mother') = 237


Overflow: Mareinette – 0, Allies' - 384
Mareinette suffers 3 damage! -300 to Allies' overflow.
FOR THE OLD BLOOD activates x 3!

Backend:
Baldomare: Dispels Mareinette' 'Social Action'!
Jade Whistle: Dispel FOR THE OLD BLOOD x 1: 35 + 21 + 30 - 30 = 56! 1st​ breakpoint reached!
FOR THE OLD BLOOD x 1 dispelled!

Spoiler: THE WIRE MOTHER (Unofficial, as of Part 4)

Health: 26/50 (highballed)

Temporary Health: 0/5

[ONE WHO IS VERY GREAT]: Mareinette is willing to offer you Sacraments in the Lores of Grail and Heart, should you fulfill her requirements.

[OUR LADY OF WIRES]: Mareinette is immune to the effects of "Monstrous Appearance".

[HONORED GUEST]: Mareinette can "step in" on Velvet's horseshoes, and perform social actions in her stead even if only Velvet should have been able to perform them. (HOWEVER, see "Old Intelligence")

[WEIGHT OF PRESENCE]: Mareinette grants a full level up to the Secret Library for her preferred Lores.

[OLD INTELLIGENCE]: If Mareinette is alone while performing a social action, and a vote is offered, she will instead pick the vote based on what she thinks is best. (This will be based on her personal knowledge of you, as well as her loyalty. This trait can be either positive or negative, depending on interpretation.)

[MONSTROUS APPEARANCE]: Cannot be used for Social Actions. (Immune)

[PROUD]: Will refuse to cast any rituals that do not involve Grail or Heart.

[THE SECOND BIRTH]: Mareinette may choose to sacrifice a tremendous amount of health to immediately break her summoner's bindings. (Used.)

[NEVER ASK A LADY HER AGE]: Mareinette may elect to hide some of her characteristics from you. (She certainly is hiding her health, and she may be hiding other negative traits or skills.)

[THE SUBTLE KISS]: Mareinette may hide attacks as completely harmless kisses, pats, smiles, or intimate glances, though they still require combat rolls. Targets may make an intrigue check to realize that damage was done after each successful attack. This compounds with OUR LADY OF WIRES.

[BLOOD MERIDIAN]: Mareinette may spend a combat action to consume the last traces of life and experience from a victim who has been brought to zero hit points to recover 5 hitpoints. This also gives her a temporary bonus of +5 to rolls per life consumed this way until the Turn ends. This action can be interrupted, upon which She loses the action. This action cannot be used while She already has more than Her maximum hit points.

[GRAIL OVERFLOW]: Mareinette may gain temporary hit points above Her hit point total, up to 5.

[SAPPING FLESH]: Combat rolls targeting Mareinette must reach an overflow of 100 or higher to harm Her.

[PUPPET OF THE RED SANDS]: Mareinette does not suffer from any status of being 'Wounded'.

[WIRE MOTHER]: Mareinette gains +20 in combat against any entity that can be considered to have a mother and they have a -20 malus when targeting her.

[UNQUENCHABLE THIRST]: For every turn in the Wake, Mareinette will seek out a Grail sacrifice and consume it.

[FOR THE OLD BLOOD]: Whenever Mareinette loses hit points, all targets in the vicinity suffer a cumulative -10 to rolls as the blood spilled intoxicates and causes hallucinations.

[ALL-CONSUMING NAME]: When Mareinette consumes a living being, their existence disappears from memories. Characters may figure out something is wrong (strange clothes that they would never wear, an empty room with paraphernalia) but it is more likely that they would simply fill in any discpreancies by themselves.

[Other traits negative, unknown]

1 2 3 4 J R 5 S 6 K​

 

[OurLadyOfWires]

Spoiler: Winning Vote

[Y] Assassination

You stare at Comet Feet, as he stands at the other end of the bridge.

He does not look like a stallion as much as he looks like a wall. Or perhaps a machine made for killing.

The muscles under his skin are taut, like metal springs ready to be unleashed. The veins on his throat, and on the other few places where you can see them, are like thick cords of iron, as his heart pumps blood and adrenaline to every last part of his body.

And his eyes… if glares could hurt, then you are sure you would be feeling some degree of pain right now. But of course, you do not begrudge this treatment from him.

After all, you are everything he hates, everything he wants gone. You are an Edge-sharp invader, standing at the threshold that separates his home from everything else. You are the crushing reminder that his past did not simply disappear, and that there are still ponies out there who remember who he is, and what he has done.

You are the consequence of his actions. Reckoning incarnate, clad in battle Edge and sharp vengeance, who came to collect the price for the latest of his many wrongs.

You are everything he hates, and everything he knows he cannot escape from.

But most of all, more than just the hate in his eyes, you can also see… fear.

Because you know, just by looking at him, that you can probably kill him, if the two of you fight.

So, given how you know his senses are as accurate as yours, you know that he knows he will probably lose, if it comes down to it.

If you had the mind for idle thoughts, you would probably wonder how you look like, right now, in his eyes. If you had the capacity to be distracted right now, you would probably be wondering what he is seeing right now, that would elicit that kind of reaction from him.

But you do not have the mind for such frivolities.



So, you act.



"I would have you serve me, if I could truly assure your obedience. But I do not. Fluttershy is of use to me, but yours is a double-edged blade."

You say that, and you can almost feel the stallion preparing to do… something. Perhaps attack you, or perhaps try to escape.

You can almost hear the solid muscles of his legs moving into position, like stone grinding against stone, as he prepares to pounce.

"If you leave, you have my word I will not cross your path," he says, the acid in his words dwarfed only by the honesty in them.

And you know, in that moment, that he is telling the truth. You know he only wants to be left alone, with the one pony who ever cared about him.

You know that, if you leave now, then the two of you will be done.

But you had already made your decision several days ago. And you will not change your mind.

"Your word means nothing. I have already seen you break your oaths twice now."

You shake your head.



And Comet Feet's eyes go wide as-

Spoiler: Combat rolls

[Biedde has initiated combat]

[Biedde has drawn his blowpipe (invoked A Resolution)]

[Comet Feet has invoked the Attention of the Laws]



[Comet Feet's current health: 4/4]

[Biedde's health: 5/5]

[Current overflow (damage occurs on 50): Comet – 0, Biedde – 0]

[A Confident Certainty: Comet Feet can reroll one every six dice]

[?????: Biedde can reroll one every two dice]



[Comet's first roll: 16 65 + 39 (Personal Combat) + 20 (Attention of the Laws) + 20 (A Rousing Air) = 144]

[Biedde's first roll: 41 99 + 80 (Personal Combat) + 40 (A Resolution) = 219]



[Overflow: Comet – 0, Biedde – 75]

[Comet suffers one wound (-50 to Biedde's overflow)]



[Comet's first roll: 25 + 39 (Personal Combat) + 20 (Attention of the Laws) + 20 (A Rousing Air) = 104]

[Biedde's first roll: 74 + 80 (Personal Combat) + 40 (A Resolution) = 194]



[Overflow: Comet – 0, Biedde – 115]

[Comet suffers two wound (-100 to Biedde's overflow)]



[Comet Feet attempts to escape…]

[Biedde successfully intercepts]

!!!!!!!



-as you suddenly go deaf.

You feel like a stray bolt of lightning just struck the ground, right next to you. And more than just that, a hurricane-like gale of wind crashes into your side, hammering at your dress and nearly pushing you towards the ground.

You can't hear a thing. You really can't hear anything at all, for several seconds. And the best your alarmed body can do is root your four legs under you, to at least try and stabilize your posture. Your ears ringing all the while during the fraction of a second you have to understand what just happened.

But the answer appears at your side before you can even string two thoughts together.

Because the next moment, Biedde is walking past you. You have no idea where he came from, or when he got so close. But he is walking past you as if he had been standing three steps behind you this whole time.

Except this is not the cordial, careful Biedde you have seen this whole time. Far from it.

The Biedde walking by you is not the careful and grandfatherly stallion who has been lodging at your home. And he is not walking past you as if he had just dropped a coin nearby, and was moving to pick it up.

No.

He doesn't look like a grandfather. And he doesn't just look like a dangerous pony either. He is walking past you, carrying an item you have never fully seen before. A long and old blowpipe that is hanging from his neck from a battered bandolier.

And the look he has in his eyes… the arctic cold he has in his gaze, and the utter disgust he has on his expression...

He does not look like a murderer, but only because that word is not enough to do this sight justice.

He looks like inevitability itself. Like a guillotine that is currently in mid-fall.

And a quarter of a second after that deafening sound, when you finally realized what just happened, you turn your gaze back to Comet Feet.



"N-no!"



You turn your eyes back to Comet Feet, and your mind can't truly accept what you are looking at.

The large pegasus is ruined. His right foreleg is completely gone, and he is currently lying on his back, belly up, as he tries to crawl away from Biedde.

There is blood everywhere. You can see a large, cone-shaped spray of blood behind the stallion, marring the green of the grass with its bright red. And you can see a growing pool of it surrounding Comet Feet, leaking freely from the stump of his leg and other places besides, as he weakly tries to crawl away.

And you… you…

It has now been three full seconds since you heard that noise. And the ringing on your ear is finally starting to die down. Slowly, and painfully. But as your hearing starts to clear up, your mind finally pieces together what just happened.

Biedde was waiting nearby… somewhere. Maybe a hundred meters away, behind the trees. Maybe right behind you. And the moment you gave him the signal, he…

… he used his blowpipe. He shot a single dart at Comet Feet, from wherever he was hiding.

The gale-speed wind, the deafening crack, and the immediate shearing oh his leg, followed by the massive concussive damage to the rest of his body… that was all from a single dart.



"Please…! I-I beg you! I will do anything just please-!"

"I could have said you would have made a fine apprentice, but that would be a lie."

Spoiler: Combat rolls

[Comet Feet's current health: 1/4]

[Biedde's health: 5/5]

[Current overflow (damage occurs on 50): Comet – 0, Biedde – 15]



[Comet's first roll: 42 + 39 (Personal Combat) + 20 (Attention of the Laws) + 20 (A Rousing Air) = 121]

[Biedde's first roll: 39 64 + 80 (Personal Combat) + 40 (A Resolution) = 184]



[Overflow: Comet – 0, Biedde – 78]

[Comet suffers one wound (-50 to Biedde's overflow)]

[Comet Feet has been defeated]

The bleeding stallion tries to do everything at once. And only now do you realize that his harsh expression is completely gone. Instead, there are tears in his eyes, and a deathly fear on his face, as he begs.

He begs, and he uses his remaining foreleg to drag his bleeding body away. And when Biedde's measured pace finally reaches him, Comet Feet uses his hindleg to give him a pair of kicks so strong that they could have felled a tree or cracked a boulder.

But he was not trying to kick something as soft as those. And the result of his kicks are as expected as they are horrifying to watch.

The first kick lands squarely in the middle of Biedde's chest. And a loud, dry sound fills the air when it does. You think you hear something break, and a moment later you realize the metal horseshoe Comet Feet had on his hoof is now cracked.

Comet Feet hit him, yes, but only because Biedde did not bother to block it. Or perhaps he did block it, with his clothes and with his skin and with the countless scars that exist upon both of them. Either way, the only pony who was hurt by the first kick was Comet himself.

The second kick, born more out of panic than anything else, is caught by Biedde's hoof. He grabs the lightning-fast hindleg as easily as he might have grabbed a toy that was offered by a foal.

He then proceeds to coil his foreleg around the stallion's hindleg and-



CRACK



-it is bent in all the wrong directions on the next moment.



"…-!"



Comet's eyes roll to the back of his head. He tries to say something, but the ringing in your ears is still too loud for you to understand it.

Although Biedde's words cut through your horror just fine.



"That would have been a lie, because success, and victory, are self-executing virtues. And that you fell off from the Path is evidence that you were never suited for it."



The older stallion keeps walking towards Comet, and you realize he never really broke his stride. Ever since he took a shot from his blowpipe, heaven knows from where, he has been walking towards Comet Feet. Even as Comet crawled away, and even as Biedde casually broke his leg, he has still been walking towards him.

You only realized that because the older stallion has finally stopped. Biedde is now standing over the broken body of Comet Feet, looking down at the larger stallion as he weakly tries to breathe, and as he bleeds out from too many different places.

And still, the only thing in his cold expression is disgust.



"I would also have thanked you for sparing me the effort of learning you were made of such brittle material. But I do not thank an unworthy blade for its failure."



He says that, and then he raises a hoof.

He raises a hoof as casually as if he is about to take another step forward.

And just as casually, he brings it down on the stallion's throat.

The movement is so fluid that he might as well have missed. His hoof meets so little resistance that he might as well have been dipping his hoof on a pool of water, or on a pile of dry leaves.

But the liquid that gushes out from his action is not the color of clear water, and the snapping and crackling sounds that follow are not the sound of dry leaves being crushed.

And when the old stallion is done, less than ten seconds have passed since this all began. The ringing in your ears is still there, and you are only beginning to realize that your body is so tense it is actually painful.

…

Still, Biedde looks down at the broken corpse for one more moment, and then he casually turns back from where he came from. Making his way to the bridge, and to the river stream, as if nothing unusual has happened.

In fact, the tone he has in his voice when he speaks up is so calm you almost think there is another pony nearby, who is talking to you.

"You have use for bodies, yes? I recall you telling me that you have ways to put them to use," he says, as he cleans his hoof on the river. The red stains on his old uniform washing away as he calmly rubs them. "In that case, I will leave the cleanup to you. Have a good day, employer."

He says that, and as soon as he is done cleaning his hoofs he is gone.

Leaving you alone.

The sole winner of the disagreement that just happened, over the humble wooden bridge.





The resources that Comet Feet had gathered to fight you are not accurate or "canon" to the main story.

But the fact that he would have died like a dog is.

Spoiler

I also kinda just want to see Comet and Biedde fight?

Click to shrink...

This makes as much sense as saying you would like to see Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy compete in a race.

This was not a fight. This was an execution.

But none of this ever happened, did it? So why don't you go back to where you came from?

 

[Sveta08]

I...

The story from Comet's perspective is still in the margins of my brain, still slowly unfurling into something sharp and sad and sweet and tender. But this is not that little tidbit of story.
This... is a moment I couldn't tell you, but that I woke up with the vague impressions of it etched in my mind, and as I've written it it has become more clear.
This is... it's at the furthest edges of what I know how to write. How to even express.
But it has something.... I don't know.
Something I feel we keep forgetting.



In which even the shackled dance

---

The air is thick in the perfect sort of way.
The lights are low, the scent of something rich and floral flourishing. A delicate sense of decay just beneath. The tension in the air like a glass held too tight. Too sharp. Too firm and just about to-

Snap.

But it doesn't.
It can't.
You won't let it.

Because the air is thick in the perfect sort of way.



You are chewing on a book.
It's already been used. Been read. Been lost.
No one was going to miss it if it was gone.
And it had such a history in it.

The words in it were bright. Brighter than bright. A useful kind of bright.
The sort of bright that once would have ponies talk about things in terms of iron and metal and stone. Flesh and blood and bone.
But now, the words are too bright for that.
Chemistry.

But as your teeth touched it, you could feel it.
A past where it had been something more than it was.
Where there had been something worth savoring.
And that's why the air is so perfect.



The book had no idea why it was right that a story of a sordid love affair might have once found its way into it's pages.
It had no way of knowing the connection between the beating of a heart and the pulsing in the air.
Neither the author nor the students who read about the things now called vibrations truly understood the way in which the heart and the world pulsed.
Nor why it mattered that those two were linked.
But you do.

Between passions, between lovers, in an embrace there is dew. Moisture and heat, and friction and texture.
The air it grows thick.
Between sound, in the pulses, in the rhythm of the heart. Voice and volume, song and dance.
The air grows thick.

In the most perfect of ways.



The others are still off. It's their nature to notice it. To befoul it.
Light... refracts, they call it now. What a beautiful word for it. Present, yet twisted, all according to your own view.
Paths are forgotten. Blades dull in their sheaths. Cold is fought with warmth of magic.
They all... grow frustrated at it.
But not you.

As long as the sky is above.
As long as there is earth below.
As long as he heart beats.
As long as the
Heart
Beats



She left today.
Resolved

And you feel it beneath you.
In the earth she walks upon.
The pulse between each step of her hooves.
The purpose that pushes her forward.
Demanding she march to the beat.

It's a dance.
An old dance.
You like old dances. The new ones are too full of flesh.
Not enough blood. Not enough bone.
But it's not the old dance you know.



The world is bent.
Step step. Step step.
It was different before.
Step step step. Step step step.

You already know what the outcome will be.
Because the dance is different than it once was.
You know what it will not be.
What it once was.

You wonder.
If she even knows.
How full of [HEART] she is?


But you are still moving to that beat.
In motions no one can see. At a pace no one would know.
Because the air is thick.
In the most perfect way.
You can feel it.

The shackles.
Dance

It's nearly time